It is spring-time, the sun shines brightly, and everyone is gay. Even
the window-panes of the old stone houses seem to wear a cheerful smile.
Along the street of the little town streams a crowd in bright holiday
attire. The whole population of the town is there: workers, soldiers,
tradespeople, priests, officials, fishermen; all are intoxicated
with the spirit of spring-time, talking, laughing, singing in joyous
confusion, as if they were a single body overflowing with the zest of
life.
The hats and parasols of the women make a medley of bright colours;
red and blue balloons, like wonderful flowers, float from the hands
of the children; and children, merry lords of the earth, laughing and
rejoicing, are everywhere, like gems on the gorgeous cloak of a fairy
prince.
The tender green leaves of the trees have not yet unfolded; they are
sheathed in gorgeous buds, greedily drinking in the warm rays of the
sun. Far off the sun smiles gently and seems to beckon us.
The impression seems to prevail that people have outlived their
misfortunes, that yesterday was the last day of the hard shameful life
that wearied them to death. To-day they have all awakened in high
spirits, like schoolboys, with a strong, clear faith in themselves, in
the invincibility of their will to overcome all obstacles, and now, all
together, they march boldly into the future.
It was strange--strange and sad and suddenly depressing--to notice a
sorrowful face in this lively crowd: it was that of a tall, strongly
built man, not yet over thirty but already grey, who passed arm-in-arm
with a young woman. He carried his hat in his hand, the hair on his
shapely head glistened like silver, his thin but healthy face was calm
and destined to remain for ever sad. The eyes, large and dark, and
shaded by long lashes, were those of a man who cannot forget--who will
never forget--the acute suffering through which he has passed.
"Notice that couple," said my companion to me, "especially the man: he
has lived through one of those dramas which are enacted more and more
frequently amongst the workers of Northern Italy."
And my companion went on:
That man is a socialist, the editor of a local Labour paper, a workman
himself, a painter. He is one of those characters for whom science
becomes a religion, and a religion that still more incites the thirst
for knowledge. A keen and clever Anti-Clerical he was--just note what
fierce looks the black priests send after him.
About five years ago he, a propagandist, met in one of his circles a
girl who at once attracted his attention. Here women have learnt to
believe silently and steadfastly; the priests have cultivated this
ability in them for many centuries, and have achieved what they wished.
Somebody rightly said that the Catholic Church has been built up on the
breast of womankind. The cult of the Madonna is not only beautiful,
as such heathen practices go, it is first of all a clever cult. The
Madonna is simpler than Christ, she is nearer to one's heart, there
are no contradictions in her, she does not threaten with Gehenna--she
only loves, pities, forgives--it is easy for her to make a captive of a
woman's heart for life.
But there he sees a girl who can speak, can inquire; and in all her
questions he perceives, side by side with her naïve wonderment at his
ideas, an undisguised lack of belief in him, and sometimes even fear
and repulsion. The Italian propagandist has to speak a great deal
about religion, to say incisive things about the Pope and the clergy;
every time he spoke on that subject he saw contempt and hate for him
in the eyes of the girl; if she asked about anything her words sounded
unfriendly and her soft voice breathed poison. It was evident that she
was acquainted with Catholic literature directed against socialism, and
that in this circle her word had as much weight as his own.
Until latterly the attitude here towards women was far more vulgar and
much coarser than in Russia, and the Italian women were themselves to
blame for this; taking no interest in anything except the Church, they
were for the most part strangers to the work of social advancement
carried on by men and did not understand its meaning.
The man's self-love was wounded, the clever propagandist's fame
suffered in the collisions with the girl; he got angry; lost his
temper; occasionally he ridiculed her successfully, but she paid him
back in his own coin, evoking his involuntary admiration, forcing him
carefully to prepare the lectures he had to give to the circle she
attended.
In addition to all this he noticed that every time he came to speak
about the present shameful state of things, how man was being
oppressed, his body and his soul mutilated--whenever he drew pictures
of the life of the future when all will be both outwardly and inwardly
free--he noticed that she was quite another being: she listened to his
speeches, stifling the anger of a strong and clever woman who knows
the weight of life's chains; listened to them with the rapt eagerness
of a child that is told a fairy tale which is in harmony with its own
magically complex soul.
This excited in him the anticipation of victory over a strong foe--a
foe who could be a fine comrade, a valiant champion in the cause of a
better future.
The rivalry between them lasted nearly a year, without calling forth
any desire in them to join issue and fight their battle out; at length
he made the first advance.
"Signorina is my constant opponent," he said, "does she not think that
in the interests of the cause it would be better if we were to become
more closely acquainted?"
She willingly fell in with his suggestion, and almost from the
first word they entered upon a spirited contest: the girl fiercely
defended the Church as the only place where the souls of the weary
find rest, where before the face of the Madonna all are equal and
equally pitiable, notwithstanding the differences in worldly seeming.
He replied that it was not rest that people needed but struggle, that
civic equality is impossible without equality in material things, and
that behind the cloak of the Madonna is concealed a man to whom it is
advantageous that people should remain miserable and unenlightened.
Thereafter these discussions filled their whole life, every meeting
was a continuation of the one same endless, passionate theme, and every
day the stubborn strength of their beliefs became more and more evident.
For him life was a struggle for the widening of knowledge, for the
conquest of the forces of Nature, a struggle for the subjugation of
mysterious energies to the will of man. It was meet that everybody
should be equally armed for this struggle, which was to issue in
Freedom and the triumph of Reason--the most powerful of all forces, and
the only force in the world which acts consciously. For her life was a
slow and painful sacrifice of man to the Unknown, the subjugation of
Reason to that will the laws and aims of which are known to the priest
only.
Nonplussed by this, he inquired:
"Why do you attend my lectures and what do you expect from socialism?"
"Yes, I know that I sin and contradict myself!" she confessed
sorrowfully.
"But it is pleasant to listen to you and to dream about the possibility
of happiness for all!"
Though not specially pretty she was slim and graceful, with an
intelligent face, and large eyes, whose glance could be mild or angry,
gentle or severe. She worked in a silk factory, lived with her old
mother, her one-legged father and a younger sister who was attending
a technical school. Sometimes she was happy, not boisterously,
but quietly happy; she was fond of museums and old churches, grew
enthusiastic over pictures and the beauty of which they were the token,
and looking at them would say:
"How strange it is to think that these things have been hidden in
private houses and that but one person had the right to enjoy them!
Everybody must see the beautiful, for only then does it live!"
She often spoke in so strange a manner that it seemed to him that her
words came from some dark crevice in her soul; they reminded him of the
groans of a wounded man. He felt that this girl loved life and mankind
with that deep mother love which is full of anxiety and compassion;
he waited patiently till his faith should kindle her heart and this
quiet love change to passion. The girl appeared to him to listen more
attentively to his speeches and, in her heart, to be in agreement
with him. And he spoke more passionately of the need for an incessant,
active struggle for the emancipation of man, of the nation, of humanity
as a whole, from the old chains, the rust of which had eaten into their
souls, and was blighting and poisoning them.
Once, while accompanying her home, he told her that he loved her, and
that he wanted her to be his wife. He was startled at the effect his
words had on her: she reeled as though she had been struck, stared with
wide-open eyes and turned pale; she leaned against the wall, and said,
clasping her hands and looking, almost terrified, into his face:
"I was beginning to fear that that might be so; almost I felt it,
because I loved you long ago. But, O God! what is going to happen now?"
"Days of your happiness and mine will begin, days of mutual work," he
exclaimed.
"No," said the girl, her head drooping. "No; we should not have talked
about love."
"Why?'
"Will you be married according to the laws of the Church?" she asked
quietly.
"No!"
"Then, good-bye!"
And she walked quickly away from him.
He overtook her, tried to persuade her; she heard him out in silence
and then said:
"I, my mother and my father are all believers, and will die believers.
Marriage at the registrar's is no marriage for me; if children are born
of such a marriage I know they will be unhappy. Love is consecrated
only by marriage in a church, which alone can give happiness and peace."
It seemed to him that soon she would yield; he, of course, could not
give in. They parted. As she bade him good-bye the girl said:
"Let us not torment each other, don't seek meetings with me. Oh, if
only you would go away from here! I cannot, I am so poor."
"I will make no promises," he replied.
The struggle between two strong natures began: they met, of course, and
even more often than before; they met because they loved each other,
sought meetings in the hope that one or other of them would be unable
to stand the torments of an ungratified longing which was becoming more
and more intense. Their meetings were full of anguish and despair;
after each one he felt quite worn out and exhausted; she, all in tears,
went to confess to a priest. He knew this and it seemed to him that
the black wall of people in tonsures became stronger, higher and more
insurmountable every day, that it grew and parted them till death.
Once, on a holiday, while walking with her through a field outside the
town, he said, not threateningly, but more as if to himself:
"Do you know, it seems to me sometimes that I could kill you."
She remained silent.
"Did you hear what I said?"
Looking at him affectionately she answered:
"Yes."
And he understood that she would rather die than give in to him. Before
this "yes" he had embraced and kissed her sometimes; she struggled with
him, but her resistance was becoming feebler, and he cherished the
hope that some day she would yield, and that then her woman's instinct
would help him to conquer. But now he understood that that would not be
victory, but enslavement, and from that day on he ceased to appeal to
the woman in her.
So he wandered with her in the dark circle of her life's horizon, lit
all the beacons before her that he could; but she listened to him with
the dreamy smile of the blind, saw nothing, believed him not.
Once she said:
"I understand sometimes that all you say is possible, but I think that
is because I love you! I understand, but I do not believe, I cannot
believe! As soon as you go away all that is of you goes away too."
This drama lasted nearly two years, and then the girl's health broke
down: she became seriously ill. He gave up his employment, ceased
to attend to the work of his organisation, got into debt. Avoiding
his comrades, he spent his time wandering round her lodgings; or sat
at her bedside, watching her wasting from disease and becoming more
transparent every day, noting how the fire of fever glowed more and
more brightly in her eyes.
"Speak to me of life, of the future," she asked him.
But he spoke of the present, enumerating vindictively everything that
crushes us, all those things against which he was vowed to a lifelong
struggle; he spoke of things that ought to be cast out of mens lives,
as one discards soiled and worn-out rags.
She listened until the pain it gave her became unbearable; then touched
his hand, and stopped him with an imploring look.
"I, am I dying?" she asked him once, many days after the doctor had
told him that she was in a galloping consumption and that her condition
was hopeless.
He bowed his head but did not answer.
"I know that I shall die soon," she said. "Give me your hand."
And, taking his outstretched hand, she pressed it to her burning lips
and said:
"Forgive me, I have done you wrong. It was all a mistake--and I have
worn you out. Now when I am struck down I see that my faith was only
fear before what I could not understand, notwithstanding my desire and
my efforts. It was fear, but it was in my blood, I was born with it. I
have my own mind--or yours--but somebody else's heart; you are right, I
understand it now, but my heart could not agree with you."
A few days later she died; he turned grey during her agony; he was only
twenty-seven.
Not long ago he married the only friend of that girl, his pupil. It is
they who go to the cemetery, to her--they go there every Sunday and
place flowers on her grave.
He does not believe in his victory, he is convinced that when she
said to him: "You are right," she lied to him in order to console
him. His wife thinks the same; they both lovingly revere her memory.
This sad episode of a good woman who perished gives them strength by
filling them with a desire to avenge her; it gives their mutual work
a strangely fascinating character, and renders them untiring in their
efforts.
*
The river of gaily dressed people streams on in the sunshine; a merry
noise accompanies its flow: children shout and laugh. Not everyone is
gay and joyful; there are many hearts, no doubt, oppressed by dark
sorrow, many minds tormented by contradictions; but we all go steadily
forward. And "Freedom, Freedom is our goal!"
And the more vigour we put into it the faster we shall advance!