A TASTE OF THE KNOUT.
Thus were laid and cemented the foundations of a friendship destined
to last for many a long, history-making year. Boris was a man after
Peter's own heart, and from those early Archangel days until the end
of their lives the two were rarely parted for long, excepting when the
exigencies of public affairs necessitated the departure of one of them
for distant portions of the realm.
The summer in Archangel is a short one, and by the end of August autumn
is in full progress, with icy warnings of winter at night-time. Peter
the Tsar had, besides, many important duties which called for his
presence at the capital, Moscow; and towards the end of July it became
necessary to bring his delightful seaside holiday to an end, and return
to sterner duties at home. Peter decided to travel in a three-horse
_tarantass_, a springless carriage slung upon a pole instead of
springs--comfortable enough on soft country roads, but desperately
jolting on stony ones.
Boris had begged to be allowed to accompany his beloved patron and
friend, in order that he might instruct the Tsar in the art of
"calling" wolves and perhaps lynxes, and thus while away a few of the
tedious hours of the long journey. Peter was delighted to acquiesce in
this arrangement; for if there was one thing in the world that this
most energetic of sovereigns could not tolerate, it was to sit idle
with no possibility of finding food for observation for his eyes or new
facts and new ideas for assimilation in his ever active and receptive
brain. So the two posted on in front of the long procession of servants
and luggage, comfortably housed in a covered tarantass, drawn by three
horses abreast, and driven by a notable driver renowned for his skill
in persuading that erratic animal, the Russian pony, to move along
faster than had been its intention when it started. Ivan arrived at
this happy result by a judicious mixture of coaxing and abuse, calling
the ponies every pet name in the Russian vocabulary at one moment, and
sounding the very depths and shoals of the language of the slums at
the next. Ivan was never silent for a moment, but spoke to his ponies
incessantly; and these latter generously decided as a rule that they
must do their best for such an orator.
Through the tumble-down villages of northern Russia the tarantass flew,
while the inhabitants stared round-eyed as it passed, not dreaming for
a moment that it was their Tsar who glided by, but taking him for one
of the many traders who posted between the seaport and the capital in
tarantasses crammed with merchandise of every description. Peter was
well armed with matchlock and pistols, for there was the possibility of
a _rencontre_ with wolves or robbers, and it was well to be prepared
for every contingency.
The two young men frequently stopped at some village _traktir_, or
inn, as they passed, to refresh themselves with a meal of peasant fare
and a chat with the village people, whose opinions about his august
self Peter loved to learn. Since they had not the slightest idea of
the identity of their questioner, the Tsar gathered much information
of great value to himself in indicating which way, to use a familiar
expression, "the cat jumped" with regard to popular opinion upon some
of the important questions of the day.
Most peasants, Peter found, were convinced that the Tsar was more than
human. Exaggerated versions of his intelligence and vigour as child
and boy had reached them, and it was a common belief that the young
prince had been specially sent by Providence to right the wrongs of the
Russian people, and to make life for the peasantry a sweet dream of
marrow and fatness and exemption from work.
The priests, on the other hand, had widely different ideas upon the
subject. The young Tsar, they said, mournfully shaking their heads,
was a fine young fellow, no doubt, but his character was full of
danger for Holy Russia. He was too liberal and progressive. Progress
was the enemy of Russia and of the Holy Church. Russia required no
western civilization imported within her peaceful borders. She was
not a secular country, but the specially favoured of the church, and
foreigners and foreign manners and so-called civilization would be the
curse of the country, and Peter threatened to introduce both. He was
all for progress, and the priests did not believe in progress.
Occasionally discussion waxed warm at the traktirs visited by the two
young men, and once or twice blows were exchanged.
Once a party of drunken peasants uproariously declared that the Tsar
Peter was a mere usurper, and that if he had had his deserts he would
have been "put away" long since in some monastery or castle, never more
to be heard of. Peter flushed when he heard this, for the question
of his right to the throne of Russia was always to him a sore point;
whereupon Boris, seeing that his master was annoyed, sprang up and
knocked the speaker down. The landlord then rushed in, and finding that
two strangers had set a company of his regular customers by the ears,
bade them depart from his house that instant.
Peter laughed good-naturedly, but on the landlord becoming abusive he
seized the man by the neck and trousers and pitched him upon the top of
the stove. Then Boris and the Tsar took the rest of the company, who
fought with drunken desperation, and pitched them up, one after the
other, to join the landlord, until there were nine men in all huddled
together on the wide top of the stove, whining and afraid to come down
again.
Peter was perfectly good-humoured throughout, and enjoyed the fun;
but the landlord was naturally furious, and when his two tall guests,
having paid their reckoning, left the house, he took the opportunity of
scrambling down from his prison and going for the village policeman,
whom he despatched at full speed after the travellers. The policeman,
being well mounted, overtook the tarantass, and explained his mission,
when Peter immediately gave orders to the driver to turn the horses'
heads and return to the village.
There the pair, to their great amusement and delight, were placed
in the village lock-up, pending inquiries by the village council of
peasants; and there they still were when, with bells jingling, and
horses galloping, and dust flying, and with much shouting and pomp, the
Tsar's retinue drove into the place, and pulled up at the traktir.
It so happened that the whole of Peter's late antagonists, including,
of course, the landlord, were still present, having all by this time
climbed down from the stove. They were discussing, in the highest
good-humour and with much self-satisfaction, the promptitude with which
the landlord had avenged the insult to his customers, and discussing
also what punishment would be suitable for the delinquents now confined
in the village lock-up. The arrival of the Tsar's retinue broke up the
deliberations, however, and the peasants retired to the far end of
the room in order to make way for the crowd of kaftaned and uniformed
servants of the Tsar, who quickly monopolized all the tables and
chairs, and settled themselves for a quarter of an hour's rest and
refreshment.
The visitors were noisy, and took to ill-using the peasants and
chaffing the irate landlord. One of them threw a glass of vodka in his
face, and asked him if that was the only sort of stuff he had to offer
to gentlemen of quality? The landlord sputtered and raged, and, in the
pride of his late successful capture of two travellers, threatened.
His threats largely increased the merriment of his guests, who thumped
him on the back and roared with laughter. One seized him by the nose
in order to cause his mouth to open wide, when he dashed down his
throat the contents of a huge tumblerful of _kvass_, a kind of beer
very nauseous to any palate save that of a Russian peasant. The poor
landlord choked and sputtered and abused, but succeeded in escaping
out of the room, returning, however, in a few minutes armed with
authority in the shape of the _ooriadnik_, or village policeman, whom
he requested instantly to "arrest these men."
The little policeman glanced at the uproarious company in a bewildered
way. He was not a coward, and he relied much upon the power of the
law--of which he was the embodiment--to overawe the minds of all
good Russians. Besides, had he not, a few minutes since, successfully
arrested and locked up two giants, in comparison with whom these noisy
people were mere puppets? He therefore pulled himself together, and
tentatively laid his hand upon the arm of one who seemed to be quieter
than the rest of the party; he was smaller, anyhow, and would therefore
do very well to practise upon first. But the man shook him off and
warned him.
"Don't be a fool," he said; "get out of this and let us alone. Don't
you see we could strangle you and the whole villageful of peasants if
we pleased? Go home while you can walk on two legs, and let us alone!"
But the plucky little ooriadnik was not so easily discouraged.
"You may threaten as much as you please," he said, "but you will find
I am not afraid of a party of tipsy cowards like you. Why, it isn't
half-an-hour since I arrested, all by myself, a couple of fellows three
times your size. Didn't they fight, too!"
The Tsar's servants interchanged glances.
"Where are the two men you speak of?" some one asked.--"What were they
driving in, and where were they coming from?" said another.
"They're in the village lock-up at this moment," said the ooriadnik;
"and that's where you'll be in another minute or two."
Some of the party looked serious, some burst into roars of laughter,
others started up excitedly.
"You must show us this lock-up first," said the small person whose
arrest was half accomplished; "we can't submit to be huddled into a
little hole of a place incapable of holding more than the two you have
there already!"
"Oh, there's plenty of room for you, never fear!" said the brave
ooriadnik. "Come along, by all means, and see for yourself!"
The policeman foresaw an easy way to effect the arrest of at least one
or two of those present, and they would serve as hostages for the rest.
He would push them in as they stood at the door of the lock-up, and
fasten the bolt upon them!
So the whole party adjourned to the lock-up. The door was opened, and
there, to the horror of his frightened servants, sat the Tsar of all
the Russias, unconcernedly playing cards with Boris the Bear-Hunter.
One official instantly seized the ooriadnik by the throat and pinned
him to the wall; another performed the same service on the landlord.
Others threw themselves upon the floor at Peter's feet and whined out
incoherent reproaches that their beloved sovereign should have trusted
himself to travel so far in advance of his faithful servants and
guards, and thus lay himself open to outrage of this description.
"What is the matter?" asked Peter; "what's all the disturbance about?
Let those men go. Get up, all you fools there, and stop whining;
there's no harm done.--Listen, Mr. Landlord. You have had me arrested;
very well, here I am. I am the Tsar; but what of that? If I have done
wrong, I desire to be treated just as any other delinquent would be
treated. Call your village council together, and let's have the inquiry
over as quickly as possible. We must push on!"
The landlord, followed by the ooriadnik, both in tears and with loud
lamentations, threw themselves at Peter's feet, asking his pardon and
pleading ignorance of his identity with their beloved Tsar. But Peter
insisted upon being treated exactly as any other offender, and the
_moujiks_ of the community were convened as quickly as possible to the
village court. All these, including the persons whose upheaval upon
the stove had been the original cause of all the disturbance, came in
terror for their lives--most of them loudly weeping--for there was not
one but made sure that the lives of every moujik in the village must of
necessity be forfeit, since so terrible an outrage and insult had been
inflicted upon the Tsar.
Peter bade the landlord state his case, and instructed the starost,
or elder of the community, to question both accuser and accused
according to the usual procedure of the village court. But it appeared
that both landlord and starost were far too frightened to find their
tongues. Then the Tsar took upon himself to state the case. He and
his body-servant, he explained, had violently assaulted the landlord
of the inn, together with certain of his customers. There had been
provocation, but nevertheless the assault was undoubtedly committed.
What was the penalty for assault?
The starost, to whom the Tsar addressed this remark, burst into tears
and knelt with his forehead tapping the floor at Peter's feet. All the
moujiks followed suit, and for some minutes there was naught to be
heard save groanings and whinings and bits of the litany in use in the
Russo-Greek Church. But neither the starost nor any of his peers of
the community offered a reply.
"Speak up, man!" said the Tsar angrily, and then immediately bursting
into one of his loud guffaws. "What's the penalty for assault? Speak! I
am determined to be told, and by yourself."
Once more the entire company of peasants made as though they would
throw themselves upon the ground and whine and pray as they had done
before; but when Peter angrily stamped upon the floor, they all, with
one accord, renounced the intention and stood quaking in their places.
"Come, come," said Peter impatiently; "don't be a fool, man. You are
here to state the law, and you shall state it! What is the penalty for
assault?"
The wretched starost strove to speak, but his lips would not open. He
essayed once again, and this time succeeded in whispering,--
"Your High Mercifulness--pardon--it is ten cuts of the knout."
Then his legs failed him once more, and he fell, together with his
moujiks, upon the floor, weeping and wailing, and calling upon the Tsar
and upon Heaven for mercy. When the hubbub had in part subsided, Peter
spoke again.
"Very well," he said. "Ooriadnik, do your duty. Don't be afraid; I
prefer to see duty fearlessly done. Take your knout and lay on!"
The unfortunate ooriadnik was sufficiently master of himself to
comprehend that it was useless to resist when the Tsar's will had once
been expressed. He took his knout in his nerveless hand, and with white
face and haggard expression tapped the Tsar's back the necessary number
of times, inflicting strokes which would hardly have caused a fly, had
one of these insects happened to settle upon Peter's broad back, to
raise its head and inquire what the matter was. Then he threw down his
knout and grovelled at the Tsar's feet, begging forgiveness.
"Nonsense, man," said Peter, but kindly; "finish your work first, and
then we can talk of other matters.--Now, Boris, your turn.--Lay on,
ooriadnik, and put a little more muscle into it; this fellow's skin is
as hard as leather!"
The ooriadnik, intensely relieved by the Tsar's evident good-humour,
laid on with some vigour, and flogged poor Boris in a manner not
entirely agreeable to the hunter's feelings, who, nevertheless, did not
flinch, though he felt that the young Tsar's manner of amusing himself
was somewhat expensive to his friends. Boris lived to learn that this
was so indeed. Nothing ever pleased Peter more than to enjoy a hearty
laugh at the expense of his familiar companions.
But the ooriadnik's duties were not yet concluded. The Tsar patted
him kindly on the back. "Bravo, ooriadnik!" he cried; "you are
improving.--Now, then, you gentlemen who threw vodka and kvass at the
landlord of the traktir, step out.--Lay on again, ooriadnik, and teach
these persons not to waste good vodka!"
Then those servants found that they had committed an error in having
assaulted the landlord; for the ooriadnik, having warmed to his work,
and remembering the laughter and contempt with which his authority
had been treated by these men at the inn, laid on his blows with such
good will that the unfortunate culprits howled for mercy, to the huge
delight of the Tsar.
After which object-lesson upon the impartiality of true justice, and
the duty of respect towards the powers that be, Peter and his retinue
resumed their journey.