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THE LAND OF RIDDLES
(RUSSIA OF TO-DAY)
BY
HUGO GANZ
TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN
AND EDITED BY
HERMAN ROSENTHAL
[Illustration: Logo]
HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS
NEW YORK AND LONDON
1904
Copyright, 1904, by HARPER & BROTHERS.
_All rights reserved._
Published November, 1904.
CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
PREFACE v
I. INTRODUCTION 1
II. WARSAW 8
III. WARSAW--_Continued_ 17
IV. ST. PETERSBURG 24
V. ST. PETERSBURG--_Continued_ 33
VI. ARTIST AND PROFESSOR--ILYA RYEPIN 44
VII. THE HERMITAGE 60
VIII. THE HERMITAGE--_Continued_ 69
IX. THE CAMORRA--A TALK WITH A RUSSIAN PRINCE 83
X. SÄNGER'S FALL 94
XI. THE PEOPLE'S PALACE OF ST. PETERSBURG (NARODNI DOM) 103
XII. RUSSIA'S FINANCIAL FUTURE 111
XIII. THE RUSSIAN FINANCES 123
XIV. A FUNERAL 133
XV. THE CHINOVNIK (THE RUSSIAN OFFICIAL) 144
XVI. THE SUFFERINGS OF THE JEWS 154
XVII. THE JEWISH QUESTION 167
XVIII. PLEHVE 173
XIX. THE ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE 182
XX. THE IMPERIAL FAMILY AS THE PUBLIC SEES IT 196
XXI. PUBLIC OPINION AND THE PRESS 206
XXII. SOME REALITIES OF THE LEGAL PROFESSION 217
XXIII. THE STUDENT BODY IN RUSSIA 226
XXIV. BEFORE THE CATASTROPHE 235
XXV. SECTARIANS AND SOCIALISTS 245
XXVI. MOSCOW 257
XXVII. MOSCOW--_Continued_ 270
XXVIII. A VISIT TO TOLSTOÏ 285
XXIX. A VISIT TO TOLSTOÏ--_Continued_ 295
XXX. A VISIT TO TOLSTOÏ--_Continued_ 310
PREFACE
In this volume is presented to American readers an unbiased description
of the real state of affairs in Russia to-day. The sketches here brought
together are the result of a special visit to Russia by Mr. Hugo Ganz,
the well-known writer of Vienna, who was furnished with the best of
introductions to the various circles of Russian society, and had thus
exceptional opportunities to acquire reliable information.
Were not the reputation of the author and the standard of his informants
alike absolutely above suspicion, it would seem incredible that such
conditions as those depicted could exist in the twentieth century in a
country claiming a place among civilized nations. Indeed, whereas Japan
has incontestably proved that she is emerging from the darkness of
centuries, Russia is content to remain in a state of semi-barbarism
which might be looked for in the Middle Ages.
Since the sketches were written, the birth of an heir to the imperial
throne and the assassination of Von Plehve have altered Russian
conditions to a certain extent. But though the appointment of
Svyatopolk-Mirski seems at first sight to afford ground for
congratulation, it is evident that even with the best intentions the new
minister of the interior will hardly be able to effect much amelioration
until the entire system of the Russian government is changed.
Several of the articles in the following pages have appeared in the
Berlin _Nation_ and in the Frankfort _Zeitung_, and have received very
favorable notice in the German press. It is intended to publish an
edition of the book in German, but the present translation is the only
authorized one in the English language.
HERMAN ROSENTHAL
NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY,
_October 1, 1904_.
THE LAND OF RIDDLES
(RUSSIA OF TO-DAY)
I
INTRODUCTION
Shortly before my departure from Vienna I chanced to meet an
acquaintance, a Viennese writer.
"Are you really going to Russia?" said he. "I almost envy you, for it is
to us a land of riddles. It has great artists and writers and
undoubtedly a highly educated upper stratum of the nation; at the same
time it displays political conditions really barbarous in their
backwardness. How are these co-ordinated? How is the maintenance
possible, in the close proximity of comparatively free governments, of a
régime which knows no personal liberty, no privacy of the mails, and in
which there is but one master--namely, the absolute police?"
"You are raising the very questions which lead me there," I replied. "We
do not know Russia. We wonder at its great writers, but we cannot
conceive how their greatness is possible under the existing conditions
of public life, which remind one of a penitentiary rather than of a
civilized state. And the question that persistently arises is whether
our conception of these conditions corresponds to reality, or whether we
are laboring under such a delusion as would befall one attempting to
judge public life in Germany from the speeches of Bebel and other
radicals. In truth, we know only the opposition or revolutionary
literature of Russia; and, as far as appearances go, it is hardly
credible that a system such as it describes and brands for its _inhuman_
wickedness can long retain the ascendency."
"You are going, then, without prejudices?"
"I think I may say that I have none. We have long been cured of the
notion that one and the same form of government may be prescribed as the
only one leading to contentment in all times and in all countries.
Deductive philosophy in political science has been replaced by inductive
realistic philosophy, and a true understanding of existing conditions
appears now to us of greater moment than the most beautiful ideals.
Above all things, I feel myself free from the childish moral valuation
of different political beliefs. One person may be at the same time a
conservative and a gentleman or a radical and a knave. Should I come to
the conclusion that Russian absolutism is or can be defended in good
faith by upright Russian patriots there will be nothing to prevent my
freely admitting it. An unbiased observer should not be wedded to any
doctrine."
"In that case I shall be doubly curious as to the results of your
studies."
We parted.
I have cited here this characteristic conversation because it
demonstrates better than any introduction what the intelligent European
is nowadays eager to discover about Russia, and what led me in the depth
of winter, at the critical moment before the outbreak of a great war, to
the northern empire. That this war was imminent was then (at the
beginning of January) apparent to every statesman free from official
bias. There was scarcely a foreboding of it in Russia itself. For me,
however, that particular moment was of value, for it offered an
opportunity to study for a short time Russian society, first in a state
of calm, and then in the excitement which naturally followed the
declaration of war. I made provision for both war and peace and set out
on my journey.
To be sure, I was not as light of heart as if I had been preparing to
spend the winter on the Riviera or in Sicily. The climate had no terrors
for me, for I knew that nowhere is one so well protected from the
severity of the season as in the regions where ice and snow hold sway
for at least one-third of the year. But it was the gorgon-headed Russian
police that confronted me threateningly. My aim in travel was the study
of political conditions, the unreserved discussion with clear-sighted
and well-informed persons of the existing state of affairs. It was my
purpose to record carefully my impressions and observations, and to
report them to all who were interested in my studies. But we are told
that all political conversation is forbidden in Russia. One may subject
himself and his friends to great annoyance by allowing some meddling
ear-witness to catch accidentally a fragment of a political
conversation. Writing and note-taking are even more dangerous; for the
police open all letters, and they are not deterred by any conscientious
scruples from confiscating the notes even of foreigners when they appear
suspicious. Ambassadors and consuls are loath to engage in altercations
with the Russian police, for statesmanship enjoins friendly relations
with the government of the powerful Russian empire, and when an
inconvenient foreigner disappears somewhere in darkest Russia--as was
the case with a French engineer who came in conflict with the police in
a concert-hall and was never seen again--no one is disturbed by the
incident. All these reflections were not cheering to me, who, besides,
was unfamiliar with the language of the country. None the less was I
averse to returning home without my whole skin or with empty hands.
Here I would state that I did not experience the slightest annoyance
throughout my entire journey. I was not subjected to police
surveillance, nor did I notice in my meagre correspondence the least
trace of police interference--the latter being probably due to the
extreme precautions taken by me in sending my mail in inconspicuous
envelopes. And yet what a condition of things for a great country--that
every traveller who wishes to enter its territory must arm himself with
precautionary measures, as if he were preparing to visit a robber's den!
Is it compatible with the usages of modern Europe, forsooth, that no
step may be taken in this country without one's being provided with
documents of identification; that one may not cross the boundary either
into or out of the country without the special permission of the
consulate or of the police? Is Russia a state or a prison? Is it a
modern Tauris full of terrors to the stranger? I am not now speaking of
the passport difficulties peculiar to Jews, who, generally speaking, can
hardly obtain entrance to holy Russia, and who, when they succeed in
gaining admission, must be in constant dread of unpleasantness in every
town and in every hotel. I merely ask whether it is compatible with the
good name of a state that still wishes to exchange courtesies with
neighboring states to appear in the popular imagination as a ferocious
monster ignoring right and without decency? How can trade and
intercourse develop; how can the unimpeded flow of the sap of culture,
the circulation of the national blood, take place in a land where terror
guards the boundaries and where the reputation of arbitrariness impedes
all progress? And what modern state or system of national economy may,
without the unimpeded circulation of the sap of culture, maintain itself
at a level corresponding to the modern requirements of its internal and
external productive capacity? Are the advantages of an all-controlling
police system in any degree proportionate to its innumerable economic
disadvantages? Is the occasional annoyance of a really objectionable
intruder sufficient compensation for the evil reputation which this
system attaches to the whole country? It is a sheer impossibility to
watch daily and hourly a hundred million people. Why are such enormous
sacrifices made at all for the sake of an undertaking injurious in
itself and, moreover, impossible of execution?
Such are the thoughts that the traveller approaching the frontier cannot
escape. I may here say, in advance, that the police could not prevent my
holding conversations throughout Russia with men in various walks of
life on subjects very objectionable to the police officials. Is it worth
while, then, to bear the evil repute that Russia is a prison where no
man's life or property is secure? Apart from actual fact, the stranger
does not know, before crossing the boundary, whether the police tyranny
is really as inexorable as it is pictured and is believed abroad, but of
this he is certain, that such an evil reputation does the country
incalculable economic injury, and that a country with such an evil
repute can never be regarded as mature from the economic stand-point, to
say nothing of political honor, to which, perhaps, there is a
disposition to attach less value in the high places of autocratic rule.
II
WARSAW
The express-train is nearing the frontier at dawn. We are greeted by the
sleeping-car conductor with the significant announcement, "We shall soon
be in Russia"--an announcement which, it must be confessed, produces a
slight palpitation of the heart. We are now at the gate of a mysterious
country, with passport and baggage in the best of order. A Russian
consulate had found us worthy to set foot upon the soil of holy Russia,
and had explicitly stated that fact in our passport. Travellers may
journey without this certificate through the five continents, but if
unprovided with it may not set foot on Russian soil. We have no weapons
save our five fingers, and, above all, not a single printed book or
newspaper that might cause trouble at the frontier, excepting the
invaluable _Baedeker_, for the importation of books, as we already knew
at home, is put under severe ban in the domain of the Holy Synod. None
the less, a slight palpitation of the heart, a slight anxiety, are felt
at the sight of a narrow bridge leading between two sentry-boxes over a
small stream separating two countries--nay, two civilizations. Shall we
find favor in the eyes of the almighty gendarme who enters our coupé
with a polite bow, as we approach the station, and asks for our
passport? May it not be that a secret police prohibition has preceded
us, notwithstanding the regularity of our passport, and that it now
precludes our entrance? Has not your pen sinned many a time against the
knout and autocracy, and are you not, after all, if carefully examined,
with all your scribbling, a thoroughly objectionable person in the eyes
of the police--at least, when seen with Russian eyes?
But, thank Heaven, the world is great and I am insignificant; Russian
censorship has not yet taken notice of all the sins of my pen; hence the
same officer returns to me with the same bow my passport after the
customs inspection. The holy Russian empire, from Warsaw to Vladivostok,
is now exposed to my curious eyes.
The customs inspection was in itself a peculiar experience. The porter,
a Pole with a good-natured, handsome face, takes our baggage and
baggage-certificate, and invites us with a friendly gesture to follow
him to the great inspection hall. The hall is scrupulously clean and no
loud talking is heard there. The passengers take their places on one
side of the inspection-table, the porters on the other, the latter in
orderly file with their caps in their hands. They communicate with one
another only with their eyes. _Silence_ has begun. I do not know
whether it is purposely so, or whether it is merely incidental to the
particularly strict local régime, that the implicit obedience, the
silent subjection, and the irresistible power of despotism are here
brought home so effectively to the stranger. But this impression remains
with the traveller throughout the entire journey:
"Be silent, restrain yourselves,
We are watched in word and look."
An empire of one hundred and thirty millions of prisoners and of one
million jailers--such is Russia; and these jailers understand no joke.
It is a terrible machinery, this despotism, with all its wheels working
one within the other. It is relentless and keen in all its mechanism,
henceforth no loud word shall be spoken. The official organs alone have
a voice; private persons may speak only in low tones.
But how orderly, politely, and neatly do the officials and porters
execute the examination and forwarding of our baggage when despotism
wishes to reconcile people to its threatening silence. Only ten kopeks,
turned into the common treasury, are asked for the handling of our large
amount of baggage, and we are then led, together with the other
travellers, to the Russian exit of the customs inspection hall. After a
short wait there the gate is opened, and at a given signal we are
marched out of the hall in single file to refresh ourselves, before the
departure of the train, with a little breakfast.
Scrupulous cleanliness reigns in the large, airy restaurant also. We
are in the land of caviar. Caviar sandwiches, appetizingly prepared, lie
on the buffet-table. "Caviar" may also be found in one or another of the
foreign papers offered for sale by the newsboys. When the censorship
finds it inconvenient to eliminate entire pages whose contents are
objectionable, it generously spreads printer's ink on the condemned
passages, scatters sand over them, and puts the whole in the press. The
result is a lattice-like pattern, not unlike in appearance to pressed
caviar, to which the Russian, with good-natured self-derision, applies
the term "press-caviar," an expression which has a two-fold meaning.
Caviar is admittedly regarded as an easily digestible food. The Russian
censor considers his caviar more useful and less harmful than that which
ill-advised men in foreign countries allow themselves to print.
A few glasses of tea drawn from a samovar drive away the last traces of
the morning frost, and, wrapped in fur coats, and with a feeling like
that succeeding an adventure crowned with victory, we for the first time
stroll along a Russian railway platform.
We again enter the coupé, now in charge of Russian attendants.
A long, monotonous ride through level, swampy country, over which there
slowly floats the gray vapor of the locomotive, finally brings us at
dusk to Warsaw.
Nothing oppresses the spirit more deeply than such a ten-hour monotony
of leaden-gray skies, dirty-gray snow, and a thick, gray, smoky mist.
The gendarmes in gray coats at the infrequent stations; the greasy Jews
with their long coats of uncertain color; the secret police with their
questionable gentility, never absent--all these are not calculated to
relieve the painful feeling of sadness and dreariness. We were out of
humor when we reached Warsaw. We believed that we had the right to
expect crisp winter weather in Russia and were disappointed to find only
mud and humidity. But perhaps Warsaw is not really Russia? Or are we
still in central Europe? The evening at the hotel and the following days
conclusively proved to us that Warsaw, indeed all Poland, with its
climate, its civilization, its religion, and--its ideas, does not
belong, in the real sense of the term, to Russia; that the isotherm
which connects Russia proper with other regions of the same mean
temperature runs considerably north of Poland. A Buckle would be puzzled
by this fact alone. The dwellers could not be of the same race here nor
the same system be possible. When, nevertheless, only one power rules
here, it does so by violence and in spite of natural laws; it must give
rise to resentment and can give no promise of permanence.
On my return journey from the heart of Russia I purposely suppressed the
first impression gained by me in Warsaw, but when I was there again
this impression reasserted itself even more strongly. Warsaw is no more
Russia than Lemberg or Dresden, in spite of the overpowering Russian
churches, in spite of the innumerable Russian officers and soldiers, in
spite of the obligatory Russian signs on the stores, which, with some
experience, may be deciphered as "Chajim Berlinerblau," or something
similar.
Aside from its jargon-speaking Jews, Warsaw is pre-eminently a Catholic
city, and its entire civilization is Roman Catholic. Its very situation
is striking. Approaching it from the Vistula, one may see where the city
had built its defences--towards the east! Thence came the enemy, the
Mongol, the Russian. From the east there came barbarism and oppression,
therefore the fortifications and walls were built on the river-bank
commanding the valley of the Vistula, through which alone an enemy could
come. From the west came only the blessings of civilization and
religion, with its messengers that once were harbingers of civilization,
and which, perhaps, still remain such in this region.
Warsaw is a beautiful and fashionable city when considered apart from
the sections where the Jews are crowded together. The members of its
elegant society know how to live in spite of national misery and
oppression. Hotel Bristol, the finest hotel in the city, is their
rendezvous. Here they meet one another at breakfast, at dinner, in the
splendid English dining-room; men and women, guests from
Prussian-Poland and Galicia, noble families of the partitioned kingdom.
They are of one race, one class, one caste; they know one another, like
members of the same club, and all approximately the same type--somewhat
overslender forms, long, nervous hands, finely sculptured noses, sharply
chiselled temples, angular foreheads, the women supple and lissome, each
motion accompanied by a touch of polished affectation. When compared
with this Polish aristocracy, the Russian officers, who eat at separate
tables, leave the impression, with their German scholar-faces or Cossack
physiognomies, of provincial backwardness. They are merely bourgeois in
uniform even though they be real princes, while the Pole who has
graduated from that high-school of refinement, the Jesuit
boarding-school, is an aristocrat, a cavalier, from head to foot. They
remain separate like oil and water. The Russian, even though he is the
master, is of no consequence here. It is only necessary to observe for
the space of an hour from some corner of the elegant dining-room of
Hotel Bristol the behavior of the Polish society and the complete
isolation of the Russian officers or officials; it is only necessary to
be able to distinguish the groups from one another--the Baltic nobility
with their almost bourgeois families, merchants from all the principal
countries, Russian functionaries, and Polish society--and it will at
once become clear who is at home here, firmly rooted to the soil, so
that all others become strangers and intruders; it is the Poles and the
Poles alone.
There is some talk of a change of relations that has been attempted with
the aid of the French ally through the Vatican, so as to array Poland
against Protestant Prussia and to reconcile it to orthodox Russia.
Indeed, the Russian government has found it necessary to allow religious
instructions in secondary schools to be given in the Polish
mother-tongue, just at the time when the German government had on its
hands the Wreschen trials. In fact, the more Prussian narrowness insults
and provokes the Poles the greater are the Russian efforts to win them
over. This, however, is only a political move, an attempt at bribery
that the Poles let pass because it suits them, though one, perhaps, that
the real go-betweens, the Jesuits, take in earnest, but the success of
which, after all, would be contrary to all known facts of history and
civilization, for it would be opposed to the national sentiment. In
Russia dwells the marrow of the Polish nation; in Russia dwell the
Polish aristocracy and that industrial middle class which has become
rich and Polish in spirit in so far as it was of foreign origin; and yet
in this homogeneous land of Poland the Polish language is interdicted,
so to speak, and tolerated everywhere only as a local dialect.
University, gymnasiums, courts, and administration are all Russian--a
Gessler hat, placed in the Russian sign of every store, on which the
Latin-Polish inscription may appear only in a secondary position--a
proceeding to which no self-respecting people will submit, and need not
submit, especially from a master whose so-called civilization is of far
more recent origin than its own. The German in America becomes
Americanized voluntarily and irresistibly, because the English language
is recognized as a more useful medium than his own, as the
world-language. The Pole will never become Russianized as long as he
remains on Polish soil; and no matter how significantly the
"Ausgleichspolen" (Polish compromise party) flirt with the Russian
régime, such an attitude hides a sense of annoyance and is not caused by
real fellow-feeling. For the Pole, Germanization is an ill-fitting
garment that only binds; Russianization is a thorn in the flesh,
producing pus and throwing the entire system into a fever.
III
WARSAW--_CONTINUED_
Political reflections force themselves on you in this subjugated but by
no means pacified country. It is in vain you tell yourself that the
constant factors of climate, soil, race, and religion are of greater
importance for the true understanding of a country, city, or people than
passing political incidents and systems. You cannot emancipate yourself
from politics in Poland. This is not a country like German Alsace,
where, according to Moltke, a guard must be kept for fifty years, after
which, like the German country it originally was, it will again become
and remain German. Poland is a country forcibly subjected and conquered,
and you feel it when walking the streets and in the fashionable hotel,
where the national sorrow is generously moistened with champagne at the
tables of the aristocracy even at the early breakfast hour.
However, it is not necessary for us to be more passionately patriotic
and political than these champagne counts, and we must attempt to secure
something of the street scenes without becoming involved too deeply in
political problems.
Whenever I come to a town I ask myself, Why was it built here and not
elsewhere? With the help of a little imagination one can understand even
to-day how Warsaw came into existence. It was at the head of a bridge.
The word "Warsaw" is believed to be derived from the word "Warszain" (on
the height). So the city lies at a height of about forty metres on the
bank of the Vistula, fully half a kilometre wide at this place. An
elevation of forty metres on the immediate bank of a broad stream
offered, at the time of its foundation in the twelfth century, a natural
fortification, and the merchants who came up from the sea to sell their
wares to the semi-barbarous inhabitants of the plain may have found
perhaps on this height a frequent protection from the attacks of the
plainsmen. Later the fort became a city and culture and luxury made
their appearance, offering to the tamed dwellers of the plains and to
the landed proprietors from far and near the opportunity to squander the
proceeds of their crops. The numerous churches did not fare badly in the
days of penitence then.
To-day, Warsaw is still a fine city of broad streets paved with wooden
blocks, with rows of stores on both sides, prominent among which are the
richly equipped jewelry establishments. Carriage traffic is
considerable, even though it cannot compare with that in St. Petersburg.
Just now the main artery of the city, the Vistula, is closed. The stream
is frozen almost over its entire width and ravens croak on the snowy
shoals. But within the city there pass unceasingly modestly neat
cabriolets, fashionable cabs, and splendid private turnouts with Russian
harness and servants. The buildings are of little interest. A few
attempts in the Russian style, a few Polish shadings of quite modern
secession architecture strike the foreigner, but the deepest impression
is created by the feverish life on the streets and not by its ornamental
frame-work. From this should be excepted the pleasure Villa Lazienki and
its quaint park situated at the end of the avenue. Even snow and ice
cannot banish the spirits that possess one in these gardens. It is a
miniature Versailles. Here is a little castle within which is a
picture-gallery of aristocratic beauties, statues, and portraits of King
Stanislas Poniatowski represented mythologically as King Solomon
entering Jerusalem; without are enchanting villas scattered throughout
the park, in the centre of which is a little natural theatre built in
the open of stone, and arranged like an amphitheatre, the stage
separated from the rest by an arena of the wide lake, and constructed of
Corinthian columns and palisade of bushes. Plays were given here in the
times when the court and the "beauties" of the picture-gallery enjoyed
nature and art together. The moon in the sky was one of the requisites,
and fireworks were burned for the relaxation of the high and most high
lords. Meanwhile the kingdom hastened to its ruin; for a witty,
pleasure-loving court and an immoral oligarchy together are beyond the
endurance of one people, especially when it is surrounded by covetous
neighbors. One hundred years of slavery and three ruthlessly suppressed
revolutions are the historical penalty for the pleasures of Castle
Lazienki. There and on the broad election plane the "Pole Elekcji
Krolow," in the southern part of the town, where the "schlachtzitz"
(lordling) could deposit his "liberum veto" for a couple of rubles or
thalers, the kingdom was destroyed, and its resurrection is a pious wish
the fulfilment of which even our grandchildren will not live to see.
I have no faith in a Polish kingdom. There may be a Polish revolution
to-morrow, perhaps, when the Russians shall meet defeat in eastern Asia,
as the Russian patriots hope, but a Polish kingdom there will never be.
It is quite apparent how the influence of the times is changing the
entire social structure of the people. No nation can maintain itself
without a middle class, and Poland still has no middle class. The
material for such a class, the strong Jewish population, has been so
ground down that a half-century would not be sufficient for its
restoration and the Russian régime of to-day is disposed to anything
rather than to the uplifting and the education of the Polish Jewry. It
is stated that there are in Warsaw a quarter of a million Jews, a few
well-to-do people among them, who have hastened, for the most part, to
transform themselves into "Poles of the Mosaic faith," without
disarming thereby the clerical anti-Semitism of the Polish people, and
innumerable beggars or half-beggars, who are designated in western
Europe as "schnorrer." And of these there are in Warsaw an unknown
number. It is hard to draw the line between the "schnorrer" and the
"Luftmensch" (a man without any certain source of income), who has not
yet resigned himself to beggary, and yet cannot tell in the morning
whence he is to draw his sustenance at noon. These include artisans,
sweat-shop workers, agents, and go-betweens, a city proletariat of the
very worst kind. I have seen no such shocking misery in the Jewish
quarters on the Moldau as I encountered in the brilliant capital Warsaw.
The Polish Jew, everywhere despised and unwelcome, is the wandering
poverty-witness of Polish mismanagement. A system that succeeds in
depraving the sober, pious, and sexually disciplined orthodox Jew to the
extent observed in a portion of the Jewish Polish proletariat should be
accorded recognition as the most useless system on the face of the
earth. In the last analysis it was the Polish "schlachtzitz," and the
Polish clerical going hand-in-hand with him, that constituted the prime
cause of all the miseries of the nineteenth century.
And yet, to be just, one should compare this cheerless Polish-Jewish
proletariat with its immediate environment--the Polish peasants and the
common people. Here one would still find a plus of virtues on the Jewish
side. The wretched Polish peasant is not more cleanly than the Jew. On
the contrary, he lives in the same room with his pig, and no ritual
requirement compels him to wash his body at least once a week. The Jew,
under his patched garment, is for the most part comparatively clean,
only hopelessly stunted and emaciated. The Jew does not drink, while his
"master," the Pole, has a kindly disposition towards all sorts of
spirituous liquors. Also, the modesty of the Jewish women has yielded
but lately to the pressure of endless misery or the temptations of the
cities, while of the higher classes of Polish and Russian society but
little of an exemplary character has been told. And finally:
"Deutsche Redlichkeit suchst Du in allen Winkeln vergebens."
Goethe's verse applies not only to the Italians, for whom it was
intended; it applies also to Poland and Russia, where less faith is
attached to statements than is customary with us, and it applies, above
all, to the merchant classes of all nations who are wont to make their
living by overreaching their neighbors. There is a wide gulf between the
development of commercial ethics, as they are understood with us and in
England, and the tricks and devices of petty trade no matter of what
nation. But the Jew in Poland and in Russia has been and still is being
driven, in great measure, into a class of wretched petty traders; and
the law of the land forces back into the pale of settlement by drastic
regulations him who would escape from its cage and from an occupation of
dubious ethics.
The Jewish section is the "partie Hortense" of the beautiful Polish
capital; the Jewish misery is a shameful stain on Polish rule and its
Nemesis. All the five continents must have their misery and toil, and
they need a firm, all-embracing humanity to relieve them of this
contagious wretchedness, this residue of centuries of depravity. But for
Poland and Russia the humane solution of the Jewish question is simply a
life-question.
IV
ST. PETERSBURG
A hymn of praise to the Russian railroad! The Russian tracks begin at
Warsaw to have a considerably broader bed. This for a strategical
purpose, to render difficult the invasion by European armies. It is also
a benefit to the traveller, for the Russian coaches are wider and more
comfortable than the European, and the side-passages along the coupé are
very convenient for little walks during the journey. A separate heating
compartment and buffet, with the indispensable samovar, where one may
secure a glass of tea at any time, are situated in the centre of the
long car. The trains do not jolt, although they are almost as fast as
ours. The smoke and soot do not drive through the tightly closed double
windows. A twenty-four hour trip here tires one less than a six-hour
trip with us. Certainly there is more need of preparation for a
comfortable journey in Russia than in the West. The distances are
immense, a twenty-four hour journey creating no comments. The
Warsaw-Petersburg train was as well filled as the ordinary express-train
between Frankfort and Cologne.
The run, which lasts from one morning to the next, is naturally not
very entertaining. The broad expanse of snowy plain, relieved only by
snow-breaks and frozen swamps, at every two miles a few wretched
half-Asiatic huts, and occasionally the dark profile of a forest, no
more to be seen, and a sea of unintelligible Slavic sounds, no more to
be heard. The feeling of loneliness grows upon one, and the impression
becomes constantly stronger that Russia is a world for itself.
But there is an end to everything, even to a railroad journey without
books, without papers, and without conversation. At the dawn of the
clear, wintry day one may already distinguish the signs of a great city.
A station with magnificent buildings and a well-cared-for park
stretching almost to the tracks claims our attention after the many
unimpressive sights of the long road. We decipher the name "Gatschina,"
and understand why there is such a strong police force on the platform.
This is the Winter Palace. Scarcely an hour later the gilded cupolas
stand out bright above the snow; the brakes are put on; we are in St.
Petersburg.
It cannot be said that the city appears in a favorable light when viewed
from the railroad. The not over-elegant two-horse vehicle which takes us
and our baggage rattles over miserable pavements, dirty from the melting
snow, through broad, endless suburban streets. The houses on either side
are of only one story, built mostly of wood, their poverty-stricken
appearance being intensified here and there by three-storied barracks.
Liquor-shops, little second-hand stores, wooden huts, with putrid
garbage, follow one another in a variety by no means pleasing. The
passers-by, ill-clad, with the inevitable rubber shoes, shuffle along
the slushy sidewalks; trucks with two or sometimes three horses, their
necks bent under the brightly painted Russian "duga" (wooden yoke), a
truly Gorki atmosphere in its entirety. One can scarcely believe that he
is entering one of the most brilliant cities of the continent. The
endless rows of stores with their two-storied sheds, which one passes on
the way to the centre of the city, but slightly improve one's first
impression, for even they are far removed from the splendor of the
capital.
We finally reach the hotel to which our mail has been addressed. It is
an enormous structure, more than two hundred metres long. Yet it has no
room for us. It is filled to overflowing. It is impossible to crowd in
one more soul. We again take our carriage. We drive from one hotel to
another, growing constantly more modest in our demands for lodging. But
our efforts are vain. Everything is occupied to the very gables.
We were careless in coming to St. Petersburg in January. This is the
time of congresses, of business, of carnivals. All the provincial
officials are here to render their annual reports to their ministries.
Naturally, they bring with them their families, who wish to make their
important purchases here and to taste of the social season. Congresses
and conferences are held here not in the summer and vacation months as
with us, but shortly before the "butter-week," really a carnival, the
pleasure of which one may wish to take this opportunity to test.
Medical, teachers', and insurance congresses are held here at the same
time. Foreign merchants come here to complete their transactions. But
the great city of St. Petersburg is not adapted for foreign guests.
The instincts of self-defence awake at the time of need. We do not
intend to camp to-night under the bridge arch. We make great efforts and
by the evening have secured a room, in spite of the "absolute
impossibility," in that large and only comfortable hotel in St.
Petersburg, which we shared with a friendly mouse, but which was free
from other objectionable tenants. Even the little mouse was deprived in
a base manner of its life and liberty the very next night. Once provided
with board and lodging, we decided to become acquainted with the better
side of St. Petersburg. What does a stranger usually do in the evening
when he visits a strange city? He goes to some theatre.
There are plenty of hotel porters and agents to provide for the wishes
of the guests. "Hello, agent; get me tickets for the Imperial
Theatre"--where a ballet of Tschaikowski's is to be presented to-night
by first-class talent. The theatre programme, obligingly provided with a
French translation, informs us that among others, Kscheschinska will do
herself the honor to play the leading rôle. "But, honored sir, that is
quite impossible; first, because this is the carnival time; second,
because most of the seats are already subscribed for; and third, because
Kscheschinska dances to-night"--a sly closing of the left eye
accompanies the mention of the name--"and neither the Emperor nor the
court will be absent from the theatre. Unless you pay twenty to thirty
rubles to a speculator you will hardly get into the theatre."
Since my passion for the ballet or for Kscheschinska does not attain the
proportions of a twenty-ruble investment, I find it preferable to devote
the evening to the always interesting and fruitful hotel studies. What
seething life in the numberless corridors, dining-halls, and vestibules
of the fashionable St. Petersburg Hotel! Governors in generals'
gold-braided uniforms, covered with so many orders and medals that it
makes one curious to find out about all the deeds of heroism for which
they were bestowed; chamberlains with refined elegance in their gala
dress, hiding the "beau restes" of the one-sided Adonis; tall, agile,
dark-eyed Circassians with the indispensable cartridge-pouch on the
breast region of their long coats, with the dagger hanging in its
massive gold sheath from the tightly drawn belt; Cossacks with fur caps
a foot high, made of white or black Angora skins, placed on their
bristly heads; a nimble Chinese man, or maid, servant, with long
pigtail, whose sex it is impossible to distinguish; a whole troop of
dark-eyed Khivanese squatting on their prayer-rugs before the apartment
of their khan, passing the nargile from hand to hand, and exchanging
witticisms about the passing Europeans; beardless Tatar waiters
shuffling by in their flat-soled shoes--a mixture of Europe and Asia
such as may hardly be seen at once in any other part of the world. The
west European merchants and other travellers, who throng the hotel, are
scarcely noted among the exotic appearances. In this hotel, as elsewhere
throughout St. Petersburg, the European, the civilian, is seemingly
merely tolerated. The city belongs to the functionaries, soldiers,
officials, and chamberlains, to the Cossacks, Circassians, and, above
all others, to the police. More intimate acquaintance reveals that a
goodly portion of the uniformed persons in St. Petersburg are ordinary
students, technologists, professors, etc., and that these uniformed
persons do not equally represent the state. On the contrary, the fight
of the state, or, to be more precise, of the police, against the free
professions, would not be so bitter if the members of the latter were
not entitled to wear uniforms. As it is, they also may appear to the
common people as representatives of the Czar's authority.
We slept through the night. Kind fate had decreed for us snow and cold
in succession to the disagreeable thaw, and we availed ourselves of the
clear weather to become acquainted with the bright side of St.
Petersburg. And, first of all, the snow! It changes the entire
appearance of the city as if by a magic wand. The narrow, open carriages
where two persons can accommodate themselves only with difficulty,
especially when wrapped in fur coats, have disappeared. Their places
have been taken by small, low sleighs without backs. The "izwozchik"
(driver) in his blue, plaited Tatar fur coat and multicolored sash, with
fur-trimmed plush cap on his head, sits almost in the passenger's lap.
Yet there is compensation for the meagre dimensions of the sleigh. The
small, rugged horses speed along like arrows through the straight
streets, hastened on by the caressing words or the exclamations of the
bearded driver. Horse, driver, and sleigh are very essential figures in
the St. Petersburg street scenes. We at home cannot at all realize how
much driving is done in St. Petersburg. The distances are enormous;
streets five or six kilometres long are not unusual. There are almost no
streetcar lines, thanks to the selfishness of the town representatives,
composed of St. Petersburg house-owners, who do not care to see a
reduction in rents in the central portion of the town. The average city
inhabitant readily parts with the thirty, forty, or fifty kopeks
demanded by the "izwozchik," and thus everything is rushed along in an
unending race. The "pravo" (right) or "hei beregis!" (look out!), which
the drivers bawl to one another or to the pedestrians, resounds through
the streets, but they are not very effectual. One must open his eyes
more than his ears if he wishes to escape injury in the streets of St.
Petersburg. The constant racing often results in four or five rows of
speeding conveyances attempting to pass one another. The drivers with
their bearded, apostle faces, which appear lamblike when they
good-naturedly invite you to enter their conveyances, are like wild men
when they let loose. Their Cossack nature then asserts itself. On and
always on, and let the poor pedestrian take care of his bones. And
however much the little horse may pant and the flakes of foam may fly
from its sides, "his excellency," "the count," "his highness" (the
izwozchik is extremely generous with his titles), will surely add a few
kopeks when the driver has been very smart; and so the little horse must
run until the passenger, unaccustomed to such driving, loses his breath.
But the Russian barbarian conception of wealth and fashion is to have
his driver race even when out for a pleasure drive, as if it were a
question of life or death. The numberless private turnouts,
distinguished by their greater elegance, their splendid horses, harness,
liveries, and carriages, have no less speed than the hackney-coachman,
but the reverse, at a still greater speed, thanks to the elasticity of
their high-stepping Arab trotters. And now imagine twenty-five thousand
such vehicles simultaneously in racing motion, with here and there a
jingling "troika," its two outer horses galloping madly and the middle
horse trotting furiously; imagine, at the same time, the bright colors
of the four-cornered plush caps on the heads of the stylish drivers, the
gay-colored rugs on the "troikas," the blue and green nets on the
galloping horses of the private sleighs, the glitter of the gold and
silver harness, the scarlet coats of the court coachmen and lackeys,
everything rushing along on a crisp winter day, over the glimmering,
freshly fallen snow, between the mighty façades of imposing structures,
flanked by an almost unbroken chain of tall policeman and gendarmes, and
you have the picture of the heart of St. Petersburg at the time of
social activity. Splendor, riches, wildness are all caricatured into
magnificence as if calculated to impress and to frighten. Woe to him
here who is not of the masters!
V
ST. PETERSBURG--_CONTINUED_
St. Petersburg is an act of violence. I have never received in any city
such an impression of the forced and the unnatural as in this colossal
prison or fortress of the Russia's mighty rule. The Neva, around whose
islands the city is clustered, is really not a stream. It comes from
nowhere and leads nowhere. It is the efflux of the Heaven-forsaken
Ladoga Lake, where no one has occasion to search for anything; and it
leads into the Bay of Finland, which is frozen throughout half of the
year. No commercial considerations, not even strategical reasons, can
justify the establishment of this capital at the mouth of the Neva. The
fact that St. Petersburg has none the less become a city of millions of
inhabitants is due entirely to the barbaric energy of its founder, Peter
the Great, an energy which still works in the plastic medium of Russian
national character. On the bank of the Neva stands the equestrian statue
of Peter, raised on a mighty block of granite, a notable work of the
Frenchman Falconet. The face of the Emperor as he ascends the rock is
turned to the northwest, where his most dangerous rival, the Swedish
Charles, lived. And just as his whole attitude expresses defiance and
self-conscious power, so his city, St. Petersburg, is only a monument of
the defiance and the iron will of its founder. The historians relate
that Peter intended, by removing his residence to St. Petersburg, to
facilitate the access of European civilization to the Russian people. If
this be true, Peter utterly failed in his purpose. The old commercial
city, Riga, would have answered the purpose much better. To be sure,
Riga did not come into Russian possession until eighteen years after the
founding of St. Petersburg. Yet what was there to prevent the despot
from abandoning the work that he had begun? But no, St. Petersburg was
to bid defiance to the contemporary might of Sweden, and so forty
thousand men had to work for years in the swamps of the Neva to build
the mighty tyrant's castles, the Peter-and-Paul fortress, an immense
stone block on the banks of the icy stream. Malarial fevers carried off
most of them; but the Russian people supplied more men, for such was the
will of the Czar. The drinking-water of St. Petersburg to-day is still a
yellow, filthy fluid, consumption of which is sure to bring on typhoid
fever; but the will of Peter still works, and St. Petersburg remains the
capital.