[2] A comic poem by Count Alexey K. Tolstoi.
[3] Mme. Kolokoltsev was the wife of the landowner N. A. Kolokoltsev.
She suffered from nervous disorder and made several attempts at
suicide. In spite of constant observation, she managed one night to
make the blanket on the bed into a figure, and thus deceived her
husband. She went into his study, opened the drawer of his table with
a skeleton key, took out his revolver and shot herself. She was an
elderly woman, the mother of two grown-up daughters.
[4] G. S. Petrov, a publicist and politician who started his career as
a preacher of the Church and then resigned his priesthood.
[5] Called in its final version, _After the Ball_.
[6] N. V. Orlov, a painter from the people, of whose pictures Tolstoi
was very fond. Reproductions of most of his paintings hang in Tolstoi’s
room.
[7] The brother of the well-known editor M. N. Katkov.
1904
At Christmas Alexandra Lvovna made a Christmas tree in the lodge to
entertain the village children. I do not know who made the choice,
but, as there was not enough room, all the children were not admitted.
Tolstoi, myself, and some one else, I don’t remember who, came in
rather later when the entertainment was at its height. At the door of
the lodge stood the children who could not be admitted. When they saw
us, the mothers of the children began asking Tolstoi to take their
children with him. Tolstoi took two or three inside with him. It was
bright and hot. Inside the burning candles flamed. It smelt of burnt
branches. We soon came out.
Tolstoi said with a sigh:
“How wrong it is! Some are inside and the others are not allowed in.
When our children were small, Sophie Andreevna always had a Christmas
tree, and the village children came to it. Once they gave us the
scarlet fever, and after that they were no longer admitted, except a
few who were carefully chosen. I remember once there was a Christmas
tree upstairs. I was lying downstairs on the sofa (where the library
now is), and I was terribly ashamed to think of the children crowding
outside and not being let in. I remember I could not endure it, came
out, and gave them three roubles, and of course made things still
worse--they began to dispute and quarrel over the division of it, and
it was revolting, shameful, and painful!”
_June 5th._ Yasnaya Polyana.
On the day of our arrival, May 27th, Tolstoi talked at dinner about
the Decembrists whom he knew after their return from banishment (he is
again studying that period).