SCENE 8. TRUTHFUL, UNCOUTH, BEASTLY, A SERVANT

_Servant_ (_to Uncouth, out of breath_). Sir, sir! Soldiers have come;

they have stopped in our village.

_Uncouth._ There is a misfortune! They will ruin us completely.

_Truthful._ What frightens you so?

_Uncouth._ Oh, I have seen terrible things, and I am afraid to show up

before them.

_Truthful._ Don’t be afraid. Of course, an officer is leading them,

and he will not permit any insolence. Come, let us go to him. I am

confident you are unnecessarily frightened. (_Truthful, Uncouth and

Servant exeunt._)

_Beastly._ They have all left me alone. I think I’ll take a walk in the

cattle yard.

_End of Act I._

AN OPEN-HEARTED CONFESSION OF MY ACTS AND THOUGHTS

My parents were pious people, but as in our childhood they did not

wake us for the morning service, there was a night service held in

our house every church holiday, as also in the first and last weeks

of Lent. As soon as I learned to read, my father made me read at the

divine services. To this I owe whatever knowledge of Russian I possess,

for, reading the church books, I became acquainted with the Slavic

language, without which it is impossible to know Russian. I am thankful

to my father for having watched carefully my reading: whenever I began

to read indistinctly, he would say to me: “Stop mumbling! or do you

imagine God is pleased with your muttering?” But more than that:

whenever my father noticed that I did not understand the passage that

I had just read, he undertook the labour of explaining it to me,--in

short, he showed endless care in my instruction. As he was not able to

hire teachers of foreign languages for me, he did not delay, I may say,

a day to place me and my brother in the University as soon as it was

founded.

Now I shall say something of the manner of instruction at our

University. Justice demands that I should state at the start that the

University of to-day is quite a different thing from what it was in my

days. Both the teachers and students are of a different calibre, and

however much the school was then subject to severe criticism, it now

deserves nothing but praise. I shall relate, as an example, how the

examination was conducted in the lower Latin class. The day before the

examination we were being prepared. Here is what was done: our teacher

came in a caftan that had five buttons, while his vest had only four.

This peculiarity surprised me much, and I asked the teacher for the

cause of it. “My buttons seem to amuse you,” he said, “but they are the

guardians of your honour and of mine: those on the caftan stand for the

five declensions, and on the vest for the four conjugations. And now,”

he proceeded, as he beat the table with his hand, “be all attentive to

what I have to say! When they shall ask you for the declension of some

noun, watch what button I am touching: if you see me holding the second

button, answer boldly ‘The second declension.’ Do similarly in regard

to the conjugations, being guided by the buttons on my vest, and you

will never make a mistake.” That is the kind of an examination we had!

O you parents who take pleasure in the reading of gazettes, when you

find the names of your children mentioned in them as having received

prizes for diligence, listen what I got a medal for! Our inspector had

a German friend who was made a professor of geography. He had only

three students. As this teacher was more stupid than our Latin teacher,

he arrived at the examination in a full complement of buttons, and we

were consequently examined without preparation. My companion was asked:

“Where does the Vólga flow to?” “Into the Black Sea,” was his answer.

The same question was put to my other schoolmate. “Into the White

Sea,” was his answer. Then they asked me the same question. “I don’t

know,” I said with such an expression of simplicity, that the examiners

unanimously voted to give me a medal. Now, I did not in the least earn

this medal for any geographical knowledge, though I deserved it for an

illustration of practical morals.

However it may be, I owe the University a grateful recognition: I

learned there Latin, and thus laid the foundation for some of my

sciences. I also learned there some German, and especially acquired a

taste for literary studies. A love for writing was developed in me very

early in my childhood, and I practised for many years translating into

Russian.

* * * * *

At that time our director had taken it into his head to journey to St.

Petersburg with a few of his students, in order to show the founder

of the University the fruits of his school. I do not know how, but my

brother and I were among the number of the chosen pupils. The director

started for St. Petersburg in the winter with his wife and ten of us

youngsters. This was the first, and consequently a difficult, journey

for me and my companions, but I must make a grateful acknowledgment of

the kind attention we received from our director and which alleviated

our hardships. He and his wife looked after us as after their children.

When we arrived in St. Petersburg, my brother and myself stopped at the

house of an uncle of ours. A few days later, our director presented us

to the curator. This esteemed gentleman, whose deserts Russia must not

forget, received us very kindly. He took hold of my hand and led me to

a man whose appearance had attracted my respectful attention. That was

the immortal Lomonósov. He asked me what I had learned. “Latin,” said

I. Then he began to speak with great eloquence of the importance of the

Latin language.

After dinner of the same day we were at Court, it being a reception

day, but the Empress did not appear. I was wonder-struck by the

magnificence of the Empress’s palace. All around us was sparkling gold,

a gathering of men in blue and red ribbons, a mass of beautiful women,

an enormous orchestra,--all that bewildered and blinded me, and the

palace appeared to me to be the dwelling-place of a superhuman being.

Indeed, it could not have been otherwise, for I was then only fourteen

years old, had never seen anything, and everything appeared to me new

and charming. Having returned to the house, I asked my uncle whether

they had often receptions at Court, to which he answered: “Almost every

Sunday.” I decided to stay in St. Petersburg as long as possible, in

order to see more of the Court. This desire was the result of curiosity

and impulse: I wanted to enjoy the magnificence of the Court and hear

agreeable music. This desire soon subsided, and I began to pine for my

parents, whom I became impatient to see. The day I received letters

from them was for me the pleasantest of all, and I went often to the

post to ask for them.

Nothing delighted me in St. Petersburg so much as the theatre, which I

saw for the first time in my life. They were playing a Russian comedy,

_Henry and Pernilla_, and I remember it as if it happened to-day. I saw

there Shúmski, who so amused me with his jokes that I lost all sense of

propriety and laughed as loud as I could. It is almost impossible to

describe the feelings which the theatre aroused in me. The comedy which

I saw was quite stupid, but I looked upon it as the production of the

greatest mind, and upon the actors as great people, whose acquaintance

I regarded as the greatest happiness. I almost went insane when I found

out that these actors frequented the house of my uncle, where I was

living. After a little while I there became acquainted with our famous

actor, Iván Afanásevich Dmitrévski, an honourable, clever and cultured

gentleman, whose friendship I am enjoying even now.

Standing once in the pit, I struck up an acquaintanceship with the

son of a distinguished gentleman, who had taken a fancy to my face.

As soon as he received a negative answer to his question whether I

knew French, he suddenly changed and became cold to me. He looked

upon me as an ignoramus and badly educated man, and began to make fun

of me. When I noticed from his manner of speech that he did not know

anything else but French, which he spoke badly, I made such a biting

repartee, that he stopped his raillery, and invited me to his house; I

answered politely, and we parted as friends. But I learned from this

how necessary it was for a young man to know French; so I began to

study the language in earnest, continuing at the same time the study

of Latin, in which language I heard the lectures on logic by Professor

Sháden, who was then rector. This learned man has the rare gift of

lecturing and expounding so clearly that we all made palpable progress,

and my brother and I were soon admitted as real students. All that

time I did not stop practising translations from German into Russian;

among other things I translated _Seth, the Egyptian King_, but not very

successfully. My knowledge of Latin was exceedingly useful to me in my

study of French. In two years I could understand Voltaire, and I began

translating in verse his _Alzire_. That translation was nothing more

than a youthful error, nevertheless there are some good verses in it.

LETTERS TO COUNT P. I. PÁNIN, DURING HIS FIRST JOURNEY ABROAD

MONTPELLIER, November 22 (December 3), 1777.

... I found this city (Leipsic) full of learned men. Some of these

regard it as their chief desert that they are able to talk in Latin,

which, by the way, five-year-old children were able to do in the days

of Cicero. Others soar in thoughts in the sky, and are ignorant of what

goes on upon earth. Others again are strong in artificial logic, having

an extreme absence of natural logic. In short, Leipsic proves beyond

controversy that learning does not beget common sense. I left these

pedants, and went to Frankfurt-on-the-Main. This city is celebrated

for its antiquities, and is noteworthy from the fact that the Roman

Emperor is chosen here. I was in the election room from which he

issues to the people. But its antiquity consists merely in being old:

all I saw there were four empty walls in an old building. They showed

me also the famous so-called La Bulle d’Or of Emperor Charles IV.,

which was written in the year 1356, and I was also in the Imperial

Archives. But it was hardly worth my while to climb up garrets and down

cellars, in order to see the relics of a rude age. From Frankfurt I

travelled through German principalities: every step a new principality.

I saw Hanau, Mainz, Fulda, Sachsen-Gotha, Eisenach and a few other

principalities of minor princes. I found the roads frequently not

paved, but I had nevertheless to pay dearly for the pavement. When

they pulled me out of a bog and asked pavement money of me, I had the

courage to ask them: “Where is it?” To which they answered me that

his Majesty, the reigning prince, had the intention of having the

roads paved, but that at the present he was only collecting toll. Such

justice in regard to strangers has led me to make my own conclusions

in regard to their relations with their subjects, and I did not at

all wonder when from every hut there came out a crowd of beggars and

followed my carriage....

From here I went into France, and reached the famous city of Lyons. In

this country the roads are very good; but in the cities the streets are

so narrow and are so badly kept that I cannot understand how people

with their five senses manage to live in such dirt. It is evident that

the police does not interfere with it. To prove this I shall take the

liberty of telling your Highness an occurrence. I was walking in the

finest and largest street in Lyons (which, however, cannot compare

with our by-streets), and saw in bright daylight burning torches and

a crowd of people in the middle of the street. Being near-sighted, I

naturally thought it was some elegant funeral. Upon approaching nearer

out of curiosity, I saw how great my mistake was: Messrs. Frenchmen had

simply stuck a pig and were singeing it in the middle of the street!

The stench, dirt and a crowd of leisure people who were watching the

operation compelled me to take another street. I have not yet seen

Paris, so I do not know whether my olfactories will suffer there less;

in any case, all the French cities which I have so far seen are badly

off as to their cleanliness.

PARIS, March 20 (31), 1778.

... Voltaire’s arrival in Paris produced the same effect on the people

here as if a divinity had come down upon earth. The respect shown to

him in no way differs from worship. I am confident that if his deep old

age and ailments did not oppress him, and he wished to preach now some

new sect, the whole nation would at once turn to him. Your Excellency

will form your own opinion from what follows whether one can come to

any other conclusion from the reception the public gave him.

When he arrived here, the poets who are devoted to him began to write

poems in his honour, while those who hate him sent him anonymous

satires. The first are printed, but not the other, for the Government

has by a special rescript forbidden to print anything that might be

prejudicial to Voltaire. This consideration is shown him as much for

his great talents as for his advanced age. This man of eighty-five

years has composed a new tragedy, _Irene and Alexis Comnenus_, which

has been performed. Although it can by no means be compared to his

former plays, yet the public received it with rapture. The author being

ill, he was not present at the first presentation. It is only the first

time yesterday that he has driven out: he was in the Academy, then in

the theatre, where they purposely gave his new tragedy.

As he drove out from his house, the carriage was accompanied as far as

the Academy by an endless throng of people who kept up applauding. All

the academicians came out to meet him. He was seated in the president’s

chair and, waiving the customary voting, was elected by acclamation to

be president for the April quarter. As he walked down the staircase and

took his seat in the carriage, the populace demanded vociferously to

take off hats. From the Academy to the theatre he was accompanied by

the people’s cheering. When he entered his box, the audience applauded

repeatedly with indescribable rapture, and a few minutes later the

oldest actor, Brisard, stepped into his box with a wreath which he

placed on Voltaire’s head. Voltaire immediately took the wreath off and

with tears of joy spoke aloud to Brisard: “Ah, Dieu! vous voulez donc

me faire mourir!” The tragedy was played with much greater perfection

than at any previous performance. At its conclusion there was a new

spectacle. All the actors and actresses surrounded Voltaire’s bust

and adorned it with laurel wreaths. This homage was followed by the

people’s applause, which lasted nearly fifteen minutes. Then Madame

Vestrice, who had played Irene, turned towards Voltaire and read some

laudatory verses. To show their appreciation, the public demanded

that the verses be read again, and they applauded wildly. As soon

as Voltaire seated himself in his carriage, the people stopped the

coachman and cried: “Des flambeaux, des flambeaux!” When the torches

were brought, they ordered the coachman to drive at a slow pace, and an

endless crowd accompanied him to his very house with torches, crying

all the time: “Vive Voltaire!” Voltaire has received many an ovation in

his lifetime, but yesterday was, no doubt, the best day of his life,

which, however, will soon come to an end. Your Excellency will see how

he now looks from his portrait which I here enclose and which is a very

good likeness of him.

Ermíl Ivánovich Kostróv. (1750-1796.)

Kostróv was the son of a peasant. He studied in a seminary and began

to write verses early, first under the influence of Lomonósov, in

the pseudo-classic style,--later, under the influence of Derzhávin,

he cultivated a simpler and better language. His chief services to

Russian literature are his translations of Apuleius, Ossian, and the

Iliad. The ode which is given here marks the turning-point in his

manner of writing, and at the same time indicates how great was the

change brought about by Derzhávin’s _Felítsa_ (see p. 378) in Russian

poetry.

LETTER TO THE CREATOR OF THE ODE IN PRAISE OF “FELÍTSA, THE

KIRGÍZ-KAYSÁK PRINCESS”

Singer, to whom with a gentle smile the Muse has lately brought from

the Parnassian heights a wreath, I hanker for your friendship and union

with you. Moscow is my habitation, you sing the Neva stream. But not

the distant roads, nor mounts, nor hills, nor forests, nor rivers shall

impede my zeal to you, which to Petropolis shall be borne, to issue in

your breast and ears: not impossible to Muses is what the Muses will.

Tell me, I pray, how without a lyre, nor violin, not even having

saddled the Parnassian steed, you have sung so sweetly Felítsa’s acts,

and her crown’s life-giving beams? You evidently have walked all

streets and byways on Pindus’ heights and in the grassy vale of the

pure Muses, and to glorify, console, make happy, amuse the Princess,

you have discovered a new, untrodden path. Having discovered it, you

ran it at will, and neither stump nor stone e’er tripped you, but

all appeared to you a grassy mead, and your caftan was nowhere rent

by thorns. Proclaiming the praises of the Princess, recounting the

pleasures of the bashaws, you played the bagpipe, yet sang enticingly

withal.

Disdaining the evil conscience of the envious, you onward bore, which

boldness seeing, Parnassus wound a wreath for you. Their flowing hair

descending on their arms, disporting on their pink-white breasts and

cheeks, the forms of fairy nymphs from the Neva rose; gently waving

on the crests, they listened intent to you, and praised the beautiful

innovation of your verse. In token of their heartfelt tribute, they

clapped their hands in ecstasy, then disappeared into the crystal

depths.

By easy post Felítsa’s praise was borne to Moscow, to the delight of

all the hearts, and all who read have sung your praise, and arbiters of

taste have wound a wreath for you. They have read it a hundred times,

yet listen gladly, with attention, when someone in their presence reads

it again, and cannot assuage their spirits, nor satisfy their captive

ears, while listening to its sportive jests. Just so a garden, with

charming shrubs and shade of trees, planted on a hill above a stream of

limpid waters, though it be well known to us, though known the taste of

every fruit therein, though familiar to us its every path, yet drawn by

a mysterious feeling, we hasten to walk in it once more, and turn our

glances all about us, to discover something new, though we have seen it

all before.

Our ears are almost deaf from the vociferous lyric tones, and, meseems,

’tis time to come down from the clouds, lest, forgetful of the law of

equilibrium, and flying from the heights, one break his arms and legs:

no matter what our endeavour be to rise on high, Felítsa’s deeds will

still be higher. She likes simplicity of style, so ’t were better,

treading that road in modesty, to raise our voice to her. Dwelling on

Parnassus in union with the nymphs, I have thrummed the sonorous harp,

while praising the Kirgíz-Kaysák Princess, and have only earned cold

praises. All lauded there my verses, flattered me, though themselves

were but amused; and now they have the honour in oblivion to lie: ’tis

evident high-soaring odes are out of fashion.

Above us you have risen through your simplicity! Write, as formerly,

again a letter to your neighbour; you have well depicted his luxurious

mind, how he invites a hungry mob to dinner, games and luxuries on the

tables; or, loving Nature’s beauties, sing of the crystal waters, as

once you sang the Spring of Grébenev. This spring, flowing through the

valley, even now is pleasing to me: whenever I slaked my thirst, a ray

of joy shone to me.

But to you, who preside most wisely, leader of the Muses, their

labours’ judge, listening to their sweet thunderous music, to you this

honour and praise is due, because, burning with zeal and inventive of

new paths, you labour to advance our native tongue. It is majestic,

sweet and rich, thunderous, elate, liquid and strong, and great is your

work of its perfection. Encouraged by you, the lovers of the sciences

have with heartfelt zeal walked on the glorious path: we see the fair

Russian diction in their labours, and its progress in him who has

extolled you.

I shall say it without hesitation: you emulate Minerva, and bring

your rest as a sacrifice to the Muses, and the glory of your country

is your pleasure and consolation. Your exploits are enviable to men.

With Felítsa’s beloved, precious name, with Felítsa’s praise and the

laudation of her wise acts the beginning of these labours has been

adorned, and has brought joy and rapture to its readers. Blessed is

that beginning where her resplendent name appears, and the end is

crowned with success. To him who thus has glorified Felítsa, and has

given a new flavour to his verses, honour and glory from the depth of

our hearts!

Alexander Nikoláevich Radíshchev. (1749-1802.)

In 1765 Catherine II. sent twelve young men to Leipsic to be educated

in the University; among the number was Radíshchev. He studied

philosophy under Platner, and for his own amusement took a full course

in medicine. Upon his return he was attached to the Kommerz-Kolleg,

a kind of Department of Finance, where he distinguished himself for

his unexampled honesty and gained the love of its President, Count

Vorontsóv, whom he had the courage to oppose in a decision at law, in

order to save some innocent men from transportation to Siberia. When

he was later put in charge of the Customs House of St. Petersburg,

he discovered that the considerable traffic with England demanded a

knowledge of English, if he wished to dispense with a translator;

accordingly at the age of thirty he acquired the English language and

began to read its literature, which exerted a great influence upon him.

In 1790 he wrote his _Journey from St. Petersburg to Moscow_, which

he distributed among his friends, though it had not been approved by

the censor. This work, written in the style of Sterne’s _Sentimental

Journey_, is not only remarkable as a piece of literature, but also

as a political pamphlet. It attacks the institution of Russia in the

light of the most advanced liberalism of France and North America.

Radíshchev advocated in no unmistakable terms the liberation of the

serfs, almost half a century before Turgénev. When Catherine II.

read the book, she exclaimed: “He is a Martinist. He is worse than

Pugachév, he praises Franklin.” Radíshchev was banished to Siberia.

There he devoted himself to literature, wrote his _Ode to Liberty_,

which is the forerunner of all the poems of liberty by Rylyéev,

Ogarév, Odoévski, and a few longer poems in a lighter vein. Emperor

Paul pardoned him, and Emperor Alexander advanced him to higher

honours. When an acquaintance of his accused him of returning to his

youthful ideals and warned him of subjecting himself to the danger of

another banishment, he committed suicide in a moment of despondency.

JOURNEY FROM ST. PETERSBURG TO MOSCOW

DEPARTURE

After having taken supper with my friends, I took my seat in the

kibítka. The driver drove the horses at full gallop, as was his wont,

and in a few minutes we were outside the city. It is hard to part, even

for a short time, from those who have become necessary to us at every

moment of our existence. It is hard to part,--but happy is he who can

part without smiling, for love or friendship is his consolation. You

weep as you say “good-bye”; but think of your return,--and let your

tears dry up at this thought, as dries up the dew before the face of

the sun. Happy is he who weeps, hoping to be consoled! Happy is he who

sometimes lives in the future! Happy is he who lives in meditation! His

existence is enriched; his joy is multiplied, and calm assuages the

gloom of his pining, generating images of happiness in the mirrors of

his contemplation.

I lay in the kibítka. The tinkling of the post bell was monotonous

to my ears, and finally brought to me beneficent Morpheus. The grief

of my parting persecuted me in my deathlike state, and painted me to

my imagination as forlorn. I saw myself in a spacious vale which had

lost all its amenity and greenness of leafage through the hot rays of

the sun. There was not a spring to offer coolness, nor tree-shade to

protect from the heat. I was a hermit, left in the midst of Nature! I

shuddered. “Miserable man!” I sighed, “where are you? What has become

of all that has enticed you? Where is all that has made your life

agreeable? Is it possible that the pleasures which you have tasted are

only an idle dream?”

Luckily there was a deep rut in the road, and my kibítka, getting into

it, jostled me and woke me up. The kibítka stopped. I raised my head

and saw three habitations in a barren spot.

“What is that?” I asked my driver.

“A post station.”

“Where are we?”

“In Sofíya,” and he unhitched the horses.

SOFÍYA

All around me was silence. I was absorbed in contemplation and did not

notice that the kibítka had been standing quite a while without the

horses. My driver broke my meditation:

“Master, father, some money for a drink!”

This tax is illegal, but no one objects to paying it, in order that he

may be able to travel at his ease; the twenty kopeks I gave him were

a good investment. Who has travelled by post knows that a passport is

a precaution without which any purse, unless it be a general’s, will

have to suffer. I took it out of my pocket and went with it, as people

sometimes go with the cross for their defence.

I found the Post Commissary snoring. I touched his shoulder.

“Whom does the devil drive so? What a miserable habit to depart from

the city at night? There are no horses here,--it’s too early yet. Go

into the inn and drink tea, or go to sleep!”

Having said that, the Commissary turned to the wall, and went to

snoring again. What was I to do? I once more shook the Commissary by

his shoulder.

“What is the matter with you? I told you there are no horses!” and,

covering himself with the blanket, the Commissary turned away from me.

If the horses are all engaged, I thought to myself, then it is not

right for me to disturb the Commissary’s sleep. But if there are any

horses in the stable ... I made up my mind I would find out whether

the Commissary told the truth. I went into the yard, hunted up the

stable and found some twenty horses in it. It is true, one could count

the bones on them, yet they would have taken me to the next station.

From the stable I returned to the Commissary, and shook him harder than

before, for I felt I had a right to do so, having discovered that he

had told a lie. He jumped up from his bed and without opening his eyes

asked who had arrived. “I ...” But coming to his senses, and noticing

me, he said:

“Young man, you are evidently in the habit of commanding drivers of

olden days, when they used to beat them with sticks. Well, that won’t

work now-a-days.” The Commissary lay down angrily in his bed again.

I had really a desire to treat him like one of those drivers when

they were discovered cheating; but my generosity to the city driver

caused the Sofíya drivers to hurry up and hitch the horses to the

kibítka. Just as I was getting ready to commit a crime on the back of

the Commissary, the bells were heard in the yard. I remained a good

citizen, and thus twenty kopeks saved a peaceable man from an inquest,

my children from an example of incontinence in anger, and I discovered

that reason is a slave to impatience.

The horses carried me away. The driver started a song which, as usual,

was a doleful one. He who knows the tunes of Russian popular songs

will admit that there is something in them that speaks of sadness of

spirit. Nearly all the tunes of such songs are in the minor key. In

this musical inclination of the popular ear one may find a solution

of the trend of his actions. In it one may discover the condition of

the nation’s soul. Look at a Russian! You will always find him lost in

meditation. If he wants to drive away ennui, or, as he calls it, have

a good time, he goes to the inn. In his intoxication he is impulsive,

bold, quarrelsome. If anything takes place not to his liking, he at

once starts a brawl or fight. A churl who goes into the inn with a

downcast look and returns from it covered with blood from having had

his ears boxed may throw a light on many an enigmatic point in Russian

history.

My driver was singing. It was three o’clock in the morning. As before

the bell, so now his song put me to sleep: “O Nature! Having swathed

man at his birth in the winding-sheets of sorrow, dragging him all

his life over the forbidding crags of fear, ennui and sadness, you

have given him sleep as a consolation. You fall asleep, and all is at

an end! Unbearable is the awakening to the unfortunate man. Oh, how

acceptable death is to him! And if it is the end of sorrow.... All-kind

Father! Wilt Thou turn away Thy look from him who ends his life in

a manly way? To Thee, the source of all goodness, this sacrifice is

brought. Thou alone givest strength when creation trembles and is

convulsed. It is the voice of the Father, calling His child unto

Himself! Thou hast given me life, to Thee I return it: upon earth it

has become useless.”

TOSNÁ

When I left St. Petersburg I thought I would find a very good road. All

those who have travelled upon it after the Emperor have thought so.

It had been such, indeed, but only for a short time. The dirt which

had been put upon the road in dry weather in order to make it even

had been washed by the rains, forming a swamp in the summer, and made

it impassable. Fearing bad weather, I got out of the kibítka and went

into the post station, intending to take a rest. In the room I found

a traveller who was sitting behind a long, common peasant table in

the nearer corner and was turning over some papers. He asked the Post

Commissary to give him horses as soon as possible. To my question who

he was, I learned that he was a pettifogger of the old style, and that

he was going to St. Petersburg with a stack of torn papers which he was

then examining. I immediately entered into a conversation with him, and

here is what he said:

“Dear sir,--I, your humble servant, have been a Registrar in the

Archives of the Estates, where I had an opportunity to make good use of

my position: by assiduous labour I have collected a genealogy, based

on clear documentary proof, of many Russian families, and I can trace

their princely or noble origin several centuries back. I can reinstate

many a man in his princely dignity, by showing his origin from Vladímir

Monomákh, or even from Rúrik. Dear sir,” he continued, as he pointed to

his papers, “all Great-Russian nobles ought to purchase my work, paying

for it more than for any other wares. But with the leave of your High

Birth, Noble Birth, or High and Noble Birth, for I do not know how to

honour you, they do not know what they need. You know how the orthodox

Tsar Feódor Aleksyéevich of blessed memory has injured the Russian

nobility by doing away with the prefecture. That severe legislation

placed many honourable princely and royal families on a level with

the Nóvgorod nobility. But the orthodox Emperor Peter the Great has

entirely put them in the shade by his Table of Ranks. He opened the

way to all for obtaining the title of nobility through military and

civil service, and he, so to say, has trampled the old nobility in

the dirt. Our Most Gracious Mother, now reigning, has confirmed the

former decrees by her august Law of the Nobility, which has very much

disquieted all our higher nobles, for the old families are placed in

the Book of the Nobility lower than the rest. There is, however, a

rumour that there will soon be issued a supplementary decree by which

those families that can trace their noble origin two or three hundred

years back will be granted the title of Marquis or something like it,

so that they will have some distinguishing feature from the other

families. For this reason, dear sir, my work must be acceptable to all

the old nobility. But there are rascals everywhere. In Moscow I fell in

with a company of young gentlemen to whom I proposed my work, in order

to be repaid through their kindness at least for the paper and ink

wasted upon it. But instead of kindness they heaped raillery upon me;

so I left that capital from grief, and am on my way to St. Petersburg,

where there is more culture.”

Saying this, he made a deep bow, and straightening himself up, stood

before me with the greatest respect. I understood his thought, took

something out of my purse and, giving it to him, advised him to sell

his paper by weight to peddlers for wrapping paper, for the prospective

marquisates would only turn people’s heads, and he would be the cause

of a recrudescence of an evil, now passed in Russia, of boasting of old

genealogies.

LYUBÁNI

I suppose it is all the same to you, whether I travelled in summer or

winter, especially since it is not uncommon for travellers to travel

both summer and winter, starting out in a sleigh and returning in a

wheel carriage. The corduroy road wore out my sides. I crawled out of

the kibítka, and started on foot. While I was lying in the kibítka,

my thoughts were directed to the immeasurableness of the world, and

while my soul flitted away from the earth, it seemed easier to bear

the jostling of the carriage. But spiritual exercises do not always

distract our corporeality, and it was in order to save my sides that I

went on foot.

A few steps from the road I noticed a peasant who was ploughing his

field. It was warm; I looked at my watch: it was twenty minutes to one.

I left the city on Saturday, so it was Sunday then. The peasant that

was ploughing evidently belonged to a landowner that did not receive

any tax from him. The peasant was ploughing with great care; evidently

the field did not belong to the master. He was turning the plough with

remarkable ease.

“God aid you!” I said as I approached the ploughman, who did not stop

but finished the furrow he had begun.

“God aid you!” I repeated.

“Thank you, sir!” said the ploughman as he cleaned the ploughshare and

transferred the plough to a new furrow.

“You are, of course, a dissenter, since you work on Sunday.”

“No, sir, I make the correct sign of the cross,” he said, and showed me

his three fingers put together; “but God is merciful and does not want

a person to starve, as long as he has a family and sufficient strength.”

“Have you not any time to work during the week, that you work on a

Sunday, and at that in a great heat?”

“In the week, sir, there are six days, and we have to work for the

manor six times a week, and in the evening we haul the hay from the

meadows, if the weather is good; and on holidays the women and girls

go to the woods to gather mushrooms and berries. God grant a rain this

evening,” he added as he made the sign of the cross. “Sir, if you have

any peasants, they are praying for the same.”

“I have no peasants, my friend; and so nobody curses me. Have you a

large family?”

“Three sons and three daughters. My eldest is ten years old.”

“How do you manage to get enough grain, if you have only the Sundays to

yourself?”

“Not only the Sundays,--the nights are ours too. We need not starve, if

we are not lazy. You see, one horse is resting; and when this one gets

tired, I’ll take the other, and that’s the way I make my work count.”

“Do you work the same way for your master?”

“No, sir! It would be sinful to work the same way; he has in his fields

one hundred hands for one mouth, and I have but two hands for seven

mouths, if you count it up. If you were to work yourself to death at

your master’s work, he would not thank you for it. The master will

not pay the capitation tax; he will let you have no mutton, no hempen

cloth, no chicken, no butter. Our people are fortunate in those places

where the master receives a rent from the peasant, particularly without

a superintendent! It is true, some good masters ask more than three

roubles for each soul, yet that is better than tenant labour. They are

now getting in the habit of letting farms out to renters who, being

poor, flay us alive. They do not give us our own time, and do not let

us go out in the winter to work for ourselves, because they pay our

capitation tax. It is a devilish idea to let one’s peasants do work for

somebody else! There is at least a chance of complaining against a

superintendent, but to whom is one to complain against a tenant?”

“My friend! You are mistaken: the laws do not permit to torture people.”

“Torture, yes! But, sir, you would not want to be in my hide!” In the

meantime the ploughman hitched another horse to his plough and, bidding

me good-bye, began a new furrow.

The conversation with this agriculturist awakened a multitude of

thoughts in me. Above all, I thought of the inequality of the peasant’s

condition. I compared the crown peasants with those of the proprietors.

Both live in villages, but while the first pay a stated tax, the

others have to be ready to pay whatever the master wishes. The first

are judged by their peers; the others are dead to the laws, except in

criminal matters. A member of society only then is taken cognisance

of by the Government that protects him when he violates the social

bond, when he becomes a criminal! That thought made all my blood boil.

Beware, cruel proprietor! On the brow of every one of your peasants I

see your condemnation!

Absorbed in these thoughts I accidentally turned my eyes to my servant,

who was sitting in front of me in the kibítka and was shaking from side

to side. I felt a sudden darkness come over me, which passed through

all my blood and drove a burning feeling upwards and made it spread

over my face. I felt so heartily ashamed of myself, that I wanted to

cry. “In your anger,” I said to myself, “you attack the cruel master

who maltreats his peasants in the field; and are you not doing the

same, or even worse? What crime did your poor Petrúshka commit that you

do not allow him to enjoy the comfort of our misfortunes, the greatest

gift of Nature to the unfortunate man,--sleep? ‘He receives his pay,

his food and dress; I never have him whipped with a scourge or sticks.’

O you kind man! You think that a piece of bread and a rag give you the

right to treat a being that resembles you as a top? You are merely

boasting that you do not very often whip it as it is whirling about.

Do you know what is written in the first law of each man’s heart? ‘If

I strike anyone, he has the right to strike me also.’ Remember the day

when Petrúshka was drunk and did not dress you fast enough! Remember

how you boxed his ears! Oh, if he had then, drunk as he was, come to

his senses, and had answered your question in a befitting manner! Who

has given you the right over him? The law! Law! And you dare besmirch

that sacred name! Wretch!...” Tears flowed from my eyes, and in this

condition the post horses brought me to the next station.

Alexander Onisímovich Ablesímov. (1742-1783.)

Ablesímov was a frequent contributor to several periodical

publications; his contributions present no special interest, but he

gained a great reputation by his comic opera _The Miller_, which,

though it is an imitation of a foreign original, was the first play

to introduce a popular element, taken directly from the life of the

people. The public hailed this comedy as a new departure; it was given

to crowded houses twenty-seven times in succession, and a number of

imitations appeared with the same element of sorcery and country life

for their background.

THE MILLER

ACT I

_The stage represents on one side a forest, with small villages in the

distant hills, and on the other a mill, and nearby a waggon with sacks.

In front of it is a tree._

SCENE 1

_Miller_ (_alone. He is planing a board and sings, only the song is

without words and music. Then he says_): What song is that?... Oh, yes:

“How our night from midnight” ... that’s it ... (_he begins to sing

that tune, continuing his work_).

How our night from midnight,

From midnight to white day ...

What a downpour it has been, and now it has stopped! (_He sings again,

and continues his song._)

’Twas at the dawn, the early one,

At the fall of the shining moon....

How it did blow! I declare, it did blow; why, it almost tore my

mill down. I would have been left with nothing. It has done some

damage,--thanks to the Lord, not much damage. Did I say not much

damage? Well, I have enough to do to fix it up. (_Putting the level

to the board._) It’ll come out all right, and all will go well again.

(_Advancing towards the orchestra._) I have to laugh every time I think

of it; they say that a mill cannot exist without a wizard, and that a

miller isn’t just a man like anybody else: he is on speaking terms with

the house-spirit, and the house-spirits live in their mills like devils

... ha, ha, ha, ha! What bosh! Am I not a miller through and through?

I was born, brought up, and have grown old in the mill, and yet I have

never laid my eyes on a house-spirit. Now, to tell the gospel truth,

it’s just this: if you are a shrewd fellow and a good hand at cheating,

that sorcery business is a good thing.... Let them prattle what they

please, but we earn our bread by our profession.

Who by cheating makes a living,

Him at once all call a gipsy,

And you gain through gipsy dealings

The reputation of a wizard.

Even in that way the witches

Make a living by deception.

There’s a big lot of these rascals:

Some of them bespeak the water,

Others turn the sieve for people,

And through such tricks make a living!

Just like me, sinful man!...

SCENE 2. FILIMÓN AND THE FORMER

_Miller_ (_noticing him_). Ah! I am getting a guest. I’ll earn a penny

this day. (_To Filimón._) Godspeed, young man!

_Filimón._ My respects, old man.

_Miller._ Whence come you, whither tend you?

_Filimón._ Not farther than my business takes me.

_Miller._ Of your own will, or by compulsion?

_Filimón._ I am looking for horses: my roan and grey have gotten away

from me; they are fine horses, such fine horses. (_Aside._) He is a

fortune-teller: I’ll try my fortune with him. (_To the Miller._) Say,

old man, I want to ask you----

_Miller._ What is it you want? As you please, I am at your service.

_Filimón._ That’s good! And I’ll pay you for it. Tell me my fortune:

shall I find my horses?

_Miller._ Shall you find your horses?

_Filimón._ That’s it, old man. I am very anxious to find out about them.

_Miller._ Now, how about that; is there going to be anything?

(_Stretches out his hand to him._)

_Filimón._ First tell me, old man, and then we’ll see.

_Miller_ (_turns away from him, and angrily begins a song_):

Tell the fortune:

As the guess is,

So is the pay.

_Filimón._ But, old man, I expect to pay you.

_Miller._

’Tis with a promise

As with a chair:

If you sit and do not eat,

Then your belly is not full.

_Filimón._ Believe me, I am not lying to you.

_Miller._

If it’s so,

All this talking is in vain;

Take out your purse,

Don’t talk uselessly,

Count out the money.

(_Puts out his hand, and looks in his eyes._)

_Filimón._ Well, I don’t care: I’ll give you some money in advance.

_Miller._ Only this?

_Filimón._ It will do for the present; what more do you want?

_Miller_ (_aside_). You won’t get off with less than half a rouble.

_Filimón._ What are you going to tell me now?

_Miller._ What is it now, early in the morning?

_Filimón._ Not very late yet, the sun has not yet set behind the woods.

_Miller._ Turn three times around, towards the sun.

_Filimón._ What for?

_Miller._ That’s what I need in my sorcery. Do as you are told!

_Filimón._ To please you, I’ll turn around. (_Turns around once._)

_Miller._ Once more, towards the sun.

_Filimón_ (turning around). Here it is, and towards the sun.

_Miller._ Now stand against this tree. (_Filimón is about to start for

the tree, but the Miller says_): No, no, stop! Have you a kerchief?

_Filimón_ (_taking out his handkerchief_). Here it is.

_Miller._ Close your eyes tight, and tie your kerchief over them.

That’s all right! Now listen: you must stand quiet, and don’t move from

the spot, nor speak a word to anyone, while I go and see the elder.

_Filimón_ (_does all the Miller commands him to do_). But suppose

someone should come and ask me why I am standing there, and why my eyes

are tied up?

_Miller._ Not a word to anybody; but you may grumble to yourself.

_Filimón._ May I sing a song?

_Miller._ You will frighten all. No, you must not.

_Filimón_ (_aside_). What is it all going to be?

_Miller._ Stand still and don’t move!

Ippolít Fédorovich Bogdanóvich. (1743-1803.)

Ippolít Bogdanóvich, the son of a minor official, entered the

mathematical school connected with the Senate; at fourteen years of

age he began to study at the University and to write verses under

the guidance of Kheráskov. He then served as secretary of legation

in Saxony, and later was connected with the Government Archives.

His reputation rests only on his _Psyche_, which is a paraphrase

in verse of La Fontaine’s _Les amours de Psyché et de Cupidon_,

itself an imitation of an episode in Apuleius’s _Golden Ass_. It is

a mock-heroic in the style of Máykov’s _Eliséy_ (see p. 263), and

was immensely popular at the end of the eighteenth century, and even

Dmítriev, Púshkin and Byelínski found pleasure in reading it. There

are traces in his poems of an intimate acquaintance with the Russian

popular literature, from which are introduced many characters. The

poem found so many admirers because it was an expression of the

reverse side of the philosophy, of the eighteenth century, with its

frivolity and superficiality.

PSYCHE

FROM BOOK I

The goddess donned her ancient gala dress, and seated in the shell, as

they paint in pictures, glided over the waters on two large dolphins.

Cupid, bestowing his imperious look, bestirred all Neptune’s court. The

frisky waves, perceiving Venus, swam after her, replete with merriment.

The watery tribe of Tritons issues to her from the abysses of the

waters: one dives all about her and pacifies the wanton waves; another,

whirling in the depths, gathers pearls at the bottom and drags forth

all the secrets of the sea to place before her feet. One, struggling

with the monsters, forbids them to disport nearby; another, briskly

leaping into the coachman’s seat, scolds loudly those he meets and

orders them to stand aside; he proudly holds the lines, and steers his

path away from rocks, and crushes impudent monsters. One, with trident,

precedes her on a whale and drives all far out of the way; he casts

about him his angry looks and, that all may know his will, loudly blows

a coral horn; another, having come to the goddess from distant regions,

bears before her a bit from a crystal mountain instead of a mirror.

This sight refreshes her pleasure and the joy upon her brow.

“Oh, if this sight,” proclaims he, “for ever remained in this crystal!”

But the Triton’s wish is vain: that vision will disappear like a dream,

and nothing will remain but the stone, and in the heart a fatal flame

which will consume him. Another has joined the retinue of the goddess,

and protects her from the sun and cools the sultry beam by sending

upwards a stream of water. Meanwhile sirens, sweet singers, sing

verses in her honour, and mingle fiction with truth in their attempt

to extol her: some dance before her; others, anticipating her wishes,

are present to serve her, and with fans waft coolness to the goddess;

others, borne on the crests, breathe heavily in travelling post from

fields, beloved by Flora, and bring her flowery wreaths. Thetis herself

has sent them for small and great services, and wishes only that her

husband stay at home. The weather being most favourable, the storms

dare not annoy her, and only the Zephyrs are free to fondle Venus.

FROM BOOK II

Psyche awoke from her sleep not sooner than midday past, nay, one hour

after midday. All serving-maids came to dress the princess, and brought

with them forty garments and all that with them went. For that day

Psyche designated the simplest of all gowns, for she hastened as soon

as possible to inspect the marvels of the palace. I shall follow in the

princess’s track and shall present the mansion to you, and describe all

in detail that could amuse her.

At first Psyche visited the rooms, nor left a corner in them where she

did not pass a while; thence to the conservatory and to the balcony;

thence on the veranda, and down, and out, to inspect the house from all

sides. A bevy of girls were slow in following her; only the Zephyrs

were fast enough, and they guarded her, lest running she should fall.

Two or three times she inspected the house from within and from

without. Meanwhile the Zephyrs and Cupids pointed out the architecture

to her and all the marvels of nature, which Psyche was anxious to

inspect. She wished to see all, but knew not where to begin, for her

eyes were distracted now by one thing, now by another. Psyche would

fain have looked at everything, but running around so much, she soon

became fatigued.

While resting herself, she looked at the statues of famous masters:

those were likenesses of inimitable beauties, whose names, in prose and

verse, in various tales, both short and long, reign immortally among

all the nations and through all the ages: Calisto, Daphne, Armene,

Niobe, Helen, the Graces, Angelica, Phryne, and a multitude of other

goddesses and mortal women appeared before her eyes in lifelike form,

in all their beauty arrayed along the wall. But in the middle, and

right in front of them, Psyche’s image stood on an elevated pedestal

and surpassed them all in beauty. Looking at it, she herself fell to

wondering, and, beside herself with wonderment, stopped: then you might

have perceived another statue in her, such as the world had never seen.

Psyche would have stayed there a long time, looking at her image that

held sway over her, if her servants who were with her had not pointed

out in other places, for the pleasure of her eyes, other likenesses of

her beauty and glory: up to her waist, her feet, her lifelike form, of

gold, of silver, of bronze, of steel, her heads, and busts, and medals;

and elsewhere mosaic, or marble, or agate represented in these forms

a new splendour. In other places Apelles, or the god of artists who

with his hand had moved Apelles’s brush, had pictured Psyche in all her

beauty, such as no man could have imagined before.

But does she wish to see herself in pictures? Here, Zephyrs bring

her Pomona’s horn and, strewing flowers before her, disport with her

in vales; in another, she with mighty buckler in her hands, dressed

as Pallas, threatens from her steed, with her fair looks more than

with her spear, and vanquishes the hearts through a pleasant plague.

There stands Saturn before her: toothless, baldheaded and grey, with

new wrinkles on his old face, he tries to appear young: he curls his

sparse tufts of hair, and, to see Psyche, puts on his glasses. There,

again, she is seen like a queen, with Cupids all around her, in an

aërial chariot: to celebrate fair Psyche’s honour and beauty, the

Cupids in their flight shoot hearts; they fly in a large company,

all carrying quivers over their shoulders, and, taking pride in her

beautiful eyes, raise their crossbows and proclaim war to the whole

world. There, again, fierce Mars, the destroyer of the law of peace,

perceiving Psyche, becomes gentle of manner: he no longer stains the

fields with blood, and finally, forgetting his rules of war, lies

humbled at her feet and glows with love to her. There, again, she is

pictured among the Pleasures that precede her everywhere and by the

invention of varied games call forth a pleasant smile upon her face.

In another place the Graces surround the princess and adorn her with

various flowers, while Zephyr, gently wafting about her, paints her

picture to adorn the world with; but, jealous of licentious glances,

he curbs the minds of the lovers of licentiousness, or, perchance,

shunning rebellious critics, hides in the painting the greater part of

her beauties, though, as is well known, before Psyche those beauties of

themselves appear in the pictures.

In order that various objects, meeting her eyes, should not weary

her, her portraits alone were placed upon the wall, in simple and in

festive gowns, or in masquerade attire. Psyche, you are beautiful in

any attire: whether you be dressed as a queen, or whether you be seated

by the tent as a shepherdess. In all garments you are the wonder of

the world, in all you appear as a goddess, and but you alone are more

beautiful than your portrait.

Gavriíl Románovich Derzhávin. (1743-1816.)

Derzhávin was born near Kazán, deriving his descent from a Tartar

Murza, and passed his childhood in the east, in the Government of

Orenbúrg. His early education was very scanty. In his fourteenth

year his mother hastened with him to Moscow to enter him for future

service as the son of a nobleman; but, her means being exhausted, she

returned with him to Kazán, where she placed him in the newly opened

Gymnasium. Even here the lack of good teachers precluded his getting

any thorough instruction; his only positive gain was a smattering of

German, which was to help him later in acquainting himself with the

productions of the German Muse. In 1762 he entered the regiment of the

Transfiguration (Preobrazhénski) as a common soldier. Whatever time

he could call his own in the crowded and dingy barracks in which he

passed eight years of his life he devoted to reading and to imitations

of Russian and German verse. In 1772 he was made a commissioned

officer, and was employed to quell the Pugachév rebellion.

It was only in 1779 that Derzhávin began to write in a more

independent strain; one of the best odes of this new period is his

_Monody on the Death of Prince Meshchérski_. But the one that gave

him his greatest reputation was his _Felítsa_, with which began a new

epoch in Russian poetry. Lomonósov, Sumarókov, Tredyakóvski, and a

number of minor poets had flooded Russian literature with lifeless

odes in the French pseudo-classic style, written for all possible

occasions, and generally to order. Just as a reaction was setting in

against them in the minds of the best people, Derzhávin proved by his

_Felítsa_ that an ode could possess other characteristics than those

sanctioned by the French school. In 1782 he occupied a position in

the Senate under the Procurator-General Vyázemski. He had an exalted

opinion of Catherine, whom he had not yet met, and he spoke with full

sincerity of her in his ode. The name _Felítsa_ was suggested to

him by the princess in her moral fable (see p. 276 _et seq._). The

chief interest in the ode for contemporary society lay in the bold

attacks that Derzhávin made on the foibles of the dignitaries. Its

literary value consists in the fact that it was the first attempt

at a purely colloquial tone of playful banter, in a kind of poetic

composition formerly characterised by a stilted language, replete

with Church-Slavic words and biblical allusions. Numerous are the

references made by the poets of the day to the Singer of _Felítsa_

(see p. 358 _et seq._); they all felt that Derzhávin had inaugurated a

new era, that the period which had begun with Lomonósov’s _Capture of

Khotín_ was virtually over.

Catherine made Derzhávin Governor of Olónetsk, and later of Tambóv;

but neither in these high offices, nor later, when Paul appointed

him Chief of the Chancery of the Imperial Council, and Alexander

I. made him Minister of Justice, was he successful. His excitable

temperament, combined with a stern love of truth which brooked no

compromise, made him everywhere impossible. Of the many productions

which he wrote after _Felítsa_, none gained such wide popularity

as his _Ode to God_. Though parts of it bear strong resemblance to

similar odes by Klopstock, Haller, Brockes, and to passages in Young’s

_Night Thoughts_, yet the whole is so far superior to any of them

that it soon was translated into all European languages, and also

into Japanese; there are not less than fifteen versions of it in

French. Derzhávin lived to hear Púshkin recite one of his poems and to

proclaim him his spiritual successor. The following translations of

Derzhávin’s poems in English are known to me:

_God_, _On the Death of Meshcherski_, _The Waterfall_, _The Lord and

the Judge_, _On the Death of Count Orlov_, _Song_ (_The Little Bee_),

in Sir John Bowring’s _Specimens of the Russian Poets_, Part I.;

_To a Neighbour_, _The Shipwreck_, _Fragment_, _ib._, Part II.; _To

God_, _The Storm_, in William D. Lewis’s _The Bakchesarian Fountain_,

Philadelphia, 1849; _The Stream of Time_, in J. Pollen’s _Rhymes from

the Russian_; _Drowning_, by N. H. Dole; _Ode to the Deity_, by J.

K. Stallybrass, in The Leisure Hour, London, 1870, May 2; _Ode to

God_, by N. H. Dole, in The Chautauquan, vol. x; _On the Death of

Meshcherski_, in C. E. Turner’s _Studies in Russian Literature_, and

the same in Fraser’s Magazine, 1877.

ODE TO THE DEITY

O Thou infinite in being;

Living ’midst the change of all;

Thou eternal through time’s fleeing;

Formless--Three-in-one withal!

Spirit filling all creation,

Who hast neither source nor station;

Whom none reach, howe’er they plod;

Who with Thine existence fillest,

Claspest, mouldest as Thou willest,

Keepest all; whom we call--God!

Though the lofty mind could measure

Deepest seas, and count the sand,

Of the starry rays the treasure,

Thou no number hast, no strand!

Highest souls by Thee created,

To Thy service consecrated,

Ne’er could trace Thy counsels high;

Soon as thought to Thee aspireth,

In Thy greatness it expireth,

Moment in eternity.

Thou didst call the ancient chaos

From eternity’s vast sea:

On Thyself, ere time did ray us,

Thou didst found eternity.

By Thyself Thyself sustaining,

From Thyself unaided shining,

Thou art Light--light flows from Thee;

By Thy words all things creating,

Thy creation permeating,

Thou wast, art and aye shalt be.

All existence Thou containest

In Thee, quick’nest with Thy breath;

End to the beginning chainest;

And Thou givest life through death.

Life as sparks spring from the fire,

Suns are born from Thee, great sire:

As, in cold clear wintry day,

Spangles of the frost shine, sparkling,

Turning, wavering, glittering, darkling,

Shine the stars beneath Thy ray.

All the million lights, that wander

Silent through immensity,

Thy behests fulfil, and squander

Living rays throughout the sky.

But those lamps of living fire,

Crystals soaring ever higher,

Golden waves in rich array,

Wondrous orbs of burning ether,

Or bright worlds that cling together,

Are to Thee as night to day.

Like a drop in sea before Thee

Is the firmament on high:

What’s the universe of glory,

And before Thee what am I?

In yon vast aërial ocean

Could I count those worlds in motion,

Adding millions to them--aught

I could fancy or decipher,

By Thy side is but a cipher;

And before Thee I am--naught!

Naught! And yet in me Thou rayest,

By Thy gift and through Thy Son:

In me Thou Thyself portrayest,

As in one small drop the sun.

Naught! Yet life I feel throughout me,

And, content with naught about me,

Upward fly with eager heart.

That Thou art, my soul supposes,

Tries, and with this reas’ning closes:

“Sure I am, hence Thou too art.”

Yes, Thou art--all nature tells me;

Whispers back my heart the thought;

Reason now to this impels me:

Since Thou art, I am not naught!

Part of Thine entire creation,

Set in nature’s middle station

By Thine order I abide;

Where Thou endest forms terrestrial

And beginnest souls celestial,

Chains of beings by me tied.

I’m the link of worlds existing,

Last high grade of matter I,

Centre of all life subsisting,

First touch of divinity.

Death to dust my body sunders:

In my mind I wield the thunders.

I’m a king, a slave to Thee:

I’m a worm, a god! Whence hither

Came I, wonderful? Oh, whither?

By myself I could not be.

Thine am I, Thou great Creator,

Outcome of Thy wisdom sole;

Fount of life, blest conservator;

Of my soul the king and soul!

Needful to Thy just decreeing

Was it that my deathless being

Pass to Thee through death’s abyss:

That my soul, in body vested,

Wend, by death refined and tested,

Father, to Thy deathlessness.

Traceless One, unfathomable!

Now I cannot see Thy face:

My imagining’s too feeble

E’en Thy shadow here to trace;

But, if we must sing Thy glory,

Feeble mortals, to adore Thee

In a worthy attitude,

We must rise to Thee to wreathe Thee,

Lost in distance far beneath Thee,

And--shed tears of gratitude.

--Translated by J. K. Stallybrass, in The Leisure Hour, London, 1870,

May 2.

MONODY ON PRINCE MESHCHÉRSKI[147]

O iron tongue of Time, with thy sharp metallic tone,

Thy terrible voice affrights me:

Each beat of the clock summons me,

Calls me and hurries me to the grave.

Scarcely have I opened my eyes upon the world,

Ere Death grinds his teeth,

And with his scythe, that gleams like lightning,

Cuts off my days, which are but grass.

Not one of the horned beasts of the field,

Not a single blade of grass escapes,

Monarch and beggar alike are food for the worm.

The noxious elements feed the grave,

And Time effaces all human glory;

As the swift waters rush towards the sea,

So our days and years flow into Eternity,

And empires are swallowed up by greedy Death.

We crawl along the edge of the treacherous abyss,

Into which we quickly fall headlong:

With our first breath of life we inhale death,

And are only born that we may die.

Stars are shivered by him,

And suns are momentarily quenched,

Each world trembles at his menace,

And Death unpityingly levels all.

The mortal scarcely thinks that he can die,

And idly dreams himself immortal,

When Death comes to him as a thief,

And in an instant robs him of his life.

Alas! where fondly we fear the least,

There will Death the sooner come;

Nor does the lightning-bolt with swifter blast

Topple down the towering pinnacle.

Child of luxury, child of freshness and delight,

Meshchérski, where hast thou hidden thyself?

Thou hast left the realms of light,

And withdrawn to the shores of the dead;

Thy dust is here, but thy soul is no more with us.

Where is it? It is there. Where is there? We know not.

We can only weep and sob forth,

Woe to us that we were ever born into the world!

They who are radiant with health,

Love and joy and peace,

Feel their blood run cold

And their souls to be fretted with woe.

Where but now was spread a banquet, there stands a coffin:

Where but now rose mad cries of revelry,

There resounds the bitter wailing of mourners;

And over all keeps Death his watch,--

Watches us one and all,--the mighty Tsar

Within whose hands are lodged the destinies of a world;

Watches the sumptuous Dives,

Who makes of gold and silver his idol-gods;

Watches the fair beauty rejoicing in her charms;

Watches the sage, proud of his intellect;

Watches the strong man, confident in his strength;

And, even as he watches, sharpens the blade of his scythe.

O Death, thou essence of fear and trembling!

O Man, thou strange mixture of grandeur and of nothingness!

To-day a god, and to-morrow a patch of earth:

To-day buoyed up with cheating hope,

And to-morrow, where art thou, Man?

Scarce an hour of triumph allowed thee

Ere thou hast taken thy flight to the realms of Chaos,

And thy whole course of life, a dream, is run.

Like a dream, like some sweet vision,

Already my youth has vanished quite.

Beauty no longer enjoys her potent sway,

Gladness no more, as once, entrances me,

My mind is no longer free and fanciful,

And all my happiness is changed.

I am troubled with a longing for fame;

I listen; the voice of fame now calls me.

But even so will manhood pass away,

And together with fame all my aspirations.

The love of wealth will tarnish all,

And each passion in its turn

Will sway the soul and pass.

Avaunt, happiness, that boasts to be within our grasp!

All happiness is but evanescent and a lie:

I stand at the gate of Eternity.

To-day or to-morrow we must die,

Perfílev, and all is ended.

Why, then, lament or be afflicted

That thy friend did not live for ever?

Life is but a momentary loan from Heaven:

Spend it then in resignation and in peace,

And with a pure soul

Learn to kiss the chastening rod.

--From C. E. Turner’s _Studies in Russian Literature_, and the same in

Fraser’s Magazine, 1877.

FELÍTSA[148]

Godlike queen of the Kirgíz-Kaysák horde,[149] whose incomparable

wisdom discovered the true path for the young Tsarévich Khlor, by which

to climb the high mountain where grows the rose without prickles, where

virtue dwells that captivates my soul and my mind! Oh, teach me how to

find it!

Instruct me, Felítsa, how to live voluptuously, yet justly; how to tame

the storm of passions, and be happy in the world. Your voice enthuses

me, your son guides me, but I am weak to follow them. Disturbed by

worldly cares, I control myself to-day, to-morrow am a slave of my

caprices.

You do not emulate your Murzas,[150] and frequently go on foot; the

simplest food is served at your table. You disdain your rest, and read

and write by the tallow dip, and from your pen flows bliss to all

the mortals.[151] Nor do you play cards, like me, from morning until

morning.[152]

You do not care overmuch for masquerades, and do not set your foot

into a club. You keep old customs and habits, and make no Don Quixote

of yourself. You do not saddle the steed of Parnassus,[153] do not

attend the séances, to see spirits,[154] do not go to the East[155]

from your throne; but, walking on the path of humility, your gracious

soul passes an even tenor of useful days.

But I sleep until noon, smoke tobacco and drink coffee. I change the

work-days into holidays, and live in a whirl of chimerical thoughts: I

now take booty from the Persians, now direct my arrows to the Turks;

now, imagining myself to be the Sultan, I make the world tremble with

my looks; or, suddenly attracted by a sumptuous garment, I hasten to

the tailor for a new caftan.[156]

Or I am at a sumptuous feast, where they celebrate in my honour, where

the table sparkles with its silver and gold, where there are a thousand

different courses,--here the famous Westphalian bacon, there slices of

Astrakhán fish, there stand the pilau and the cakes,--I drink champagne

after my waffles and forget everything in the world ’midst wine,

sweetmeats and perfumes.

Or, ’midst a beautiful grove, in an arbour, where the fountain plashes,

by the sound of a sweet-voiced harp, where the zephyr scarcely

breathes, where everything inclines to luxury, and entices the mind

to joy, and the blood becomes now languid, now flows warm, inclining

upon a velvet divan, I rouse the tender feelings of a young maiden, and

inspire her heart with love.

Or, in a magnificent tandem, in a gilded English carriage, I drive with

a dog, a fool, or friend, or fair maiden to the Swings, or stop at the

taverns to drink mead; or, when I get tired of that, for I am inclined

to change, fly, with my cap posed jauntily, on a mettled steed.

Or I delight my soul with music and singers, the organ and flute, or

boxing and the dance.[157] Or, dropping all care of business, go on the

chase, and take pleasure in the barking of the hounds[158]; or, on the

banks of the Nevá, enjoy at night the sound of horns and the rowing of

agile oarsmen.[159]

Or, staying at home, pass my time playing “Old Maid” with my wife; or

we climb together into the dove-cot, or, at times, play Blindman’s

Buff with her, or sváyka,[160] or have her examine my head; or I love

to pore over books, to enlighten my mind and heart, that is, I read

_Pulicane_ and _Bovo_,[161] or yawn and fall asleep over the Bible.

Such are my debauches, Felítsa! But the whole world resembles me, no

matter if one passes for a sage: every man is a living lie. We travel

not by the paths of light, we run after the whims of pleasure. ’Twixt

the Indolent and the Choleric,[162] ’twixt vanity and vice, one seldom

finds the straight road to virtue.

Suppose we have found it! How are we weak mortals not to blunder,

where even Reason stumbles and follows after passions, where learned

ignoramuses bedim our heads as the mist bedims the wanderers?

Temptation and flattery dwell everywhere, and luxury oppresses all

the pashas. Where, then, dwells virtue? Where grows the rose without

prickles?

It becomes you alone, O Empress, to create light from darkness,

dividing chaos harmoniously in spheres, to firmly unite them by a

common bond; you alone can bring forth concord out of discord, and

happiness out of violent passions: thus the sailor, crossing the sea,

catches the gale in his sails and safely guides his ship.

You alone hurt not, nor injure anyone; though you may connive at

stupidity, you tolerate no mean act; you treat peccadillos with

condescension. You do not choke people, as the wolf chokes the sheep,

but you know their worth: they are subject to the will of kings, but

more to righteous God who lives in their laws.

You judge soundly of merits, and mete out honour to the deserving:

you deem him not a prophet who merely makes rhymes. And as for that

entertainment of the mind,--the honour and glory of good caliphs, the

lyric strain to which you condescend,--poetry is pleasing to you,

acceptable, soothing, useful,--like a refreshing lemonade in summer.

Rumour tells of you that you are not in the least haughty, that you are

pleasant in business and in jest, agreeable in friendship and firm;

that you are indifferent to misfortune, and so magnanimous in glory

that you refused to be called “Wise.”[163] Again, they justly say that

one may always tell you the truth.

This, too, is an unheard-of thing and worthy of you alone: you permit

the people boldly to know and think all,[164] openly or in secret; nor

do you forbid them to say of you what is true or false; and you are

always prone to forgive those crocodiles, the Zoiluses of all your

benefactions.

Rivers of joyful tears stream from the depth of my heart. Oh, how happy

the people must be there with their fate, where a meek, peaceful

angel, clad in porphyry splendour, wields the heaven-sent sceptre!

There one may whisper conversations and, without fearing punishment, at

dinners not drink the health of kings.

There one may erase Felítsa’s name in the line, or carelessly drop

her portrait on the ground. There they do not celebrate preposterous

weddings, and steam people in ice baths, and pull the mustaches of

dignitaries; princes do not cackle like sitting hens, nor favourites

laugh loud at them and smear their faces with soot.

You know, O Felítsa, the rights of men and kings. While you enlighten

the manners, you do not turn men into fools. In your moments of rest

you write fables for instruction and teach the alphabet to Khlor: “Do

no wrong, and you will cause the bitterest satirist to become a hated

prevaricator.”

You are ashamed to be called great, lest you be feared and hated: it

becomes only a wild she-bear to tear animals and suck their blood. Need

one have recourse to the lancet, unless in extreme fever, when one

can get along without it? And is it glorious to be a tyrant, a great

Tamerlane in cruelty, where one is great in goodness, like God?

Felítsa’s glory is the glory of a god who has calmed strife, who has

covered, dressed and fed the orphaned and the poor; whose radiant eye

emits its light to fools, cowards, ungrateful people and the just, and

enlightens alike all mortals, soothes, cures the sick,--does good for

good’s sake;

Who has given the liberty to travel to other lands, has permitted his

people to seek gold and silver; who makes the waters free, and does not

prohibit cutting down the woods; who orders to weave, and spin, and

sew; who, freeing the mind and the hands, orders to love commerce and

the sciences, and to find happiness at home;

Whose law and hand distribute favours and justice. Announce, wise

Felítsa, where is the villain separated from the honest man? Where does

old age not go a-begging, and merit find its bread? Where does revenge

not drive anyone? Where dwells conscience with truth? Where shine

virtues?--if not at your throne?

But where does your throne shine in the world? Where do you flourish,

celestial branch? In Bagdad, Smyrna, Cashmir? Listen: wherever you may

live and my praises reach you, think not that I wish a hat or caftan

for them. To feel the charm of goodness is for the soul a wealth such

as even Crœsus did not possess.

I pray the great prophet that I may touch the dust of your feet, that I

may enjoy the sweet stream of your words and your look. I entreat the

heavenly powers that they extend their sapphire wings and invisibly

guard you from all diseases, evils and ennui, that the renown of your

deeds may shine in posterity like stars in the heavens.

FROM “THE WATERFALL”

Lo! like a glorious pile of diamonds bright,

Built on the steadfast cliffs, the waterfall

Pours forth its gems of pearl and silver light:

They sink, they rise, and sparkling cover all

With infinite refulgence; while its song,

Sublime as thunder, rolls the woods along,--

Rolls through the woods,--they send its accents back,

Whose last vibration in the desert dies:

Its radiance glances o’er the watery track,

Till the soft wave, as wrapt in slumber, lies

Beneath the forest shade; then sweetly flows

A milky stream, all silent, as it goes.

Its foam is scattered on the margent bound,

Skirting the darksome grove. But list! the hum

Of industry, the rattling hammer’s sound,

Files whizzing, creaking sluices, echoed come

On the fast-travelling breeze! Oh no, no voice

Is heard around but thy majestic noise!

When the mad storm-wind tears the oak asunder,

In thee its shivered fragments find their tomb;

When rocks are riven by the bolt of thunder,

As sands they sink into thy mighty womb:

The ice that would imprison thy proud tide

Like bits of broken glass is scattered wide.

The fierce wolf prowls around thee--there it stands

Listening,--not fearful, for he nothing fears:

His red eyes burn like fury-kindled brands,

Like bristles o’er him his coarse fur he rears;

Howling, thy dreadful roar he oft repeats,

And, more ferocious, hastes to bloodier feats.

The wild stag hears thy falling waters’ sound,

And tremblingly flies forward,--o’er her back

She bends her stately horns, the noiseless ground

Her hurried feet impress not, and her track

Is lost among the tumult of the breeze,

And the leaves falling from the rustling trees.

The wild horse thee approaches in his turn:

He changes not his proudly rapid stride;

His mane stands up erect, his nostrils burn,

He snorts, he pricks his ears, and starts aside;

Then rushing madly forward to thy steep,

He dashes down into thy torrents deep.

--From Sir John Bowring’s _Specimens of the Russian Poets_, Part I.

THE STORM

As my bark in the restless ocean

Mounts its rough and foaming hills,

Whilst its waves in dark commotion

Pass me, hope my bosom fills.

Who, when warring clouds are gleaming,

Quenches the destructive spark?

Say what hand, what safety’s beaming,

Guides through rocks my little bark?

Thou, Creator, all o’erseeing,

In this scene preserv’st me dread!

Thou, without whose word decreeing

Not a hair falls from my head!

Thou in life hast doubly blest me,

All my soul to Thee’s revealed,--

Thou amongst the great hast placed me,--

Be ’midst them my guide and shield!

--From W. D. Lewis’s _The Bakchesarian Fountain_.

THE STREAM OF TIME[165]

The stream of time, with onward sweep,

Bears off men’s works, all human things,

And plunges o’er Oblivion’s steep

Peoples and kingdoms with their kings.

If for a space amidst the swirl

The lyre of trumpet some sustain,

They’re swept at last in ceaseless whirl,

And none escape Fate’s common main.

--From John Pollen’s _Rhymes from the Russian_.

FOOTNOTES:

[147] Alexander Ivánovich Meshchérski was the president of the St.

Petersburg magistracy, and later served in the Chief Customs Chancery.

Both he and his friend Perfílev, mentioned at the end of the monody,

led a life of luxury.

[148] See Catherine II.’s _Prince Khlor_, p. 280.

[149] Catherine had some villages in the Government of Orenbúrg, near

the settlements of the Kirgíz-Kaysák horde,--hence the name given her

by Derzhávin.

[150] Tartar chiefs, but courtiers are meant here.

[151] Through the promulgation of her laws.

[152] Derzhávin was much addicted to gambling in his early life, and

had even tried to mend his fortune by cheating.

[153] Catherine was not successful as a versifier.

[154] She loved neither Masons nor Martinists, who were a kind of

precursors of the modern spiritualists.

[155] Name of a Masonic lodge.

[156] The reference is to Potémkin, his dreams of conquering India and

Persia, his foppery, his sumptuous feasts.

[157] Characterisation of A. G. Orlóv.

[158] P. I. Pánin.

[159] Allusion to S. K. Narýshkin, who had introduced wind instruments,

where each player played but one note.

[160] A game which consists of throwing a large nail into a ring.

[161] Famous popular novels much in vogue in all Europe; the latter

is the English _Bevys of Hamptoun_; the allusion is here to the rude

manners of Prince Vyázemski.

[162] Lentyág and Bryúzga of Catherine’s _Prince Khlor_, by whom she

meant Potémkin and Vyázemski.

[163] In 1767 the Senate and deputies, who had been invited to present

a project for a new code of laws, proposed a title for the Empress

“Great, Most Wise, and Mother of the Country,” but she declined it.

[164] This and the following lines refer to the reign of Empress

Anna, when the least inattention to the minutest details of Imperial

prerogatives brought about the severest persecution: it was sufficient

not to empty a beaker which was drunk to her health, or to scratch out

or correct her name in a document, or to drop a coin with her picture

upon it, in order to be immediately denounced to the secret police.

Then follows the reference to the ice palace in which the marriage of

the Court fool, Prince Golítsyn, was celebrated; the other Court fools

of the day were the Princes Volkónski and Apráksin.

Yúri Aleksándrovich Neledínski-Melétski. (1752-1829.)

After finishing his education in the University of Strassburg,

Neledínski occupied various posts in the army and with legations. In

1800 he was made a Senator. He distinguished himself in literature by

his simple, deep-felt songs, two of which, given below, have become

enormously popular. His other poems and translations from French

authors are now forgotten.

Sir John Bowring has translated his “Under the oak-tree, near the

rill,” “To the streamlet I’ll repair,” and “He whom misery, dark and

dreary”; the latter is the same as Lewis’s “He whose soul from sorrow

dreary.”

SONG

To the streamlet I’ll repair,

Look upon its flight and say:

“Bear, O fleeting streamlet, bear

All my griefs with thine away!”

Ah, I breathe the wish in vain!

In this silent solitude

Counted is each throb of pain:--

Rest is melancholy’s food.

Waves with waves unceasing blend,

Hurrying to their destiny:

E’en so thoughts with thoughts, and tend

All alike to misery.

And what grief so dark, so deep

As the grief interred within,

By the friend, for whom I weep,

All unnoticed, all unseen?

Yet, could I subdue my pain,

Soothe affection’s rankling smart,

Ne’er would I resume again

The lost empire of my heart.

Thou, my love, art sovereign there!

There thou hast a living shrine:

Let my portion be despair,

If the light of bliss be thine.

Loved by thee, oh, might I live,

’Neath the darkest, stormiest sky:

’Twere a blest alternative!

Grief is joy, if thou be nigh.

Every wish and every pray’r

Is a tribute paid to thee:

Every heart-beat--there, oh there,

Thou hast mightiest sovereignty.

To thee, nameless one! to thee

Still my thoughts, my passions turn;

’Tis through thee alone I see,

Think, and feel, and breathe, and burn.

If the woe in which I live

Ever reach thy generous ear,

Pity not, but oh, forgive

Thy devoted worshipper!

In some hour of careless bliss

Deign my bosom’s fire to prove;

Prove it with an icy kiss,--

Thou shalt know how much I love!

--From Sir John Bowring’s _Specimens of the Russian Poets_, Part I.

STANZAS

He whose soul from sorrow dreary,

Weak and wretched, naught can save,

Who in sadness, sick and weary,

Hopes no refuge but the grave;

On his visage Pleasure beaming

Ne’er shall shed her placid ray,

Till kind fate, from woe redeeming,

Leads him to his latest day.

Thou this life preservest ever,

My distress and my delight!

And, though soul and body sever,

Still I’ll live a spirit bright;

In my breast the heart that’s kindled

Death’s dread strength can ne’er destroy,

Sure the soul with thine that’s mingled

Must immortal life enjoy.

That inspired by breath from heaven

Need not shrink a mortal doom,

To thee shall my vows be given

In this world and that to come.

My fond shade shall constant trace thee,

And attend in friendly guise,

Still surround thee, still embrace thee,

Catch thy thoughts, thy looks, thy sighs.

To divine its secret pondering,

Close to clasp thy soul ’t will brave,

And if chance shall find thee wandering

Heedless near my silent grave,

E’en my ashes then shall tremble,

Thy approach relume their fire,

And that stone in dust shall crumble,

Covering what can ne’er expire!

--From W. D. Lewis’s _The Bakchesarian Fountain_.

FOOTNOTES:

[165] The last verses Derzhávin wrote.

Mikhaíl Nikítich Muravév. (1757-1807.)

Muravév was an alumnus of the Moscow University, and early

distinguished himself for his intimate knowledge of the ancient and

many modern languages. In 1785 he became the instructor of Alexander

and Constantine, and when the first ascended the throne, Muravév was

made Senator, and later Curator of the Moscow University. He not only

did much for the cause of education in Russia, but himself educated a

new generation of writers, among them Bátyushkov; through his efforts

Karamzín was made historiographer, and the Archives were opened to

him. In his prose and poetry, Muravév was himself a follower of the

pseudo-classic school, with an addition of sentimentalism, through

Karamzín’s influence. In his classicism, however, he differs from all

his contemporaries in that he drew directly from the ancient sources,

with which he was intimately acquainted.

Sir John Bowring translated Muravév’s _To the Goddess of the Neva_,

_Boleslav_, and “She bent her head, and her tears that fell.”

TO THE GODDESS OF THE NEVÁ

Glide, majestic Neva! Glide thee,

Decked with bright and peaceful smiles;

Palaces are raised beside thee,

’Midst the shadows of the isles.

Stormy Russian seas thou bindest

With the ocean--by the grave

Of our glorious Tsar thou windest,

Which thy graceful waters lave.

And the middle-ocean’s surges

All thy smiling naiads court;

While thy stream to Paros urges,

And to Lemnos’ classic port.

Hellas’ streams, their glory shaded,

See the brightest memories fade;

Glassy mirrors--how degraded!

Dimmed by Kislar Aga’s shade.

While thy happier face is bearing

Ever-smiling images,

On thy busy banks appearing

Crowds in gaiety and peace.

Thames’ and Tagus’ gathering prizes,

Spread their riches o’er thy breast,

While thy well-known banner rises,

Rises proudly o’er the rest.

In thy baths what beauties bathe them,

Goddesses of love and light;

There Erota loves to swathe them

In the brightest robes of night.

Cool thy smiling banks at even,

Cool thy grottoes and thy cells,

Where, by gentle breezes driven,

Oft the dancing billow swells.

Then thou gatherest vapours round thee,

Veil’st thee in thy twilight dress;

Love and mirth have now unbound thee--

Yield thee to thy waywardness.

Thou dost bear the dying over,

Weary of this earthly dream;

And with awful mists dost cover

All the bosom of the stream.

With thy car thou troublest never

The calm silence of the deep;

Sirens dance around thee ever,

Laughing o’er thy quiet sleep.

Peaceful goddess! Oft the singer

Sees thee in his ecstasy,

On the rock he loves to linger,

Sleepless,--then he meets with thee.

--From Sir John Bowring’s _Specimens of the Russian Poets_, Part II.

Vasíli Vasílevich Kapníst. (1757-1824.)

Kapníst, the son of a brigadier, entered the army as a corporal

in 1771, and was made a commissioned officer in 1775, but he soon

retired to his native village of Obúkhovka in the Government of Kíev,

which he later described in the manner of Horace. He was elected

a Representative of the Nobility of his district, later (upon his

return to St. Petersburg), became a member of the Academy, and rose

to many other honours. He early distinguished himself by translations

and imitations of Horace, in which he devoted a closer attention

to perfect form than any of his contemporaries, so that, but for a

somewhat antiquated language, he is read with pleasure even at the

present time. His chief reputation with his contemporaries was earned

by the comedy _The Pettifoggery_, which had a phenomenal success, and

was only superseded by Griboyédov’s _Intelligence Comes to Grief_

and Gógol’s _The Revizór_. Like all the great comedies of Russia,

_The Pettifoggery_ deals with the negative sides of social life, and

lays bare the corruption of officialdom. The plot of the play is as

follows: Pettifog devises a plan by which he is to get hold of the

property of Squareman. The latter is named in his certificate of birth

Theodotos; his father left his estate to this Theodotos, but he naming

himself Deodatus (Bogdán), Pettifog argues before the judges that

Deodatus is another unlawful holder of that estate, and that it ought

to revert to himself, as a distant relative of the deceased man. To

make his case sure he bribes the judges, Gurgle, Snare, Gladly and

Wordy, and the Procurator Grab and Secretary Talon, and sues for the

hand of Sophia, the daughter of the Presiding Judge Casetwister. All,

however, ends well, for Pettifog is denounced to the Senate and put

in gaol, and the judges are turned over to the criminal court, while

Squareman marries Sophia, his old sweetheart. The verses at the end of

Act III., Scene 6, “Take, you’ll learn the art with ease,” went like

wild-fire through all Russia, and became the byword for the large host

of bribers.

Sir John Bowring has translated his _On Julia’s Death_, also reprinted

in F. R. Grahame’s _The Progress of Science, Art and Literature in

Russia_.

FROM “THE PETTIFOGGERY”

ACT III., SCENE 6. FÉKLA, SOPHIA, ANNA, CASETWISTER, PETTIFOG, GURGLE,

SNARE, GLADLY, WORDY, GRAB, TALON AND SLY (_tipsy, playing cards_)

_Talon._ They have picked me clean.

_Gurgle._ Well! We are not picking your own feathers.

_Pettifog._ My dear friend, always grab the jack-pot!

_Talon._ A well-born man grabs all in splendid style.

_Wordy_ (_to Pettifog_). Your intimate has been flaying us.

_Pettifog._ That’s proper. (_To Sly._) You had better rise. (_To

Casetwister._) Will you not let him mix a punch for us? He is a great

hand at it.

_Casetwister._ Very well.

_Gurgle._ That’s right, for the young beauty has been watering us as

from a trough....

_Sly_ (_walking up to Anna_). There is some brandy in the basket.

_Fékla._ His goose is cooked.

_Pettifog._ That’s so.

_Casetwister._ Whose?

_Pettifog._ Mine.

_Gurgle._ That accursed Theodotos has done it all.

_Gladly_ (to Grab, who has been looking into his cards). Leave my

ca-ca-ca----

_Grab_ (_putting his hand on his mouth_). Stop your cawing.

_Wordy._ Say, Sly, stop courting her.

_Casetwister._ Anna, why have you run away from us? You had better

serve us the new punch; we will be obliged to you.

_Fékla_ (_to Anna_). Hurry up.

(_Anna serves to the guests punch and wine, while Fékla gives her

privately some signs: the guests are getting drunk._)

_Snare._ Oh, oh, we are getting there!

_Pettifog._ Eh?

_Wordy_ (_pointing to Sly_). Ask him.

_Sly._ Sir, the trouble is, it’s all gone.

_Pettifog._ Keep it up; here is the wherewithal (_throws a purse to

him_).

_Gurgle._ The trouble is all with Theodotos.

_Pettifog._ It is easy for you to have your fun with Theodotos; but

it’s I who am having the trouble with him.

_Casetwister._ What of it? If it is true that through conspiracy

Deodatus has gotten away with Theodotos’s property, there is a law for

such a case.

_Talon._ I have already given the order to find the laws that cover the

case.

_Casetwister._ I suppose there are some statutes?

_Talon._ Lots of them, sir.

_Wordy._ And also some decrees?

_Talon._ There are.

_Gurgle._ And, of course, there must be a special ukase.

_Talon._ There are several.

_Grab._ But clearest of all it is in the Institutes; you will find it

in the chapter where ... about it----

_Snare._ Rather dark.

_Wordy._ It’s an ace and a jack.

_Casetwister._ And then we may apply the law of false pretences?

_Talon._ Of course, we may, sir! It fits the case.

_Gurgle._ And we bring the Reglement in accord with the Institutes....

_Talon._ Then all will agree with the above-mentioned ukase.

_Gurgle._ That’s it. You see, you can easily pass sentence.

_Casetwister._ Theodotos is out of the question. Deodatus is certainly

a villain; so we will take Theodotos’s property and give it where it

belongs. That’s my opinion.

_Gurgle._ Mine too.

_Snare._ And mine.

_Wordy._ And mine.

_Gladly._ A-a-and mine.

_Grab._ I agree with that unanimous opinion.

_Pettifog._ Thank you all.

_Casetwister._ ’Tis not hard to pick the laws.

_Anna_ (_aside, as she picks up the cards on the ground_). And I will

pick the cards.

_Casetwister._ Where is the punch?

_Fékla._ Anna! Be quick about it, and serve them often all around, and

ask their favour.

_Gurgle._ Oh, we will soon ask hers.

_Casetwister._ Let’s have a song.

_Wordy._ Let’s throw away the cards: the queen has forsaken me.

_Snare._ You deal with a heavy hand.

_Casetwister_ (_to Grab_). Dear Procurator! You have a good voice: give

us a song!

_Grab._ Most gladly, but I have no voice.

_Casetwister._ The best way you can.

_Gurgle._ We will sing the refrain.

_Grab_ (_sings_).

Take, you’ll learn the art with ease!

Take whatever you can seize!

God for this your hands did make,

That you may take!

(_All repeat_: Take, take, take!)

(_Sophia shuts her ears and goes away._)

ACT IV., SCENE 6. CASETWISTER, FÉKLA AND TALON

_Casetwister_ (_to Talon_). But hear, my dear. The rumour must be false

that some meddler has denounced us to the Senate for taking bribes and

for deciding wrongly cases at law.

_Talon._ I declare! What bad luck is that?

_Casetwister._ I could not find out all. But you, my friend, tell me in

truth what case it was we decided so wrongly that we did not cover our

tracks? I can’t think of any.

_Talon_ (_scratching his spine_). Even if I were to go to confession, I

could not think of any.

_Fékla._ But that’s impossible.

_Casetwister._ I beg you, wife, leave us alone! We know affairs better

than you.

_Fékla._ Indeed, I know as well as you. Is it not my business to

receive things and look after them? But may the wrath of the Lord

strike me on the spot, if my right hand knows what my left hand takes.

_Casetwister_ (_to Talon_). Say: it just occurs to me that there was

quite a disturbance about the note whose endorsement I ordered to have

scratched.

_Talon._ O sir, there is no cause for your worry there. I myself did

the scratching. The defendant suspected the plaintiff of changing the

endorsement. You decided the case properly according to the laws, and

ordered the note to be destroyed.

_Fékla_ (_to Casetwister_). Well, you have done no more wrong there

than I.

_Talon._ Besides, you did not scratch the note, but only clean paper.

_Fékla._ Then where is your guilt? What sin is there in scratching mere

paper? None at all.

_Casetwister._ So much the better.

_Talon._ There is something else that occurs to me. Do you remember

the lawsuit for Simple’s estate? Pettifog, who had really nothing to

do with the case and had forgotten the name of Simple in the lawsuit,

contrived cunningly to sue Trickster, who had also not the slightest

right to the estate. We did not bother about finding out whose the

village in question was, and without further investigation, in the

absence of Simple, disposed of the lawsuit by adjudging another’s

property to the contending parties, which they proceeded at once to

divide among themselves. I can’t imagine what Simple is going to say

about it.

_Casetwister._ Let him say whatever he pleases, since he has paid so

little attention to it. Why should we worry about him now? We are the

judges. ’Tis our duty to know only that which is presented for our

consideration on paper. What right have we to know that the estate

under contention does not belong to the contending parties, but to

someone else? We should have to have some written proof of that; in

absence of the same, we simply must decide a lawsuit between two

parties strictly according to the laws. We cannot help it if both were

contending for something that did not belong to them.

OBÚKHOVKA

At peace with my neighbours and relatives, at peace with my conscience,

in love with my beloved family, I here with my joys alone measure the

stream of quiet days.

My cosey house with straw-thatched roof is all I want, neither too low,

nor too high; there is a nook in it for friendship, and indolence has

forgot to put a lock on the door, to notabilities unknown.

By a mount from the north protected, it stands upon a grassy hill,

and looks into groves and distant meadows, while Psel, winding like a

serpent, babbles as it tends towards the mills.

Nearby, the favourite child of nature, a vast shadowy forest, surrounds

it on all sides with its thick tree-tops, without encroachment on the

free expanse.

Before it, and on a small eminence, art, to please our eyes, having

given a gentle slope to abrupt mounds, has on a modest elevation raised

a modest temple to moderation.

Moderation, O heavenly friend, be ever my companion! You lead men

to happiness; but your altar, not known to all, is hidden from the

boastful rich.

You have taught me from earliest youth not to seek honour nor gold,

without pinions not to fly upwards, and in the glowworm not to show the

light to the wonderment of the world.

With you, the dearest one to me in the world, I treasure my fate;

whithersoever I glance with you, in every object I discover a new

charm.

As I walk down the hill, the arbour covered by the dense shade of trees

calls the tired one, through the forest that bends into a vault, to

rest, and mirrors itself in the crystal stream below.

Coolness reigns here for ever and refreshes the feelings and the mind,

while the gentle, incessant murmur of the impetuous waterfall induces

sleep amidst sweet thoughts.

There suddenly twenty wheels begin to turn, and circle hastens after

circle; diamonds, opals, hyacinths, rain down from gleaming bows, while

pearls beat underneath in clouds.

Thus the vision of happiness moves the passions, and with them the

whole world is in motion. Fortunate he who gets away from them, for

they crush all, tear all in pieces that passes under their millstone.

Let us go, before it grows dark, to rest upon the nearby island; a

covered way leads to it, where the rays of the sun dare not glide

through the dark foliage.

There I shall sit down under a mossy elm, leaning against a mighty

trunk. Alas, not long, upon a hot day, will its leafy top carpet for me

a hospitable shade!

Already it has inclined its brow upon the water that has undermined

the steep bank; already it looks into the gloomy depth,--and soon, in

stormy weather, it will fall with upturned roots into the water.

Thus in the world all is carried away by the stream of time amidst an

eternal strife; thus ancient altars have fallen; thus kingdoms and

kings have fallen, with the pillars of their thrones.

But to disperse painful thoughts, let us walk the path to the

forest-covered hill where Phœbus with brilliant beam reflects from the

zenith a mighty shade.

I see a modest plain with a hedge of crimson bushes: there Flora, the

tender mother of the gardens, has scattered her basket full of fragrant

flowers.

Farther off, in the realm of Pomona, fruit burdens the trees; beyond is

the vineyard of Bacchus, where, filled with nectar juice, gleam amber

clusters.

Is it possible to picture all the beauties of nature, and all its

charm? To weld there the distance with the horizon, to adorn here the

vales with flocks, and nap it with the golden harvest?

No, no! Abandon the vain endeavour! Already the sun has disappeared

behind the mountain; already above the ethereal azure, ’twixt clouds,

twinkle bright stars and glisten on the waves of the river.

I ascend the hill. The golden moon has swum out on a gentle cloud, and,

glinting through the bluish cirrus, leaves behind it a gleaming path

above the liquid glass.

Oh, how dear that place is to me when the satellite of the night

comes, in all her beauty, to weld with the dream of a pining soul the

remembrance of bright days!

ON JULIA’S DEATH

The evening darkness shrouds

The slumbering world in peace,

And from her throne of clouds

Shines Luna through the trees.

My thoughts in silence blend,

But gathered all to thee:

Thou moon! the mourner’s friend,

Oh, come and mourn with me!

Upon her grave I bow,

The green grave where she lies:

Oh, hear my sorrows now,

And consecrate my sighs!

This is her ashes’ bed,--

Here her cold relics sleep,--

Where I my tears shall shed,

While this torn heart can weep.

O Julia! Never rose

Had half the charms of thee!

My comfort, my repose,--

Oh, thou wert all to me!

But thou art gone, and I

Must bear life’s load of clay,--

And pray, and long to die,

Though dying day by day.

But I must cease to sing,

My lyre all mute appears.

Alas! Its plaintive string

Is wetted with my tears.

Oh! Misery’s song must end,--

My thoughts all fly to thee:--

Thou moon! The mourner’s friend,

Oh, come and mourn with me!

--From Sir John Bowring’s _Specimens of the Russian Poets_, Part II.

Adrián Moyséevich Gribóvski. (1766-1833.)

Gribóvski was a Little-Russian by birth. In 1784 he was secretary to

Derzhávin, the poet, who was then Governor of Olónetsk. Then he served

under Potémkin, and after his death in 1791 he entered the service

of Count Zúbov, Catherine’s favourite. In 1795 he was Catherine’s

Secretary of State. Like so many Russian Memoirs of the eighteenth

century, Gribóvski’s _Memoirs_ not only throw light on contemporary

events, but are of great importance for a correct appreciation of the

literature of the time. What Gribóvski reports of the simplicity of

Catherine’s private life forms the subject of Derzhávin’s _Felítsa_

(see p. 385 _et seq._).

FROM HIS “MEMOIRS”

The Empress’s [Catherine II.] manner of life was of late years the

same: In the winter she resided in the large Winter Palace, in the

middle story, above the right, smaller entrance. Her own rooms were

few. Upon ascending a small staircase, one entered into a room where,

for the immediate dispatch of the Empress’s orders, there stood behind

a screen a writing table with writing material for the secretaries of

state and other officers. This room faced a small court, and from it

you passed into the boudoir, with its windows on the Palace Square.

Here stood a toilet table. Of the two doors in this room, the one to

the right led into the diamond room, the other, to the left, into the

sleeping-room, where the Empress generally received her reports. From

the sleeping-room one passed straight into the interior boudoir, and to

the left--into the study and mirror room, from which one way led into

the lower apartments, and the other, over a gallery, into the so-called

Neighbouring House. In these apartments the Empress lived until spring,

but sometimes she removed earlier to the Tauric Palace, which had been

built by Prince Potémkin on the bank of the Nevá.

The main building of this latter palace was only one story high,

on purpose, it seems, that the Empress should not be annoyed by

staircases. Here her rooms were larger than in the Winter Palace,

especially the study in which she received the reports. In the first

days of May she always went incognito to Tsárskoe Seló, and from there

she returned, also incognito, in September to the Winter Palace. Her

apartments in Tsárskoe Seló were quite large and tastefully furnished.

All know the magnificent gallery in which the Empress frequently

took a walk, particularly on Sundays when the park was filled with a

large crowd of people that used to come down from St. Petersburg. She

received the reports in the cabinet, or in the sleeping-room.

The Empress’s time and occupations were arranged in the following

manner: She rose at seven, and was busy writing in her cabinet until

nine (her last work was on the Senate Regulations). She once remarked

in her conversation that she could not live a day without writing

something. During that time she drank one cup of coffee, without cream.

At nine o’clock she passed into the sleeping-room, where almost in

the entrance from the boudoir she seated herself in a chair near the

wall. Before her stood a table that slanted towards her and also to the

opposite direction, where there was also a chair. She then generally

wore a sleeping-gown, or capote, of white gros de Tours, and on her

head a white crêpe bonnet which was poised a little towards the left.

In spite of her sixty-five years, the Empress’s face was still fresh,

her hands beautiful, her teeth all well preserved, so that she spoke

distinctly, without lisping, only a little masculinely. She read with

eyeglasses and a magnifying glass. Having once been called in with my

reports, I found her reading in this way. She smiled and said to me:

“You, no doubt, do not need this apparatus! How old are you?” And when

I said: “Twenty-six,” she added: “But we have, in our long service to

the Empire, dulled our vision, and now we are of necessity compelled

to use glasses.” It appeared to me that “we” was used by her not as an

expression of majesty, but in the ordinary sense.

Upon another occasion she handed me an autograph note which contained

some references for her Senate Regulations for verification, and said:

“Laugh not at my Russian orthography. I will tell you why I have

not succeeded in mastering it. When I came here, I applied myself

diligently to the study of Russian. When my aunt, Elizabeth Petróvna,

heard of this, she told my Court mistress that I ought not to be

taught any more,--that I was clever enough anyway. Thus, I could learn

Russian only from books, without a teacher, and that is the cause of

my insufficient knowledge of orthography.” However, the Empress spoke

quite correct Russian, and was fond of using simple native words, of

which she knew a great number. “I am very happy,” she said to me, “that

you know the order of the Chancery. You will be the first executor of

my Regulations before the Senate. But I caution you that the Chancery

of the Senate has overpowered the Senate, and that I wish to free

it from the Chancery. For any unjust decisions, my punishment for

the Senate shall be: let them be ashamed!” I remarked that not only

the Senate, but also other bureaus that are guided by the General

Reglement, are hampered in the transaction of their business by great

inconveniences and difficulties that demand correction. “I should

like very much to see those inconveniences and difficulties of which

you speak to me in such strong terms. The General Reglement is one of

the best institutions of Peter the Great.” Later on, I presented to

her Highness my notes upon the General Reglement, which I read to her

almost every afternoon of her residence in Tsárskoe Seló in 1796, and

which were honoured by her undivided august approval. (These notes must

be deposited with other affairs in the Archives of the Foreign College.)

After occupying her seat, of which I spoke above, the Empress rang a

bell, and the valet of the day, who uninterruptedly remained outside

the door, entered and, having received his order, called in the

persons. At that time of the day, the Chief Master of Police and the

Secretary of State waited daily in the boudoir; at eleven o’clock there

arrived Count Bezboródko; for the other officers certain days in the

week were set apart: for the Vice-Chancellor, Governor, Government

Procurator of the Government of St. Petersburg, Saturday; for the

Procurator-General, Monday and Thursday; Wednesday for the Superior

Procurator of the Synod and Master General of Requests; Thursday for

the Commander-in-Chief of St. Petersburg. But in important and urgent

cases, all these officers could come any other time to report.

The first one to be called in to the Empress was the Chief Master of

Police, Brigadier Glázov. He made a verbal report on the safety of

the capital and other occurrences, and presented a note, written at

the office irregularly and badly on a sheet of paper, containing the

names of arrivals and departures on the previous day of people of all

conditions who had taken the trouble to announce their names at the

toll-house, for the sentinels stopped no one at the toll-house, nor

inquired anything of them,--in fact there existed then no toll-gates;

anybody received a passport from the Governor at any time he asked for

it, and without any pay, and could leave the city whenever he wished:

for this reason the list of arrivals and departures never could be very

long. After the Chief Master of Police left, the Secretaries of State

who had any business had themselves announced by the valet, and were

let in one by one. I was one of them. Upon entering the sleeping-room,

I observed the following ceremony: I made a low obeisance to the

Empress, to which she responded with a nod of her head, and smilingly

gave me her hand, which I took and kissed, and I felt the pressure of

my own hand; then she commanded me to take a seat. Having seated myself

on the chair opposite, I placed my papers on the slanting table, and

began to read. I suppose the other reporting officers acted in the same

way, when they entered the room of the Empress, and that they met with

the same reception.

About eleven o’clock the other officers arrived with their reports,

as mentioned above, and sometimes there came Field-Marshal Count

Suvórov Rýmnikski, who then, after the conquest of Poland, resided at

St. Petersburg. When he entered, he first prostrated himself three

times before the image of the Holy Virgin of Kazán, which stood in the

corner, to the right of the door, and before which there burned an

undying lamp; then he turned to the Empress, prostrated himself once

before her, though she tried to keep him from it, and, taking him by

the hand, lifted him and said: “Mercy! Alexander Vasílevich, are you

not ashamed to act like that?” But the hero worshipped her and regarded

it as his sacred duty to express his devotion to her in that manner.

The Empress gave him her hand, which he kissed as a relic, and asked

him to seat himself on the chair opposite her; two minutes later she

dismissed him. They used to tell that Count Bezboródko and a few others

prostrated themselves in the same way before her, but not before the

Holy Virgin.

At these audiences in the Winter and Tauric Palaces, the military

officers wore uniforms, with their swords and shoes, but boots on

holidays; civil officers wore during week-days simple French coats,

but on holidays gala dresses; but at Tsárskoe Seló, both the military

and civilians wore dress-coats on week-days, and only on holidays the

former put on uniforms, and the latter French coats with their swords.