RATHER less than a month after our arrival in Moscow I was sitting
upstairs in my Grandmamma’s house and doing some writing at a large
table. Opposite to me sat the drawing master, who was giving a few
finishing touches to the head of a turbaned Turk, executed in black
pencil. Woloda, with out-stretched neck, was standing behind the drawing
master and looking over his shoulder. The head was Woloda’s first
production in pencil and to-day--Grandmamma’s name-day--the masterpiece
was to be presented to her.
“Aren’t you going to put a little more shadow there?” said Woloda to
the master as he raised himself on tiptoe and pointed to the Turk’s
neck.
“No, it is not necessary,” the master replied as he put pencil and
drawing-pen into a japanned folding box. “It is just right now, and
you need not do anything more to it. As for you, Nicolinka,” he added,
rising and glancing askew at the Turk, “won’t you tell us your great
secret at last? What are you going to give your Grandmamma? I think
another head would be your best gift. But good-bye, gentlemen,” and
taking his hat and cardboard he departed.
I too had thought that another head than the one at which I had been
working would be a better gift; so, when we were told that Grandmamma’s
name-day was soon to come round and that we must each of us have a
present ready for her, I had taken it into my head to write some
verses in honour of the occasion, and had forthwith composed two rhymed
couplets, hoping that the rest would soon materialise. I really do not
know how the idea--one so peculiar for a child--came to occur to me, but
I know that I liked it vastly, and answered all questions on the subject
of my gift by declaring that I should soon have something ready for
Grandmamma, but was not going to say what it was.
Contrary to my expectation, I found that, after the first two couplets
executed in the initial heat of enthusiasm, even my most strenuous
efforts refused to produce another one. I began to read different poems
in our books, but neither Dimitrieff nor Derzhavin could help me. On
the contrary, they only confirmed my sense of incompetence. Knowing,
however, that Karl Ivanitch was fond of writing verses, I stole softly
upstairs to burrow among his papers, and found, among a number of German
verses, some in the Russian language which seemed to have come from his
own pen.