Conscious of my
inability, it is with diffidence and hesitation that I approach this work,
sacred in my eyes--the life-story of my teacher, the aged prophet, Leo Tolstoy.
Only a few years ago I
was so far from dreaming of this undertaking that, while living much of my time
in close proximity to Tolstoy, and often staying in his house for hours or even
whole days, it never entered into my mind to make any note or record of what I
heard from Tolstoy himself or from those about him. Now, an exile [See P.S. to
this Introduction] for my religious opinions, living far from my country and
far from Tolstoy, I have set myself to accomplish this important task.
I was first encouraged
to do it by the French publisher Stock, who, when taking in hand a complete
publication of Tolstoy’s works in French, asked me if I would revise the
Russian texts and write a biography of the author.
I knew very well that
it was impossible to write the biography of a man still living without the
consent of himself and his family, so, before accepting Stock’s offer, I wrote
to Countess Tolstoy, asking if she had any objection to my undertaking the
biography of her husband. I received from her a kind and encouraging reply,
from which I will quote a few lines:
"...Of course you
ought to write the biography, and Lev Nikolayevich could answer many of your
questions, only you must not delay. The life so precious to us all was on the
point of passing away. But now Lev Nikolayevich is progressing favorably and is
again at work."
This letter bears the
date July 19, 1901, and was written directly after Tolstoy’s severe illness.
On receipt of this
letter I did not trouble Tolstoy himself, being convinced beforehand that he
would not stand in my way; I accepted Stock’s offer and set to work.
When I began to look
into my materials and to consider the nature and the plan of the work I was
undertaking, I grew alarmed on the one hand at its magnitude, while on the
other I felt more and more fascinated by it, and, carried away as I was with
the subject, I became so much engrossed with it that at the present moment I
look upon it as my life’s work, and heed no considerations which are offered
from a publisher’s point of view.
Some preliminary labor
had to be spent in the collection of materials. These I divide into four
categories, according to their importance and value.
In the first category I
place Tolstoy’s own autobiographical notes, as well as his letters and diaries.
Such notes can be turned to much better account in the lifetime of the author,
for the reason that any discrepancies between them and information derived from
other sources can be explained by the author himself.
In the second category
I place reminiscences and notices generally of Tolstoy by those who knew him
personally, such as relations, friends, and acquaintances who had immediate
intercourse with him. It may also include various kinds of official documents,
such as certificates of birth, documents of the educational authorities,
official records of State service, copies from judicial and administrative
documents, and so on.
The third category
includes notices of Tolstoy from outside sources, as well as works of his own
in which real facts are intermingled with fiction by the play of the artistic
imagination. But these, when looked at from a biographer’s point of view, must
be treated with great caution.
Lastly, the fourth
category consists of sundry short articles, not to speak of whole books, which,
though badly or clumsily written, or coming from authors who are not wholly
trustworthy, yet have a certain comparative value where there is a gap left by
other works. These I do not consider it necessary to enumerate.
Foreign literature
gives us very few facts, especially in relation to the first period of Tolstoy’s
life. For this reason I do not make a separate list of foreign works, but
include them in the general catalogue.
At the end of this
Introduction is appended a list of all the written materials I have used.
After my first few
steps in the examination of the collected materials, I found it necessary to
seek personal intercourse with Tolstoy, as he alone could explain a number of
obscure points by which I was puzzled. For a long while I hesitated, wondering
whether it was right to trouble him, but at last I made up my mind to write to
him and say that I had resolved to approach him with a few questions. Being
aware that he permitted artists to take his portrait or make busts of him and
amateur photographers to take his likeness, though all this gave him no
pleasure, I requested him to sit for me too, as I wished to make a picture of
him in words. To this he returned his kind consent in the following terms in a
letter of December 2, 1901:
"...I shall be
very glad to give you a sitting and will categorically answer your
questions."
My friend V. Chertkov
rendered me an important service by consenting to lay open for my work his rich
archive of Tolstoy’s private correspondence and of extracts from his diaries.
One great drawback to
my labor was the fact that through a senseless administrative order [See P.S.
to this Introduction], I was exiled from Russia, and have thus been deprived of
an opportunity of consulting the man whose life I was writing, as well as
prevented from working in Russian public libraries and archives, a circumstance
which greatly hindered my work so far as dependent on the use of extracts from
old periodicals, although, owing to the kindness of some owners of private
Russian libraries and to the literary wealth of the Russian Department of the
British Museum, this obstacle has been to some extent overcome. I have done my
best in accordance with conscience and reason to meet these difficulties; I
even petitioned the Minister of Interior to be allowed to visit Russia for two
months, but I received a distinct refusal. I therefore cannot look upon my task
as complete.
As to the first volume,
which I am now publishing, I may state that the readers will find there
something perfectly new--I mean Tolstoy’s memories of his childhood, and of his
relations, as well as a great many of his private letters.
In order to illustrate
for the reader the difficulty which Tolstoy had in writing his Reminiscences,
as well as the way in which to treat them, I will quote a few extracts from our
correspondence upon the subject.
I had written several
times to Tolstoy and also to his intimate friends begging the latter to write
down anything that, during quiet evening conversations, they might hear from
him about his childhood.
At last I received the
following communication from Tolstoy:
"...At first I
thought that I should not be able to help you with my biography,
notwithstanding all my desire to do so. I was afraid of the insincerity
incidental to every autobiography, but now I seem to have found a form in which
I can meet your wish by pointing out the distinguishing features of the
consecutive periods of my life, in childhood, youth, and manhood. As soon as I
find it possible, I will devote some hours to this work, and will endeavor to
carry it out."
In one of his
subsequent letters he writes:
"...I am afraid
that it was in vain I gave you hopes by my promise to write my Reminiscences. I
have tried to think about it, and I saw what a dreadful difficulty it is to
avoid the Charybdis of self-praise (by keeping silence about all that is bad)
and the Scylla of cynical frankness about all the abomination of one’s life.
Were a man to describe all his odiousness, stupidity, viciousness,
vileness--quite truthfully, even more truthfully than Rousseau--it would be a
seductive book or article. People would say: ‘Here is a man whom many place
high, but look what a scoundrel he was; if so, then for us ordinary folk it is
all the more admissible.’
"Seriously, when I
began to recall vividly to my mind all my life and saw all its stupidity (sheer
stupidity) and abomination, I thought, ‘What then are other men if I, praised
by many, am such a stupid worm?’ And yet this could be explained by the fact
that I am more cunning than others. I tell you all this not for the sake of
verbal display, but quite sincerely. I have personally experienced it."
Seeing his hesitation
and being alive to the great importance of the subject, I still insisted, and I
sent him the outlines of the intended biography by way of canvas for him to
embroider.
In my scheme I set
forth the plan of dividing human life into periods of seven years’ duration. I
heard once from Tolstoy that he believed that, as physiologists divide human
life into periods of seven years, so psychological life has the same periods of
growth, and that each period of seven years’ duration has its own moral
physiognomy.
In arranging thus
briefly the facts of Tolstoy’s life we arrive at the following scheme:
(1) 1828-35: From birth
to 7 years. Childhood.
(2) 1835-42: From 7 to
14 years. Boyhood.
(3) 1842-49: From 14 to
21 years. Youth, studies university, country life, and farming.
(4) 1849-56: From 21 to
28 years. The beginning of a literary career; the Caucasus, Sevastopol, St.
Petersburg.
(5) 1856-63: From 28 to
35 years. Retirement from service.
Travels, death of a
brother, educational activity, services as a "Mediator," marriage.
(6) 1863-70: From 35 to
42 years. Married life. War and Peace. Farming.
(7) 1870-77: From 42 to
49 years. The famine in Samara. Anna Karenina. The summit of literary fame,
family happiness, and wealth.
(8) 1877-84: From 49 to
56 years. Crisis, How I Came to Believe (My Confession). New Testament. What I
Believe.
(9) 1884-91: From 56 to
63 years. Moscow. What shall we do? Literature for the people. Posrednik. Spread
of ideas in the classes and the masses. The Critics.
(10) 1891-98: From 63
to 70 years. Famine. The Kingdom of God is Within You. the Doukhobors. The
persecutions of the supporters of these views.
(11) 1898-1905: From 70
to 77 years. Resurrection. Excommunication. The latest period. Appeal to the
military, the people, the clergy, and social reformers. The war.
On even a cursory
glance at this scheme the reader must notice the spiritual tendency of each
period. And this scheme or plan has not remained without results. Before long I
received a letter from Tolstoy in which, among other things, he writes:
"...With regard to
my biography, I may tell you that I very much desire to help you and to write
at least what is most essential. I decided that I might write it, because I can
understand that it may be interesting and possibly useful to men were I to show
all the abomination of the life I led before my awakening, and--speaking
without false modesty--what was good in it (were it only in intentions, which,
owing to my weakness, were not always realized) after the awakening. It is in
this spirit that I should like to write it for you. Your programme of
seven-year periods is useful to me and does indeed suggest thoughts. I will
endeavor to occupy myself with this as soon as I complete the work I am now
engaged in."
Finally, in a few more
months, I received a rough draft of the first part of his reminiscences written
by Tolstoy. I hastened to make use of them, putting his own vivid descriptions
in the place of colorless passages of the biography I had begun. At the first
opportunity which I had I forwarded to Tolstoy the early chapters of my work,
asking him to give his opinion of it. In his answer he says:
"...My general
impression is that you make very good use of my notes, but I avoid entering
into details, as this might draw me into the work of correcting, which I wish
to avoid. So I leave it all to you, merely requesting that in your biography,
when citing extracts from my notes, you should add that they are taken from
uncorrected draft notes sent to you and put at your disposal by me."
I relate all this here
in order to free Tolstoy from all literary responsibility, and, in accordance
with his wish, I quote the italicized sentence both in the Introduction and
with all the extracts from his notes.
With this encouragement
I continued my labors.
The first volume, now
published, contains the story of his origin and the earlier periods of his
life--childhood, youth, and manhood, and ends with his marriage.
This limit is, I think,
very appropriate, the more so as Tolstoy himself looks upon his marriage as the
beginning of a new life. It happens also to have one practical convenience--its
contents make up an ordinary-sized volume.
In the second volume
will be described the period of Tolstoy’s greatest literary success, family
happiness, and material welfare, followed by an important crisis which led to
his birth into a new spiritual life. The period is that of the years 1863-84,
corresponding to his age, 35-56.
In the third and last
volume will be presented the life which he lives now, and which I hope will
continue to our joy for many years.
It is well remarked by
one of Tolstoy’s biographers that his life may be compared to a pyramid with
its top downward and the base upward, growing higher and wider. The
biographical material is distributed in a corresponding proportion: there is
very little of it during his childhood, but, as we approach the present time,
its growth becomes enormous.
Tolstoy’s name is so well
known that I am relieved of the difficult and responsible task of giving his
general characteristics in order to introduce him to the public. It is my sole
aim and endeavor to adhere to the simple facts.
October 15, 1905
Onex, near Geneva,
Villa Russe, Switzerland
P.S. I had already
reached the end of my first volume, when, in consequence of a temporary
relaxation of repressive measures in Russia, I received permission to revisit
my country. I went to Russia, accordingly, and have there been able adequately
to enlarge the biographical material of the first volume, thanks to my personal
intercourse with Tolstoy himself, and also by reading his diaries and
correspondence, for which privilege I am deeply grateful to Countess S.
Tolstoy. She gave me access to the valuable collections of biographical
materials collected by her and placed in the Historical Museum of Moscow, in
the room called after Tolstoy’s name.
Had my work been begun
under more favorable circumstances, it would probably appear in a different and
less imperfect shape. But it is impossible to go back and begin again from the
beginning; I therefore leave it in its original form, introducing only such
changes as are rendered necessary by the additional material newly collected in
Russia. I also leave unchanged the Introduction to the work, as it truly
represents the conditions under which I have done it.
Two more words. I hope
the reader will understand under what peculiar conditions I had to labor and
still am laboring. I am writing the biography not only of a living man, but
also of one who leads a strenuous and energetic life, and hence, as a
biographer, I am unable to say the last word or give my judgment on the stream
of life which is still flowing so forcibly.
I must therefore be
content simply to call my work, as I most sincerely do, a Collection of those
materials for the biography of Leo Tolstoy which are accessible to me. I
desired not to delay the publication of this volume, which is more or less
complete in itself, as I thought that its publication might indicate to
everyone a center to which information and reminiscences, as well as any
documents concerning Tolstoy, could be forwarded, and for all help and advice I
shall be very grateful.
List of materials used
for the writing of Volume I.
First Division
(1) A Short Biography,
written by Tolstoy at the request of N. Strakhov for the Stasulevich
publication, Russian Library, Issue IX. Count L. Tolstoy, St. Petersburg, 1879.
(2) How I Came to
Believe, L. Tolstoy. Complete Edition of Tolstoy’s Works, vol. i. Published by
The Free Age Press, Christchurch, Hants.
(3) First
Reminiscences. A Fragment. Complete Edition of Leo Tolstoy’s Works, vol. xiii,
tenth edition. Moscow, 1897.
(4) A rough draft of
uncorrected notes intrusted to me by Tolstoy.
(5) Private letters of
Tolstoy to his friends and relations.
(6) The Diary of Leo
Tolstoy.
(7) The Memoirs of
Countess S.A. Tolstoy.
(8) Autobiographical
Tales, printed in vol. iv. Complete Edition of Tolstoy’s Works (Articles on
Education).
(9) My Reminiscences,
1848-1889, by A. Fet. Moscow, 1890. (Many letters by Tolstoy).
(10) "A Few Words
in Connection with the Book, War and Peace." An article by Tolstoy. The
Russian Archive, 1868, vol. iii.
Second Division
(11) S.A. Bers,
Reminiscences of Count L.N. Tolstoy. Smolensk, 1894.
(12) Paul Boyer, Chez
Tolstoy: Trois jours a Yasnaya Polyana. Le Temps, August 27-29, 1901.
(13) A. E. Golovachev
Panayev, Russian Writers and Artists: Reminiscences, 1824-1870. St. Petersburg,
1890. Published by Gubinsky.
(14) D.V. Grigorovich,
Literary Reminiscences. Complete Works, vol. xii, p. 326.
(15) G.P. Danilevsky, A
Journey to Yasnaya Polyana. Historical Messenger, March, 1886.
(16) From the Papers of
A.V. Druzhinin: Twenty-Five Years. Magazine published by the Friendly Society
of Needy Writers and Scholars. St. Petersburg, 1884.
(17) N.P. Zagoskin,
Count Leo Tolstoy and his Life as a Student. Historical Messenger, January,
1894.
(18) Zakharyin (Yakunin),
Dr., Countess A.A. Tolstaya: Personal Impressions and Reminiscences. Messenger
of Europe, June, 1904.
(19) R. Loewenfeld,
Count Leo Tolstoy; His Life and Works. Translated from the German by A.V.
Pereligin (with notes by the Countess S.A. Tolstaya). Moscow, 1897.
(20) R. Lowenfeld,
Gespraeche mit und ueber Tolstoy. Leipzig.
(21) Eugene Markov, The
Living Soul in School. Thoughts and Reminiscences of an old Educationist.
Messenger of Europe, February, 1900.
(22) M.O. Menshikov,
The First Work of Tolstoy. Booklets of "Nedelya." October, 1892.
(23) N.K. Mikhailovsky,
Literary Reminiscences and the Contemporary Muddle, vol. i. Published by the
Russian Wealth. St. Petersburg, 1900.
(24) "Opinion of
One Hundred and Five Noblemen of the Tula Province upon the Question of
Allotting Land to Peasants." The Contemporary, 1858, vol. lxxii.
(25) N.A. Nekrasov,
Four Letters to Count Leo Tolstoy. "Niva." N. 2, 1898.
(26) L.P. Nikiforov,
Biographical Sketch. The Courier, September 1902.
(27) Prince D.D.
Obolensky, Reminiscences and Characteristics. The Russian Archive, 1894.
(28) I.I. Panayev,
Literary Reminiscences, including Letters. St. Petersburg, 1888. Published by
Martinov.
(29) S. Plaksin, Count
Leo Tolstoy among Children, 1903.
(30) V.A. Poltoratsky,
Reminiscences. Historical Messenger, June, 1893.
(31) A. Rumyantsev,
Letter to D.D. Titov. The Polar Star, iv. Published by Herzen, London, 1857.
(32) The Sevastopol
Song. Related by one of the authors of the song. Russian Olden Times, February,
1884.
(33) P.A. Sergeyenko,
How Leo Tolstoy Lives and Works. Moscow, 1898.
(34) Eugene Schuyler,
Reminiscences of Count Leo Tolstoy. Russian Olden Times, October, 1890.
Translated from the English (Scribner’s Magazine, 1889).
(35) I.S. Turgenev,
First Collection of Letters, 1840-1883. Published by the Literary Fund, St.
Petersburg, 1885.
(36) D. Oospensky.
Archive Materials for Tolstoy’s Biography. Russian Thought, September, 1903.
(37) Private letters of
Tolstoy’s friends and relations about him.
(38) N.K. Schilder,
Episode of the Battle of Austerlitz. Russian Olden Times, vol. lxviii, 1890.
Third Division
(39) Eugene
Gogoslavsky, Turgenev on Lyof Tolstoy, Seventy-five Opinions. Tiflis, 1894.
(40) Wilh. Bode, Tolstoy
in Weimar. Der Saemann, Monatschrift, Leipzig. September, 1905.
(41) M.I. Venukov,
Sevastopol Song. Russian Olden Times, February, 1875.
(42) Princess E.G.
Volkonskaya, The Family of the Princes’ Volkonsky. Materials collected and
edited by Princess E.G. Volkonskaya. St. Petersburg, 1900.
(43) Prince. S.G.
Volkonsky (decembrist). Memoirs. Published by M.S. Volkonsky.
(44) Eugene Garshin,
Reminiscences of I.S. Turgenev. Historical Messenger, November, 1883.
(45) P.D. Draganov,
Count L.N. Tolstoy; as a writer of world-wide fame, and the circulation of his
works in Russia and abroad.
(46) A.F. Kony, A
Biographical Sketch: "I.F. Gorbunov" (preface to the edition of his
works).
(47) V.N. Lyaskovsky,
A.S. Khomyakov, His Biography and Teaching. The Russian Archive, No. 11, 1896.
(48) V.N. Nazaryev,
Life and Men of the Past Time. Historical Messenger, November, 1900.
(49) Eugene Solovyov,
L.N. Tolstoy; His Life and Literary Activity. Published by Pavlenkov.
(50) M.A. Yanzhul, To
Tolstoy’s Biography. Russian Olden Times, February, 1900.
Books of Reference,
Articles in Newspapers, Notes.
(51) Brockhaus and
Effron. Encyclopaedic Dictionary.
(52) Yuriy Bitoft.
Count Tolstoy in Literature and Art. Bibliographical Indicator. Published by
Sytin. Moscow, 1903.
(53) Russian
Literature, Eleventh to Nineteenth Century Inclusive, by A.V. Mezyer.
(54) V. Zelinsky,
Criticism in Russian Literature of Tolstoy’s Works. Moscow, 1896.
My friend, Paul Biryukov,
having undertaken to write my biography (for the complete edition of my works),
has asked me to furnish him with some particulars of my life.
I very much wished to
fulfill his desire, and in my imagination I began to compose my autobiography.
At first, I involuntarily began in the most natural way with only that which
was good in my life, merely adding to this good side, like shade on a picture,
its dark, repulsive features. But upon examining the events of my life more
seriously I saw that such an autobiography, though it might not be a direct
lie, would yet be a lie, owing to the biased exposure and lighting up of the
good and the hushing up or smoothing down of the evil. Yet when I thought of
writing the whole truth without concealing anything that was bad in my life, I
was shocked at the impression which such an autobiography was bound to produce.
At that time I fell ill, and during the unavoidable idleness of an invalid, my
thoughts kept continually turning to my reminiscences, and dreadful these
reminiscences were.
I experienced with the
utmost force what Pushkin says in his verses, "Memory":
"When, for
mankind, the weary day grows still,
And on the City’s
silent heart there fall
The half transparent
shadows of the night
With sleep, the sweet
reward of daily work--
Then is the time when
in the hush I wear
Through dragging hours
of heavy watchfulness:
When, idle in the dark,
most keen I feel
The stinging serpent of
my heart’s remorse:
Reflection seethes--and
on my o’erwhelmed mind
Rushes a multitude of
woeful thoughts,
While memory, her
unending roll unfolds
In silence, and with
sick recoil I read
The story of my life,
and curse myself,
And bitterly bewail
with bitter tears--
But not one woeful line
can I wash out!"
In the last line I
would only make this alteration: instead of "woeful line" I would say
"shameful line can I wash out."
Under this impression I
wrote the following in my diary:
6th January, 1903:--I
am now suffering the torments of hell: I am calling to mind all the infamies of
my former life--these reminiscences do not pass away and they poison my
existence. Generally people regret that the individuality does not retain
memory after death. What a happiness that it does not! What an anguish it would
be if I remembered in this life all the evil, all that is painful to the
conscience, committed by me in a previous life. And, if one remembers the good,
one has to remember the evil too. What a happiness that reminiscences disappear
with death and that there only remains consciousness, a consciousness which, as
it were, represents the general outcome of the good and the evil, like a
complex equation reduced to its simplest expression: x = a positive or a
negative, a great or a small quantity.
Yes, the extinction of
memory is a great happiness; with memory one could not live a joyful life. As
it is, with the extinction of memory we enter into life with a clean white page
upon which we can write afresh good and evil.
It is true that not all
my life was so fearfully bad. That character prevailed only for a period of
twenty years. It is also true that even during that period my life was not the
uninterrupted evil that it appeared to me during my illness; for even during
that period there used to awake in me impulses toward good, although they did
not last long and were soon stifled by unrestrained passions.
Still these
reflections, especially during my illness, clearly showed me that my autobiography--as
autobiographies are generally written--if it passed over in silence all the
abomination and criminality of my life, would be a lie, and that, when a man
writes his life, he should write the whole and exact truth. Only such an
autobiography, however humiliating it may be for me to write it, can have a
true and fruitful interest for the readers.
Thus recalling my life
to mind, i.e., examining it from the point of view of the good and evil which I
had done, I saw that all my long life breaks up into four periods: that
splendid--especially in comparison with what comes after--that innocent,
joyful, poetic period of childhood up to fourteen; then the second, those
dreadful twenty years, the period of coarse dissoluteness, of service of
ambition and vanity, and, above all, of sensuousness; then the third period of
eighteen years, from my marriage until my spiritual birth, a period which, from
the worldly point of view, one might call moral; I mean that during these
eighteen years I lived a regular, honest family life, without addicting myself
to any vices condemned by public opinion, but a period all the interests of
which were limited to egotistical family cares, to concern for the increase of
wealth, the attainment of literary success, and the enjoyment of every kind of
pleasure; and lastly, there is the fourth period of twenty years in which I am
now living and in which I hope to die, and from the standpoint of which I see
all the significance of my past life, and which I do not desire to alter in anything
except in those habits of evil which were acquired by me in the previous
periods.
Such a history of my
life during all these four periods, I should like to write quite, quite
truthfully, if God will give me the power and the time. I think that such an
autobiography, even though very defective, would be more profitable to men than
all that artistic prattle with which the twelve volumes of my works are filled,
and to which men of our time attribute an undeserved significance.
And I should now like to
do this. I will begin by describing the first joyful period of my childhood,
which attracts me with special force; then, however ashamed I may be to do so,
I will also describe, without hiding anything, those dreadful twenty years of
the following period; then the third period, which may be of the least interest
of all; and, finally, the last period of my awakening to the truth which has
given me the highest well-being in life and joyous peace in view of approaching
death.
In order not to repeat
myself in the description of my childhood, I have read over again my work under
that title, and felt sorry that I had written it--so badly, in such an
insincere literary style is it written. It could not have been otherwise,
first, because my aim was to describe, not my own history, but that of the
companions of my childhood; and, secondly, because when writing it I was far
from independent in the form of expression, being under the influence of two
writers who at that time strongly impressed me: Sterne (Sentimental Journey)
and Topfer (Bibliotheque de mon oncle).
I am at this day
especially displeased with the last two parts, Boyhood and Youth, in which,
besides the clumsy confusion of truth with fiction, there is also insincerity,
the desire to put forward as good and important that which, at the time of
writing, I did not regard as good and important--my democratic tendency.
I hope that what I
shall now write will be better and, above all, more profitable to others.1
1. From uncorrected
draft notes communicated to me and put at my disposal by Tolstoy.
The history of the
Counts Tolstoy presents a picture of an ancient and noble family descending,
according to the accounts of genealogists, from the good and true man Indris,
who came from Germany to Chernigov in 1353 with his two sons and a retinue of
3,000 men; he was baptized and received the name of Leonty; he became the
founder of several noble families. His great-grandchild, Andrey Kharitonovich,
who moved from Chernigov to Moscow and received from the Grand Duke Vasiliy
Tyomniy the surname of Tolstoy, was the founder of the branch known to us as
the Tolstoys (in which branch Count Lev Tolstoy was born in the twentieth
generation from the founder Indris).
One of his descendants,
Peter Andreyevich Tolstoy, became a dignitary at the Russian court in 1683, and
was afterward one of the chief actors in the rebellion of the Streltsi. The
fall of the Tsarevna Sofya caused this Tolstoy abruptly to change his attitude
and pass over to the Tsar Peter; but the latter behaved to him for a long time
with coldness, and a considerable period passed before Peter Andreyevich
enjoyed the full confidence of the Tsar. It is said that at their merry
banquets Tsar Peter delighted to pull the big wig off Peter Tolstoy’s head, and
tapping him on the bald crown to repeat: "Little head, little head, if you
were not so clever, you would have parted from your body long ago."
The Tsar’s suspicions
were not allayed even by the military achievements of Peter Tolstoy during the
second Azov campaign (1696).
In 1697 the Tsar sent
"volunteers" to study in foreign countries, and Peter Tolstoy,
already a middle-aged man, offered himself to go abroad to study naval matters.
Two years which he spent in Italy gave him an opportunity of seeing something
of the culture of Western Europe. At the end of 1701 Peter Tolstoy was
appointed ambassador in Constantinople, an important but very difficult post. During
the complications of 1710-1713 Peter Tolstoy was twice confined in the Castle
of the Seven Towers, a fact which accounts for this castle being represented in
the Tolstoy coat-of-arms.
In 1717 Tolstoy
rendered an important service to the Tsar, and so strengthened his position for
all subsequent time. Having been sent to Naples, where the Tsarevich Alexis was
hiding with his mistress Euphrosyne in the Castle of St. Elmo, Peter Tolstoy,
with the help of the lady, adroitly outwitted the Tsarevich, and by means of
threats and false promises induced him to return to Russia. For his active
participation in the subsequent trial and secret execution of the Tsarevich
carried out by Peter Tolstoy, with the aid of Rumyantsev1, Oshakov, and
Buturlin, his accomplices, at the direction of Peter I, Peter Tolstoy received
a present of land, and was appointed Chief of the Secret Chamber, where there
was soon a great deal to be done in consequence of the rumors and agitations
provoked among the people by the fate of Alexis. From that time Peter Tolstoy
is conspicuous as one of the most intimate and trusted persons about the
Emperor. The affair of the Tsarevich brought Peter into favor with the Empress
Catherine, and on the day of her coronation, May 7, 1724, he was made a Count.
After the death of Peter I, Tolstoy, together with Menshikov, greatly aided
Catherine’s accession to the throne, and consequently enjoyed much favor during
her reign. But on Peter II’s accession his fall ensued. In spite of his
advanced age--he was eighty-two years old--he was exiled to the Solovetsky
Convent, where, however, he did not live long. He died in 1729.
We still possess the
diary of Peter Tolstoy’s journey abroad in 1697-1699, a characteristic
exhibition of the impression made on men of his period by their acquaintance
with Western Europe. Besides this, in 1706, Peter Tolstoy wrote a detailed
description of the Black Sea. There also exist two translations he made: Ovid’s
Metamorphoses, and Administration of the Turkish Empire.
Peter Tolstoy had a
son, Ivan Petrovich, who was himself deprived of his office, that of President
of the Court, at the same time as his father, and was exiled to the same
convent, where he died soon after him.
It was not till May 26,
1760, when the Empress Elizabeth Petrovna was already on the throne, that the
descendants of Peter Andreyevich were restored to the rank of counts in the
person of Peter’s grandson, Andrey Ivanovich, the grandfather of Lev Tolstoy.
"I heard from my
aunt the following story about Andrey Ivanovich, who whilst very young married
the Princess Schetinin. For some reason or other his wife had to go to a ball
without her husband. Having started on her way, probably in a covered sledge,
from which the seat had been removed in order that her high headgear should not
be injured, the young countess, perhaps seventeen years old, remembered that
she had not said goodby to her husband, and returned home.
"When she arrived,
she found him in tears; he was so much distressed at his wife’s leaving the house
without bidding him goodby."2
In his Reminiscences
Tolstoy speaks of his grandfather and grandmother on his father’s side as
follows:
"My grandmother,
Pelageya Nikolayevna, was the daughter of the blind Prince Nikolay Ivanovich
Gorchakov, who had amassed a large fortune. As far as I can form an idea of her
character, she was not very intelligent, poorly educated--like all at that time,
she knew French better than Russian (and to this her education was
limited)--and exceedingly spoilt, first by her father, then by her husband, and
lastly, in my time, by her son. Besides this, as a daughter of the elder
branch, she enjoyed great regard from the Gorchakovs: from the former Minister
of War, Nikolay Ivanovich, from Andrey Ivanovich and the sons of Dmitriy
Petrovich, the freethinker, Peter, Sergey, and Mikhail of Sevastopol.
"My grandfather,
Ilya Andreyevich, her husband was, according to my view of him, a man of
limited intelligence, gentle in manner, merry, and not only generous, but
carelessly extravagant, and above all, trustful. In his estate, Polyani, in the
Belyefski district--not Yasnaya Polyana, but Polyani--incessant fetes,
theatrical performances, balls, banquets, and excursions were kept up, which
largely owing to my grandfather’s tendency to play for high stakes at lomber
and whist without knowing the game, and his readiness either to give or lend to
any one who asked, both in loan and donation, and above all with the
speculations and monopolies he used to start, resulted in his wife’s large
estate being so involved in debts, that at last there was no means of
livelihood, and my grandfather had to procure the post of governor in Kazan,
which he did easily owing to his connections.
"My grandfather,
as I have been told, would not accept bribes, except from wine merchants,
though it was then a universal custom, and he was angry when any were offered
to him. But my grandmother, as I am informed, accepted presents unknown to her
husband.
"In Kazan, my
grandmother gave her youngest daughter Pelageya in marriage to Yushkov; the
eldest, Alexandra, while yet in St. Petersburg, had married Count Osten-Saken.
"After the death
of her husband in Kazan, and the marriage of my father, my grandmother settled
down with my father in Yasnaya Polyana, and here I knew her as an old woman,
and well remember her.
"My grandmother
passionately loved my father and us, her grandchildren, and amused herself with
us. She was fond of my aunts, but I think she did not quite love my mother; she
considered her unworthy of my father, and was jealous of her in regard to him.
With the servants she could not be exacting, because all knew she was the first
person in the house, and tried to please her, but with her maid, Gasha, she
gave herself up to her caprices and tormented her, calling her ‘You, my dear,’
and demanding of her what she had not asked for, and in every way worrying her.
Strange to say, Gasha or Agafiya Mikhaylovna3, whom I knew well, became
infected with my grandmother’s capricious ways, and with her little daughter,
with her cat, and in general with all those beings with whom she could be
exacting, was as capricious as my grandmother was with herself.
"My earliest
reminiscences of my grandmother, before our removal to Moscow and our life
there, amount to three strong impressions concerning her. One was how my
grandmother washed, and with some kind of special soap produced on her hands
wonderful bubbles, which, so it seemed to me, she alone could produce. We used
to be purposely brought to her--probably our delight and wonder at her
soap-bubbles amused her--in order to see how she washed. I remember the white
jacket, petticoat, white aged hands, and the enormous bubbles rising on them,
and her satisfied, smiling, white face.
"The second
recollection is how she was drawn out, my father’s valets acting as horses, in
the yellow cabriolet on springs--in which we used to go for drives with out
tutor, Feodor Ivanovich--into the small coppice for gathering nuts, of which
there was a specially great quantity that year. I remember the dense thicket of
hazel trees into which, thrusting aside and breaking the branches, Petrusha and
Matyusha, the house valets, dragged the cabriolet with my grandmother, how they
pulled down to her branches with clusters of ripe nuts, sometimes dropping off,
how my grandmother herself gathered them into a bag, and how we either
ourselves bent down branches, or else were astonished by the strength of Feodor
Ivanovich, who bent down thick stems, while we gathered nuts on all sides, and
always noticed that there yet remained nuts ungathered by us when Feodor
Ivanovich let go the stems, and the bushes slowly catching in one another
straightened up again. I remember how hot it was in the open spaces, how
pleasantly fresh in the shade, how one breathed the sharp odor of the
hazel-tree foliage, how the nuts cracked on all sides under the teeth of the
girls who were with us, and how we, without ceasing, chewed the fresh, full,
white kernels.
"We gathered the
nuts into our pockets, into the skirts of our jackets, into the cabriolet, and
our grandmother took them from us and praised us. How we came home, and what
happened after, I do not remember. I remember only that grandmother and the
hazel trees, the peculiar odor of the foliage of the hazel bushes, the valets,
the yellow cabriolet, and the sun were blended into one joyful impression. It
seemed to me that, as the soap-bubbles could be produced only by my
grandmother, so also the wood, the nuts, the sun, could only be in connection
with my grandmother in her yellow cabriolet drawn by Petrusha and Matyusha.
"But the strongest
impression connected with my grandmother was a night passed in her bedroom with
Lev Stepanovich. Lev Stepanovich was a blind story-teller (he was already an
old man when I came to know him)--the survival of ancient luxury, the luxury of
my grandfather. He was bought merely for the purpose of narrating stories,
which, owing to the extraordinary memory peculiar to blind people, he could
retell word for word after they had been twice read to him.
"He lived
somewhere in the house, and during the whole day he was not seen. But in the
evenings he came up into my grandmother’s bedroom (this bedroom was a low
little room into which one had to enter up two steps), and he seated himself on
a low window ledge, where they used to bring him supper from the master’s
table. Here he waited for my grandmother, who might with impunity perform her
night toilet in the presence of a blind man. On the day when it was my turn to
sleep in my grandmother’s bedroom, Lev Stepanovich, with his white eyes, clad
in a long blue coat with puffs on the shoulders, was already sitting on the
window ledge having his supper. I don’t remember where my grandmother
undressed, whether in this room or another, or how I was put to bed, I remember
only the moment when the candle was put out and there remained only a little
light in front of the gilded icons, and my grandmother, that same wonderful
grandmother who produced the extraordinary soap-bubbles, all white, clothed in
white, lying on white, and covered with white, in her white nightcap, lay high
on the cushions, and from the window was heard the even quiet voice of Lev Stepanovich.
‘Will it please you for me to continue?’ ‘Yes, continue,’ ‘"Dearest
sister," she said,’ recommenced Lev Stepanovich, with his quiet, even,
aged voice, ‘"tell us one of those most interesting stories which you know
so well how to narrate." "Willingly," answered Shaheresada,
"would I relate the remarkable history of Prince Kamaralzaman, if our lord
will express his consent." Having received the consent of the Sultan,
Shaheresada began thus: A certain powerful king had an only son"’...and,
evidently word for word, according to the book, Lev Stepanovich began the
history of Kamaralzaman. I did not listen, I did not understand what he said,
so absorbed was I by the mysterious appearance of the white grandmother, by her
swaying shadow on the wall, and the appearance of the old man with white eyes
whom I could not now see, but whom I realized as sitting immovably on the
window ledge, and who was saying with a slow voice some strange words, which
seemed to me very solemn as they alone resounded through the darkness of the
little room lighted by the trembling of the image-lamp. I probably immediately
fell asleep, for I remember nothing further, and in the morning I was again
astonished and enraptured by the soap-bubbles which my grandmother when washing
produced on her hands.
"According to
Marie’s recollections, the blind Lev Stepanovich’s sense of hearing was so
perfect that he could distinctly hear mice running about and could tell in
which direction they were going. In grandmother’s room one of the special
attractions for the mice was the oil used for the image-lamp, which they drank
up. At night while telling stories he would say, without changing his tone of
voice: ‘There, your excellency, a little mouse has just run to the image-lamp
to get at the oil.’ After that he would go on again with his story-telling in
the same monotone."
The following
genealogoical table gives the reader a view of the nearest ancestors and
relations of Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy:
The Counts Tolstoy
Number of Generations
from Indris
15 Peter Andreyevich
Tolstoy, the first Count (died 1729)
16 Ivan Petrovich (died
1728)
17 Andrey Ivaonvich
(died 1803)
18 Ilya Andreyevich,
Governor of Kazan (died 1820)
19 Aleksandra, married
to Count Osten-Saken. Nikolay (died 1837)
19 Pelageya, married
V.P. Yushkov. Ilya (died childless)
20 Nikolay (born 1823).
Sergey (born 1826). Dmitriy (born 1827). Lev (born 1828). Marie (born 1830).4
The Counts Tolstoy are
known in many branches of social activity. It would probably interest the reader
to know the degree of relationship which some of these bear to Tolstoy. For
example, let us take Feodor Petrovich Tolstoy, the well-known artist,
medallist, and vice-president of the Imperial Academy of Arts, his nephew the
poet, Aleksey Konstantinovich Tolstoy, and the ex-minister Dmitriy Andreyevich
Tolstoy, well known for his reactionary measures. These three members of the
Tolstoy family were distantly related to our Tolstoy, their common ancestor
being Ivan Petrovich Tolstoy, son of the first Count Tolstoy, Peter
Andreyevich, who died with his father in exile at the Solovetsky Convent.5
I ought her to mention
Theodore Tolstoy, and original man, called the American. He was known for his
very unusual adventures, and the following words in Griboyedov’s comedy, called
"Come to Grief through being too Clever," refer to him: "Exiled
to Kamchatka, he returned an Aleoute." Tolstoy speaks of him in his
reminiscences of his childhood, and it was his individuality which partly
suggested the character of Dolokhov in War and Peace. He was Tolstoy’s first
cousin once removed.
Notes to Chapter I:
1. Rumyantsev. Letter
to D.T. Titov. The Polar Star, IV. Herzen’s publication. London, 1857.
2. Note added by
Tolstoy when revising the MS of this work.
3. Agafiya Mikhaylovna
died an old woman a few years ago in Yasnaya Polyana, where she had been living
in retirement for many years.
4. "Count L.N.
Tolstoy and His University Life." N.P. Zagoskin Istoricheskiy Vestnik,
Jan., 1894, p. 81.
5. Information given by
Lev Tolstoy. See also Brockhaus and Effron’s Encyclopedia, vol. xxxiii, p. 462.
The Princes Volkonsky
trace their descent from Rurik. Since the days of Prince Volkonsky (Tolstoy’s
grandfather) the genealogical tree of the princes Volkonsky, painted in oil
colors, has been preserved1 at Yasnaya Polyana. In this the founder of the
line, St. Michael, Prince of Chernigov, is represented as holding in his hand a
tree whose branches exhibit an enumeration of his descendants.
At the beginning of the
fourteenth century Prince Ivan Turyevich, in the thirteenth generation from
Rurik, had received the Volkonsky property, situated on the Volkona; this river
flows through the present province of Kaluga and to some extent through Tula.
Hence the family was known as that of the Princes Volkonsky.2
His son, Feodor
Ivanovich, was killed in the battle of Mamai in 1380.
Among other ancestors
of Tolstoy we may mention his great-grandfather, Prince Sergey Feodorovich
Volkonsky, who is the hero of the following legend:
"The prince took
part in the Seven Years’ War as Major-General. During the campaign his wife
dreamed that a voice commanded her to have a small icon painted, showing on one
side the source of life and on the other Nikolay the Thaumaturgist, and to send
it to her husband. She selected a wooden plate, on which she ordered that the
icon should be painted, and this she sent to Prince Sergey by the hands of
Field-Marshal Apraksin. The same day Sergey received by the courier an order to
go out in search of the enemy; and having appealed for God’s help, he put on
the sacred image. In a cavalry attack a bullet struck him on the breast, but it
knocked against the icon and did not hurt him, and in this way the icon saved
his life. It was treasured in later years by his younger son, Nikolay
Sergeyevich. Prince Sergey Feodorovich died March 10, 1784."3
Tolstoy was no doubt
acquainted with this legend, and made use of it in War and Peace to illustrate
the character of the devout princess Marie Volkonskaya, as it is made to appear
in an incident represented as occurring before Prince Andrey’s departure for
the war. The reader will remember that the princess persuaded her brother to
wear the image, handing it to Prince Andrey with the words: "You may think
what you like, but do this for my sake. Please do it! The father of my father,
our grandfather, wore it during all his wars...."4
We see here artistic
truth interwoven with historical, and if the latter gives the former an air of
truthfulness, so it receives from it in return that touch of human nature which
makes all the characters of War and Peace so lifelike and so irresistibly
soul-stirring.
The younger son of
Sergey Feodorovich, Nikolay Sergeyevich, was Tolstoy’s grandfather on his
mother’s side. What we learn about him from the genealogy is as follows:
"Nikolay
Sergeyevich, an infantry general, youngest son of Sergey Feodorovich and
Princess Marie Dmitriyevna, nee Chaadayeva, was born March 30, 1753. In 1780 he
was in the suite of the Empress Catharine II when she was in Mogilev, and was
present at her first interview with the Emperor Joseph II. In 1786 he
accompanied the Empress to Taurida. On the occasion of the wedding of the
hereditary prince, afterward King Frederick William III, he was appointed
special envoy to Berlin. He died on February 3, 1821, on his estate, where he
lived throughout those last years of his life which have been immortalized by
his grandson in his novel War and Peace. His remains rest in the
Troitsko-Sergey monastery."5
In his Reminiscences
Tolstoy speaks of his maternal grandfather as follows:
"As for my
grandfather, I know that having attained the high position of
Commander-in-chief during the reign of Catherine, he suddenly lost it by
refusing to marry Potemkin’s niece and mistress, Varenka Engelhardt. To
Potemkin’s suggestion he answered: ‘What makes him think that I’ll marry his
strumpet?’
"In consequence of
this exclamation, not only was his career checked, but he was nominated
Governor of Archangel, where he remained, I believe, until Paul’s accession,
when he retired; and having after that married Princess Catherine Trubetskaya,
he settled down in his estate, Yasnaya Polyana, which he had inherited from his
father, Sergey Feodorovich.
"The Princess
Catherine died early, leaving my grandfather an only daughter, and with this
dearly beloved child and her friend, a Frenchwoman, he lived until his death
about 1821. He was regarded as a very exacting master, but I never heard
instances of his cruelty or of his inflicting the severe punishments which were
usual at that time. I believe that such cases did occur on his estate, but that
the enthusiastic respect for his character and intelligence was so great among
the servants and the peasants of his time, whom I have often questioned about
him, that although I have heard condemnation of my father, I heard only praises
of my grandfather’s intelligence, business capacities, and interest in the
welfare of the peasants and of his enormous household. He erected splendid
accommodation for his servants, and took care that they should always be not
only well fed, but also well dressed and happy. On fete days he arranged
recreations for them, swings, dancing, etc.
"Like every
intelligent landowner of that time, he was concerned with the welfare of the
peasants, and they prospered, the more so that my grandfather’s high position,
inspiring respect as it did in the police and local authorities, exempted them
from oppression from this quarter.
"He probably
possessed refined aesthetic feeling. All his buildings were not only durable
and commodious, but also of considerable beauty; and these last words would
apply also to the park which he laid out in front of the house. He probably was
very fond of music, for he kept a small but excellent orchestra, merely for
himself and my mother. I still remember an enormous elm tree which grew near
the avenue of limes and was surrounded by benches with stands for the
musicians. In the mornings he used to walk in the avenue and listen to the
music. He could not bear sport, and he loved flowers and hot-house plants.
"A strange fate
brought him into contact with that same Varenka Engelhardt whom he had refused
to marry, for which refusal he had suffered during his service. Varenka married
Prince Sergey Golitsin, who consequently received various promotions,
decorations, and rewards. With this Sergey Golitsin and his family,
consequently also with Varvara Vassiliyevna (Varenka), my grandfather entered
into so close a friendship that my mother was betrothed in her childhood to one
of Golitsin’s ten sons, and the two old princes exchanged portrait galleries
(that is, of course, copied made by serf artists). These Golitsin portraits are
all still in our house, among them Prince Sergey Golitsin wearing the ribbon of
St. Andrew, and the red-haired, fat Varvara Vassiliyevna dressed as a high lady
of the Court. The alliance, however, was not destined to be concluded: ‘My
mother’s betrothed, Lev Golitsin6, died from fever before the marriage.’"7
In going through the
genealogy of the Princes Volkonsky one comes across another interesting
personage, a cousin of Tolstoy’s mother, the Princess Varvara Aleksandrovna
Volkonskaya, a woman who saw much that went on in the house of Tolstoy’s
grandfather. We find the following said about her:
"The Princess
Varvara Aleksandrovna Volkonskaya, daughter of Prince Aleksandr Sergeyevich,
after her mother’s death frequently made long visits with her father to the
house of his brother Nikolay Sergeyevich. Her she met the persons described by
Count Leo Tolstoy in his novel War and Peace, and many details relating to them
and to the events of their time remained fresh in her memory in her old age.
Toward the close of her life she moved into a neighboring village, Sogalevo,
which also belonged to her parents. Here she had a house built for herself
close to the church, and in the society of a few old women house servants, who
did not care to part from her, she passed her life there, full of memories of
the past, reading and rereading War and Peace. Long forgotten by others, the
aged princess remained an object of respect and devotion to the local peasants.
To one casual visitor, who called on her in 1876, she related with delight how
peasants of villages long before sold and handed over to strangers, had
nevertheless on her ninetieth birthday presented her with a sack of flour and a
silver rouble, while the women brought her a rouble, fowls, and some linen. She
told this not only with a feeling of gratitude, but also with pride, since it
was a proof that a kindly recollection of her parents was still cherished among
the peasants.8
"I knew the dear
old lady, my mother’s cousin. I made her acquaintance when living in Moscow in
the fifties. Tired of the dissipated worldly life I was then leading in Moscow,
I went to stay with her on her little estate in the district of Klin, and
passed a few weeks there. She embroidered, managed her household work in her
little farm, treated me to sour cabbage, cream cheese, and fruit marmalades,
such as are only made by housewives on such small estates; and she told me
about old times, about my mother, my grandfather, and the four coronations at
which she had been present. During my stay with her I wrote the Three Deaths.
"And this visit
has remained one of the pure, bright reminiscences of my life."
Let us finally mention
one more personality of the Volkonsky family, who, though not an ancestor of
Tolstoy’s in the direct line, is yet one of his kinsmen, Prince Sergey
Grigoriyevich Volkonsky, the Decembrist. He is a second cousin of Tolstoy’s
mother and a grandson of Simon Fedorovich Volkonsky, brother of Prince Sergey
Feodorovich, mentioned above.
The prince was born in
1788, took part in the campaign of 1812, and afterward joined the southern
secret society; and for participation in the conspiracy of the Decembrists he
was exiled to Eastern Siberia, where he remained for thirty years; the earlier
years he spent doing hard labor in irons, but afterward he lived there in
Siberia as a settler.9 The journey and arrival of his wife, Princess Marie
Nikolayevna, are described in the well-known poem of Nekrasov.
In 1801 his brother
Prince Nikolay Grigoriyevich Volkonsky took, by order of the Emperor Aleksandr
I, the surname Repnin, that of his grandfather on his mother’s side, whose
family in the direct line had died out. "Let not the family of the princes
Repnin," said the ukase, "which so gloriously served its country,
become extinct with the death of the last of them, but let it be renewed, and
remain with its name and example never to be obliterated in the remembrance of
the Russian nobility."
Prince Nikolay Grigoriyevich
took part in all the campaigns against Napoleon and in the national war. For
his share in the battle of Austerlitz he was rewarded by St. George’s Order of
the fourth class. In the battle he commanded a squadron and took part in the
well-known attack of the cavalry guards described in War and Peace, in which he
was wounded in the head and otherwise severely hurt. The French bore him from
the battlefield and carried him to the hospital tent. On hearing of this,
Napoleon ordered that he should be brought on the following day to his
quarters, and out of respect for his valor he offered to set him free with all
the officers under his command, on the sole condition that they should not take
part in the war for two years. Nikolay Grigoriyevich thanked Napoleon for the
offer, but said that "he had given his oath to serve his emperor to the
last drop of his blood, and therefore could not accept the proposal."
Shortly afterward, on
his return from captivity, he was given leave of absence out of consideration for
his wounds.10
In the Russian
periodical entitled Olden Times of 1890, p. 209, appears a letter from Prince
Repnin to Mikhailovskiy-Danilevskiy, a veteran of the national war. In this
letter Prince Repnin relates in detail the episode described in War and Peace,
and quotes the actual words of his conversation with Napoleon. The first part
of this conversation is exactly reproduced in the novel War and Peace.
Notes to Chapter II:
1. This picture has
been destroyed, according to latest information.
2. The Family of the
Princes Volkonsky, p. 7.
3. The Family of the
Princes Volkonsky, p. 697.
4. War and Peace, vol.
i., p. 167, tenth edition.
5. The Family of the
Princes Volkonsky, p. 707.
6. An aunt of mine told
me that this Golitsin’s name was Leo, but this is evidently a mistake, as
Sergey Golitsin had no son Leo. I therefore think that the story about my
mother being betrothed to one of the Golitsins is correct, as well as that he
died; but that the name of Leo is not correct. (Note by Lev Tolstoy.)
7. From Tolstoy’s
uncorrected draft Reminiscences sent to me and put at my disposal by himself.
8. The Family of the
Princes Volkonsky, p. 720.
9. The Memoirs of S. G.
Volkonsky (the Decembrist).
10. The Family of the
Princes Volkonsky, pp. 704, 714, 715.
In speaking of his
parents, Tolstoy’s Reminiscences follow a certain chronological order. First he
tells us of the faintly seen features of his mother, supplementing his
description by accounts furnished by surviving members of her family; after
this he gives his fresher and more exact recollections of his father and of his
aunts. We propose to follow his example, endeavoring to change as little as
possible the order of his narrative. In giving his account of his father and
mother we have omitted only what he says of his grandfather Volkonsky, which we
have already quoted in the chapter dealing with the ancestors.
"My mother I do
not at all remember. I was a year and a half old when she died. Owing to some
strange chance no portrait whatever of her has been preserved, so that, as a
real physical being, I cannot represent her to myself. I am in a sense glad of
this, for in my conception of her there is only her spiritual figure, and all
that I know about her is beautiful, and I think this is so, not only because
all who spoke to me of my mother tried to say only what was good, but because
there was actually very much of this good in her.
"However, not only
my mother, but also all those who surrounded my infancy, from my father to the
coachman, appear to me as exceptionally good people. Probably my pure loving
feeling, like a bright ray, disclosed to me in people their best qualities
(such always exist); when all these people seemed to me exceptionally good, I
was much nearer truth than when I saw only their defects.
"My mother was not
handsome. She was very well educated for her time. Besides Russian, which,
contrary to the national illiterateness then current, she wrote correctly, she
knew four other languages, French, German, English, and Italian, and was
probably sensitive to art. She played well on the piano, and her friends have
told me that she was a great hand at narrating most attractive tales invented
at the moment. But the most valuable quality in her was that she was, according
to the words of the servants, although hot-tempered, yet self-restrained. ‘She
would get quite red in the face, even cry,’ her maid told me, ‘but would never
say a rude word.’ Indeed she did not know such words.
"I have preserved
several of her letters to my father and aunts, and her diary concerning the
conduct of Nikolenka (my eldest brother), who was six years old when she died,
and I think resembled her more than the rest of us. They both possessed a
feature very dear to me, which I infer from my mother’s letters, but personally
witnessed in my brother: their indifference to the opinion of others, and their
modesty in their endeavors to conceal those mental, educational, and moral
advantages which they had in comparison with others. They were, as it were,
ashamed of these advantages.
"I well knew these
qualities in my brother, about whom Turgenev very correctly remarked that he
did not possess those faults which are necessary in order to become a great
writer.
"I remember once
how a very silly and bad man, an adjutant of the governor, when out shooting
with him, ridiculed him in my presence, and how my brother smiled
good-humoredly, evidently greatly relishing the position.
"I remark the same
feature in my mother’s letters. She evidently stood on a higher spiritual level
than my father and his family, with the exception, perhaps, of Tatyana
Yergolskaya, with whom I passed half my life, and who was a woman remarkable
for her moral qualities.
"Besides this,
they both had yet another feature which I believe contributed to their
indifference to the judgment of men--it was that they never condemned any one.
This I know most certainly about my brother, with whom I lived half my life.
The utmost extreme expression of his negative relation to a man consisted with
my brother in good-natured humor and a similar smile. I observe the same in my
mother’s letters, and have heard of it from those who knew her.
"In the Lives of
the Saints, by Dmitriy Rostovskiy, there is a short narrative which has always
exceedingly touched me, of the life of a certain monk who had, to the knowledge
of all his brethren, many faults, and, notwithstanding this, appeared to an old
monk in a dream among the saints in a place of honor. The astonished old man
asked: ‘How could this monk, so unrestrained in many respects, deserve such a
reward?’ The answer was: ‘He never condemned any one.’
"If such rewards
did exist, I think that my brother and my mother would have received them.
"A third feature
which distinguishes my mother among her circle was her truthfulness and the
simple tone of her letters. At that time the expression of exaggerated feelings
was especially cultivated in letters: ‘Incomparable, divine, the joy of my
life, unutterably precious,’ etc., were the most usual epithets between
friends, and the more inflated the less sincere.
"This feature,
although not in a strong degree, is noticeable in my father’s letters. He
writes: ‘Ma bien douce amie, je ne pense qu’au bonheur d’etre aupres de toi.’
Whereas she addresses her letters invariably in the same way, ‘Mon bon ami,’
and in one of her letters she frankly says, ‘Le temps me parait long sans toi,
quoiqu’a dire vrai, nous ne jouissons pas beaucoup de ta societe quand tu es
ici,’ and she always subscribes herself in the same way: ‘Ta devouee Marie.’
"My mother passed
her childhood partly in Moscow, partly in the country with a clever and
talented, though proud man, my grandfather Volkonsky. I have been told that my
mother loved me very much, and called me ‘Mon petit Benjamin.’
"I think that her
love for her deceased betrothed, precisely because it was terminated by death,
was that poetic love which girls feel only once. Her marriage with my father
was arranged by her relatives and my father’s. She was a rich orphan, no longer
young, whereas my father was a merry, brilliant young man with name and
connections, but the family fortune was much impaired by my grandfather
Tolstoy--indeed my father even refused to accept the heritage. I think that my mother
loved my father, but more because he was her husband and especially as he was
the father of her children; she was never in love with him. Of real loves she
had, as I understand, experienced three or four: there was her love to her
deceased betrothed; then a passionate friendship for a Frenchwoman, Mlle.
Enissienne, about which I heard from my aunts and which I believe was
terminated by a disillusionment. Mlle. Enissienne married a cousin of my mother’s
Prince Mikhail Volkonsky, the grandfather of the present-day writer of that
name.
"This is what my
mother writes about her friendship with this lady. She is referring to two
girls who were living in her house:
"‘I get on very
well with both of them. I do some music, I laugh and joke with the one, and I
talk sentiment and condemn the frivolous world with the other. I am
passionately loved by both and am the confidante of each; I reconcile them when
they have quarreled, for there never was friendship more quarrelsome and funny
to witness than theirs; it is a series of sulks, tears, reconciliations, and
reproaches, and then of transports of affection; in a word, I see as in a
mirror the exalted and romantic friendship which had animated and troubled my
life during several years. I contemplate them with an indefinable feeling;
sometimes I envy them their illusion which I no longer possess, but of which I
know the sweetness. Let us ask frankly whether the solid and real happiness of
ripe years is worth the charming illusions of youth, when everything is embellished
by the all-powerful imagination. And sometimes I smile at their childishness.’
"Her third strong
feeling, perhaps the most passionate, was her love for my eldest brother Koko,
the diary of whose conduct she kept in Russian--putting down in it his bad
conduct--and then read to him. From this diary one can see that while she had a
passionate desire to do all that was possible toward giving Koko the best
education, she had a very indefinite idea as to what was necessary for this
purpose. Thus, for instance, she rebukes him for being too sensitive and being
moved to tears at the sight of animals suffering. A man, according to her
ideas, should be firm. Another fault which she endeavors to correct in him is
that he is absorbed in his thoughts, and instead of ‘Bon soir,’ or ‘Bon jour,’
says to his grandmother, ‘Je vous remercie.’
"The fourth strong
feeling which did perhaps exist as my aunts told me--I earnestly hope that it
did exist--was her love for me, which took the place of her love for Koko, who
at the time of my birth had already detached himself from his mother and been
transferred into male hands. It was a necessity for her to love what was not
herself, and one love took the place of another.
"Such was the
figure of my mother in my imagination. She appeared to me a creature so
elevated, pure, and spiritual that often in the middle period of my life,
during my struggle with overwhelming temptations, I prayed to her soul, begging
her to aid me, and this prayer always helped me much.
"My mother’s life
in her father’s family was a very good and happy one, as I may conclude from
letters and stories.
"My father’s
household consisted of his mother, an old lady; of her daughter, my aunt
Countess Aleksandra Osten-Saken, and her ward Pashenka; of another aunt, as we
used to call her, although she was a very distant relative, Tatyana
Yergolskaya, who had been educated in my grandfather’s house and had passed all
her later life in my father’s; and the tutor, Feodor Ivanovich Resselier,
fairly correctly described by me in Childhood. We were five children--Nikolay,
Sergey, Dmitriy, myself, the youngest boy, and our younger sister Mashenka, at
whose birth my mother died. My mother’s very short married life--I think it
lasted not more than nine years--was very full, and adorned by everyone’s love
to her and hers to every one who lived with her. Judging by the letters, I see
that she lived at that time in great solitude. Scarcely any one visited Yasnaya
Polyana except our intimate friends the Ogaryovs and some relatives who, if
casually travelling along the high-road might look in upon them.
"My mother’s life
was passed in occupations with the children, in reading novels aloud of an
evening to my grandmother, and in serious readings, such as Emile by Rousseau,
and discussions about what had been read; in playing the piano, teaching
Italian to one of her aunts, walks, and household work. In all families there
are periods when illness and death are yet unknown, and the members live
peacefully. Such a period, it seems to me, my mother was living through in her
husband’s family until her death. No one died, no one was seriously ill, my
father’s disordered affairs were improving. All were healthy, happy, and
friendly. My father amused everyone with his stories and jokes. I did not
witness that time. At the time with which my remembrances begin, my mother’s
death had already laid its seal upon the life of our family.
"All this I have
described from what I have heard and from letters. Now I shall begin about what
I have my self experienced and remember. I shall not speak about the vague,
indistinct recollections of infancy, in which one cannot yet distinguish
reality from dream-land. I will commence with what I clearly remember, with the
circumstances and the persons that surrounded me from my first years. The first
place among them is occupied, of course, by my father, if not owing to his
influence upon me, yet from my feeling toward him.
"My father from
his early years had remained his parents’ only son. His younger brother,
Ilenka, was injured, became a cripple, and died in childhood. In the year 1812,
my father was seventeen years old, and, notwithstanding the horror and fear and
pleading of his parents, he entered the military service. At that time Prince
Nikolay Gorchakov, a near relative of my grandmother, Princess Gorchakov, was
Minister of War, his brother Andrey was a general in command of troops in the
field, and my father was attached to him as adjutant. He went through the
campaigns of the years ’13 and ’14, and in ’14, having somewhere in Germany
been despatched as a courier, he was taken prisoner by the French, and was
liberated only in the year ’15, when our troops entered Paris. Even at the age
of twenty my father was not a chaste youth, but before he entered the military
service, consequently when he was sixteen years old, a connection had been
arranged by his parents between him and a servant-girl, as such a union was at
that time deemed necessary for health. A son was born, Mishenka, who was made a
postilion, and who, during my father’s life, lived well, but afterward went
wrong and often applied for help to us, his half-brothers. I remember my
strange feeling of consternation when this brother of mine, fallen into
destitution, bearing a greater resemblance to our father than any of us, begged
help of us and was thankful for ten or fifteen rubles which were given him.
"After the
campaign, my father, disillusioned as to military service, as is evident from
his letters, resigned and came to Kazan, where my grandfather, already
completely ruined, was governor, and where also resided my father’s sister who
was married to Yushkov. My grandfather soon died in Kazan, and my father
remained with an inheritance which was not equal to all the debts, and with an
old mother accustomed to luxury, as well as a sister and a cousin, on his
hands. At this time his marriage with my mother was arranged for him, and he
removed to Yasnaya Polyana, where, after living nine years with my mother, he
became a widower, and within my memory lived with us.
"My father was a
lively man of sanguine temperament; he was of medium height, well built, with a
pleasant face, and eyes of a constantly serious expression. His life was passed
in attending to the estate, a business in which he, as it seems, was not very
expert, but in which he exercised a virtue great for that time: he not only was
not cruel, but was, perhaps, even weak. So that during his time, too, I never
heard of corporal punishment. Probably it was administered, for it is difficult
to imagine at that time the management of an estate without the use of such
punishments, but the cases were probably so rare, and my father took so little
part in them, that we children never came to hear of them. It was only after my
father’s death that I learned for the first time that such punishments took
place at home.
"We children with
our tutor were returning home from a walk, when by the barn we met the fat
steward, Andrey Flyin, followed by the coachman’s assistant - ‘Squinting Kuzma,’
as he was called - with a sad face. He was a married man, no longer young. One
of us asked Andrey Flyin where he was going, and he quietly answered that he
was going to the barn, where Kuzma had to be punished. I cannot describe the
dreadful feeling which these words and the sight of the good-natured,
crestfallen Kuzma produced on me. In the evening I related this to my aunt,
Tatyana Aleksandrovna, who had educated us and hated corporal punishment, never
having allowed it for us any more than for the serfs, wherever she had
influence. She was greatly revolted at what I told her, and rebuking me said: ‘And
why did you not stop him?’ Her words grieved me still more...I never thought
that we could interfere in such things, and yet it appeared that we could. But
it was too late, and the dreadful deed had been committed.
"I return to what
I knew about my father, and how I represent to myself his life. His occupation
consisted in managing the estate, and above all in litigation, which was very
frequent at that time, and I think particularly so with my father, who had to
disentangle my grandfather’s affairs. These lawsuits often compelled my father
to leave home, besides which he used often to go out shooting and hunting. His
chief sporting companions were his old friend, a wealthy bachelor, Kireyevskiy,
Yazikov, Glebov, and Islenyev. My father, in common with other landowners of
that time, had special favorites among the house serfs. Of these there were two
brothers, Petrusha and Matyusha, both handsome, smart fellows, who helped in
the sport. At home my father, besides his occupations with his business and
with us children, was greatly given to reading. He collected a library
consisting, in accordance with the taste of the time, of French classics,
historical works, and books on natural history by Buffon, Cuvier, etc. My aunt
told me that my father had made a rule not to buy new books until he had read
those previously purchased. But although he read much, it is difficult to
believe that he mastered all these Histoires des Croisades and des Papes which
he purchased for his library. As far as I can judge, he had no leanings toward
science, but was on a level with the educated people of his time. Like most men
of the first period of Aleksandr’s reign, who served in the campaigns of the
years ’13, ’14, and ’15, he was not what is now called a Liberal, but, merely
as a matter of self-respect, he regarded it as impossible to serve either
during the latter part of Aleksandr’s reign or during the reign of Nicholas.
Not only did he never serve himself, but even all his friends were similarly
people of independent character, who did not serve, and who were in some
opposition to the government of Nicholas I. During all my childhood and even
youth, our family had no intimate relations with any government official.
Naturally I understood nothing about this in childhood, but I did understand
that my father never humbled himself before any one, nor altered his brisk,
merry, and often chaffing tone. And this feeling of self-respect which I witnessed
in him increased my love, my admiration for him. I remember him in his study,
where we used to come to say good-night to him and sometimes merely to play,
where he with a pipe in his mouth used to sit on a leather couch and caress us,
and sometimes, to our immense delight, used to allow us to mount the couch
behind his back, while he would continue reading, or talking to the steward
standing by the door, or to S.I. Yazikov, my godfather, who often stayed with
us. I remember how he used to come downstairs to us and draw pictures which
appeared to us the height of perfection, as well as how he once made me declaim
to him some verses of Pushkin, which had taken my fancy, and which I had
learned by heart: ‘To the Sea,’ ‘Fare thee well, free element,’ and to Napoleon,
‘The wonderful fate is accomplished, the great man is extinguished,’ and so on.
He was evidently impressed by the pathos with which I recited these verses,
and, having listened to the end, he in a significant way exchanged glances with
Yazikov, who was there. I understood that he saw something good in this
recitation of mine, and at this I was very happy. I remember his merry jokes
and stories at dinner and supper, and how my grandmother and aunt and we
children laughed listening to him. I remember also his journeys to town, and
the wonderfully fine appearance he had when he put on his frock-coat and
tight-fitting trousers. But I principally remember him in connection with
hunting. I remember his departures from the house for the hunt. It afterward always
seemed to me that Pushkin took his description of the departure for the hunt in
Count Nulin from my father. I remember how we used to go for walks with him,
how the young greyhounds who had followed him gambolled on the unmown fields in
which the high grass flicked them and tickled their bellies, how they flew
round with their tails on one side, and how he admired them. I remember how, on
the day of the hunting festival of the 1st September, we all drove out in a
lineyka1 to the cover, where a fox had been let loose, and how the foxhounds
pursued him, and, somewhere out of our sight, the greyhounds caught him.2 I
particularly well remember the baiting of a wolf. It was quite near the house.
We all came out to look. A big gray wolf, muzzled, and with his legs tied, was
brought out in a cart. He lay quietly, only looking through the corners of his
eyes at those who approached him. At a place behind the garden the wolf was
taken out, held to the ground with pitchforks, and his legs untied. He began to
struggle and jerk about, fiercely biting the bit of wood tied into his mouth.
At last this was untied at the back of his neck, and some one called out, ‘Off!’
The forks were lifted, the wolf got up and stood still for about ten seconds,
but there was a shout raised, and the dogs were let loose. The wolf, the dogs,
and the horsemen all flew down the field; and the wolf escaped. I remember how
my father, scolding and angrily gesticulating, returned home.
"But the
pleasantest recollections of him were those of his sitting with grandmother on
the sofa and helping her to play Patience. My father was polite and tender with
everyone, but to grandmother he was always particularly tenderly subservient.
They used to sit, grandmother, with her long chin, in a cap with ruche and a
bow, on the sofa, playing Patience, and from time to time taking pinches from a
gold snuffbox. Close to the sofa, in an arm-chair, sat Petrovna, a Tula
tradeswoman who dealt in fire-arms, dressed in her military jacket, and
spinning thread, and at intervals tapping her reel against the wall, in which
she had already knocked a hole. My aunts are sitting in arm-chairs, and one of
them is reading out loud. In one of the arm-chairs, having arranged a
comfortable depression in it, lies black-and-tan Milka, my father’s favorite
fast greyhound, with beautiful black eyes. We come to say good-night, and
sometimes sit here. We always take leave of grandmother and our aunts by
kissing their hands. I remember once, in the middle of the game of Patience and
of the reading, my father interrupts my aunt, points to the looking-glass, and
whispers something. We all look in the same direction. It was the footman
Tikhon, who, knowing that my father was in the drawing-room, was going into his
study to take some tobacco from a big, leather, folding tobacco-pouch. My
father sees him in the looking-glass, and examines his figure, carefully
stepping on tiptoe. My aunts are laughing. Grandmother for a long time does not
understand, and when she does she cheerfully smiles. I am enchanted by my
father’s kindness, and taking leave of him with special tenderness, kiss his
white muscular hand. I loved my father very much, but did not know how strong
this love of mine for him was until he died."3
To the above valuable
information about his parents, given by Tolstoy himself, we need add only a few
facts taken from historical documents.
Count Nikolay Ilich
Tolstoy, the father of Lev Tolstoy, was born in 1797. In the documents of the
Kazan University, among the papers connected with Tolstoy’s admission as a
student, one of some interest is the certificate of the military service of his
father, Nikolay Ilich.
We give the material
part of the text of this document, dated January 29, 1825.4
"The bearer of
this, Lieutenant-Colonel Nikolay Ilich, the son of Tolstoy, as appears by the
official documents, is twenty-eight years old, has the order of St. Vladimir of
the fourth class, belongs to the nobility, owns no serfs. Being a government
secretary, he entered his Majesty’s service as a cornet in 1812, June 11, in
the Irkutsk regular regiment of Cossacks, whence he was transferred to the
Irkutsk regiment of hussars in 1812, August 18; he distinguished himself and
was promoted lieutenant in 1813, April 27; and in the same year was promoted
second cavalry captain. He further distinguished himself, and was transferred
in the same rank to the regiment of horse-guards in 1814, August 8. From this
he was transferred to the regiment of the prince of Orange with the rank of
major in 1817, December 11. Having resigned, owing to illness, he was rewarded
with the rank of lieutenant-colonel in 1819, March 14. He received an
appointment in the Military Orphanage as assistant to the superintendent in
1821, December 15. During his service he took part in various campaigns. In
1813 he was often in action; on April 2 he was taken prisoner by the enemy
before the fall of Paris, and, for his distinguished conduct in battle, was
rewarded as above described with the ranks of lieutenant and captain of
cavalry, and the order of St. Vladimir of the fourth class with ribbon."
From the same document
we learn that count N.I. Tolstoy resigned his post in the Military Orphanage
and definitely retired from service, "for family reasons," January 8,
1824.
After his resignation
Count Nikolay Ilich Tolstoy settled in Yasnaya Polyana. At that time he and his
wife had only one child, their son Nikolay, one year old, born in 1823. In the
country the family quickly increased. On February 17, 1826, a son, Sergey, was
born; on April 23, 1827, Dmitriy; on August 28, 1828, a third son, Lev.
The peaceful and calm
country life of the family did not last long. In 1830, having brought into the
world a daughter, Mariya (born March 7), the Countess Tolstoy died, leaving her
husband with five children.
After the death of
their mother the children were left under the care of a distant relation, the
above-mentioned Miss Tatyana Aleksandrovna Yergolskaya, who had been
practically brought up in the house of Count Ilya Andreyevich, the grandfather
of our Count Tolstoy.
An interesting episode
in the life of the father of Tolstoy is remembered in the family.
In 1813, after the
blockade of Erfurt, he was sent to St. Petersburg with despatches, and on his
way back, near the village of St. Obie, he was taken prisoner together with his
orderly, but the latter managed to hide in his boot all his master’s gold coins.
For several months, while they were kept prisoners, he never took off his
boots, for fear he should reveal his secret. He had to bear extreme discomfort;
he had, for instance, a bad sore on his foot, still he showed no sign of pain.
When Nikolay Ilich arrived in Paris he could, thanks to his orderly, live in
luxury. He long retained a grateful recollection of his devoted servant.5
Any one who has read
Tolstoy’s personal reminiscences will readily agree that the parents whom he
describes in the novel Childhood are not his own. In fact, so far as we know,
in the father was represented A.M. Islenev, a neighboring landowner and a
friend of Tolstoy’s father. The mother is an imaginary character. But in War
and Peace it is not difficult to find an artistic description of his parents in
the persons of Count Nikolay Ilich Rostov and Princess Mariya Volkonskaya.
Almost every member of
the Rostov family, from Count Ilya Andreyevich to Sonya the adopted,
corresponds to some personage in the Tolstoy family; and the inhabitants of the
Bleak Hills can be similarly brought into comparison. The reading of this novel
therefore may add much to our knowledge of the manners and characters of the
ancestors and parents of Tolstoy.
Notes to Chapter III:
1. A Russian country vehicle,
somehwat resembling a low four-wheeled jaunting-car.
2. In Russia, owing to
local conditions, the methods of sport are necessarily different from those in
England. Thus foxes, abounding in great numbers, are hunted out of the woods by
foxhounds, and then sometimes caught by greyhounds in the surrounding fields..
3. From a draft of
uncorrected memoirs by L. Tolstoy in my possession.--P.B.
4. "Count L.N.
Tolstoy and his University Life." N.P. Zagoskin Istoricheskiy Vestnik,
January, 1894.
5. Sergeyenko, How L.N.
Tolstoy Lives and Works, p. 40. Moscow, 1898.
"I was born and I
spent my earliest childhood in the village Yasnaya Polyana."
With these words
Tolstoy opens his Reminiscences, and before we begin the description of his
childhood we think it well to say a few words about this little corner of the
earth, destined to become of world-wide interest. What a variety of visitors
have called at Yasnaya Polyana! Natives of the Malay Archipelago, Australians,
Japanese and Americans, Siberian runaways, and representatives of all the
European nations, have visited this village and spread abroad a description of
it, as well as the words and thoughts of the aged prophet, its inhabitant.
Yasnaya Polyana, the
family estate of the Princes Volkonsky, is situated in the Krapivensk district
of the province of Tula, almost on the border line of the district of Tula,
fifteen versts to the south of the town of the same name. Three high-roads of
three different periods cross one another in its neighborhood; the old Kiev
road, overgrown with grass, the new Kiev macadamized road, and the Moscow-Kursk
Railway line, the nearest station of which, Kozlovka-Zasseka, is at three and a
half versts distance from Tolstoy’s home.
The beautiful hilly
neighborhood surrounding Yasnaya Polyana is divided from east to west by a long
belt of Crown forest, called the Abattis. This name points back to ancient
times when in that place the Slavs had to repel the attacks of the Crimean
Tartars and other Mongolian tribes, and were obliged to cut trees and make
barriers which formed a natural and impenetrable defence against the enemies’
hordes.
The house in which
Tolstoy was born no longer stands in Yasnaya Polyana. The work of building it
was started by his grandfather, Prince Volkonsky, and finished by his father;
after which the house was sold to a neighboring landowner, Gorokhov, and was
removed to the village Dolgoye, where it now stands. It was in the early 1850s,
when Tolstoy was in great need of money, that he requested one of his relatives
to sell this house. The large-sized residence with columns and balconies was
sold for the comparatively insignificant price of about five thousand rubles in
paper money. From Tolstoy’s letters to his brother it is evident that he was
very sorry to part with it, and only dire necessity induced him to do so. At
present nobody lives in it. It stands neglected, with its window-shutters
nailed up. The present two houses of Yasnaya Polyana consist of the two wings,
formerly standing at the sides of the main body of the old house which was
sole. The place occupied by the old house is partly planted with trees, partly
cleared and turned into a croquet ground and a small square which is used as a
dining-place when weather permits.
In front of the house
there is at present a flower-bed, and beyond that spreads an old garden with
ponds and aged lime-tree avenues. The garden is surrounded by a ditch and a
rampart. At the entrance of this garden stand two brick towers, painted white.
Old people say that in the time of the grandfather, Prince Volkonsky, sentries
used to stand there. A birch avenue, the so-called "Prospect," begins
at the towers and leads up to the house.
To the old garden are
added new fruit gardens planted under Tolstoy’s own supervision. The whole
residence is situated on rising ground and surrounded by a luxurious growth of
shrubs.
It is unfortunate that
there exist no details of interest relating to Tolstoy’s birth besides the
following extract from the church register, quoted by Zagoskin in his
reminiscences:
"In the year 1828,
on August 28, in the village of Yasnaya Polyana, a son, Lev, was born to Count
Nikolay Ilich Tolstoy and baptized on the 29th of August by the priest Vasiliy
Mozhaiskiy, deacon Arkhip Ivanov, chanter Aleksandr Feodorov, and sexton Feodor
Grigoriyev. The sponsors at the baptism were the landowner of the Belevsky
district, Simon Ivanovich Yazikov, and Countess Pelageya Tolstova."1
The countess Pelageya
Tolstova was in fact the grandmother of Lev Tolstoy on his father’s side,
Pelageya Nikolayevna Tolstaya.
It is seldom that a
biographer has the good fortune to learn facts of such an early age. In his
First Memories, Tolstoy relates his vague sensations on being swathed,
sensations, that is, felt during the first year of his life.
We quote these
reminiscences as they stand:
"Here are my first
reminiscences, which I am unable to arrange in order, not knowing what came
before and what after; of some of them I do not even know whether they happened
in reality or in a dream. Here they are: I am bound; I wish to free my arms and
I cannot do it and I scream and cry, and my cries are unpleasant to myself, but
I cannot cease. Somebody bends down over me, I do not remember who. All is in a
half light. But I remember that there are two people. My cries affect them;
they are disturbed by my cries, but do not unbind me as I desire, and I cry yet
louder. They think that this is necessary (i.e. that I should be bound),
whereas I know it is not necessary and I wish to prove it to them, and am
convulsed with cries distasteful to myself but unrestrainable. I feel the
injustice and cruelty, not of human beings, for they pity me, but of fate, and
I feel pity for myself. I do not and never shall know what it was, whether I
was swathed when a babe at the breast and tried to get my arm free, or whether
I was swathed when more than a year old, in order that I should not scratch
myself; or whether, as it happens in dreams, I have collected into this one
reminiscence many impressions; but certain it is that this was my first and
most powerful impression in life. Nor is it my cries that are impressed upon my
mind, nor my sufferings, but the complexity and contrast of the impression. I
desire freedom, it interferes with no one else, and I, who require strength, am
weak, whilst they are strong.
"Another
impression is a joyful one. I am sitting in a wooden trough, and am enveloped
by the new and not unpleasant smell of some kind of stuff with which my little
body is being rubbed. It was probably bran, and most likely I was having a
bath, but the novelty of the impression from the bran aroused me, and for the
first time I remarked and liked my little body with the ribs showing on the
breast, and the smooth, dark-colored trough, my nurse’s rolled-up sleeves, and
the warm steaming bran-water, and its sound, and especially the feeling of the
smoothness of the trough’s edges when I passed my little hands along them.
"It is strange and
dreadful to think that from my birth until the age of three years, during the
time when I was fed from the breast, when I was weaned, when I began to crawl,
to walk, to speak, however much I may seek them in my memory, I can find no
other impressions save these two: When did I originate? When did I begin to
live? And why is it joyous to me to imagine myself as at that time, and yet has
been dreadful to me, as it is still dreadful to many, to imagine myself again
entering that state of death of which there will be no recollections that can
be expressed in words? Was I not alive when I learned to look, to listen, to
understand, and to speak, when I slept, took the breast, kissed it, and laughed
and gladdened my mother? I lived, and lived blissfully! Did I not then acquire
all that by which I now live, and acquire it to such an extent and so quickly,
that in all the rest of my life I have not acquired a hundredth part of the
amount? From a five-year-old child to my present self there is only one step.
From a new-born infant to a five-year-old child there is an awesome distance.
From the germ to the infant an unfathomable distance. But from non-existence to
the germ the distance is not only unfathomable, but inconceivable. Not only are
space and time and causation forms of thought, and not only is the essence of
life outside these forms, but all our life is a greater and greater subjection
of oneself to these forms, and then again liberation from them.
"The next
reminiscences refer to the time when I was already four or five years old, but
of these I have very few, and not one of them concerns life outside the walls
of the house. Nature, up to five years old, did not exist for me. All that I
remember takes place in my little bed in a room. Neither grass nor leaves nor
sky nor sun exists for me. It cannot be that I was not given flowers or leaves
to play with, that I did not see the grass, was not shaded from the sun; still,
up to five or six years, I have no recollection of what we call nature.
Probably one has to leave it in order to see it, and I was nature itself.
"After that of the
trough, the next reminiscence is one about ‘Yeremeyevna.’ ‘Yeremeyevna’ was a
word with which we children were threatened, but my recollection of it is this:
I am in my little bed, happy and content as always, and I should not remember
this were it not that my nurse, or some person who formed part of my childish
world, says something in a voice new to me, and goes away, and, besides being
merry, I become afraid. And I call to mind that I am not alone, but with some
one else who is like myself; this probably was my sister Mashenka, a year
younger than myself, whose bed stood in the same room as mine. I recall that my
bed has a curtain, and my sister and I are happy, and afraid of something
extraordinary which has happened among us, and I hide under my pillow, both
hide and watch the door, from which I expect something new and amusing, and we
laugh and hide and wait. And lo! there appears some one in a dress and cap
quite unlike anything I have ever seen, but I recognize that it is the same
person who is always with me (whether my nurse or my aunt I do not know), and
in a gruff voice which I recognize, this some one says something dreadful about
naughty children and "Yeremeyevna." I shriek with fear and joy, and
am indeed horrified and yet delighted to be horrified, and I wish the one who
is frightening me not to know I have recognized her. We quiet down, but then
purposely begin whispering to each other to recall ‘Yeremeyevna.’
"I have another
recollection of ‘Yeremeyevna,’ probably of a later period, for it is more
distinct, although it has forever remained incomprehensible to me. In this
reminiscence the chief part is played by the German, Feodor Ivanovich, our
tutor; but I know for certain that I am not yet under his supervision;
therefore that this takes place before I am five. And this is my first impression
of Feodor Ivanovich, and it happened so early that I do not as yet remember any
one, neither my brothers nor my father. If I have an idea of any separate
person, it is only my sister, and that simply because she is, like me, afraid
of ‘Yeremeyevna.’ With this reminiscence is connected my first recognition that
our house has a second story. How I got up there, whether I mounted alone or
was carried up, I don’t at all remember, but I remember that there were many of
us, and that we were all moving in a circle, holding each other’s hands. Among
us there were women, strangers to us (I somehow remember that they were
washerwomen), and we all begin to circle round and jump, and Feodor Ivanovich
jumps, lifting his legs too high, flinging about and making a great noise, and
I feel at one and the same moment that this is not right, and that it is
wicked, and I rebuke him, and I think I begin to cry, and everything
ceases."
The account given by
Marie, Tolstoy’s sister, of their childish games belongs to this period.
"Three of us slept
in the same room - I, Lyovochka, and Dunechka2 - and we often played with one
another, making a children’s party apart from our elder brothers, who lived
with the tutor downstairs.
"‘Milashki’ was
one of our favorite games. One of us would pretend to be the ‘milashki,’ i.e.,
a child who was specially petted by others, put to bed, fed, given medical
treatment, and generally made much fuss about. This ‘milashki’ (favorite),
according to the rules of the game, had to submit without complaining to all
the tricks that were played with him, and to act his part submissively.
"I remember how
grieved and vexed we were during the game when our ‘milashki’ (generally Lev
Nikolayevich) really fell asleep after having been put to bed. According to the
rules of the game, he had to cry, then to be doctored, given medicine, rubbed,
etc. And thus his sleep put an end to our play, and called us back from
illusions to reality.
"This is all I
remember till I was five years old," continues Tolstoy. "As for my
nurses, my aunts, brothers, sisters, father, the rooms, and the playthings--of
all these I remember nothing. My definite reminiscences commence from the time
when I was transferred downstairs to Feodor Ivanovich and my elder brothers.
"With Feodor
Ivanovich and the boys I experienced for the first time, and therefore more
powerfully than ever after, that feeling which is called the feeling of
duty--the feeling of the Cross, which every man is called to bear. I was sorry
to abandon what I was used to (used to from eternity), I was sorry, poetically
sorry, to separate not so much from persons, from my sister, my nurse, and my
aunt, as from my little bed, with its curtain and the pillow, and I was afraid
of the new life into which I entered. I tried to find what was joyful in the
new life which confronted me; I tried to believe the caressing words with which
Feodor Ivanovich sought to attract me; I tried not to see the contempt with
which the boys received me, the younger one; I tried to think that it was
shameful for a big boy to live with girls, and that there was nothing good in
the upstairs life with the nurse. But inwardly I felt dreadfully sad, I knew
that I was irretrievably losing innocence and happiness, and only the feeling
of self-respect, the consciousness that I was fulfilling my duty, supported me.
Many times later on I had to live through such moments at the parting of the
ways in life, when I entered on a new road. I experienced a quiet grief at the
irretrievableness of what was being lost, I kept disbelieving that it was
really happening. Although I had been told that I was to be transferred to the
boys, yet I remember that the dressing-gown, with belt sewn to the back, which
was put on me, cut me off as it were forever from upstairs, and then for the
first time I was impressed, not by all those with whom I had lived upstairs,
but by the principal person with whom I lived and whom I did not previously
understand. This was my aunt, Tatyana Aleksandrovna. I remember a short, stout,
black-haired, kind, affectionate, solicitous woman. She put the dressing-gown
on to me, and tightened the belt while embracing and kissing me, and I saw that
she felt as I did; that it was sad--dreadfully sad--but necessary. For the
first time I felt that life was not a plaything, but a difficult task. Shall I
not feel the same when I am dying? I shall understand that death or future life
is not a plaything, but a difficult task."3
Of this aunt, Tatyana
Aleksandrovna, Tolstoy gives the following interesting information in his
Memoirs:
"The third person,
after my father and mother, as regards influence upon my life, was my ‘Aunty,’
as we called her, Tatyana Aleksandrovna Yergolskaya. She was a very distant
relation of my grandmother through the Gorchakovs. She and her sister Lisa, who
afterward married Count Peter Ivanovich Tolstoy, remained poor little orphan
girls after the death of their parents. There were also several brothers whom
my parents managed to get adopted. But it was decided that one of the girls should
be taken to be educated by Tatyana Semyonovna Skuratov, powerful, important,
famous in her time and circle of the Chern district, and the other by my
grandmother. Scraps of paper were folded and put under the icons, and after
prayer they were chosen, when Lizenka fell to the lot of Tatyana Semyonovna,
and the little dark one (Tanichka) to my grandmother. Tanichka, as we called
her, was of the same age as my father. She was born in 1795, was brought up
exactly in equal lines with my aunts, and was tenderly loved by all; and indeed
it was impossible not to love her for her firm, resolute, energetic, and at the
same time self-sacrificing character, a character very well displayed in an
incident with a ruler, about which she used to tell us, showing the scar of a
burn on her arm, almost as big as the palm of the hand, between the elbow and
the wrist. The children had been reading the story of Mucius Scaevola, and they
disputed as to whether any of them could make up his mind to do the same. ‘I
will do it,’ she said. ‘You will not,’ said Yazikov, my godfather, and also
characteristically to himself he burned a ruler on a candle, so that it became
charred and smoked all over. ‘There, place this on your arm,’ he said. She
stretched out her white arm (at that time girls were always dressed decollete)
and Yazikov applied the charred ruler. She frowned, but did not withdraw her
arm; she groaned only when the ruler with the skin was torn away. When the
older people saw her wound and asked how it was caused, she said she had done
it herself, wishing to experience what Mucius Scaevola had done.
"So resolute and
self-sacrificing was she in everything.
"She must have
been very attractive, with her crisp, black, curling hair in its enormous
plait, her jet black eyes, and vivacious, energetic expression. V. Yushkov, the
husband of my Aunt Pelageya Ilyinishna, a great flirt, even when an old man,
used often, when recalling her, to say with the feeling with which those who
have been in love speak about the object of their previous affections: ‘Toinette,
oh! elle etait charmante!’4
"When I remember
her she was more than forty, and I never thought about her being pretty or not
pretty. I simply loved her--loved her eyes, her smile, and her dusky, broad
little hand with its energetic little cross vein.
"She probably
loved my father and my father loved her, but she did not marry him in youth, in
order that he might marry my rich mother, and later she did not marry him
because she did not wish to spoil her pure poetic relations with him and us. In
her papers, in a little beaded portfolio, there lies the following note,
written in 1836, six years after my mother’s death:
"‘16th August,
1836.--Nicolas m’a fait aujourd’hui une etrange proposition--celle de l’epouser,
de serivr de mere a ses enfants et de ne jamais les quitter. J’ai refuse la
premiere proposition, j’ai promis de remplir l’autre tant que je vivrai.’5
"Thus she
recorded, but she never spoke of this either to us or to any one. After my
father’s death she fulfilled his second desire. We had two aunts and a
grandmother; they all had more right to us than Tatyana Aleksandrovna--whom we
called aunt only by habit, for our kinship was so distant that I could never
remember it--but she, by right of love to us, like Buddha with the wounded
swan, took the first place in our bringing up. And this we felt.
"I had fits of
passionately tender love for her.
"I remember how
once on the sofa in the drawing-room, when I was about five, I squeezed in
behind her, and she caressingly touched me with her hand. I caught this hand
and began to kiss it and to cry from tender love toward her.
"She had been
educated like a young lady of a rich house; she spoke and wrote French better
than Russian, and played the piano admirably, but for thirty years she did not
touch it. She resumed playing only when I had grown up and learned to play, and
sometimes in playing duets she astonished me by the correctness and refinement
of her performance. Toward the servants she was kind; she never spoke to them
angrily and could not bear the idea of blows or flogging, yet she regarded
serfs as serfs and treated them as their superior. Notwithstanding this, all
the servants distinguished her from others and loved her. When she died and was
being borne through the village, peasants came out from all the houses and paid
for Te Deums. Her principal characteristic was love, but how I could wish that
this had not been all for one person--for my father. Still, starting from this
center her love spread on all around. We felt that she loved us for his sake,
that through him she loved every one, because all her life was love.
"She, owing to her
love for us, had the greatest right to us, but our aunts, especially Pelageya
Ilyinishna, when the latter took us away to Kazan, had the external rights and ‘Auntie’
submitted to them, but her love did not thereby diminish. She lived with her
sister, the Countess L.A. Tolstaya, but in her soul she lived with us, and,
whenever possible, she would return to us. The fact that the last years of her
life, about twenty years, were passed me at Yasnaya Polyana was a great joy to
me. But how incapable we were of appreciating our happiness, the more so that
true happiness is never loud nor manifest! I appreciated it, but far from
sufficiently. ‘Auntie’ liked to keep sweets in her room in various little
dishes--dried figs, gingerbread, dates; she liked to buy them and to treat me
first to them. I cannot forget, and cannot call to mind without a cruel twinge
of conscience, how several times I refused her money for the sweets, and how
she, sadly sighing, desisted. It is true I was then in straitened
circumstances, but now I cannot recall without remorse how I refused her!
"When I was
already married and she had begun to fail, she once, having waited for the
opportunity when I was in her room, turning her face away, said to me (I saw
she was ready to shed tears): ‘Look here, mes chers amis, my room is a very
good one and you will require it. But if I die in it,’ she went on with a
trembling voice, ‘the memory of that will be unpleasant, so move me to another
that I may not die here.’ Such she was from the earliest time of my childhood,
when as yet I could not understand....
"Her room was
thus. In the left corner stood a worktable with innumerable little articles
valuable only to her, in the right corner a glass cupbord with icons and one
big one--that of the Saviour--in a silver setting; in the middle the couch on
which she slept, in front of it a table. To the right a door for her maid.
"I have said that
Aunty Tatyana Aleksandrovna had the greatest influence on my life. This
influence consisted first, in that ever since childhood she taught me the
spiritual delight of love. She taught me this, but not in words: by her whole
being she filled me with love. I saw, I felt, how she enjoyed loving, and I
understood the joy of love. This was the first thing.
"Secondly, she
taught me the delights of an unhurried, lonely life.
"But about this we
will speak later.
"Although this
reminiscence is not of childhood but of adult life, I cannot refrain from
recalling my bachelor life with her at Yasnaya Polyana."6
In the chapter dealing
with Tolstoy’s parents we have already mentioned that his novels, Childhood,
Boyhood, and Youth, are not to be considered autobiographical; but this remark
only applies to their external facts and scenery, created by the author to give
greater completeness to his picture.
As to the description
of the inner life of the child-hero, we can say with confidence that, in one
way or another the author lived through all the experiences of his hero, and
therefore we consider that we have a right to use them as furnishing hints for
our biography.
Further, we know that
certain of the characters which we meet with in this work are copies from life.
We will mention them here as they will throw some further light on the group of
persons among whom Tolstoy’s childhood was spent.
Thus, the German, Karl
Ivanovich Mauer, is certainly Feodor Ivanovich Kessel, the German tutor, who
really lived in Tolstoy’s home, and whom we have mentioned before. Tolstoy
speaks of him in his Earliest Memories. He must undoubtedly have influenced the
spiritual life of the child, and we may presume that the influence had been for
good, since the author of Childhood speaks with great love of him, where he
sketches his "honest, straightforward, and loving nature."
It is not without
reason that Tolstoy begins the story of his childhood with a description of
this character. Feodor Ivanovich died in Yasnaya Polyana, and was buried in the
parish churchyard.
Another real character
in Childhood is the half-crazy Grisha. Though he is not a real person, many
traits of his character are true to life; he had evidently left a deep trace in
the child’s soul. To him Tolstoy dedicates the following pathetic words
describing the evening prayer of the pilgrim, which he overheard:
"His words were
incorrect, but touching. He prayed for all his benefactors (thus he called all
who received him), among them for my mother, and for us; he prayed for himself
and asked the Lord to forgive him his heavy sins, and repeated, ‘O Lord,
forgive mine enemies.’ He arose with groans, still repeating the same words,
prostrated himself upon the ground, and again arose, in spite of the weight of
the chains that emitted a grating, penetrating sound as they struck the
ground....
"Grisha was for a
long time in this attitude of religious ecstasy, and he improvised prayers. Now
he repeated several times in succession, ‘The Lord have mercy upon me,’ but
every time with new strength and expression; now, again, he said, ‘Forgive me,
O Lord, instruct me what to do, instruct me what to do, O Lord!’ with an
expression as if he expected an immediate answer to his prayer; now, again,
were heard only pitiful sobs. He rose on his knees, crossed his arms on his
breast, and grew silent.
"‘Thy will be
done!’ he suddenly exclaimed with an inimitable expression, knocked his brow
against the floor, and began to sob like an infant.
"Much water has
flowed since then, many memories of the past have lost all meaning for me and
have become dim recollections, and pilgrim Grisha has long ago ended his last
pilgrimage; but the impression which he produced on me, and the feeling which
he evoked, will never die in my memory.
"O great Christian
Grisha! Your faith was so strong that you felt the nearness of God; your love
was so great that words flowed of their own will from your lips, and you did
not verify them by reason. And what high praise you gave to the majesty of God,
when, not finding any words, you prostrated yourself on the ground."
Are we not entitled to
regard this man as the first who taught Tolstoy that faith of the people,
which, after his fruitless wanderings through the labyrinths of theology,
philosophy, and positive science, satisfied his soul. A faith which he in his
turn has lighted with his own light of reason, purified and intensified in the
struggle and sufferings which unavoidably accompany the search for truth. He
gives a few indications of this in his Reminiscences.
Of other secondary
characters in the novel we will mention Mimi and her daughter Katenka,
"something like the first love." Under the name Mimi is presented the
governess of a neighboring house, and Katenka is Dunechka Temeshova, an adopted
member of the tolstoy family. Tolstoy in his Reminiscences, speaks of her thus:
"Besides my
brothers and my sister, a girl of my age, Dunechka Temeshov, grew up with us,
and I must tell who she was and how she came to be in our house. The visitors
whom I remember in childhood were my aunt’s husband Yushkov, of an appearance
strange to children, with black mustaches and whiskers and wearing spectacles
(I shall yet have much to say about him); and my godfather, S. Yazikov, a remarkably
ugly man, saturated with the smell of tobacco, his big face possessing a
superfluity of skin which he kept twisting incessantly into the strangest
grimaces, and our neighbors Ogarev and Islenev. Besides these we were also
visited by a distant relative through the Gorchakovs, a wealthy bachelor
Temeshov, who addressed my father as brother, and had a peculiarly enthusiastic
love for him. He lived forty versts from Yasnaya Polyana, in the village
Pirogovo, and once brought with him from there some sucking pigs, with tails
twisted into rings, which were placed on a tray on the table in the servants’
hall. Temeshov, Pirogovo, and sucking pigs are blended into one in my
imagination.
"Besides this,
Temeshov retained a place in the memory of us children by his playing on the
piano in the hall some dancing tune--it was all he could play--and making us
dance to this music, and when we used to ask him what dance we were to dance,
he would say that all dances could be danced to that music. And we liked to take
advantage of this.
"It was a winter
evening. Tea was over, we were soon going to be taken to bed, and my eyes were
already blinking, when from the servants’ hall into the drawing-room, where we
were all sitting, and where only two candles were burning, and it was half
dark, there came suddenly and quickly through the big open door a man in soft
boots who, having reached the middle of the room, fell down on his knees. The
lighted pipe with its long stem, which he held in his hand, struck against the
floor, and the sparks flew out lighting the face of the kneeling man--it was
Temeshov. What Temeshov told my father, while kneeling before him, I do not
remember nor indeed did I hear, but only afterward I learned that he had fallen
on his knees before my father because he had brought with him his illegitimate
daughter, Dunechka, concerning whom he had previously spoken, and arranged that
my father should accept her and bring her up with his own children. Thenceforth
a broadfaced girl appeared among us, of the same age as myself, Dunechka, with
her nurse Eupraksiya, a tall, wrinkled old woman with a hanging chin, like a
turkey in which there was a ball which she used to let us feel.
"The introduction
of Dunechka into our house was connected with a complicated business agreement
between my father and Temeshov. The agreement was of this sort:
"Temeshov was very
wealthy. He had no legitimate children; he only had two little girls, Dunechka
and Verochka, the latter a little hunchback, born of a former serf girl, Marfusha,
who was subsequently set free. The heirs of Temeshov were his sisters. He made
over to them all his estates except Pirogovo, in which he lived, and this he
desired to transfer to my father, on the understanding that my father should
remit to the two girls its value of 30,000 pounds sterling. It was always said
of Pirogovo that it was as good as a gold mine, and was worth much more than
that sum. In order to arrange this matter the following method was devised:
Temeshov drew up a conveyance according to which he sold Pirogovo to my father
for 30,000 pounds, while my father gave promissory notes to three unconcerned
persons--Islenev, Yazikov, and Glebov--to the amount of 10,000 pounds each. On
Temeshov’s death my father was to take possession of the estate, and having
previously explained to Glebov, Islenev, and Yazikov for what purpose the notes
were given them, he was to pay them the 30,000 pounds which were to go to the
two girls.
"Perhaps I may be
mistaken in the description of the whole plan, but I positively know that the
estate of Pirogovo passed over to us after my father’s death, and that there
were three promissory notes payable to Islenev, Glebov, and Yazikov, that our
guardians redeemed these notes, and that the amount of the first two was paid
to the girls, 10,000 to each; whereas Yazikov misappropriated the other 10,000;
but about this later.
"Dunechka lived
with us, and was a nice simple, quiet, but not clever girl, and much disposed
to weep. I remember how, when I had already learned French, I was made to teach
her the alphabet. At first it went well (we were each five years old), but
later she probably became tired, and ceased to name correctly the letter I
pointed out. I insisted. She began to cry. I also. And when the elders came we
could not pronounce anything owing to our hopeless tears. I remember another
incident about her. When a plum was found to be missing from a plate and the
culprit could not be discovered, Feodor Ivanovich, with a serious face and not
looking at us, said that its being eaten did not much matter, but that any one
who swallowed the stone might die. Dunechka could not restrain her terror, and
said that she had spat out the stone. I further remember her tears of despair
when she and my brother Mitenka got up a game which consisted in spitting into
each other’s mouth a little copper chain, and she spat so strongly, while
Mitenka opened his mouth wide, that he swallowed the chain. She cried
inconsolably until the doctor arrived and reassured everyone...."
This brief but valuable
information Tolstoy gives concerning the servants who surrounded him during his
childhood. The information forms a supplement to what is described in his
published story Childhood. We borrow this description also from his
Reminiscences:
"I have described
Praskovya Issayevna fairly correctly in Childhood. All I there wrote about her
was actual truth. She was the housekeeper, a venerable personage. I remember
one of the pleasantest impressions was that of sitting in her room after or
during a lesson and talking with and listening to her. She probably liked to
see us at these moments of specially happy and touching expansiveness: ‘Praskovya
Issayevna, how did grandfather fight? On horseback?’ one would ask her.
"‘He fought in
various ways, on horseback and on foot, and in consequence he was
General-in-Chief,’ she would answer, opening a cupboard and getting out a
burning tablet which she called the ‘Ochakovskiy smoke.’ According to her
words, it appeared that this tablet grandfather brought from Ochakov. She would
ignite a taper at the little lamp in front of the icons, and with it would
light the tablet, which smouldered with a pleasant scent.
"Besides her
devotion and honesty, I especially loved her because, with Anna Ivanovna, she
was connected in my eyes with that mysterious side of my grandfather’s
life--with the ‘Ochakovskiy smoke’.
"Anna Ivanovna
lived in retirement, but once or twice she visited the house, and I saw her. It
was said that she was a hundred years old, and that she remembered Pogachev.7
She had very black eyes and one tooth. She was in that stage of old age which
inspires children with fear.
"Nurse Tatyana
Filipovna, small, dusky, and with plump little hands, was the young assistant
of our old nurse Annushka, whom I scarcely recall precisely, because at the
time I was with Annushka I was conscious of myself only. And as I did not
observe myself nor understand myself as I then was, so also I do not remember
Annushka.
"And as I did not
look at myself, and don’t remember how I looked, so I cannot recall to mind
Annushka, but Dunechka’s nurse, Eupraksiya, with a little ball on her neck, is
well preserved in my memory.
"Nurse Tatyana
Filipovna I remember because she was afterward the nurse of my nieces and of my
eldest son. She was one of those pathetic beings from among the people who so
identify themselves with the families of their nurslings that they transfer all
their interests to those families, and so that their own relatives see in them
only an opportunity for extortion or await the inheritance of the money they
earned. Such have always spendthrift brothers, husbands, or sons. Such were, so
far as I can remember, Tatyana Filipovna’s husband and son. I remember how he
[sic?] painfully, quietly, and meekly died in the very place where I am now
sitting writing these Reminiscences. Her brother, Nikolay Filipovich, was a
coachman, whom we not only loved, but for whom, as gentlemen’s children
generally do, we felt a great reverence. He had peculiar thick boots; he always
carried with him the pleasant smell of the stables, and his voice was tender
and musical.8
"The butler,
Vasiliy Trubetskoy, should be mentioned. He was a pleasant, kindly man, who
evidently loved children, and therefore loved us, especially Seryozha, at whose
house he afterward served, and where he died. I remember the kind, one-sided
smile of his beaming face with its wrinkles, and his neck, which we saw close,
and his peculiar smell when he took us in his arms and seated us on the tray
(it was one of our great pleasures; ‘And me, now me!’) and carried us about the
pantry--a place mysterious in our eyes, with its strange underground passage.
One poignant reminiscence connected with him was his departure to
Shcherbachovka, an estate in the government of Kursk, inherited by my father
from a relative. This (Vasiliy’s departure) happened during Yule-tide, at the
time when all the children and some of the household servants were playing at ‘Rublik’
in the hall. I must say a word about those Yuletide amusements. They took place
thus: all the household servants--and there were many of them, about
thirty--used to dress up, come into the house, play various games, and dance to
the accompaniment of the fiddle of old Gregoriy, who only appeared in the house
on these occasions. It was very amusing. Those masquerading usually represented
a bear with its leader, a goat, Turks and Turkish women, tyrolese, brigands,
peasant men and women. I remember how beautiful some of the characters appeared
to me, and especially so Masha, the Turkish woman. Sometimes Auntie dressed us
up also. Especially desirable to us was a belt with stones and a muslin towel, embroidered
with silver and gold; and I thought myself very grand with mustaches painted
with burnt cork. I remember that looking in the mirror at my face, with black
mustaches and eyebrows, I could not refrain from a smile of delight, though I
had to assume the fierce expression of a Turk. All these characters walked
about the rooms and were treated to various refreshments. During one of the
Yule-tides of my earlier childhood, all the Islenevs came to us dressed up: the
father, who was my wife’s grandfather, with his three sons and three daughters.
They all had on costumes, which appeared most extraordinary to us; there was a
toilet, there was a boot, there was a cardboard belt, and something else
besides. The Islenevs, having driven thirty miles, changed dress in the
village, and on entering our hall Islenev sat down to the piano and sang some
verses he had invented, to a tune which I can still remember. The verses were: ‘We
have come here to congratulate you on the New Year; should we succeed in
amusing you we shall be happy!’ This was all very extraordinary, and probably
entertaining to the elders, but for us children the most amusing were the
household servants. Such entertainments took place during Christmas and at New
Year, sometimes even later, up to the day of Baptism9; but after New Year few
people came and the amusements slackened. So it was on the day when Vasiliy was
leaving for Shcherbakova. I remember we were sitting in a circle in the corner
of the dimly lighted hall on home-made chairs of imitation mahogany with
leather cushions and playing at ‘Rublik’. One of us was walking about searching
for the ruble, while we, passing it on from hand to hand, were singing, ‘Pass
on Rublik, pass on Rublik.’ I remember one of the servant-girls kept singing
these words with an especially pleasant and true voice. Suddenly the door of
the pantry opened, and Vasiliy, buttoned up in an unusual way, without his tray
and china, passed along the end of the hall into the study. Then only did I
learn that Vasiliy was going as overseer to Shcherbakova. I understood it was a
promotion, and was glad for Vasiliy, and at the same time I was not only sorry
to part from him, to know that he would no longer be in the pantry and would no
longer carry us on his tray, but I did not even understand, did not believe,
that such an alteration could take place. I became dreadfully and mysteriously
sad, and the chant of ‘Pass on Rublik’ grew pathetically touching. And when
Vasiliy left my aunt, and with his dear one-sided smile approached us, and
kissed us on the shoulder, I experienced for the first time horror and fear in
the presence of the inconstancy of life, and pity and love toward dear Vasiliy.
When I afterward used to meet Vasiliy I saw in him merely a good or a bad
overseer of my brother’s, a man whom I respected, but there was no longer any
trace of the former sacred, brotherly, human feeling.
"In a mysterious
way, incomprehensible to the human mind, the impressions of early childhood are
preserved in one’s memory, and not only are they preserved, but they grow in
some unfathomed depth of the soul, like a seed thrown on good ground, and after
many years all of a sudden thrust their vernal shoots into God’s world."
Such a seed-time in
Tolstoy’s early childhood were the days of his eldest brother Nikolenka’s games
with the younger brothers. His great influence on Tolstoy’s life is referred to
in his Reminiscences more than once, for example, in the stories about the
Fanfaronov Hill, Ant Brothers, and the Green Wand.
"Yes, the Fanfaronov
Hill is one of the earliest, pleasantest, and most important memories. My
eldest brother, Nikolenka, was six years older than I. He was consequently ten
or eleven when I was four or five, namely, at the time when he led us on to the
Fanfaronov Hill. In our earlier youth we used to address him (I don’t know how
it happened) as ‘you’.10 He was a wonderful boy, and later a wonderful man.
Turgenev used very truly to say about him that but for the lack of certain
faults he would have been a great writer. For instance he was deficient in
vanity; he was not in the least interested in what people thought of him.
Whereas the qualities of a writer which he did possess were, first of all, a
fine artistic sense, an extremely developed sense of proportion, a good-natured,
gay human, an extraordinary, inexhaustible imagination, and a truthful and
highly moral view of life--and all this without the slightest conceit. His
imagination was such that he could during whole hours narrate ghost stories or
humorous tales in the spirit of Mrs. Radcliffe without pause or hesitation, and
with such vivid realization of what he was narrating that one forgot it was all
invention. When he was not narrating or reading (he read a great deal) he used
to draw. He almost invariably drew devils with horns and pointed mustaches,
intertwined in the most varied attitudes and occupied in the most various ways.
These drawings were also full of imagination and humor.
"Well, it was he
who, when I and my brothers were, myself five years old, Mitenka six, Seryozha
seven, announced to us that he possessed a secret by means of which, when it
should be disclosed, all men would become happy: there would be no diseases, no
troubles, no one would be angry with any one, all would love each other, all would
become ‘Ant brothers.’ He probably meant ‘Moravian brothers,’ about whom he had
heard and had been reading, but in our language they were ‘Ant brothers.’11 And
I remember that the word Ant especially pleased us, as reminding us of ants in
an ant-hill. We even organized a game of ant brothers, which consisted in our
sitting down under chairs, sheltering ourselves with boxes, screening ourselves
with handkerchiefs, and, thus, crouching in the dark, pressing ourselves
against each other. I remember experiencing a special feeling of love and
pathos and liking this game very much. The ant brotherhood was revealed to us,
but the chief secret as to the way for all men to cease suffering any
misfortune, to leave off quarreling and being angry, and to become continuously
happy, this secret, as he told us, was written by him on a green stick, which
stick he had buried by the road on the edge of a certain ravine, at which spot,
since my corpse must be buried somewhere, I have asked to be buried in memory
of Nikolenka. Besides this little stick, there was also a certain Fanfaronov
Hill up which he said he could lead us, if only we would fulfill all the
appointed conditions. These conditions were: first, to stand in a corner and
not think of the white bear. The second condition was to walk without wavering
along a crack between the boards of the floor; and the third, for a whole year
not to see a hare either alive or dead or cooked; and it was necessary to swear
not to reveal these secrets to anyone. He who should fulfill these conditions
and others more difficult which Nikolenka was going to communicate later, would
have his desire fulfilled, whatever it might be. We had to express our desires.
Seryozha desired to be able to model horses and hens out of wax. Mitenka desired
to be able to draw all kinds of things like an artist on a large scale. I could
not devise anything but to be able to draw small pictures. All this, as it
happens with children, was very soon forgotten and no one ascended the
Fanfaronov Hill, but I remember the profound importance with which Nikolenka
initiated us into these mysteries, and our respect and awe in regard to the
wonderful things which were revealed. But I have especially kept a strong
impression of the ‘Ant Brotherhood’ and the mysterious green stick connected
with it destined to make all men happy.
"As I now
conjecture, Nikolenka had probably read or heard of the Freemasons--about their
aspiration toward the happiness of mankind, and about the mysterious initiatory
rites on entering their order; he had probably also heard about the Moravian
brothers, and linking all into one by his active imagination, his love to men,
and his aptness to kindness, he invented all these tales, enjoyed them himself,
and mystified us with them.
"The ideals of ant
brothers lovingly cleaving to each other, though not beneath two arm-chairs
curtained with handkerchiefs, but of all mankind under the wide dome of the
sky, has remained the same for me. As then I believed that there existed a
little green stick whereon was written that which could destroy all the evil in
men and give them great welfare, so do I now also believe that such truth
exists, and that it will be revealed to men and will give them all that it
promises."12
Later on we shall refer
to Tolstoy’s memories of his brother Dmitriy. Here we will quote another
extract from his Reminiscences concerning his brother Sergey, also relating to
his early childhood: "Mitenka was for me a companion, Nikolenka I
respected, but Seryozha I enthusiastically admired and imitated. I loved him
and wished to be like him; I admired his handsome appearance, his singing--he
was always singing--his drawing, his cheerful mirth, and especially, however
strange it may be to say so, the spontaneity of his egotism. I always realized
myself, was always conscious of my myself; I always felt whether others’
thoughts and feelings about me were just or not, and this spoiled my joy of
life. This probably is why I especially liked in others the opposite feature,
spontaneity of egotism. And for this I especially loved Seryozha. The word
loved is not correct. I loved Nikolenka, but for Seryozha I was filled with
admiration as for something quite apart and incomprehensible to me. It was a
human life, a very fine one, but completely incomprehensible to me, mysterious,
and therefore specially attractive.
"A few days ago he
died, and in his last illness and his death he was to me as unfathomable and as
dear as in our bygone days of childhood. In more advanced age, his latter days,
he loved me more, valued my attachment, was proud of me, wished to agree with
me, but could not, and remained the same as he had been, entirely original,
altogether himself, handsome, high-spirited, proud, and above all and to such
an extent a truthful and sincere man that I have never seen his like. He was
what he was; he concealed nothing, and did not desire to appear anything.
"With Nikolenka I
wished to associate, to talk, to think; Seryozha I only wished to imitate. This
imitation began in our first childhood. He took to keeping his own hens and
chickens, and I did the same. This was perhaps my first insight into animal
life. I remember chickens of various breeds--gray, spotted, or tufted, how they
used to run to us at our call, how we fed them and hated the big Dutch cock
which maltreated them. Seryozha had begged these chickens for himself; I did
the same in imitation of him. Seryozha used to draw and paint on long strips of
paper (and as it appeared to me wonderfully well) rows of hens and cocks of
various colors, and I did the same but not so well. (In this I hoped to perfect
myself by the means of the Fanfaronov Hill.) Seryozha, when the double doors
were removed in spring, had the idea of feeding the hens through the keyhole in
the door by means of long thin sausages of black and white bread, and I did the
same."13
Let us add here a few
more fragmentary reminiscences related by Tolstoy himself, which, like most of
the stories of his early childhood, it is impossible to arrange in a
chronological order, though it would be a pity to omit them, as they give some
interesting traits descriptive of his childhood.
"One childish
memory of an insignificant event left a strong impression on me," said
Tolstoy. "It was, I see it now, in our nursery rooms upstairs. Temeshov
was sitting talking to Feodor Ivanovich. I do not remember why the good-natured
Temeshov, very quietly said: ‘My cook (or servant, I do not remember which)
took it into his head to eat meat during fast time. I sent him to be a soldier.’14
The reason why I now remember this is, that at the time it seemed to something
strange and incomprehensible.
"Another event was
the Perov inheritance. I remember a caravan, with horses and carts loaded high,
which arrived from Nerucha15 when the lawsuit concerning this estate had been
won, thanks to Glya Mitrovich.
"He was a tall old
man with long hair, addicted to fits of drinking, a former serf of the owner,
and a great specialist, such as there used to be in olden times, in dealing
with various cases that might lead to litigation. He directed the case, and in
return he was kept until his death in Yasnaya Polyana.
"Other memorable
impressions are: the arrival of Peter Tolstoy, the father of my sister’s
husband, Valerian; he used to come into the drawing-room in his dressing-gown;
we did not understand why, but later we learned that it was because he was in
the last stage of consumption. Another impression: the arrival of his brother,
the famous traveller in America, Feodor Tolstoy. I remember how he drove up in
a post-chaise, entered my father’s study, and ordered his special dry French
bread to be brought. He did not eat any other. At this time my brother Sergey
was suffering from a very bad toothache. He asked what was the matter, and
having ascertained, said that he could cure the pain by magnetism. He entered
the study and locked the door after him. In a few minutes he came out with two
cambrick pocket handkerchiefs--I remember they had a fancy violet edge--and he
gave the handkerchiefs, saying: ‘When he puts on this one the pain will cease,
and this one is for him to sleep with.’ The handkerchiefs were taken, put on
Seryozha, and we carried away and kept the impression that everything took
place as he had said.
"I remember his
fine, bronzed face, shaven, save for thick white whiskers down to the corners
of the mouth and similarly white curly hair. I should like to relate much about
this extraordinary, guilty, and attractive man!"
Here, unfortunately,
these reminiscences stop short.
Let us conclude this
chapter on the childhood of Tolstoy with the poetic memory in his published
story.
"Happy, happy,
irrevocable period of childhood! How can one help loving and cherishing its
memories? These memories refresh and elevate my soul and serve me as a source
of my best enjoyments....
"After the prayer
I rolled myself into my coverlet, and my heart felt light and cheerful. One
dream chased another, but what were they about? They were intangible, but
filled with pure love and hope for the bright happiness. I thought of Karl Ivanovich
and his bitter fate, of the only man whom I knew to be unhappy, and I felt so
sorry for him, and so loved him, that the tears gushed from my eyes, and I
thought: God grant him happiness, and me an opportunity of helping him, and
alleviating his sorrow; I was ready to sacrifice everything for him. Then I
stuck my favorite china toy--a hare or a dog--into the corner of the down
pillow, and I was happy seeing how comfortable and snug the toy was there. I
also prayed the Lord that He would give happiness to everybody, and that all
should be satisfied, and that tomorrow should be good weather for the outing,
and then I turned on my other side, my thoughts and dreams became mixed and
disturbed, and I fell softly, quietly asleep, my face wet with tears.
"Will that
freshness, carelessness, need of love, and strength of faith, which one
possesses in childhood, ever return? What time can be better than that when all
the best virtues--innocent merriment and limitless need of love--are the only
incitements in life?
"Where are all
those ardent prayers, where is the best gift--those tears of contrition? The
consoling angel came on his pinions, with a smile wiped off those tears, and
fanned sweet dreams to the uncorrupted imagination of the child.
"Is it possible
life has left such heavy traces in my heart that these tears and that ecstasy
have forever gone from me? Is it possible, nothing but memories are left?"
Notes to Chapter IV:
1. N. P. Zagoskin,
"Count L.N. Tolstoy and his Student Years." Historic Review, Jan.
1894, p. 87.
2. The governess; see
concerning her further on in the following chapter.
3. First Reminiscences
(from unpublished autobiographical sketches). Tolstoy’s Complete Works, tenth
Russian edition, vol. xiii, p. 515.
4. "Toinette, oh!
she was charming!""Count L.N. Tolstoy and his Student Years."
Historic Review, Jan. 1894, p. 87.
5. "16th August
1836.--Nicholas has today made me a strange proposal - that I should marry him,
be a mother to his children, and never desert them. I refused the first
proposal, I have promised to fulfill the other as long as I live."
6. From Tolstoy’s rough
Memories and uncorrected notes intrust! to me.
7. The leader of a
widespread and bloody rebellion in the reig! Catherine II.
8. From Tolstoy’s draft
Reminiscences.
9. Sixth of January.
10. Instead of the
singular "thou," as is usual in Russian between near relatives or
friends.
11. The word for ant in
Russian is "muravey," whence the similarity.
12. From Tolstoy’s
draft Reminiscences.
13. From Tolstoy’s
draft Reminiscences.
14. In Russia, in the
days of serfdom, the enlisting of a serf into the ranks for the fifteen years
was regarded as the severest punishment short of flogging him to death.
15. This estate of 900
acres which we received by inheritance was sold for the purpose of feeding the
starving during the great famine of 1840.
With the beginning of
Tolstoy’s boyhood came the time for the more serious education of his elder
brothers, Nikolay and Sergey. For this purpose, in autumn of 1836, the Tolstoy
family moved to Moscow, and settled down at Plushchikha, in a house belonging
to one Shcherbakov. This house is still in use, and stands back opposite St.
Mary the Virgin’s Church, Smolenskiy, its facade forming an acute angle with
the direction of the street.
In this house they
lived during the winter of 1836-7, and after their father’s death they remained
there for the summer.
Once in the summer of
1837 Tolstoy’s father went to Tula on business, and in the street on his way to
the house of one Temeshov, a friend, all at once he staggered, fell on the
ground, and died of apoplexy. Some people said he was poisoned by his
man-servant, because, though his money disappeared, yet some unnegotiable bonds
he had on him were brought to the Tolstoys in Moscow by an unknown beggar.
His body was taken by
his sister Aleksandra and his eldest son Nikolay to Yasnaya Polyana, in Tula,
where he was buried.
His father’s death was
the event which left the deepest impression on Tolstoy in his childhood. He
used to say that this death called forth in him a feeling of religious awe,
bringing the question of life and death vividly before him for the first time.
As he was not present when his father died, he would not believe for a long
time that he was no longer alive. For a long time afterward, if he looked at
the faces of strangers in the streets of Moscow, he not only fancied, but was
almost certain, that he might, at any moment, come upon his father alive. And
this mixed attitude of hope and unbelief called forth in him a special feeling
of tenderness. After their father’s death the Tolstoys remained for the summer
in Moscow, and this was the first and last time that Tolstoy spent a summer in
town.
They sometimes made
excursions to places near the city in a carriage drawn by four bay horses
driven abreast, according to custom. These occasions, on which they were
unattended by a post-boy, made a strong impression on him - attributable, it
may be, not only to the beauty of Kuntsev-Neskuchny, but in some measure to
escape from the unpleasant smells emitted by the factories which even then were
disfiguring the suburbs of Moscow.
"The death of her
son quite killed my grandmother, Pelageya Nikolayevna; she wept perpetually,
and every evening ordered the door into the next room to be opened, and said
that she saw her son there and talked with him. Sometimes she asked with horror
of her daughters: ‘Is it really, really true that he is no longer?’ She died at
the end of nine months from a broken heart and grief."
His grandmother’s death
reminded Tolstoy anew of the religious import of life and death - it may be
without his being fully conscious of it, but the impression was there, and that
a strong one. His grandmother suffered for a long time, till at last she was
seized with dropsy, and Tolstoy remembers the horror he felt when he was
admitted to take leave of her, and how she, lying in her lofty white bed, all
in white, looked round with difficulty on her grandchildren, and without making
a motion let them kiss her white hand which had swelled up like a pillow. But,
as is usual with children, the sense of fear and pity in the presence of death
was soon succeeded by playfulness, thoughtlessness, and love of mischief. On
one holiday, little Vladimir Milyutin, a friend Tolstoy’s of the same age, came
to stay in the house; it was he who made to the Tolstoys while they were still
in the gymnasium the remarkable statement - though the information did not make
a strong impression - that there was no God.
Just before dinner the
wildest and strangest merry-making was gain on in the children’s room, in which
Sergey, Dmitriy, and Lev were taking part, though Milyutin and Nikolay had more
sense than the rest and kept aloof. The fun consisted in burning paper in pots
behind a partition where the commode stood. It is difficult to imagine where
all the amusement was, but no doubt the sport was greatly enjoyed. All of a
sudden in the midst of the merrymaking, the light-haired, wiry, and energetic
little tutor, St. Thomas, described in Boyhood as St. Jerome, came in with a
quick step, and, without paying any attention to their doings, and without
scolding them, said to them, with the lower jaw of his white face trembling:
"Votre grand’mere est morte!"
"I remember,"
related Tolstoy, "how at that time new jackets of black material, bound
with white braid, were made for all of us. It was dreadful to see the
undertaker’s workmen hurrying about the house, and then the coffin brought with
a lid covered with glazed brocade, and my grandmother’s severe face with its
crooked nose, in a white cap, with a white kerchief on her neck, lying high in
the coffin on the table, and it was piteous to see the tears of our aunts and
of Pashenka, but at the same time the new braided jackets and the soothing
attitude taken toward us by those around gratified us. I do not remember why we
were removed to the aisle during the funeral, and I remember how pleasant it
was to me to overhear a conversation of some gossiping female guests near us,
who said: ‘Completely orphans, the father has only just died, and now the
grandmother is gone too.’"
Tolstoy has mixed
recollections of good and evil about Prosper St. Thomas, the French tutor.
"I do not now
remember for what," says Tolstoy in his Reminiscences, "but it was
for something utterly undeserving of punishment that St. Thomas first locked me
up in a room and secondly threatened to flog me. Hereupon I had a dreadful feeling
of anger, indignation, and disgust, not only toward St. Thomas himself, but
toward the violence which it was intended to inflict upon me. Very likely this
incident was the cause of the dreadful horror and repulsion toward every kind
of violence which I have experienced all my life."1
"However, the
tutor, St. Thomas, watched attentively the manifestation of gifts in his little
pupil. He probably had noticed something extraordinary in the boy, for he used
to say about him: "Ce petit a une tete, c’est un petit Moliere."2
After the death of
Tolstoy’s grandmother, complicated transactions in connection with the Court of
Wards making it imperative that expenses should be cut down, part of the family
returned to estates, namely, Dmitriy, Lev, and Mariya, with their aunt, Tatyana
Aleksandrovna Yergolskaya. Here the children’s tutors were replaced by new
German teachers and Russian students from the theological seminaries. Their
guardian was the Countess Aleksandra Ilyinishna Osten-Saken.
Of this remarkable
woman Tolstoy thus writes in his memoirs:
"My aunt
Aleksandra Ilyinishna was very early given in marriage in St. Petersburg to a
wealthy Count Osten-Saken of the Baltic Provinces. The match appeared very
brilliant, but from the conjugal point of view it terminated very sadly for my
aunt, although perhaps the consequences of this marriage were beneficial to her
soul. Aunt Aline, as we called her in the family, was probably very attractive,
with her large blue eyes and the meek expression of her pale face, as she is
depicted in a very good portrait taken when she was a girl of sixteen. Soon
after the marriage, Osten-Saken went with his young wife to his great estate in
the Baltic Provinces, and there he increasingly manifested his diseased mental
condition, which at first showed itself only in a very marked and causeless
jealousy. During the very first year of the marriage, when my aunt was already
nearing childbirth, the husband’s malady increased to such an extent that
spells of complete aberration used to take possession of him, during which he
thought that his foes, desirous of carrying away his wife, were surrounding
him, and that his only way of escape was in flight. This was in summer. Having
got up early in the morning, he announced to his wife that the only means of safety
was to flee, that he had ordered the calesh, that they were to start
immediately, and that she must get ready. And indeed the calesh drove up, he
placed my aunt inside, and ordered the coachman to drive as quickly as
possible. On the way he got two pistols out of a box, cocked the trigger, and
having given one to my aunt, told her that if his foes found out about his
flight they would catch him up, and then they were lost, and the only thing
which would then remain for them to do would be to kill each other. My
frightened and bewildered aunt took the pistol and tried to dissuade her
husband, but he did not listen to her, and only kept turning round,
anticipating pursuit, and urging the coachman to speed. Unfortunately, out of a
lane converging upon the high-road there appeared a carriage. He called out
that all was lost, and ordered my aunt to shoot herself, and himself shot
point-blank into my aunt’s breast. Startled by what he had done, and seeing
that the carriage which had frightened him had turned in another direction, he
stopped, lifted my wounded and bleeding aunt from the carriage, put her down on
the road, and galloped away. Fortunately for my aunt, some peasants soon came
across her, raised her, and drove her to the pastor, who bound up her wounds as
well as he could, and sent for the doctor. The wound was in the right side of
the chest, passing completely through the body (my aunt showed me the scar
remaining), but was not serious. When she was recovering, and still lying
enceinte at the pastor’s house, her husband, having come to himself, hurried to
her, and after explaining to the doctor how she was unfortunately wounded, he
sought an interview with her. This interview was dreadful. He, cunning as are
all the mentally diseased, pretended repentance for his act, and concern only
about her health. Having remained with her some time talking quite rationally
about everything, he profited by a moment when they were left alone together to
attempt to fulfill his intention. As if concerned with her health, he asked her
to show him her tongue, and when she put it out, he caught hold of it with one
hand, and with the other brought out a razor he had in readiness, with the
intention of cutting the tongue off. A struggle ensued - she tore herself away
from him, screamed; people rushed in, seized him, and led him away.
"Thenceforth his
insanity took a thoroughly definite form, and he lived for a long time in some
institution for lunatics, having no communication with my aunt. Soon after
this, my aunt was removed to her parents’ house in St. Petersburg, and there
she gave birth to a dead child. For fear of the consequences of grief at her
child’s death, she was told that it was alive, and a girl who was at the same
time born of a servant known to the family, the wife of a court cook, was
brought to her. This girl, Pashenka, who lived with us, was already grown up
when I begin myself to remember. I do not know when the history of her birth
was disclosed to Pashenka, but when I knew her she was already aware she was
not my aunt’s daughter. Aunt Aleksandra Ilyinishna, after what had happened to
her, lived first with her parents, and then at my father’s. After his death she
was our guardian, but when I was twelve she died in the convent of Optin
Pustin.
"My aunt was a
truly religious woman. Her favorite occupation was reading the lives of the
saints, conversing with pilgrims, crazy devotees, monks, and nuns, of whom some
always lived in our house, while others only visited my aunt. Among the
constant residents was the nun Mariya Gerassimovna, my sister’s godmother, who
had in her youth undertaken pilgrimages in the character of a ‘crazy Ivanushka.’
She was my sister’s godmother, because my mother had promised this to her,
should she by prayer obtain from God for my mother a daughter, a boon which my
mother greatly desired after bearing four sons. A daughter was born, and Mariya
Gerassimovna became her godmother, living partly in the Tula convent and partly
at our house.
"Aunt Aleksandra
Ilyinishna was not only outwardly religious, keeping the fasts, praying much,
and associating with people of saintly life, such as was in her time the hermit
Leonid in the Optin Pustin, but she herself lived a truly Christian life,
endeavoring not only to avoid all luxury and acceptance of service, but also,
as much as possible, to serve others. She never had any money, because she gave
away all she had to those who asked.
"The maid Gasha,
who after my grandmother’s death passed over to my aunt, has related to me how
during their Moscow life my aunt, in going to Matins, used carefully to pass on
tiptoe by her sleeping maid, and herself discharged all the functions which
according to the then received custom should have been done by the maid. In
food and dress she was as simple and unexacting as it is possible to imagine.
However unpleasant it is to me to say so, I remember from childhood the
specific acrid smell connected with my aunt, probably due to negligence in her
toilet, and this was that graceful, poetic Aline with beautiful blue eyes who
used to like to read and copy French verses, who played on the harp, and always
had great success at the biggest balls! I remember how she was always as
affectionate and kind to all the most important men and women as to nuns and
pilgrims. I remember how her brother-in-law, Yushkov, liked to make fun of her,
and how he once sent from Kazan a big box directed to her. In the box another
box was found, in that one a third, and so on until there appeared quite a tine
one, in which, wrapped in cotton-wool, lay a china monk. I remember how my
father laughed good-naturedly, showing this parcel to my aunt. I also remember
my father relating at table how she, according to his assertion, with her
cousin Molchanova, ran after a priest whom they reverenced that they might get
his benediction. My father described this, comparing it to coursing, saying
that Molchanova cut the priest off from the gates before the alter; he then
threw himself toward the north gates, she in pursuit made a miss, and here it
was that Aline caught him. I remember her dear, good-natured laugh and face
shining with pleasure. The religious feeling which filled her soul was
evidently so important to her, so much higher than all the rest, that she could
not be angry or annoyed by anything, she could not attribute to worldly matters
the importance which is generally given to them. She took care of us when she
was our guardian, but all she did did not absorb her soul, all was subdued to
the service of God as she understood that service."3
As has been stated
before, the younger children, i.e., Dmitriy, Mariya, and Lev, lived with Aunt
Tatyana in the country after their grandmother’s death, and the elder, Nikolay
and Sergey, remained with their guardian, Aleksandra Ilyinishna, in Moscow. In
the summer the whole family met at Yasnaya Polyana. Thus passed the years of
1838-9, and the year 1840 began a year of famine; the crops were so poor that
the Tolstoys had to buy corn to feed their serfs, and the means for this
purpose were obtained from the sale of the Neruch estate which they had
inherited.
The food for the horses
was cut short and the free supply of oats was stopped. Tolstoy recollects how
sorry the children were for their favorite horses, and how they secretly ran to
the peasants’ field of oats and, without being aware of the crime they were
committing, plucked the oat stems, gathered the grain in their skirts, and
treated their horses to it.
In the autumn of 1840
the whole family moved to Moscow where they spent the winter of 1840-41; for
the summer they returned to Yasnaya again. In the autumn of 1841 their
guardian, the Countess A.I. Osten-Saken, died.
She died in the convent
Optina Pustin. During her stay there the children remained in Yasnaya Polyana
with their Aunt Tatyana. But when the news reached her that Aleksandra
Ilyinishna was on her death-bed, Tatyana went to the convent.
After her death her
sister, Pelageya Ilyinishna, who was then the wife of V.I. Yushkov, a Kazan
landowner, arrived at Moscow from Kazan. Aunt tatyana and all the children came
there in the autumn. The elder brother of Tolstoy, who at that time was already
a student of the first year in the university, greeted his aunt with the words:
"Ne nous abandonnez pas, chere tante, il ne nous reste ques vous au monde."
Her eyes filled with tears and she made up her mind "se sacrifier."
What she meant by this no one knew; the result was that she at once began
preparations for a journey to Kazan. For this purpose she ordered some boats
which she loaded with everything she could carry away from Yasnaya Polyana. All
the servants had to follow - carpenters, tailors, locksmiths, chefs,
upholsterers, etc. Moreover, to each of the four brothers Tolstoy was attached
a serf of about the same age, as man-servant. One of these was Vanyusha, who
afterward accompanied Tolstoy to the Caucasus and who now spends his old age at
his daughter’s house in Tula.
At this time Tolstoy
was twelve years old. Masters and servants started for the journey in autumn,
and in numerous carriages and other vehicles crept slowly from Tula to Kazan.
During the journey something like regular habits were maintained. Sometimes
they stopped in the fields, sometimes in the woods, bathed, walked about and
gathered mushrooms. The parting with Aunt Tatyana Aleksandrovna was
distressing, but she had never been on friendly terms with Aunt Pelageya
Ilyinishna, and, after the death of Aleksandra Ilyinishna, she settled with her
sister, Helena Aleksandrovna Tolstaya, in the village of Pokrovskoye. The want
of a good understanding between Tatyana Aleksandrovna and Pelageya Ilyinishna
arose from the fact that the husband of the latter had been in love with
Tatyana in his youth and made her an offer of marriage, which she rejected.
Pelageya Ilyinishna could never forgive her husband’s love for the other and
hated her for it, though in public they appeared to be on thoroughly friendly
terms.
Pelageya’s husband ,
V.I. Yushkov, a retired colonel of hussars, has left behind him in Kazan the
memory of an educated, witty, and kind-hearted man, who loved jokes and lively
conversation, and such he remained until his death.
Pelageya herself was
remembered in Kazan as a very kind, but not particularly clever woman. She was
very pious, and after the death of her husband in 1869 she retired to the
convent Optina Pustin. Later on she lived in a convent in Tula and finally
moved to Yasnaya Polyana, where she fell ill and died.
All through her long
life she strictly observed all the rites of the orthodox church; but in her
eightieth year, before her death, which she greatly feared, she declined to
take the communion and grew angry with other people on account of the misery
which she suffered herself in the presentiment of her end.
Let us now point out
certain stages in the moral development of children which we find in such of
Tolstoy’s novels as are descriptive of that period of life, and which carry, in
our opinion, a real autobiographical character.
One trait often
observable in children, and which perhaps existed in Tolstoy himself in a high
degree, is extreme shyness - the outcome of self-consciousness.
People very often make
a distinction between these two characteristics - self-consciousness and
shyness. They find fault with the one and encourage the other, or vice versa,
but the traits are merely the reverse sides of the same coin, and are related
to one another as cause and effect. A man is often shy because he is
self-conscious, and as the shyness increases it intensifies his
self-consciousness. The former manifests itself on any trifling ground, for
instance in consequence of misgivings as to one’s appearance. This is how
Tolstoy speaks of it in himself under the character of Nikolenka:
"I had the oddest
conceptions of beauty - I even regarded Karl Ivanovich as the first beau in the
world; but I knew full well that I was not good-looking, and in this opinion
was not mistaken. Therefore, every reference to my looks was offensive to
me....
"Moments of
despair frequently came over me. I imagined that there was no happiness in the
world for a man with such a broad nose, fat lips, and small gray eyes, as mine
were. I asked God to do a miracle, and to change me into a handsome boy, and
everything I then had, and everything I should ever have in the future, I would
gladly have given for a pretty face."4
As soon as man turns
his glance upon himself, a conflict of most varied feelings rises in him. If he
is a man of intelligence and morality, he is bound to feel dissatisfaction, and
the feeling must call forth a longing for improvement in things external, as
well as in his own heart. As he has no power to improve the former, e.g., to
make his nose more shapely, therefore it is perhaps painful to think about the
matter. But, if the mind be strong, it will lead one to the path of inward
self-perfecting, and thereby open the way of endless progress.
This is exactly the
conflict of feeling and thought which we can follow in the child, boy, and
youth presented to us by Tolstoy in Nikolenka Irtenev. In describing his
development the author endows him with his own deep, rich inner world.
In a conversation with
one of his friends, Tolstoy said that his early youth was spent under the
influence of his brother Seryozha, and in attempts to imitate him. This brother
he specially loved and admired. In somewhat riper years he was chiefly
influenced by his brother Nikolay, whom he loved, not indeed so passionately as
he did Seryozha, but still very dearly, and whom he respected more.5
Glancing through the
novel Childhood, we find the account of a similar feeling in the description of
the love of Nikolenka Irtenev for Seryozha Ivin.
These are the glowing
words in which he depicts this affection:
"I felt
unconquerably attracted by him. It was enough for my happiness to see him, and
all the powers of my soul were concentrated upon this desire. When I passed
three or four days without seeing him, I grew lonely, and felt sad enough to
weep. All my dreams, waking and sleeping, were of him. When I lay down to
sleep, I wished that I might dream of him; when I closed my eyes, I saw him
before me, and I treasured this vision as my greatest pleasure. I did not dare
intrust this feeling to anyone in the world, I valued it so.
"Perhaps he was
tired of feeling my restless eyes continually directed toward him, or he did
not feel any sympathy for me, but he visibly preferred to play and to talk with
Volodya, rather than with me. I was, nevertheless, satisfied, wished for
nothing, demanded nothing, and was ready to sacrifice everything for him.
"Under the name of
the Ivins, I have described the Count’s Pushkin boys, one of whom, Aleksandr,
has just died - the one whom I liked so much in childhood. Our favourite game
was playing at soldiers."6
Tolstoy thus depicts
the turning-point in his development, the transition from childhood to boyhood:
"My reader, have
you ever happened to notice at a certain stage of your life how your view of
things completely changed, as though all the things which you used to know,
heretofore, suddenly turned a different, unfamiliar side to you? Some such
moral transformation took place in me for the first time, during our journey,
and from this I count the beginning of my boyhood.
"I obtained for
the first time a clear idea of the fact that we, that is, our family, were not
alone in the world, that not all interests centered about us, and there was
another life for people who had nothing in common with us, who did not care for
us, and who even did not have any idea of our existence. To be sure, I knew it
before; but I did not know it in the same manner as now - I was not conscious
of it, did not feel it."7
At an early age the
child had taken up philosophic argument, and even in his boyhood the path is
foreshadowed by which his powerful mind was to be developed to influence so
many others.
"People will
hardly believe what the favorite and most constant subjects of my thoughts were
during the period of my boyhood - for they were inconsistent with my age and
station. But, according to my opinion, the inconsistency between a man’s
position and his moral activity is the surest token of truth....
"At one time it
occurred to me that happiness did not depend on external causes, but on our
relation to them; that a man who is accustomed to bear suffering could not be
unhappy. To accustom myself to endurance, I would hold for five minutes at a
time the dictionaries of Tatishchev in my outstretched hands, though it cause
me unspeakable pain, or I would go into the lumber room and strike my bare back
so painfully with a rope that the tears would involuntarily appear in my eyes.
"At another time,
I happened to think that death awaited me at any hour and at any minute, and
wondering how it was people had not seen this before me, I decided that man
cannot be happy otherwise than by enjoying the present and not caring for the
future. Under the influence of this thought, I abandoned my lessons for two or
three days, and did nothing but lie on my bed and enjoy myself reading some
novel and eating honey cakes which I bought with my last money.
"At another time,
as I was standing at the blackboard and drawing various figures upon it with a
piece of chalk, I was suddenly struck by the idea, Why is symmetry pleasant to
the eye? What is symmetry? It is an implanted feeling, I answered myself. What
is it based upon? Is symmetry to be found in everything in life? Not at all.
Here is life - and I drew an oval figure on the board. After life the soul
passes into eternity. Here is eternity - and I drew, on one side of the figure,
a line to the very edge of the board. Why is there no such line on the other
side of the figure? Really, what kind of eternity is that which is only on one
side? We have no doubt existed before this life, although we have lost the
recollection of it....
"By none of these
philosophic considerations was I so carried away as by skepticism, which at one
time led me to a condition bordering on insanity. I imagined that nothing
existed in the whole world outside of me, that objects were no objects, but
only images which appeared whenever I turned my attention to them, and that
these images would immediately disappear when I no longer thought of them. In
short, I held the conviction with Schelling that objects do not exist, but only
my relation to them. There were moments when, under the influence of this fixed
idea, I reached such a degree of absurdity that I sometimes turned in the
opposite direction, hoping to take nothingness by surprise, where I was
not."8
Boyhood ends by a
description of Nikolenka Irtenev’s friendship with Nekhlyudov.9
The conclusion of this
novel expresses in a few words that ideal of man which Tolstoy has sought and
followed all his life, and which he still seeks in the sunset of his days.
"Of course, under
the influence of Nekhlyudov I involuntarily appropriated his point of view, the
essence of which was an ecstatic worship of the ideal of virtue, and the
conviction that a man’s destiny is continually to perfect himself. At that time
it seemed a practicable affair to correct humanity at large, to destroy all
human vices and misfortunes - and therefore it looked easy and simple to
correct oneself, to appropriate to oneself all virtues and be happy."10
It is evident that this
tendency toward abstract thought, this timidity and shyness, this striving
after an ideal - that all these qualities manifested in the child were the
primitive elements which gradually formed the harmonious soul of the
artist-thinker. We now see the full bloom of these spiritual germs which were
planted in Tolstoy’s boyhood.
Brought up in a
patriarchally aristocratic and, in its way, religious atmosphere, Tolstoy, in
his childhood, with his responsive soul, absorbed all he could and was
sincerely religious. Hints of this we see in Childhood. But this
"habitual" religiousness fell away at the first breeze of
rationalism.
He speaks thus in his
Confession about his religious education, given as it was in accordance with
the views of those days:
"I was christened
and educated in the faith of the Orthodox Greek Church; I was taught it in my
childhood, and I learned it in my youth. Nevertheless, at eighteen years of
age, when I quitted the university, I had discarded all belief in everything
that I had been taught. To judge by what I can now remember, I could never have
had a very serious belief; it must have been a kind of trust in this teaching,
based on a trust in my teachers and elders, and a trust, moreover, not very
firmly grounded.
"I remember once,
in my eleventh year, a boy, now long since dead, Vladimir M---, a pupil in a
gymnasium, spent a Sunday with us, and brought us the news of the last
discovery in the gymnasium, namely, that there was no god, and that all we were
taught on the subject was a mere invention. This was in 1838. I remember well
how interested my elder brothers were in this news. I was admitted to their
deliberations, and we all eagerly accepted the theory as something particularly
attractive and possibly quite true."
But of course this
rationalism could not shake the foundations of his soul. these foundations
withstood terrible life-storms and brought him to the path of truth.
Tolstoy given
interesting information concerning those literary works which, as far as he
remembers, had great influence on his moral development during his childhood
and boyhood, i.e., up to about fourteen years of age. Here is the list of the
works:
The Titles - Degree of
Influence
The Story of Joseph,
from the Bible - Powerful.
Thousand and One Night
Tales: The Forty Thieves, Prince Kamaralzaman - Great.
The Black Fowl, by
Pogorelskiy - Very great.
Russian Legends:
Dobrinya Nikitich, Ilya Muromets, Alyosha Popovich - Powerful.
Popular Tales, Pushkin’s
Verses: Napoleon - Great.
We shall now give a few
episodes from Tolstoy’s boyhood, partly written down from his own words, partly
gathered from his relatives, but also borrowed from other sources which have
already appeared in print, and which we have ourselves edited. In doing as
above mentioned, we shall make a selection, being guided therein by authentic
information which is in our possession. It is impossible to arrange the stories
in a chronological order.
"It was quite at
the beginning of our Moscow life, during my father’s lifetime," Tolstoy
once observed in describing his reminiscences, "that we had a pair of very
spirited horses of our own breeding. My father’s coachman was Mitka Kopilov. He
was also my father’s groom, a good horseman, sportsman, and excellent coachman,
and, above all, an invaluable postilion. He was invaluable in this respect that
a boy cannot manage spirited horses and an elderly man is too heavy and not
suitable for a postilion, so that Mitka combined the rare qualities necessary
for the purpose, which were: small stature, lightness, strength, and agility. I
remember once the phaeton was brought to the door for my father, and the horses
bolted out of the yard gate. Some one shouted, ‘The Count’s horses have run
away!’ Pashenka was overcome. My aunts rushed to my grandmother to reassure
her, but it turned out that my father had not yet entered the carriage, and
Mitka cleverly arrested the horses and returned into the yard.
"Well, it was this
same Mitka who, after the reduction of our expenses, was given freedom on
ransom. Rich merchants competed in endeavoring to engage his services, and
would have given him a big salary, as he already flaunted silk shirts and
velvet jackets. It so happened that the turn came for his brother to be
enlisted as a soldier, and his father, already aged, summoned Mitka home to do
laborer’s work for the master. And this small-sized, elegant Dmitriy in a month’s
time became transformed into a modest peasant, in bast shoes, working for the
landlord, and cultivating his own two allotments, mowing, ploughing, and, in
general, doing all the heavy peasant’s task of that time. And all this was done
without the slightest murmur, with the consciousness that this should be so,
and could not be otherwise."
This was one of the
events that fostered that love and respect for the people which Tolstoy used to
feel even in childhood.
Here are two episodes
which Tolstoy related to me, and which, according to his words, planted in his
youthful mind germs of doubt and dissatisfaction - with the injustice and
cruelty of those very people whom he still regarded as his "elders,"
and who always appeared to him as invested with a certain kind of authority.
The authority of these people was being undermined even then.
While still a child, he
was shown the unfairness, the worship of appearances, and the fashionable
contempt for everything that is modest, the exhibition of which is so painful
to childhood and directs the little ones especially to serious thoughts and
promotes the development of their spiritual perception.
One illustration of the
above was furnished by an incident connected with the Christmas-tree at Shipov’s
to which the Tolstoy children were invited, as they were related to the family.
They had just lost their father and their grandmother and were orphans, cared
for by an aunt who was in rather poor circumstances, and hence they did not
possess much attraction or importance in fashionable society.
To the same
Christmas-tree were invited the princes Gorchakov, nephews of the then Minister
of War, and the Tolstoys observed with annoyance the difference which was made
in the choice of presents for them and for the other more honored guests; the
Tolstoys received presents of cheap wooden things, while the others had
magnificent and expensive toys.
Another case took place
in Moscow.
Once they went for a
walk with their German tutor. Tolstoy, who was then nine or ten years old, his
brothers and a girl named Yuzenka, a daughter of the French governess, who
lived with their neighbors, the Islenevs, were among the children. Yuzenka was
a very good-looking and attractive girl. While walking along Bolshaya Bronaya
Street, they found themselves near a garden gate leading to Polyakov’s house.
The gate was not shut and they entered with some hesitation, not knowing what
would happen; the garden seemed to them of an unusual beauty. There were a pond
with boats, flags, and flowers, small bridges, paths, bowers, etc.; they walked
round the garden as if it was enchanted, till they were met by a gentleman who appeared
to be Astashov, the owner of the place. He greeted them affably and invited
them to look round, gave them a row in a boat, and was so amiable that they
thought their presence actually gave pleasure to the owner of the garden.
Encouraged by their good fortune, they decided to visit this garden again in a
few days. When they entered the gate they were stopped by an old man who asked
whom they wanted to see. They gave their surname and begged to be announced to
the master. Yuzenka was not with them. The old man returned with the answer
that the garden belonged to a private individual and the public was forbidden
to enter. They went away disappointed, and were unable to understand why their
friend’s pretty face should have made so great a difference in the attitude of
strangers toward them.
Here are a few stories
which indicate the originality, not to say eccentricity, of his boyish
character.
"We were once
assembled at dinner," said Mariya (Tolstoy’s sister) to me; "it was
in Moscow, during their grandmother’s illness, when etiquette was adhered to
and everybody had to appear in good time before grandmother came, and wait for
her, so that all were surprised to see that Lyovochka was not there. When all
were seated at the table, the grandmother, who had noticed his absence, asked
St. Thomas, the tutor, what was the reason of it, and whether Leo had been
punished. The tutor declared with some confusion that he did not know, but that
he was certain that Leo would appear in a minute, but that he was probably
detained in his room getting ready for dinner. The grandmother was put at her
ease, but, before long, the assistant tutor entered and whispered something to
St. Thomas, who immediately jumped up and hurriedly left the room. This was so
unusual, considering the strict etiquette observed at dinner, that everybody
concluded that some great misfortune had taken place; as Lyovochka was absent,
every one was sure that he was the person who had met with a misfortune, and
all anxiously awaited the return of St. Thomas.
"Soon the matter
was cleared up and we learned what happened.
"For some unknown
reason, Lyovochka (as he now tells us himself, simply to do something
extraordinary and surprise the others) had conceived the idea of jumping from a
second-story window, a height of several yards. And in order not to have this
achievement hindered, he remained in the room alone when everybody else went to
dinner. He climbed up to the open window in the attic and jumped into the yard.
In the basement was the kitchen, and the cook was standing by the window, when,
before she realized what was happening, Lyovochka struck the ground with a
thud. We then informed the steward, and, stepping outside, they found Lyovochka
lying in the yard in a state of unconsciousness. Luckily no bones were broken,
and the injury was limited to a slight concussion of the brain; unconsciousness
changed into sleep; he slept eighteen hours at a stretch and woke up quite
sound. You may imagine what fear and anxiety were caused by the queer little fellow’s
unpremeditated act.
"Once the idea
struck him that he would clip his eyebrows; and he carried it out, thus
disfiguring a face which was never strikingly beautiful and causing himself a
great deal of grief.
"Another
time," related Mariya, "we were driving in a troika from Pirogovo to
Yasnaya. During a pause in our journey, Lyovochka got down and walked on on
foot. When he carriage was ready to set off again, he could not be found. Soon,
however, the coachman beheld from his seat his disappearing figure on the road
ahead of him, so the party started, believing he had gone on only with the
intention of resuming his seat as soon as the troika caught him up; but this
was a mistake. As the carriage approached, he quickened his pace, and when the
horse was made to trot he began to run, apparently not desiring to take his
seat. The troika advanced at a rapid pace and he also ran as hard as he could,
and kept on running for about three versts, till at last he was tired out and
gave it up. They got him to take his seat; but he was gasping for breath,
perspiring, and broken down with fatigue."
Sofya Andreyevna,
Tolstoy’s wife, has many a time busied herself with putting down particulars of
his life, asking him questions about his childhood, and listening to stories
told by his relations. Unfortunately these notes are incomplete, but
nevertheless they are very valuable. We quote a few extracts from them,
availing ourselves of the kind permission of their writer.
"Judging by tales
of old aunts who have told me a few things about my husband’s childhood, and
also by what my grandfather Islenev has said (he was very friendly with Nikolay
Ilyich, Tolstoy’s father), little Lyovochka was a peculiar child, in fact quite
an odd little fellow. For instance, he once entered the saloon and made a bow
to everybody backward, bending his head and courtesying.
"When I asked
Tolstoy himself and also others if he studied well, I was answered that he ’did
not.’"
S.A. Bers, Tolstoy’s
brother-in-law, relates the following in his reminiscences:
"P.I. Yushkova,
Tolstoy’s late aunt, declared that in his boyhood he was very frolicsome, and
as a boy he was marked for his oddity, sometimes also for his impulsive acts,
as well as for a noble heart.
"My mother related
to me that in describing his first love in his work Childhood he omitted to say
that, being jealous, he pushed the object of his love off the balcony. This was
my mother, nine years old, who had to limp for a long time afterward. He did
this because she was not talking to him but to somebody else. Later on, she
used to laugh and say to him: ‘Evidently you pushed me off the terrace in my
childhood that you might marry my daughter afterward.’"11
Tolstoy himself used to
relate in the family circle, in my presence, that when he was a child of seven
or eight years, he had an ardent desire to fly. He imagined that it was quite
possible if you sat down on your heels and hugged your knees, and that the
harder the knees were clasped the higher you could fly.
Several stories by
Tolstoy, published in his Books for Reading, are autobiographical. We reproduce
some characteristic passages from them.
In the tale, The Old
Horse, Tolstoy relates how he and his three brothers got permission to have a
ride. They were only allowed to ride on a quiet old horse called Voronok. The
three elder brothers, after riding to their hearts’ content and exhausting the
horse, handed it over to him.
"When my turn
came, I wanted to surprise my brothers and to show them how well I could ride,
so I began to drive Raven [Voronok] with all my might, but he did not want to
get away from the stable. And no matter how much I beat him, he would not run,
but only shied and turned back. I grew angry at the horse, and struck him as
hard as I could with my feet and with the whip. I tried to strike him in places
where it would hurt most; I broke the whip, and began to strike his head with
what was left of the whip. But Raven would not run. Then I turned back, rode up
to the valet, and asked him for a stout switch. But the valet said to me:
"‘Don’t ride any
more, sir! Get down! what use is therein torturing the horse?’
"I felt offended,
and said:
"‘But I have not
had a ride yet. Just watch me gallop! Please, give me a good-sized switch! I
will heat him up.’
"Then the valet
shook his head and said:
"‘Oh sir, you have
no pity; why should you heat him up? He is twenty years old. The horse is worn
out; he can barely breathe, and is old. He is so very old! Just like Pimen
Timofeyich.12 You might just as well sit down on Timofeyich’s back and urge him
on with a switch. Now, would you not pity him?’
"I thought of
Pimen, and listened to the valet’s words. I climbed down from the horse and,
when I saw how his sweaty sides hung down, how he breathed heavily through his
nostrils, and how he switched his bald tail, I understood that it was hard for
the horse. I felt so sorry for Raven that I began to kiss his sweaty neck and
to beg his forgiveness for having beaten him."
In the tale, How I was
Taught to Ride Horseback, Tolstoy recalls how together with his brothers he
went to a riding-school.
"Then they brought
a pony. It was a red horse, and his tail was cut off. He was called Ruddy. The
master laughed and said to me:
"‘Well, young
gentleman, get on your horse!’
"I was both happy
and afraid, and tried to act in such a manner as not to be noticed by anybody.
For a long time I tried to get my foot into the stirrup, but could not do it
because I was too small. Then the master raised me up in his hands and put me
on the saddle. He said:
"‘The young master
is not heavy; about two pounds in weight, that is all.’
"At first he held
me by my hand, but I saw that my brothers were not held, and so I begged him to
let go of me. He said:
"‘Are you not
afraid?’
"I was very much
afraid, but I said that I was not. I was so much afraid because Ruddy kept
dropping his ears. I thought he was angry with me. The master said:
"‘Look out, don’t
fall down!’ and let go of me. At first Ruddy went at a slow pace, and I sat up
straight. But the saddle was smooth, and I was afraid I should slip off. The
master asked me:
"‘Well, are you
fast in the saddle?’
"I said, ‘Yes, I
am.’
"‘If so, go at a
slow trot!’ and the master clicked his tongue.
"Ruddy started at
a slow trot, and began to jog me. But I kept silent, and tried not to slip to
one side. The master praised me. ‘Oh, a fine young gentleman, indeed!’
"I was very glad
to hear it.
"Just then the
master’s friend went up to him and began to talk with him, and the master
stopped looking at me.
"Suddenly I felt
that I had slipped a little to one side on my saddle. I wanted to straighten
myself up, but was unable to do so. I wanted to call out to the master to stop
the horse, but I thought it would be a disgrace if I did it, and so kept
silence. The master was not looking at me, and Ruddy ran at a trot, and I
slipped still more to one side. I looked at the master and thought that he
would help me, but he was still talking with his friend, and, without looking
at me, kept repeating, ‘Well done, young gentleman!’
"I was now
altogether on one side, and was very much frightened. I thought I was lost, but
I felt ashamed to cry. Ruddy shook me up once more, and I slipped off entirely
and fell to the ground. Then Ruddy stopped, and the master looked at the horse
and saw that I was not on him. He said, ‘I declare, my young gentleman has
dropped off!’ and walked over to me.
"When I told him
that I was not hurt, he laughed and said, ‘A child’s body is soft.’
"I felt like
crying. I asked him to put me again on the horse, and I was lifted on. After
that I did not fall down any more."
Thus developed this
remarkable child, thoughtful, impressionable, shy, affectionate, very lonely
owing to the immense power of inner life in him which found no response in his
surroundings.
Notes to Chapter V:
1. An interpolation by
Tolstoy when looking through the MS.
2. From Countess S.A.
Tolstaya’s Reminiscences.
3. From Tolstoy’s draft
Reminiscences.
4. In Childhood.
5. From a private
letter.
6. Interpolation by
Tolstoy in the MS. of this work.
7. Boyhood.
8. Boyhood.
9. The material for the
description of this friendship I owe to my later friendship with Dyakov, during
the last year of my university life at Kazan.
10. Boyhood.
11. S.A. Bers,
Reminiscences of Count L.N. Tolstoy.
12. A man ninety years
old.
Tolstoy and his
brothers had spent five years at Kazan. In the summer the whole family,
accompanied by Pelageya Ilyinishna, used to move to yasnaya Polyana, and every
autumn they returned to Kazan.
Tolstoy spent the
greater part of his youth in Yushkov’s home.
The brothers Tolstoy
moved there in 1841. The elder brother, Nikolay, who left Moscow University for
the one in Kazan, had in 1841-42 been already for the second year in the second
division of the same faculty of philosophy in which he graduated in 1844. The
next two brothers, Sergey and Dmitriy, had chosen the same division of the
faculty of philosophy which now is the same thing as the faculty of
mathematics.
Both matriculated in
1843, and graduated in the spring of 1847.
Tolstoy had chosen the
faculty of Oriental languages, probably having the diplomatic service in view.
To enter this faulty he worked very hard during the years 1842-44, for the
entrance examinations were not easy, as one had to know the Arabic and Turko-Tartar
languages, which at that time were taught in the Kazan gymnasium. The
difficulties were successfully overcome by Tolstoy.
In the archives of the
Kazan University are kept all the documents relating to Tolstoy’s entrance and
stay in that university as well as his departure from it.
All these papers are
carefully collected and printed in the Reminiscences of Zagoskin. We will
present here only the more interesting.
The petition of Tolstoy
at entering the university.
"A Petition
"To His Excellency
the Rector of the Imperial Kazan University, the Councillor of State, and
Cavalier Nikolay Ivanovich Lobachevskiy.
"Desiring to enter
as a student of the Oriental Section (Turko-Arab category) of Kazan University,
I beg your Excellency to allow me to appear before the Board of Examination. My
papers: the certificate of birth from the Tula Theological Consistory under N
252, and the certificate of my noble origin from the Tula noblemen’s Board of
Deputies under N 267, I have the honor to present herewith.--Count Lev
Tolstoy."
In reply to this
petition he was allowed to come up for the examinations, which, however, did
not come off quite satisfactorily, as appears from the following statement of
his marks.
Here are the marks
received by Tolstoy at his preliminary examinations for the university.
Religion . . . . . . .
. . . . 4
History, general and
Russian . 1 "I knew nothing."-- Remark by Tolstoy
Statistics and
geography . . . 1 "Still less." --Remark by Tolstoy
Mathematics . . . . . .
. . . 4
Russian literature . .
. . . . 4
Logic . . . . . . . . .
. . . 4
Latin . . . . . . . . .
. . . 2
French . . . . . . . .
. . . . 5
German . . . . . . . .
. . . . 5
Arabic . . . . . . . .
. . . . 5
Turco-Tartar . . . . .
. . . . 5
English . . . . . . . .
. . . 4
"I remember I was
questioned concerning France, Pushkin, the curator, who was present, examining
me. He was a caller at our house and evidently wanted to assist me. "‘Please
name the seaports in France.’ I could not name a single one." Tolstoy’s
note.
In the minutes of the
Board of Examination relating to Tolstoy’s entrance at the university it is
stated that Count Tolstoy "has been examined upon the section of Oriental
literature, but was not admitted into the university." It was added:
"His papers to be returned."
This happened in the
spring of 1844. Tolstoy resolved to appeal for another examination to take
place in the autumn in those subjects for which he had received unsatisfactory
marks.
Accordingly, in the
beginning of August, in the same year, 1844, another petition reached the
Rector of the university, written in Tolstoy’s own hand.
"Petition.
"To His Excellency
the Rector of the Imperial University of Kazan, Professor N.I. Lobachevskiy,
from Count L.N. Tolstoy.
"In the month of
May of the present year, together with the pupils of the first and second Kazan
gymnasiums, I underwent an examination for the purpose of becoming a student of
the kazan University in the department of Arabo-Turkish languages. But at this
examination I failed to show sufficient knowledge in history and statistics. I
humbly beg your Excellency to allow me to be now re-examined in these subjects.
Herewith I have the honor to present the following documents: (1) My birth
certificate from the Consistory of Tula; (2) A copy of the resolution of the
Tula Board of Deputy Noblemen, Aug. 34d, 1844. To this petition the above-named
petitioner, L.N. Tolstoy has put his hand."
On this petition the
following remark was made:
"Presented on Aug.
4, 1844. To be allowed to come to the supplementary examinations. Aug. 4, 1844.
"Rector
Lobachevskiy."
Precisely when or how
Tolstoy passed these additional examinations no one knows. But this time all
ended well, for at the bottom of his petition was written the following
memorandum:
"Tolstoy to be
admitted to the university as an extern student in the section of Turco-Arabic
literature."
Thus Tolstoy entered
the university. But he spent there only the hours taken up with lectures. For
the rest of his time he moved in the social circle of his aunt, Mrs. Yushkova,
in whose house he lived. What were these surroundings, and how were they likely
to influence a youth?
In Zagoskin’s
reminiscences of Tolstoy’s life as a student it is stated that the surroundings
in which he moved in the kazan society were demoralizing, and that Tolstoy must
have instinctively felt repelled, but he, having seen the manuscript, remarked
that this was not the case.
"I did not feel
any repulsion," he says, "but very much liked to enjoy myself in the
Kazan society, at that time very good."
Enumerating further on
in his article the different unfavorable circumstances in Tolstoy’s life,
Zagoskin is amazed at the moral power shown by him in overcoming all these
temptations. On this Tolstoy himself made the following remark:
"On the contrary,
I am very thankful to fate for having passed my first youth in an environment
wherein a young man could be young without touching upon problems beyond his
grasp, and for living, although an idle and luxurious life, yet not an evil
one."
The winder season of
1844-45, when Tolstoy began as a "young man" to appear in society,
was still more gay than previous seasons. Balls, now at the house of the
governor of the province, not given by the chief of the nobility, now at the
Rodinovsky Institute for the young ladies of nobility (balls which were
particularly favored by the matron of the Institution, Mme. E.D. Zagoskin),
private dancing soirees, masquerades in the Hall of the Nobles, private
theatricals, tableaux-vivants, concerts--all these followed one another in an
endless chain. As a titled young man of good birth, with good local
connections, the grandson of the ex-governor of Kazan, and an eligible match,
Tolstoy was welcome everywhere. The old inhabitants of Kazan remember him as
being present at all the balls, soirees, and aristocratic parties, a welcome
guest everywhere, and always dancing, but, unlike his high-born
fellow-students, far from being a ladies’ man. He was always distinguished by a
strange awkwardness and shyness; he evidently was ill at ease in the part which
he had to play and to which he was involuntarily bound by the detestable
surroundings of his life in kazan. All this was sure to do harm to his studies,
and the first half-yearly examination gave rather a poor result, as is seen by
the examination sheet of the archive of the Kazan University, produced by
Zagoskin:
Tolstoy, Lev
Progress Application
The Church bibl.
history . . . . . . . 3 2
The history of general
literature . . (did not appear)
Arabic language. . . .
. . . . . . . . 2 2
French language. . . .
. . . . . . . . 5 3
This failure did not
change his habits. He continued his gay worldly life, and at Shrovetide,
together with his brother Sergey, took part in two private theatrical
performances with a charitable aim.
The end of all was that
Tolstoy did not pass his examinations, and regularly this would have obliged
him to follow the same course of study for another year. This is his own
account of this unfortunate examination:
"The first year
Ivanov, Professor of Russian History, prevented me from being passed to the second
course, notwithstanding the fact that I had not missed a single lecture and
knew Russian history quite well, because he had a quarrel with my family.
Besides, the same professor gave me the lowest mark--1--for German, thought I
knew the language incomparably better than any student in our division."
But Tolstoy did not
care to stay another year, and presented a petition for leave to take another
faculty, that of Jurisprudence, which was given him.
After having entered
the faculty of law, Tolstoy gave up studying altogether, and plunged with
greater zest into the gaieties and distractions of fashionable Kazan society,
which were at this time in full swing. The winter season of 1845-46 opened with
a fete on the occasion of a two days’ visit of Duke Maximilian of Leichtenberg,
and an enthusiastic reception was given in his honor.
"Notwithstanding
this," Tolstoy remarks, "at the end of this year I began for the
first time to study seriously, and even found a certain pleasure in so doing.
Among the university subjects the Encyclopedia of Law and Criminal Law were of
interest to me; moreover, the German Professor Vogel arranged discussions at
the lectures, and I remember that I was interested by one on capital
punishment; but besides the university or faculty subjects, Meyer, Professor of
Civil law, set me a task, viz., a comparison between Montesquieu’s Esprit des
Lois and Catherine’s Code, and this work greatly absorbed me."
The May examinations of
1846 went off well for Tolstoy. His marks were as follows: Logic and
psychology, five each; encyclopedia of law, history of Roman law, and Latin,
four each; universal and Russian history, theory of rhetoric and German, three
each; deportment in each of the three terms, five each. The average mark
received was three, and thus Tolstoy passed on to his second year’s course.
The same year he was
punished by the university authorities. He was put under lock and key. This
episode has been described by a student, a fellow-sufferer with Tolstoy,
Nazaryev, in his reminiscences. His version is far from true, though what he
gives as their conversation corresponded to what really happened. With the help
of Tolstoy’s remarks we hope to reproduce the incident as it occurred.
Tolstoy was locked up,
not in a lecture hall, according to Nazaryev, but in a punishment cell (prison
room), with its arches and iron gates; he and his comrade were both there.
Tolstoy carried with him a candle and candlestick secreted in his boot, and
they spent a day or two very pleasantly.
The coachman, trotter,
man-servant, and so on existed in Nazaryev’s imagination only. But their
conversation as reproduced by him is plausible, and we therefore take it from
Nazaryev’s article as follows:
"I remember,"
says Nazaryev, "noticing Lermontov’s Demon. Tolstoy made an ironical
remark about verses in general, and then turning to the Karamzin’s History
lying at my side, he attacked history as the dullest subject and an almost
useless one.
"‘History,’ he
declared curtly, ‘is nothing but a collection of fables and useless details,
sprinkled with a quantity of unnecessary dates and proper names. The death of
Igor, the snake that stung Oleg, what are these but fairy tales? And who wants
to know that the second marriage of John with the daughter of Temryuk took place
on August 21, 1562, and the fourth with Anna Alekseyevna Koltorskaya, in 1572?
Yet they expect me to learn all this, and, if I don’t know it, I get mark one!
And how is history written? All is fitted in according to a certain plan
invented by the historian. Ivan the Terrible (about whom Professor Ivanov is at
present lecturing), in 1560, from a virtuous and wise man, suddenly changes
into a stupid, cruel tyrant. How and why, you need not ask....’ This was my
companion’s strain more or less throughout. I was greatly puzzled by such sharp
criticism, the more so as history was my favorite subject.
"This time the (to
me) irresistible force of Tolstoy’s doubts fell upon the university and the
teaching of universities generally. ‘The temple of science’ was continually on
his lips. While himself remaining quite serious, he made such caricatures of
our professors, that in spite of my endeavor to appear uninterested I simply
roared with laughter."
"‘Yet,’ concluded
Tolstoy, ‘we both have a right to expect that we shall leave this temple useful
men, equipped with knowledge. But what shall we carry from the university?
Think a little and answer your conscience. What shall we take from this temple
when we return home to the country, what shall we know how to do, to whom shall
we be necessary?’ So he proceeded, addressing the question to me.
"In conversation
of this kind we spent the whole night. MOrning had hardly dawned when the door
opened, and the sergeant entered. He saluted us and explained that we were free
and could retire to our respective homes.
"Tolstoy pulled
his cap over his eyes, wrapped himself in his cloak with beaver collar,
slightly nodded to me, once more abused ‘the temple,’ and then disappeared
accompanied by his servant and the sergeant. I, too, was in a hurry to be gone.
After leaving my companion, I gave a sigh of relief to be in the open frosty
air in the midst of the silent street, just beginning to stir.
"My head was heavy
and full of doubts and questions brought before me for the first time in my
life by this strange and utterly incomprehensible companion in my
captivity."
The beginning of the
academic year 1846-47 brought certain changes in the life of the brothers
Sergey, Dmitriy, and Lev Tolstoy. They left the house of their aunt, Pelageya
Ilyinishna Yushkova, and settled in private rooms in the house belonging then
to Petondi, and now occupied by Lozhkin’s Public charitable Home. There they
had five rooms on the upper floor of the brick lodge, which still remains in
the court-yard of this house and is used as one of the wards of the home.
In January 1847,
Tolstoy once more appeared on the day of the half-yearly examinations, but did
not enter for all of them, and he evidently treated the whole affair as a
hollow formality. Probably the plan of leaving the university was already
forming in his mind. Indeed, soon after the Easter holidays, he presented a
petition to be allowed to leave the university. It was as follows:
"PETITION.
"To His Excellency
the Rector of the Imperial Kazan University, the State Councillor, and Cavalier
Ivan Mikhaylovich Simonov, from an extern undergraduate in the second year of
the faculty of law, Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy.
"Prevented from
continuing my studies in the university on account of ill-health and family
affairs, I humbly beg your Excellency to issue an order authorizing the
omission of my name from the roll of university students and the return of all
my documents."
To this petition is
added in his own handwriting the signature of the student Count Lev Tolstoy,
April 12, 1847.
After this comes the
resolution of the administration of the university authorizing "Tolstoy’s
name to be struck off the roll of students, and a memorandum to be made of the
time for which he remained in the university."
In the archives of the
university there still exists the duplicate of the testimonial given to Count
L.N. Tolstoy. This testimonial is very curious in its way, for it has been so
edited as to smooth down Tolstoy’s university failures, and to say nothing of the
causes which hindered his moving up into his second year’s course while he was
a student in the division of Oriental languages. It runs as follows:
"The bearer of
this, Count Lev, the son of Nikolay Tolstoy, having received a private
education and passed an examination in all the subjects contained in the
gymnasium curriculum, was admitted as a student at the Kazan University in the
Division of Turko-Arab literature for the first year, but what progress he made
during this year is not known, as he did not present himself for the
examinations at the end of the year, and had therefore to remain in the same
class. By the permission of the Director of the Educational Department of
Kazan, dated September 13, 1845, he was transferred under N 3919 from the Division
of Turko-Arab literature to the faculty of Law, where he made progress which,
in logic and psychology, was excellent; in comparative jurisprudence, history
of Roman law, and Latin - good; in universal and Russian history, theory of
rhetoric and German - tolerably good; he was then moved to the second year’s
course, but what progress he made while there is not known, as the yearly
examinations have not yet taken place. Tolstoy’s conduct while at the
university was excellent. Now in compliance with his petition, presented on the
12th instant of April, he is on the ground of ill-health and family affairs
discharged from the university. Not having taken a degree, he cannot enjoy the
privileges reserved to graduates, but in virtue of paragraph 590, Volume III of
the Civil Code (edition 1842), on entering civil service, he will be entitled
to the same privileges as to promotion as those who have passed through the
gymnasium course of instruction, and will have the same rank as the civil
service officials of the second class. In witness hereof this testimonial is
given to Count Lev Tolstoy by the administration of the University of kazan,
duly signed and sealed with the official seal, in accordance with the Imperial
Charter granted to Kazan University, on ordinary paper."
"Tolstoy,"
writes Zagoskin in his reminiscences, "was in a great hurry to leave
Kazan, and did not even wait for the final university examinations which his
brothers had to pass. The day came when he was to set out for Moscow, which lay
on his way to Yasnaya Polyana. In the rooms of the Counts Tolstoy in the wing
of Petondi’s house, a small party of students gathered to celebrate his
departure on a journey which was not free from difficulty in those days of
imperfect communications over great distances. One of those present who related
to me the incident is still living in Kazan. In accordance with the custom, all
drank the traveler health, and wished him every good fortune. They accompanied
him to the ferry across the river Kazanka, which had then overflowed its banks,
and for the last time the friends exchanged the farewell kisses."
Few traces are now left
of Tolstoy’s stay at Kazan.
Prince D. D. Obolensky,
who recently paid a visit to the university, told me that in the lecture hall
he saw the signature "Count L. N. Tolstoy," undoubtedly cut by
himself on the iron bar of his seat during his attendance at the lectures. This,
it seems, is the only record of Tolstoy’s presence in the Kazan University.
Tolstoy’s German
biographer, Loewenfeld, while at Yasnaya Polyana, asked him why, considering
his inherent thirst for knowledge, he left the university prematurely.
The Count’s answer was:
"This was perhaps the chief reason why I left it. I was little interested
in what our Professors read at Kazan. I first worked a year at Oriental
languages, but with little success, though I threw myself enthusiastically into
what I did. I read innumerable books, but all in one and the same direction.
When any subject interested me, I did not deviate from it either to the right
or the left, and I endeavored to become acquainted with everything which might
throw a light on this particular subject. So it was with me at Kazan."
"There were two
reasons for my leaving the university," says Tolstoy; "first that my
brother had finished his course and was leaving; and secondly, however strange
it may be to say so, that the work on the Nakaz and the Esprit de Lois (I have
still got it) opened out to me a new sphere of independent mental work, whereas
the university with its demands far from aiding such work, only hindered
it."
Calling to mind his
brother Dmitriy, Tolstoy gives interesting details of student life in Kazan, so
we insert these reminiscences here.
"Mitenka was a
year older than I. Big, black, grave eyes. I hardly remember him as a boy. I
only know by hearsay that as a child he was very capricious; it was said that
such moods used to seize him that he was angry and cried at his nurse’s not
looking at him, and next got into a rage and screamed because she was looking
at him. I know by what I have been told that my mother had much trouble with
him. He was nearest to me by age, and I played with him oftenest, but I did not
love him as much as I loved Seryozha, nor as I loved and respected Nikolenka.
He and I lived together amicably. I do not recollect that we quarreled.
Probably we did, and may even have fought; but, as it happens with children,
these fights did not leave the slightest trace, and I loved him with a simple
instinctive love, and therefore did not remark it and do not remember it. I
think, nay, I actually know, that according to my experience, especially in
childhood, love for human beings is a natural state of the soul, or rather a
natural attitude toward all men, and, as it is such, one does not remark it.
This changes only when one dislikes, when one does not love but is afraid of
something, as I was afraid of beggars, and was afraid of one of the Volkonskys
who used to pinch me, and, I think, of no one else - and when one loves some
one exceptionally, as I loved my aunt Tatyana, my brother Seryozha, Nikolenka,
Vasiliy, my nurse Issayevna, and Pashenka. As a child I remember nothing
special about Mitenka, except his childish merriment. His peculiarities became
manifest, and are memorable to me from the time of our life at Kazan, whither
we removed in the year ’40 when he was thirteen. Till then, in Moscow, I
remember that he did not fall in love as did Seryozha and I, did not
particularly like dancing, nor military pageants, about which I will speak
later, but studied well and strenuously. I remember that a student teacher
named Poplonsky, who used to give us lessons, defined the attitude of us three
brothers to our studies thus: Sergey both wishes and can, Dmitriy wishes but
cannot (this was not true), and Lev neither wishes nor can. I think this was
perfectly true.
"So that my real
memories concerning Mitenka begin with Kazan. At Kazan I, who had always
imitated Seryozha, began to grow depraved (I will relate this later). Not only
at Kazan, but even earlier, I used to take pains about my appearance. I tried
to be elegant, comme il faut. There was no trace of anything of the kind in
Mitenka. I think he never suffered from the usual vices of youth; he was always
serious, thoughtful, pure, resolute, though hot-tempered, and whatever he did
he did to the best of his ability. It happened once that he swallowed a bit of
chain; but as far as I can remember, he was not particularly troubled about the
consequences. But as for myself, I remember what terrors I underwent when I
swallowed the stone of a French plum which my aunt had given me, and how
solemnly, as if in the face of death, I announced the mishap to her. I also
remember how, as children, we used to toboggan down a steep hill by the farm
yard, and how some traveler, in order to drive his troika along the road, drove
it up this hill. I think Seryozha, with a village boy, had launched down the hill,
and being unable to stop his sleigh, got under the horses. The boy climbed out
without injury. The troika ascended the hill. We were all absorbed in the
event, thinking how they got out from under the horses, how the center horse
got frightened, etc., whereas Mitenka (a boy of nine) went up to the traveler
and began to upbraid him. I remember how it astonished and displeased me when
he said that, in order to keep people from driving where there was no road, it
would be necessary to send them to the stables, which, in the language of the
time, implied a flogging.
"At Kazan his
peculiarities began; he studied well and regularly, and wrote verses with great
facility. I remember how admirably he translated Schiller’s Der Jungling aus
Lorche, but he did not devote himself to this occupation. I remember that once
he merrily romped, and how the girls were delighted with it, and how I was
envious, and reflected that this was because he was always so serious. And I
desired to imitate him in this. Our aunt and godmother had the silly idea of
making each of us the gift of a boy, who was eventually to become our devoted
servant. To Mitenka was given Vanyusha (he is still living). Mitenka often
treated him badly, and I think even beat him. I say I think, because I do not
remember it, but only remember his repentance for something done to Vanyusha,
and his humble prayers for forgiveness.
"Thus he grew up,
associating little with others, always, except in moments of anger, quiet and
serious, with thoughtful, grave, large hazel eyes. He was tall, rather thin,
and not very strong, with long big hands and round shoulders. His peculiarities
began at the time of entering the university. He was a year younger than
Sergey, but they entered the university together, in the mathematical faculty,
solely because the elder brother was a mathematician. I do not know how or by
what he was so early attracted toward a religious life, but it began with the
very first year of his university life. His religious aspirations naturally
directed him to Church life, and he devoted himself to it as thoroughly as he
did to everything. He began to fast, he attended all the Church services, and
became especially strict in his conduct.
"In Mitenka there
must have existed that valuable characteristic which I believe my mother to
have had, and which I knew in Nikolenka, and of which I was altogether devoid -
the characteristic of complete indifference to other people’s opinion about
oneself. Until quite lately I have always been unable to divest myself of
concern about people’s opinion, but Mitenka was quite free from this. I never
remember on his fact that restrained smile which involuntarily appears when one
is praised. I always remember his serious, quiet, sad, sometimes severe, large,
almond-shaped hazel eyes. Only from the kazan days did we begin to pay
particular attention to him, and that merely because, while Seryozha and I
attached great importance to what was comme il faut - to the external - he was
careless and untidy, and for this we condemned him. He did not dance, and did
not wish to learn dancing. As a student he did not go into society; he wore a
student’s suit with a tight tie, and from his very youth he had the habit of
jerking his head as if freeing himself from this tie. His peculiarity first
revealed itself in our first preparation for communion. He made his devotions,
not in the fashionable university church, but in the church of the prison. We
lived in a house belonging to a Mr. Gortalov opposite the jail. The prison
chaplain of that time was a specially pious and devout man, who, contrary to
the ordinary usage of priests, went through the whole of the appointed readings
in the Gospels for Passion Week, as was officially required, which made the
services last a very long time. Mitenka used to stand them out, and made the
priest’s acquaintance. The jail church was so arranged that the public was
separated from the place where the convicts stood only by a glass partition
with a door. Once one of the convicts wished to pass something to one of the
vergers - either a candle, or money to buy one; no one in the church cared to
undertake the commission, but Mitenka, with a serious expression on his face,
immediately took it and passed it on. It turned out that it was forbidden, and
he was reprimanded, but, as he thought it was right, he did it again.
"We others,
especially Seryozha, kept up acquaintance with our aristocratic comrades and
other young men. Mitenka, on the contrary, out of all our comrades, selected a
piteous-looking, poor, shabbily dressed student, Poluboyarinov (whom a humorous
comrade of ours used to call Polubezobedov, and we contemptible lads thought
this amusing, and laughed at Mitenka). he consorted only with Poluboyarinov,
and with him prepared for his examinations.
"We were living in
the upper floor, which was divided in two by an inner balcony over the
ball-room. In the nearest half on this side of the balcony lived Mitenka, in
the room on the other Seryozha and myself. We two were fond of small
knick-knacks, we decorated our rooms as grown-up people do, and trifling
articles used to be given us for this purpose. Mitenka kept no ornaments at
all. The only thing he had taken from our father’s things was a collection of
minerals: he classified them, ticketed them, and placed them in a case under
glass. As we brothers, and even aunt, looked down upon Mitenka with a certain
contempt for his low tastes and associations, the same attitude was assumed by
our light-minded comrades. One of the latter, a very unintelligent man, an engineer,
one E., a friend of ours - not so much by our choice as because he stuck to us
- once, on passing through Mitenka’s room, took notice of these minerals, and
questioned Mitenka about them. E. was not sympathetic, not natural, and Mitenka
answered unwillingly. E. moved the box and jerked the minerals. Mitenka said, ‘Leave
them alone.’ E. paid no attention, but made some joke and called him Noah.
Mitenka flew in a rage, and with his big hands hit E. in the face. E. ran away
and Mitenka after him. As they rushed into our quarters we locked the doors,
but Mitenka declared that he would thrash him when he went back. Seryozha and,
I think, Shuvalov went to persuade Mitenka to let E. pass, but he took a broom
and declared that he would certainly beat him. I don’t know what might have
happened had E. passed through his room, but E. himself requested us to get him
out some other way, and we led him out, almost crawling, by some way through
the dusty garret.
"Such was Mitenka
in his moments of anger. But this is what he was when nothing put him out. To
our family had attached herself (she was taken in from pity) a most strange and
piteous being, Lyubov Sergeyevna, a girl; I don’t know what surname was given
her. She was the fruit of an incestuous connection. How she came into our house
I do not know. I have been told that she was pitied and caressed, and that they
wished to find her a situation, or even to have her married to Feodor
Ivanovich, but nothing of this succeeded. Then she was taken by my aunt to
Kazan, and lived with her, so that I came to know her at Kazan. She was a
pitiful, meek, oppressed being. She had a little room of her own, and a girl
attended her. When I made her acquaintance she was not only pitiful but
repulsive to look at. I don’t know what her disease was, but her face was all
swollen, as faces are when they have been stung by bees. Her eyes appeared in
two narrow slits, between swollen chining cushions without brows; similarly
swollen and gleaming were her cheeks, nose, lips, and mouth, and she spoke with
difficulty, probably having the same swelling within her mouth. In summer flies
settled on her face without her feeling it, and it was especially unpleasant to
see this. Her hair was still black but scanty, barely concealing the scalp. Vasiliy
Yushkov, my aunt’s husband, a sarcastic man, did not conceal his repugnance for
her. She always had a bad smell about her, and in her room, where neither
window nor ventilator was ever open, the atmosphere was oppressive. Well, it
was this Lyubov Sergeyevna who became Mitenka’s friend. He used to go to her
room, listen to her, talk to her, read to her. And strange to say, we were
morally so dense that we only laughed at this, whereas Mitenka was morally so
high, so independent of concern about people’s opinion, that he never either by
word or by hint showed that he regarded what he was doing as something good. He
simply did it.
"This was not a
passing impulse, but continued the whole time we lived at Kazan.
"How clear it is
to me that Mitenka’s death did not destroy him, that he existed before I came
to know him, before he was born, and that, having died, he still is!"
Let us take a glance at
Tolstoy’s inner life at this period, so far as we have the materials.
The critical age of man
- youth - leads him into the abyss of passion. To an ordinary man it is a
period in life when he is carried away by various sensations and passions, when
he searches for an ideal; a period of dreams, expectations, and, generally, of
unfulfilled hopes. One can imagine the mental excitement through which such a
many-sided and powerful nature had to pass, as Tolstoy’s was and remains. His
soul was tossed to and fro on divers blasts. The wings of vision lifted him to
unattainable heights, from which he plunged downward, carried away by the lower
impulses of a powerful animal nature.
References are to be
found to the tumultuous inner life of this youthful period in two works of
Tolstoy’s - Youth and My Confession. In the first we meet with autobiographical
traits in Nikolenka Irtenev’s reflections. The thoughts taken from Youth are
chiefly of an ideal character, and expressed in a beautiful poetic form. here
we bring forward only the more important of them.
"I have said that
my friendship with Dmitriy had opened up to me a new view of life, its aims and
relations. The essence of this view consisted in the conviction that it was man’s
destiny to strive after moral perfection, and that this perfection was easy,
possible, and eternal....
"But a time came
when these ideas burst upon my reason with such a fresh power of moral
discovery that I became frightened at the thought of how much time I had spent
in vain, and I wished immediately, that very second, to apply all those ideas
to life, with the firm intention of never being false to them.
"This time I
regard as the beginning of my youth.
"I was then
finishing my sixteenth year. Teachers still came to the house, St. Jerome
looked after my studies, and I was preparing myself with an effort, and against
my will, for the university.
"At that date,
which I regard as the extreme limit of boyhood and beginning of youth, the
basis of my dreams consisted of four sentiments. The first was the love for
her, an imaginary woman, of whom I dreamed ever in the same way, and whom I
expected to meet somewhere at any minute....my second sentiment was the love of
love. I wanted everybody to know and love me. I wanted to tell my name, and
have every one struck by the information, and surround me and thank me for
something. The third sentiment was a hope for some unusual vain happiness -
such a strong and firm hope that it passed into insanity....My fourth and chief
sentiment was my self-disgust and repentance, but a repentance which was so
closely welded with the hope of happiness, that there was nothing sad in
it....I even found pleasure in my disgust with the past, and tried to see it
blacker than it was. The blacker the circle of my memories of the past, the
brighter and clearer stood out from it the bright and clear point of the
present, and streamed the rainbow colors of the future. This voice of
repentance and passionate desire for perfection was the main new sensation of
my soul at that epoch of my development, and it was this which laid a new
foundation for my views of myself, of people, and of the whole world.
"Beneficent,
consoling voice, which since then has so often been heard suddenly and boldly
against all lies, in those sad moments when the soul in silence submitted to
the power of deceit and debauchery in life, which has angrily accused the past,
has indicated the bright point of the present, causing one to love it, and has
promised happiness and well-being in the future - beneficent, consoling voice!
will you ever cease to be heard?"
Fortunately for Tolstoy
himself and for all of us, we know that that voice was never for a moment
silent, and that this beneficent voice still calls to him and to us, guiding us
toward a bright and infinite ideal.
Sometimes these dreams
vividly expressed the principles of that idealistic naturalism which became the
base of the greater part of Tolstoy’s works.
"And the moon rose
higher and higher, and stood brighter and brighter in the heavens, the rich
sheen of the pond, evenly growing, like sound, became more and more distinct,
the shadows became blacker and blacker, and the light ever more transparent;
and as I looked at it all and listened, something told me that she, with her
bared arms and passionate embraces, was very far from bearing all the happiness
in the world, that the love for her was very far from being all its bliss; and
the more I looked at the full moon up on high, the higher did true beauty and
goodness appear to me, and the purer and nearer to Him, the source of all that
is beautiful and good, and tears of an unsatisfied but stirring joy stood in my
eyes.
"And I was all
alone, and it seemed to me that mysterious, majestic nature, the attractive
bright disc of the moon, which had for some reason stopped in one high
undefined spot in the pale blue sky, and yet stood everywhere and, as it were,
filled all the immeasurable space - and myself, insignificant worm, defiled
already by all petty, wretched human passions, but with all the immeasurable
might power of love - it seemed to me in those minutes that Nature and the moon
and I were one and the same."
It is interesting to
note the literary works which influenced Tolstoy and helped the development of
his views during his youth, that is to say, from about fourteen to twenty-one
years.
Titles of the
books/Degree of their influence.
The New Testament
(Gospel of St. Matthew); The Sermon on the Mount: Powerful.
Sterne: Sentimental
Journey: Very great.
Rousseau: Confession:
Powerful.
Rousseau: Emile:
Powerful.
Rousseau: Nouvelle
Heloise: Very great.
Pushkin: Eugene Onegin:
Very great.
Schiller: Die Rauber:
Very great.
Gogol: The Overcoat;
Iv. Iv. and Iv. Nik.; Nevsky Prospect; Vy; Dead Souls: Great.
Turgenev: Memoirs of a
Sportsman: Very great.
Druzhinin: Polinka Sax:
Very great.
Grigorovich: Anton
Goremika: Very great.
Dickens: David
Copperfield: Powerful.
Lermontov: Hero of Our
Times; Taman: Very great.
Prescott: The Conquest
of Mexico: Great.
At the same time
Tolstoy had to put up with the worry of the conventionalities to which his
life, as one of the gentry, was subjected; to one of which, the so-called comme
il faut, he dedicates a whole chapter in Youth. We will quote from it only the
more essential passages.
"I feel myself
constrained to devote a whole chapter to a conception that was one of the most
disastrous and false ideas with which I was inoculated by education and
society.
"My chief and
favorite classification at the time of which I am writing was into people comme
il faut and comme il ne faut pas. The second division was subdivided into
people more particularly not comme il faut, and into the common people. I
respected people comme il faut, and considered them worthy of being on an
equality with me; I pretended a contempt for the second, but in reality hated
them, cherishing against them a feeling of being personally offended; the third
for me did not exist - I disregarded them entirely. My comme il faut consisted,
first and foremost, in the use of excellent French, more especially in
pronunciation. a man who pronounced French badly immediately provoked a feeling
of hatred in me. ‘Why do you attempt to speak as we do, if you do not know how?’
I asked him mentally, with a venomous smile. The second condition for comme il
faut consisted in long, manicured and clean nails. The third was the ability to
courtesy, dance, and converse. The fourth - and this was very important - was
an indifference to everything, and a constant expression of a certain elegant,
supercilious ennui....
"It is terrible to
think how much invaluable time of my seventeenth year I wasted on the acquisition
of this temper of mind....
"But it was not
the loss of the golden time, which was employed on the assiduous task of
preserving all the difficult conditions of the comme il faut, to the exclusion
of every serious application, nor the hatred and contempt for nine-tenths of
the human race, nor the absence of any interest in all the beauty that existed
outside that circle of comme il faut, that was the greatest evil which this
conception caused me. The greatest evil consisted in the conviction that comme
il faut was an independent position in society, that a man need not have to try
to be an official, or a carriage-maker, or a soldier, or a learned man, if he
was comme il faut; that, having reached that position, he had already fulfilled
his purpose, and even stood higher than most people.
"At a certain
period of his youth, every man, after many blunders and transports, generally
faces the necessity of taking an active part in social life, chooses some
department of labor, and devotes himself to it; but this seldom happens with
the man who is comme il faut. I know many, very many, old, proud,
self-confident people, sharp in their judgments, who to the question which may
be asked them in the next world, ‘Who are you? and what have you been doing
there?’ would not be able to answer otherwise that ‘Je fus un homme tres comme
il faut.’
"This fate awaited
me."
As we know from the
conversation of Tolstoy with his German biographer, Loewenfeld, along with his
university studies (on the whole uninteresting to him) he showed capacity for
independent intellectual research. This was called forth by the university
inviting an essay comparing the Esprit de Lois of Montesquieu and the
Instruction of the Empress Catherine II.
The diaries of Tolstoy
relating to this period are full of thoughts, notes, and commentaries
concerning this essay. A swarm of ideas crowded his brain, as if the hitherto
sleeping intellect suddenly awoke and began to work actively in all directions.
In March, 1847, Tolstoy
was laid up in the Kazan hospital. During his illness, being alone in the
hospital, he found time to think of the significance of Reason. Society is but
part of the world. Reason must be in harmony with the world, with the whole, so
by studying its laws one may become independent of the past, of the world. We
see from this remark that this youth of eighteen years had already in him the
germ of the future idea of anarchy.
Having observed in
himself signs of a passion for knowledge, Tolstoy checks himself at once, and
fearing to go too far in theory, he tries to solve the questions of science
applied to practice, but chiefly those of the moral ideal and moral conduct.
Among others, he made
the following entry in his diary (March 1847):
"I have greatly
changed, but still have not attained that degree of perfection (in my
occupations) which I would like to attain. I do not fulfill that which I set
myself to do and what I do fulfill I do not fulfill well, I do not exercise my
memory. For this purpose I here put down some rules, which, as it seems to me,
would greatly help if I followed them.
"(1) To fulfill
despite everything that which I set myself.
"(2) To fulfill
well what I do fulfill.
"(3) Never to
refer to a book for what I have forgotten, but to endeavor to recall it to mind
myself.
"(4) Continually
to compel my mind to work with the utmost power it is capable of.
"(5) To read and
think always aloud.
"(6) Not to be
ashamed of telling those who interrupt me that they hinder me; at first let
them only feel it, hit if they do not understand (that they are hindering me),
then apologize and tell them so."
His university essay
leads him to the conclusion that there are two principles in Catherine’s
Instruction: that of the revolutionary ideas of modern Europe and that of
Catherine’s despotism and vanity, the latter principle being predominant. The
republican ideas are borrowed by her from Montesquieu. In the end Tolstoy comes
to the conclusion that the Instruction brought with it more glory to Catherine
than advantage to Russia.
Having resolved to
leave the university and settle in the country, Tolstoy determined that he
would study Latin, the English language, and Roman law, the subjects which, in
his own opinion, he knew least about.
But as the time of
departure drew nearer, the plans and dreams of his new life widened, and
finally he wrote this in his diary of April 17, 1847:
"A change must
take place in my way of life, but it is necessary that this change should be
the result of the soul, and not of external circumstances."
Further:
"The object of
life is the conscious aspiration toward the many-sided development of all that
exists.
"The object of
life in the country during two years:
"(1) To study the
whole course of law necessary for the final university examination. (2) To
study practical medicine and a part of the theory. (3) To study these
languages: French, Russian, German, English, Italian, and Latin. (4) To study
agriculture, both theoretically and practically. (5) To study history,
geography, and statistics. (6) To study mathematics, gymnasium course. (7) To
write my university essay. (8) To attain the highest possible perfection in
music and painting. (9) To write down the rules of conduct. (10) To acquire
some knowledge of the natural sciences. And (11) to compose essays on all the
subjects I shall study."
All the subsequent life
of Tolstoy in the country is full of such dreams, good beginnings, and serious
and sincere struggles with himself after perfection.
With incomparable
sincerity he notes down any digression, every lapse from the rule he intended
to follow, and again gathers strength for a new battle.
His relation with women
began to disturb him even then, and this is the interesting advice he gave
himself:
"Look upon the
society of women as upon a necessary unpleasantness of social life, and as much
as possible keep away from them.
"Indeed, from whom
do we get sensuality, effeminacy, frivolity in everything, and many other
vices, if not from women? Who is to blame that we lose out innate qualities of
boldness, resolution, reasonableness, justice, and others, if not women? Women
are more receptive than men, therefore in virtuous ages women were better than
we, but in the present depraved and vicious age they are worse than we."
In all this we already
see hints of his later views of life.
His first philosophical
essays also belong to this period, and it was at this time, while reading
Rousseau, that he wrote commentaries to his Discourses. We also meet his
original philosophic article, written in 1846-47, when he was eighteen years
old. The title of the article is, "On the Aim of Philosophy."
Philosophy is thus defined:
"Man aspires -
i.e., man is active. To what is his activity directed, how is his activity to
be set free? In this consists philosophy in its true sense. In other words,
philosophy is the science of life."
Besides these, he wrote
essays on various subjects, such as: "On Reasoning Concerning Future Life,"
"Definition of Time, Space, and Number," "Methods,"
"Division of Philosophy," etc.
The following incident,
noted down by the Countess Tolstoy, occurred about this time:
"During his
student days Tolstoy was struck by the idea of symmetry, and wrote a
philosophical article on the subject in an argumentative form. The article was
lying on the table in his room when Shuvalov, a friend of the brothers Tolstoy,
came in with bottles in all his pockets, and was going to drink, when he caught
sight of the article and read it. He was interested in it, and asked Tolstoy
what he had copied it from. Tolstoy replied, with some hesitation, that he had
written it himself. Shuvalov laughed and said that was not true, it could not
be, the article was too deep and clever for such a youth. Nothing would
convince him of it, and he went away with his conviction unchanged."
This little incident
shows how much Tolstoy’s intellectual standard already differed from that of
those about him, and how superior to them he was.
His Confession reveals
to us his inner world of that period from another point of view - the religious
one.
"I remember, also,
that when my elder brother, Dmitriy, then at the university, gave himself up to
a passionate faith, with the impulsiveness natural to his character, began to
attend the Church services regularly, to fast, and to lead a pure and moral
life, we all of us, as well as some older than ourselves, never ceased to hold
him up to ridicule, and for some incomprehensible reason gave him the nickname
of Noah. I remember that Mussin-Pushkin, then curator of the University of
Kazan, having invited us to a ball, tried to persuade my brother, who had
refused the invitation, by the jeering argument that even David danced before
the ark.
"I sympathized
then with these jokes of my elders, and drew from them this conclusion - that I
was bound to learn my catechism, and go to church, but that it was not
necessary to think of my religious duties more seriously. I also remember that
I read Voltaire when I was very young, and that his tone of mockery amused
without disgusting me. The gradual estrangement from all belief went on in me,
as it does, and always has done, in those of the same social position and
culture as myself. This falling off, as it seems to me, for the most part takes
place as follows: People live as others do, and their lives are guided, not by
the principles of the faith which is taught them, but by their very opposite;
belief has no influence on life, nor on the relations between men - it is
relegated to some other sphere, where life is not; if the two ever come into
contact at all, belief is only one of the outward phenomena, and not one of the
constituent parts of life.
"By a man’s life,
by his acts, it was then, as it is now, impossible to know whether he was a
believer or not. If there be a difference between one who openly professes the
doctrines of the Orthodox Church and one who denies them, the difference is not
to the advantage of the former. An open profession of the orthodox doctrines is
mostly found among persons of dull intellects, of stern character, who are much
impressed with their own importance. Intelligence, honesty, frankness, a good
heart, and moral conduct are oftener met with among those who are disbelievers.
A schoolboy of the people is taught his catechism and sent to church; from the
grown man is required a certificate of his having taken the Holy Communion. But
a man belonging to our class neither goes to school nor is bound by the
regulations affecting those in the public service, and may now live through
long years - still more was this the case formerly - without being once
reminded of the fact that he lives among Christians, and calls himself a member
of the Orthodox Church.
"Thus it happens
that now, as formerly, the influence of early religious teaching, accepted
merely on trust and upheld by authority, gradually fades away under the
knowledge and practical experience of later life, which is opposed to all its
principles, and a man often believes for years that his early faith is still
intact, while all the time not a particle of it remains in him.
"The belief
instilled in childhood gradually disappeared in me, as in so many others, but
with this difference, that I was conscious of my own disbelief. At fifteen
years of age I had begun to read philosophical works. From the age of sixteen I
ceased to pray, and ceased also to attend the services of the Church with
conviction, or to fast. I no longer accepted the faith of my childhood, but I
had a vague belief in something, though I did not think I could exactly explain
what. I believed in a God, or rather I did not deny the existence of God, but
anything relating to the nature of the Deity I could not have described; I
denied neither Christ nor His teaching, but wherein that teaching consisted I
could not have said.
"Now, when I think
over that time, I see clearly that all the faith I had, the only belief which,
apart from mere animal instinct, swayed my life, was a belief in a possibility
of perfection, though what it was in itself, or what would be its results, I
was unable to say. I endeavored to reach perfection in intellectual
attainments; my studies were extended in every direction of which my life afforded
me a chance; I strove to strengthen my will, forming for myself rules which I
forced myself to follow; I did my best to develop my physical powers by every
exercise calculated to give strength and agility, and, by way of accustoming
myself to patient endurance, subjected myself to many voluntary hardships and
trials of privations. All this I looked upon as necessary to obtain the
perfection at which I aimed. At first, of course, moral perfection seemed to me
the main end, but I soon found myself contemplating instead of it an ideal of
conventional perfectibility; in other words, I wished to be better, not in my
own eyes, nor in those of God, but in the sight of other men. This feeling
again soon led to another - the desire to have more power than others, to
secure for myself a greater share of fame, of social distinction, and of
wealth."
Further on begins the
terrible confession by which Tolstoy, in denouncing his own sins, denounces our
also at the same time, for most of us have been through the same depths of
vice, though we may not have plunged into so gigantic an abyss, or the
consciousness of our evil lives may not have been so real.
"At some future
time I may relate the story of my life, and dwell in detail on the pathetic and
instructive incidents of my youth. Many others must have passed through the
same experiences. I honestly desired to make myself a good and virtuous man;
but I was young, I had passions, and I stood alone, altogether alone, in my
search after virtue. Every time I tried to express the longings of my heart for
a truly virtuous life, I was met with contempt and derisive laughter; but
directly I gave way to the lowest of my passions, I was praised and encouraged.
I found ambition, love of power, love of gain, lechery, pride, anger, vengeance,
held in high esteem. I gave way to these passions, and becoming like my elders,
felt that the place which I filled in the world satisfied those around me. My
kindhearted aunt, a really good woman, used to say to me, that there was one
thing above all others which she wished for me - an intrigue with a married
woman: ‘Rien ne forme un jeune homme, comme une liaison avec une femme comme il
faut.’ Another of her wishes for my happiness was, that I should become an
adjutant, and, if possible, to the Emperor. The greatest happiness of all for
me she thought would be that I should find a wealthy bride who would bring me
as her dowry an enormous number of serfs.
"I cannot now
recall those years without a painful feeling of horror and loathing.
"I put men to
death in war, I fought duels to slay others. I lost at cards, wasted the
substance wrung from the sweat of peasants, punished the latter cruelly, rioted
with loose women, and deceived men. Lying, robbery, adultery of all kinds,
drunkenness, violence, and murder, all were committed by me, not one crime
omitted, and yet I was not the less considered by my equals to be a
comparatively moral man. Such was my life for ten years.
"During that time
I began to write, out of vanity, love of gain, and pride. I followed as a
writer the same path which I had chosen as a man. In order to obtain the fame
and the money for which I wrote, I was obliged to hide what was good and bow
down before what was evil. How often while writing have I cudgelled my brains
to conceal under the mask of indifference or pleasantry those yearnings for
something better which formed the real problem of my life! I succeeded in my
object, and was praised. At twenty-six years of age, on the close of the war, I
came to St. Petersburg and made the acquaintance of the authors of the day.
"I met with a
hearty reception and much flattery."
This tumultuous period
of ten years’ duration began in this country.
To this time belong
more or less Tolstoy’s attempts to arrange the affairs of his estates on new
principles, and especially his endeavors to establish reasonable and friendly
relations with the peasants. These attempts fell flat, and their failure is
vividly pictured in his tale, A Russian Proprietor. This tale gives us so much
autobiographical material, in the psychological sense, that we consider it as a
chapter of his biography, though the incidents related do not agree with the
facts of his life.
From it we quote the
letter of "Prince Nekhludov" to his aunt:
"Dear Aunty: I
have made a resolution on which the fate of my whole life must depend. I will
leave the university in order to devote myself to country life, because I feel
that I was born for it. For God’s sake, dear aunty, do not laugh at me! You
will say that I am young; and, indeed, I may still be a child, but this does
not prevent me from feeling what my calling is, and from wishing to do good,
and loving it.
"As I have written
you before, I found affairs in indescribable disorder. In trying to straighten
them out, and to understand them, I discovered that the main evil lay in the
truly pitiable, poverty-stricken condition of the peasants, and that the evil
was such that it could be mended by labor and patience alone. If you could only
see two of my peasants, David and Ivan, and the lives which they lead with
their families, I am sure that the mere sight of these unfortunates would
convince you more than all I might say to explain my intention to you.
"Is it not my
sacred and direct duty to care for the welfare of these seven hundred men, for
whom I shall be held responsible before God? Is it not a sin to abandon them to
the caprice of rude elders and managers for their plans of enjoyment and
ambition? And why should I look in another sphere for opportunities of being
useful and doing good when such a noble, brilliant, and immediate duty is open
to me?
"I feel myself
capable of being a good landed proprietor; and in order to be one, as I
understand this word, one needs neither a university diploma nor rank, which
you are so anxious I should obtain. Dear aunty, make no ambitious plans for me!
Accustom yourself to the thought that I have chosen an entirely different path,
which is nevertheless good, and which, I feel, will bring me happiness. I have
thought much, very much, about my future duty, have written out rules for my
actions, and, if God will grant me life and strength, shall succeed in my
undertaking."
If Tolstoy did not
really write this letter in his own person, such thoughts and desires agitated
his young soul, and gave direction to his life.
Tolstoy’s attempts - as
we know them from the tale - ended in failure. It could not be otherwise.
Tolstoy’s sincerity of character could not bear a position in which he posed as
benefactor to his serfs, i.e., to men wounded in the most precious thing they
possessed - their moral dignity.
Tolstoy revolted
against this contradiction: to become a "cool and stern man," as his
aunt advised him in her answer to his letter, he could not, and at the first
possible opportunity he changed his way of life.
In the autumn of the
year 1847, after having spent the summer in yasnaya Polyana, Tolstoy removed to
St. Petersburg, and at the beginning of 1848 he entered upon his examinations
for a university degree.
"In 1848 I went to
pass my examination as a candidate at the St. Petersburg University, knowing
literally nothing, and having prepared myself for one week only. I did not
sleep for nights, and received candidates’ marks in civil and criminal
law."
To Lowenfeld, Tolstoy
thus speaks about this time:
"It was very
pleasant to live in the country with my aunt Yergolskaya, but a vain thirst for
knowledge again called me away. It was in 1848, and still I did not know what
to undertake. In St. Petersburg two roads were open to me. I might enter the army,
and take part in the Hungarian campaign, or I might finish my university
studies in order afterward to get a post as a Government official. But my
thirst for knowledge conquered my ambition, and I again resumed my studies. I
even passed two successful examinations in criminal law, but after that all my
good intentions fell to the ground. Spring came on, and the delights of country
life again attracted me to the estate."
This period of his
Petersburg life we can follow through his letters to his brother Sergey. From
these we quote one passage bearing a general interest. On February 13, 1848, he
wrote to his brother:
"I am writing you
this letter from St. Petersburg, where I intend remaining forever. All are
urging me to remain and serve, except Ferzen and lev. So I have decided to
remain here for my examination and then serve; and if I do not pass (everything
may happen), then I shall begin to serve, were it even in the fourteenth rank.
I know many Government officials of this second category who serve no worse
than we of the first. In a word, I will tell you that Petersburg life has a
great and good influence on me; it accustoms me to activity, and involuntarily
takes the place of a curriculum. Somehow one cannot be idle; all are occupied,
all are busy; indeed, one cannot find a man with whom one could lead a
disorderly life, and one can’t do it by oneself.
"I know that you
will not believe that I have altered; that you will say: ‘This is already the
twentieth time, and still no good comes of you; you are the most frivolous
fellow - ’ No, I have altered in quite a different way from what I did. Then I
used to say to myself, ‘Well, now, I shall change.’ But now I see that I have
changed, and I say, ‘I have changed.’
"Above all, I am
now fully convinced that one cannot live by abstract speculation and
philosophy, but that it is necessary to live positively, i.e., to be a
practical man. This is a great step forward and a great change. This has never
once happened with me before. And if one wishes to live and is young, then in
Russia there is no other place but St. Petersburg. Whatever tendency any one
may have, there all may be satisfied, and all may be developed, and that
without any trouble. As to the means of life - for a bachelor life here, it is
not at all expensive, and, on the contrary, it is cheaper and better than at
Moscow, except lodging.
"Tell all our folk
that I love and greet all, and that in summer I shall perhaps be in the
country, but perhaps not. I summer I want to take leave of absence, and visit
the neighborhood of St. Petersburg; also I want to go to Helsingfors and Revel.
For God’s sake, write to me for once in your life. I should like to know how
you and all ours will receive this news. As for me, I am afraid of writing to
them; I have been so long without writing that they are probably angry, and
especially am I ashamed before Tatyana Aleksandrovna; ask her to forgive
me."
Alas, these good
intentions were not to be realized all at once. Strange as it may seem now, yet
at that time Tolstoy’s brother had a certain right to call him a
"frivolous fellow," as Tolstoy himself confessed to him.
Thus in his letter of
May 1, 1848, he wrote:
"Seryozha! I think
you are already saying I am a most frivolous fellow. And saying the truth. God
knows what I have been up to! I went to st. Petersburg without any reason;
there I have done nothing necessary, only spent a heap of money and run up
debts. Stupid! Insufferably stupid! You can’t believe how it torments me. Above
all, the debts, which I must pay and as quickly as possible, because if I do
not soon pay them, I shall, besides the money, lose my reputation too. Before I
get my next year’s income I absolutely require 3,500 rubles; 1,200 for the
Guardians’ Council, 1,600 to pay my debts, 700 for my current expenses. I know
you will exclaim - but what is to be done? Such stupidity is accomplished once
in a lifetime. I had to do penance for my freedom (there was no one to thrash
me, and this was my chief misfortune) and for philosophy, and so I have paid
premium. Be so kind as to arrange to get me out of the false and odious
position in which I now am, without a penny at my disposal and in debt all
round.
"You probably know
that our troops are all starting for the campaign, and that a part of the
Second Corps have crossed the frontier and, so they say, are already in Vienna.
I had begun to attend
my examinations as ‘candidate’ for my degree, and have, in fact, successfully
passed two, but I have now altered my mind and want to enter the Horse Guards
as a volunteer. I am ashamed of writing this to you because I know you love me,
and will be grieved over all my silly actions and reckless behavior. Even while
writing this letter I have several times got up and blushed, as you also will
do on reading it--but what is to be done?
"Please God I will
also some day amend myself and become a respectable man; more than all I rely
upon the service as volunteer, it will teach me practical life, and--nolens
volens--I shall have to serve up to an officer’s rank. With luck, i.e., if the
Guards should be in action, I may be promoted even before the end of the two
years’ term. The Guards start for the campaign at the end of may. Now I can do
nothing, first because I have no money--I do not need much (again in my own
opinion)--and, secondly, my two certificates of birth are at Yasnaya; get them
sent as soon as possible. Please do not be angry with me--as it is I feel my
nothingness too much--but quickly do what I ask. Good-by. Do not show this
letter to Aunty, I do not wish to give her pain."
Soon after, these plans
too were dismissed. In one of his subsequent letters to his brother, Tolstoy
says:
"In my last letter
I wrote you a lot of nonsense, of which the chief was that I intended to enter
the Horse Guards; I shall stick to this plan only if I do not succeed in
passing the examinations and the war should be a serious one."
He probably did not
consider the war sufficiently "serious," for he did not enter
military service.
In the spring he came
back to Yasnaya Polyana accompanied by a clever German musician, who was,
however, fond of drink. He met him first at the house of his friends, the
Perfilyev, and since then had given himself up to music. The German’s name was
Rudolph.
Up to the time of his
departure to the Caucasus in 1851, Tolstoy lived partly in Moscow, and partly
in Yasnaya Polyana. During this time he developed a phase of asceticism, but
varied with outbreaks of feasting, sports, card-playing, visiting gypsies, etc.
During these three
years of his life Tolstoy tasted of everything which a passionate and energetic
young man could seize.
At the same time he
neglected his diary, for want of time. Only in the middle of 1850 did he
recover himself and begin his diary, with confession and self-accusation and
expressions of a desire to write down frankly his reminiscences of these
"disgracefully spent three years of his life."
In his wish to begin a
regular life he made out a program of each day from morning to night: estate
affairs, bathing, diary, music, meals, rest, reading.
But of course the
program and the rules were not adhered to, and in the diary there was again an
entry recording how little he was pleased with himself.
This period of struggle
would last for whole months, then suddenly a wave of unrestrained passion would
break out and bear down all external restraints.
Like a drowning man who
clings to a straw, he would, when carried away by his passion, catch at various
feelings which might keep him from ruin. One of these was self-respect.
"Men whom I
consider morally beneath me can do wicked things better than I do," he
wrote in his diary, whereupon the wicked things would then become odious to him
and he would give them up.
Quiet life in the
country often helped him to subdue his passions.
It is remarkable that
in such everyday occupations as card-playing, his noble and generous nature
would assert itself. It was probably one of his most powerful passions, but
still he kept himself within limits by making it a rule of honor to play only
with the rich, his object being that such gain as he made should not cause
material loss, or humiliate and ruin his partner.
Often, not being able
to control himself, he would have a fit of despair, and then again would
recover himself and write in his diary:
"I am living a
completely brutish life, although not an utterly disorderly one. I have
abandoned almost all my occupations and have greatly fallen in spirit."
Being at one time in
straitened circumstances, he actually intended to start a business of some
kind, thinking he would run the mail post in Tula. It was at the end of 1850.
Fortunately this enterprise was not carried out, and he thus avoided many
disappointments which would have ensued from such uncongenial occupations.
Thinking of his failures he once made the following note in his diary:
"These are the
causes of my failures:
"(1) Irresolution,
i.e., want of energy. (2) Self- deception. (3) Haste. (4) Fausse-honte [False
shame, i.e., French expression for being ashamed of that which is not
shameful.] (5) A bad frame of mind. (6) Instability. (7) The habit of
imitation. (8) Fickleness. (9) Thoughtlessness."
The greater part of the
winter of 1850-51 he passed in Moscow, from which city he often wrote to his
aunt in Yasnaya, and told her various details of his life. In one of the
letters he thus describes his lodging and environment:
"It consists of
four rooms--a dining room, where I already have a piano which I have hired; a
drawing-room furnished with arm-chairs and tables in walnut, and covered with
red cloth and decorated with three large mirrors; a study where I have my
writing-table, desk, and arm-chair--which always reminds me of our disputes
about this last piece of furniture; and a room big enough to be both bedroom
and dressing-room, and besides all this a small anteroom.
"I dine at home on
shchi and kasha, with which I am quite content. I am only waiting for the
confections and home-made wines in order to have everything in accordance with
my country habits.
"For forty rubles
I have bought a sleigh of a style which is now very fashionable--Sergey must
know the kind. I have bought all that is necessary for the harness, which at
the present moment is very elegant."
Evidently his aunt felt
great fears about his behavior in Moscow; in fact she gave him advice and
warned him against bad acquaintances, for in the next letter he writes to her:
"Why are you so
set against Islenyev? If it is in order to warn me against him, that is
unnecessary, as he is not at Moscow. All you say on the subject of the evil of
gambling is very true, and I often recall it, and consequently I think that I
will play cards no more. ‘I think,’ but I soon hope to tell you for certain.
"All you say about
society is true, as is everything you say, especially in your letters, first
because you write Madame de Sevigne, and secondly because I cannot dispute it
in my usual way. You also say much that is kind about myself. I am convinced
that praises do as much good as evil. They do good because they maintain one in
the good qualities which are praised, and they do evil because they increase
vanity. I am sure that yours can only do me good, being dictated by sincere
friendship. It goes without saying that this is so, so far as I deserve them.
"I think I have
deserved them during all the time of my sojourn in Moscow--I am satisfied with
myself."
He also called at
Yasnaya, from which place he again went to Moscow in March 1951; after his
return from this trip, he wrote in his diary that, in coming to Moscow, he had
three ends in view--card-playing, marriage, and securing an official situation.
However, he did not obtain even one of these objects. He conceived a dislike
for gambling, because he had become conscious of the vileness of this passion;
he put off marrying because the three things which he recognized as conducing
to marriage --love, reason, and destiny--were not present. He could not secure
an appointment, as he had not at hand certain papers which were necessary for
this purpose.
During the
above-mentioned sojourn in Moscow he wrote to his aunt Tatyana, March 8th:
"Lately, in a book
I was reading, the author said that the first symptoms of spring generally act
upon men’s morals. ‘With the new birth of nature one would like to feel oneself
also being born again, one regrets the past, the time badly employed, one
repents of one’s weakness, and the future appears as a bright spot before one;
one becomes better--morally better.’ This, as far as I am concerned, is
perfectly true. Since I have begun to live independently spring has always put
me in a good disposition, in which I have persevered for a period more or less
extended, but it is always the winter that is a stumbling-block for me--I
always then go wrong.
"However, in
comparison with past winters, the last is without doubt the pleasantest and
most rational I have passed. I have amused myself, have gone out into society,
have laid up pleasant impressions, and, at the same time, have not deranged my
finances, though, it is true, neither have I arranged them."
The following letter
was written by him after his brother Nikolay returned from the Caucasus; he
writes:
"The arrival of
Nikolay has been an agreeable surprise for me, as I had almost lost all hope of
his coming here. I have been so glad to see him that I have even somewhat
neglected my duties, or rather my habits.
"I am now once
more alone and literally alone--I go nowhere and receive no one. I am making
plans for spring and summer--do you approve of them? Toward the end of May I
shall come to Yasnaya; I will pass a month or two there, and will endeavor to
keep Nikolay there as long as possible, and then I will go with him for a tour
in the Caucasus."
In the midst of these
disturbing scenes of worldly pleasure, card-playing, sensual indulgence,
carousals with gypsies and sport, there would come periods of remorse and
humiliation. Thus he would write a sermon while preparing for sacrament, but
his sermon remained unread.
At the same time began
attempts at serious artistic writing.
Up to 1850 he intended
to write a novel of gypsy life. Another plan of the same time was worked out on
the lines of the Sentimental Journey of Sterne.
"He once sat at
the window reflecting and observing all that took place in the street.
"There goes a
constable. Who is he and what is his life? And that carriage that went by, who
is in it?--and where is he going and what is he thinking about? And who live in
this house? What is their inner life?...How interesting it would be to describe
all this! What an interesting book could be written upon it."
This changeable and
dangerous period of life was cut short by his sudden departure for the Caucasus.
The unsuccessful
attempt to keep house, the impossibility of establishing good relations with
the peasants, and the passionate, perilous life, full of all kinds of excesses,
which was mentioned in the previous chapter, induced Tolstoy to search for a
means of changing his mode of life.
According to his own
testimony, his life was so insipid and dissipated that he was ready for any
change in it. For instance, his brother-in-law, Valerian Petrovich Tolstoy,
being engaged, was going back to Siberia to arrange some business matters there
before his marriage, and, as he was leaving the house, Tolstoy jumped into his
tarantas [Russian traveling cart], without a hat, and in his blouse only; and
it seems as if the only reason why he did not join in the journey to Siberia
was simply that he found there was no hat on his head.
At last a serious
incident took place that induced a change of life. In April, 1951, Nikolay,
Tolstoy’s eldest brother arrived from the Caucasus; he was an officer in the
Caucasian army and on leave of absence, and had shortly to return. Tolstoy
seized this opportunity, and in spring, 1951, started with him for the
Caucasus.
They left Yasnaya
Polyana on April 20, and spent two weeks in Moscow, and from there he wrote to
his aunt Tatyana at Yasnaya:
"I have been to
the promenade at Sokolniki during detestable weather, and therefore have not
met any of the society ladies I wish to see. As you assert that I am a man of
resources, I went among the plebians in the gypsy tents. You can easily imagine
the inner struggle which there took place for and against. However, I came out
victorious, i.e., having given nothing but my blessing to the merry descendants
of the illustrious Pharaohs. Nikolay has made the discovery that I should be a
very agreeable traveling companion, were it not for my cleanliness. He gets
irritated over my changing my underclothing, as he says, a dozen times a day.
For my part I find him a very pleasant companion, were it not for his
uncleanliness. I don’t know which of us is right."
From Moscow they passed
through Kazan, where they visited V. T. Yushkov, their guardian-aunt’s husband,
with whom they had lived in Kazan, and also saw Madame Zagoskin, a friend of
this aunt’s, the directress of the Kazan Institute, an eccentric and clever
woman.
In Zagoskin’s house
Tolstoy met Z. M., an ex-pupil of the Institute, and conceived for her a
sentimental kind of love, which, as usual, owing to his bashfulness, he could
not make up his mind to express, and which he took away with him to the
Caucasus.
In Madame Zagoskin’s
house, as that lady always secured the young men who were the most comme il
faut, he met and almost made friends with a young lawyer, the procurator
Ogolin, and took a journey with the latter into the country to pay a visit to
V. [J.] Yushkov. Ogolin was a new type of the official of that late period.
Tolstoy used to relate
how Yushkov was--being accustomed to see a procurator as a grave, respectable,
and hoary personage in a uniform, with a cross on his breast and a star--when
he beheld Ogolin, and got acquainted with him, under circumstances of ease and
freedom.
"When Ogolin and I
had arrived and approached the house, opposite which was a group of young birch
trees, I suggested to Ogolin that, while the servant was announcing our
arrival, we should compete as to which of us would climb these birches best and
highest. When Yushkov came out and saw the procurator climbing up a tree, he
could not recover himself for a long time."
Tolstoy, as he told me
himself, was in his most stupid and worldly mood during this trip. He related
to me how his brother made him feel his stupidity in Kazan. They were walking
about the town when a gentleman drove past them in a dolgusha [a kind of
jaunting-car on four wheels], leaning with ungloved hands on a stick resting on
the step of the carriage.
"How evident it is
that this man is some sort of ‘scallywag,’" said Lev Tolstoy, addressing
his brother.
"Why?" asked
Nikolay.
"Why, because he
has not no gloves."
"Why should he be
good-for-nothing because he has no gloves?" asked Nikolay, with his hardly
noticeable, kind, clever, and mocking smile.
Nikolay always thought
and did everything, not because others thought and did so, but because he
himself believed it to be right, and he always thought and did what he believed
to be right. Thus he planned to go to the Caucasus not via Voronezh and through
the territory of the Don Cossacks, as was the rule, but on horseback to
Saratov, from Saratov in a boat down the Volga to Astrakhan, and from Astrakhan
in a post-chaise to the Stanitsa, and this plan he put in execution.
They hired a
fishing-boat, placed the tarantas in it, and being assisted by a pilot and two
oarsmen, sailed here and there, sometimes rowing, sometimes carried by the
current. The trip lasted about three weeks, when they reached Astrakhan. From
then, Lev wrote to his aunt:
"We are at
Astrakhan, and on the point of leaving it, thus having still a journey of 400
versts to do. I have passed a most agreeable week at Kazan. My journey to
Saratov was disagreeable, but, as compensation, the passage from there to
Astrakhan in a little boat was very poetical and full of charm, owing to the
novelty of the locality, and for me even from the very method of traveling.
Yesterday I wrote a long letter to Marie, in which I tell her about my sojourn
at Kazan. I do not tell you anything about it, for fear of repeating myself,
although I am sure you will not confuse the two letters. So far as it has gone,
I am exceedingly satisfied with my journey. There are many things which make me
think, and then the very change of locality is pleasant. In passing through
Moscow, I subscribed to a lending-library, so that I have plenty of reading,
which I do even in the tarantas, and, besides, as you can well imagine, Nikolay’s
society greatly contributes to my enjoyment. I do not cease to think of you and
of all ours; sometimes I even reproach myself for having abandoned the life
which your affection rendered so sweet; but it is merely a postponement, and I
shall have only the more pleasure in seeing you again. Were I not pressed, I
would write to Sergey; but I put this off until I shall be quietly settled
down. Embrace him on my behalf, and tell him that I greatly repent of the
coldness which there was between us before my departure, and for which I blame
myself alone."
A few words must be
said as to what the Caucasus is, to make the reader understand the facts of
Tolstoy’s Caucasian life, as well as his Caucasian tales.
When the kingdom of
Moscow became so strong as to be able to make head against the Tartar tribes,
it gradually pushed them to the southeast, and, having conquered the kingdoms
of Kazan and Astrakhan, it came into conflict with wild tribes of mountaineers,
who inhabited the northern slopes of the Caucasian mountains. To keep them in
check, the Russian Government had, about the beginning of the nineteenth
century, erected a whole line of Cossack outposts on the left bank of the Terek
and the right bank of the Kuban.
On the other hand, the
Georgian kingdom, which lies on the southern slope of the Caucasian mountains,
and which was up to that time independent, had, with its King Heraclius II,
become subject to Russia in the beginning of the nineteenth century. The
subjugation of the mountain tribes between Georgia and Russia became
indispensable on political grounds, and the struggle went on for over fifty
years.
From the Cossack posts
along the banks of the Terek and the Kuban, the Russians gradually pushed on
farther to the very edge of the mountains. But they confined themselves chiefly
to making raids: a military detachment attacked the villages in the mountains,
destroyed pastures, drove off cattle, captured as many inhabitants as possible,
and with such booty returned to their posts. The mountaineers in their turn
made reprisals: they pursued the detachments on their way back, and with their
well-aimed carbine shots inflicted on them great losses; they would hide behind
the ramparts in the woods and narrow ravines, and sometimes even appear
suddenly at the very posts, where they massacred many, and carried off men and
women to the mountains. From time to time the struggle abated, but became
fiercer when, taking advantage of our ill fortune, there arose leaders who
managed to unite under their command the more powerful and warlike tribes. The
fanaticism of the latter was them kindled by the preaching of a holy war
against the infidels. The Russians had to encounter great difficulties, and
suffered heavy losses from the most warlike of the Caucasian tribes, the
Chechens, who live on the forest-clad plains of the right bank of the Terek,
near its tributaries Sunzha, Agurniy [sp], and others, and higher up in the
mountain gorges of Ichkeriya [sp]. Our spirit of enterprise grew stronger or
slackened, according to the talent and energy of the commander who happened to
be directing the military operations.
The appointment in 1856
of Prince Baryatinskiy as governor of the Caucasus, events took a decisive
turn. Profiting by his personal influence over the Emperor Aleksandr II, he
summoned an army of 200,000 men, a greater one than was ever before seen in the
Caucasus. A considerable part of this army he directed against Checheniya,
Ichkeriya, and Dagestan, then under the leadership of the well-known Shamyl.
The talent and energy
of this leader, and the fanaticism of the mountaineers, who recognized him as
their Imaum, were all crushed under the weight of this powerful army led by
Yevdokimov, whom nothing could stop. In 1857 Shamyl’s residence, the village
Vedeno in the center of Ichkeriya, capitulated, and in 1859, Shamyl himself
surrendered to Prince Baryatinskiy in his new Dagestan stronghold--Guniba [sp].
At the beginning of the
fifties, before his appointment as governor of the Caucasus, Prince
Baryatinskiy appeared in the Northern Caucasus as commander of the left wing of
the Russian army.
Just about this time
Tolstoy arrived in the Caucasus, and the events described in his Caucasian
tales, The Invaders, The Cossacks, a Wood-Cutting Expedition, and An Old
Acquaintance, took place about this time and in this locality.
From Astrakhan both
brothers traveled in a post-chaise through Lizliar to the village of
Starogladovskaya, where the eldest brother was stationed. Tolstoy came to the
Caucasus in a private capacity and settled down with his brother.
The first impression
which the Caucasus made on him was not a profound one. Shortly after he reached
the country he thus describes it in a letter to his aunt:
"I have arrived
well and whole, but am now, toward the end of may, at the Starogladovskaya. I
am feeling rather sad. I have here seen at close quarters the kind of life
Nikolay is leading, and I have made the acquaintance of the officers who form
the local society. The kind of life led here is not very attractive as it has
at first presented itself to me, for the country, which I had expected to find
very fine, is not at all so. As the village is situated on low land there is no
outlook, and besides the lodgings are bad, as well as everything that
constitutes the comfort of life. As to the officers, they are, as you can
imagine, people without education, but at the same time very good fellows, and,
above all, they are very much attached to Nikolay.
"Alekseyev, the
commander, is a little chap, with light hair approaching red, with mustaches
and whiskers, and a piercing voice, but an excellent Christian, somewhat
reminding one of Volkov, but not canting like him. Then B---, a young officer,
childish and good-natured, reminding one of Petrusha. Then an old captain,
Bilkovskiy of the Ural Cossacks, an old soldier, simple but noble, brave and
good. I will confess to you that at first many things in this society shocked
me, but I have become accustomed to it, without, however, becoming intimate
with the gentlemen. I have found a happy medium in which there is neither pride
nor familiarity. In this, however, I had merely to follow Nikolay’s
example."
However, he did not
stay very long in Starogladovskaya.
He and his brother
moved to Stariy Yurt, a fortified camp, to shelter the sick in Goryachevodsk,
where, shortly before, hot springs possessing strong healing virtues had been
discovered. Again we quote the description of this place from Tolstoy’s letter
to his aunt, written on his arrival there in July 1851.
"Nikolay left a
week after his arrival, and I followed him, so that we have been here for
almost three weeks, and we live in a tent, but, as the weather is fine and I am
somewhat adapting myself to this kind of life, I am feeling very well. Here
there are beautiful views. To begin with the place where the springs are. It is
an enormous mountain of rocks lying one upon the other, some of which have
become detached, forming a sort of grotto, others remain suspended at a great
at a great height. They are all intersected by torrents of warm water, which in
some places fall with much noise, and, especially in the morning, cover all the
elevated part of the mountain with a white vapor which is continually rising
from this boiling water. The water is so hot they can boil eggs hard in it in
three minutes. In the middle of the valley, on the chief torrent, there are
three watermills, one above the other, constructed in a peculiar and very
picturesque way. All day the Tartar women keep coming to wash their clothes
above and beneath these mills. I should mention that they wash them with their
feet. It’s like an ant heap in continual motion. The women are for the most
part handsome and well built. The costume of Oriental women is graceful,
notwithstanding their poverty; the picturesque groups formed by the women,
together with the savage beauty of the place, make a truly beautiful sight. I
sometimes remain for hours admiring the landscape. Then the view from the top
of the mountain is still finer and of quite another kind, but I am afraid of
boring you with my descriptions.
"I am very glad to
be at the waters, as I benefit by them. I take mineral baths, and I no longer
feel pain in my feet. I always have rheumatism, but during my journey on the
water I think I took cold. I have seldom felt so well as now, and notwithstanding
the great heat I take much exercise.
"Here the type of
officers is the same as that of which I have already spoken to you. There are
many of these, I know them all, and my relations with them are the same."
According to Tolstoy,
Yurt was a large village with a population of 1,500 and remarkable for its
beautiful mountain situation. In the mountains above the village rose a hot
sulfur spring. Its temperature was so high that, according to Tolstoy, his
brother’s dog after falling into the spring scalded himself so much that he
died from the effects. The spring divides itself into many small brooklets
which run down the mountain-side. These brooklets were so small that it was
easy to bank them up. The inhabitants of the village used them for working
watermills. The properties of the spring are superior to those of Pyatigorsk.
From this village
Tolstoy joined in a raid as a volunteer. Here he had glorious moments of
youthful poetical enthusiasm.
Especially memorable to
him was one night, which he has described in his diary in terms of unique
spiritual beauty.
"Stariy Yurt, 11th
June 1851.
"Yesterday I
hardly slept all night. Having written in my diary, I began to pray to God. It
is impossible to convey the sweetness of the feeling which I experienced during
prayer. I repeated the prayers I generally say: Our Father, to the Virgin, to
the Trinity, ‘the gates of mercy,’ the appeal to the guardian angel, and then I
still remained at prayer. If one were to define prayer as petition or
thanksgiving, then I did not pray. I longed for something sublime and good, but
what, I cannot convey, although I was clearly conscious that I desired it. I
wished to blend into unity with the all-enfolding Being. I asked Him to pardon
my crimes; yet no, I did not ask this, for I felt that He had given me this
blissful moment. He had pardoned me. I asked and at the same time felt that I
had nothing to ask, that I could not and did not know how to ask. I thanked
Him, but not in words, not in thoughts. I combined all in one feeling, both
petition and thanksgiving. The feeling of fear completely vanished. None of the
feelings - Faith, Hope, and Love - could I have disengaged from the general
feeling. No, here it is, the feeling which I experienced yesterday - it was
love to God, an elevated love combining in itself all that is good, and
repudiating all that is evil. How dreadful it was for me to look at all the
trivial and vicious side of my life. I could not comprehend how it was this had
attracted me. How I prayed God from a pure heart to accept me into His bosom. I
did not feel the flesh, I was...but no, the carnal, trivial side again asserted
itself, and an hour had not passed before I almost consciously heard the voice
of vice, of vanity, and of the empty side of life. I knew whence this voice
came, I knew it had ruined my bliss; I struggled, yet yielded to it. I fell
asleep in dreams of fame and of women. But it was not my fault, I could not
help it. Eternal bliss here is impossible. Suffering are necessary. Why? I do
not know? But how dare I say, I do not know? How dared I think it was possible
to knew the ways of Fate? It is the source of reason, and the reason wishes to
fathom it!...
"The mind is lost
in these depths of wisdom and emotion, and is afraid of insulting Him. I thank
Him for the moment of bliss which showed me both my insignificance and my
greatness. I wish to pray, but I do not know how. I wish to attain
comprehension, but dare not - I surrender myself to Thy will.
"Why have I written
all this? How flabbily, how lifelessly, even how senselessly have my feelings
found expression; and yet they were so elevated."
These outbursts of
religious emotion were often succeeded by periods of depression and apathy.
Thus on the 2nd of July, while yet living in the Stariy Yurt, he put down the
following thoughts:
"I am just now
meditating, recalling all the unpleasant moments of my life, which in times of
depression alone creep into one’s mind....No, there is too little delight - man
is too capable of imagining happiness and too often in one way or another Fate
strikes him, painfully, very painfully catching his tender chord - for us to
love life, and, besides, there is something specially sweet and great in
indifference to life, and I delight in this feeling. In face of everything, how
strong I appear to myself in this firm conviction that there is nothing to
expect here except death....Yet at this very moment I am thinking with delight
about a saddle I have ordered in which I will ride in Circassian attire, and
about how I will flirt with Cossack girls, and feel despair that my left
mustache is higher than the right one, and I shall spend two hours arranging
it."
Thus Tolstoy often had
to change his abode. The headquarters and the staff-battery, where his brother
served, were at Starogladovskaya, but he was often sent to the outposts, to
which Tolstoy accompanied him.
These wild Cossack and
Caucasian villages were destined to become historic. Here the artistic forms of
Tolstoy’s works were conceived, and the first fruit of his creative power came
forth. The wonderful scenery of the Northern Caucasus, its mountains, the river
Terek, and the Cossack bravery, and the almost primitive simplicity of life -
all this in one harmonious whole served to cradle these early creations, and to
point out the work of the world-wide genius, who was to struggle for an ideal,
to search for truth and the meaning of human life.
Here we give a
description of Tolstoy’s arrival at Stariy Yurt, taken from his novel The
Cossacks, in which he so very vividly depicts the impression made on him by the
majesty of the Caucasian Mountains.
"It was a very
clear morning. Suddenly he saw, some twenty steps from him, as he thought at
first, pure white masses, with their delicate contours, and the fantastic and
sharply defined outline of their summits, against the distant sky. And when he
became aware of the great distance between him and the mountains and the sky,
and of the immensity of the mountains, and felt the immeasurableness of that
beauty, he was frightened, thinking that it was a vision, a dream. He shook
himself, in order to be rid of his sleep. The mountains remained the same.
"‘What is this?
What is it?’ he asked the driver.
"‘The mountains,’
the Nogay answered, with indifference.
"‘I have been
looking at them myself for a long time,’ said Vanyusha. ‘It is beautiful! They
will not believe it at home!’
"in the rapid
motion of the vehicle over the even road, the mountains seemed to be running
along the horizon, gleaming in the rising sun with their rosy summits. At first
they only surprised Olenin, but later they gave him pleasure. And later, as he
gazed longer at this chain of snow-capped peaks, which were not connected with
other black ones, but rose directly from the steppe, he began by degrees to
understand their full beauty, and to ‘feel’ them.
"From that moment
everything he saw, everything he thought, everything he felt, assumed for him a
new severely majestic character, that of the mountains. All the Moscow reminiscences,
his shame and remorse, all the trite dreams of the Caucasus, everything
disappeared, and never returned again. ‘Now it has begun,’ a solemn voice said
to him. And the road, and the distant line of the Terek, and the villages, and
the people, all that appeared to him no longer so many trifles.
"He looked at the
sky, and he thought of the mountains. He looked at himself, and at Vanyusha -
and again at the mountains. There, two Cossacks rode by, and their muskets in
cases evenly vibrated on their backs, and their horses intermingled their
chestnut and gray legs - and the mountains. Beyond the Terek was seen the smoke
in a native village - and the mountains.
"The sun rose and
glistened on the Terek beyond the reeds - and the mountains. From the Cossack
village came a native cart, and women, beautiful women, walking - and the
mountains. ‘Abreks [mountain braves] race through the steppes, and I am
traveling, and fear them not: I have a gun, and strength, and youth’ - and the
mountains."
In August he is again
at Starogladovskaya.
From the story The
Cossacks, which bears an autobiographical character, we can form an approximate
idea of how he passed his time in the Cossack Village. His attempt to come more
in touch with the people - Cossacks, sport, the contemplation of the beauties
of nature, and the incessant inner strife which never abandoned this man, and
is vividly expressed in his works, such was Tolstoy’s life of that period.
"‘Why am I happy,
and why have I lived before?’ he thought. ‘How exacting I used to be! How I
concocted and caused nothing but shame and woe for myself!’ And suddenly it
seemed that a new world was open to him. ‘Happiness is this,’ he said to
himself: ‘happiness consists in living for others. This is clear. The desire
for happiness is inborn in man; consequently it is legitimate. In attempting to
satisfy it in an egotistical manner, that is, by seeking wealth, glory,
comforts of life, and love, the circumstances may so arrange themselves that it
is impossible to satisfy these desires. Consequently these desires are
illegitimate, but the need of happiness is not illegitimate. Now, what desires
are these that can always be satisfied, in spite of external conditions? What
desires? Love, self-sacrifice!"
He was so rejoiced and
excited when he discovered this truth, which seemed to be new, that he leaped
up and impatiently began to look around for some one to sacrifice himself for,
to do good to, and to love. "I do not need anything for myself," he
proceeded in his thought; "then why should I not live for others?"
Already then the voice
of love touched a powerful chord in the soul of the young man, who had hardly
entered the life of social activity.
But outward events were
still running their course, carrying the strong animal nature of man along its
customary path.
The life of the
passionate young man in the Cossack village was not devoid of romance. The
story of his love is described in the tale The Cossacks.
All the stages of this
unreturned affection are vividly pictured in that story, and even still better
presented in a letter to his Moscow friends. That letter shows the author’s
love of wild nature, his passionate desire to live in perfect harmony with her,
and his sufferings from inability to do so. He knew his life in civilized
surroundings had torn him away from nature and created between them an abyss
impossible to overcome. Here is the most striking and essential part of this
letter:
"How contemptible
and pitiable you all appear to me! You do not know what happiness nor what life
is! You have first to taste life in all its artless beauty; you must see and
understand what I see before me each day: the eternal, inaccessible snows of
the mountains, and majestic woman in her pristine beauty, as the first woman
must have issued from the hands of her Creator - and then it will be clear who
it is that is being ruined, and who lives according to the truth, you or I.
"If you only knew
how detestable and pitiable you are to me in your delusions! The moment there
rise before me, instead of my cabin, my forest, and my love, those
drawing-rooms, those women with pomaded hair, through which the false locks
appear, those unnaturally lisping lips, those concealed and distorted limbs,
and that prattle of the drawing-rooms, which pretends to be conversation, but
has no right to be called so - an insufferable feeling of disgust comes over
me. I see before me those dull faces, those rich, marriageable girls, with an
expression on the face which says, ‘That’s all right, you may--. Just come up
to me, even thought I am a rich, marriageable girl’; that sitting down and
changing of places; that impudent pairing of people, and that never-ending
gossip and hypocrisy; those rules - to this one your hand, to that one a nod,
and with that one a chat; and finally, that eternal ennui in the blood, which
passes from generation to generation (and consciously even then, with the
conviction of its necessity). You must understand, or believe it. You must see
and grasp what truth and beauty are, and everything which you say and think,
all your wishes for your own happiness and for mine, will be dispersed to the
winds. Happiness consists in being with Nature, in seeing it, and holding
converse with it. ‘The Lord preserve him, but he will, no doubt, marry a
Cossack woman, and will be entirely lost to society,’ I imagine them saying
about me, with genuine compassion, whereas it is precisely this that I wish; to
be entirely lost, in your sense of the word, and to marry a simple Cossack
woman; I dare not do it, because that would be the acme of happiness, of which
I am unworthy.
"Three months have
passed since I for the first time saw the Cossack maiden, Maryanka. The
conceptions and prejudices of the society from which I had issued were still
fresh in me. I did not believe then that I could fall in love with this woman.
I admired her, as I admired the beauty of the mountains and of the sky, nor
could I help admiring her, for she is as beautiful as they. Then I felt that
the contemplation of this beauty had become a necessity of my life, and I began
to ask myself whether I did not love her; but I did not find in myself anything
resembling the feeling such as I had imagined it to be. This sentiment
resembled neither the longing for solitude nor the desire for matrimony, not
platonic love, still less carnal love, which I had experienced. I had to see
and hear her, to know that she was near, and I was not exactly happy, but calm.
After an evening party which I had attended with her, and at which I had
toucher her, I felt that between this woman and myself existed an indissoluble,
thought unacknowledged bond, against which it would be vain to struggle. But I
did struggle. I said to myself: ‘Is it possible for me to love a woman who will
never comprehend the spiritual interests of my life? Can I love a woman for her
mere beauty, and I love a statue of a woman?’ I asked myself, and I was loving
her all the time, though I did not trust my own sentiment.
"After the party,
when I had spoken to her for the first time, our relations were changed. Before
that time she was to me a foreign, but majestic, object of external Nature;
after the party she became a human being for me. I have met her and spoken with
her; and I have been with her father at work, and have passed whole evenings in
their company. And in these close relations she has remained to my thinking,
just as pure, inaccessible, and majestic. To all questions she has answered in
the same calm, proud, and gaily indifferent manner. At times she has been
gracious, but for the most part every glance, every word, every motion of hers,
has expressed the same, not contemptuous, but repressing and enticing
indifference.
"Each day I tried,
with a feigning smile on my lips, to dissemble, and, with the torment of
passion and of desires in my heart, I spoke jestingly to her. But she saw that
I was dissembling, and yet looked gaily and simply at me. This situation grew
intolerable to me. I did not wish to tell lies before her, and wanted to let
her know everything I thought and everything I felt. I was very much excited;
that was in the vineyard. I began to tell her of my love in words that I am
ashamed to recall. I am ashamed to think of them, because I ought never to have
dared to tell her that, and because she stood immeasurably above the words and
above the feeling which I intended to express to her. I held my tongue, and
since that day my situation has been insufferable. I did not wish to lower
myself by persisting in the former jocular relations, and I was conscious that
I was not yet ripe for straightforward, simple relations with her. I asked
myself in despair, ‘What shall I do?’
"In my
preposterous dreams I imagined her now as my mistress and now as my wife, and I
repelled both thoughts in disgust. It would be terrible to make a mistress of
her. It would be still worse to make a lady of her, the wife of Dmitriy
Andreyevich Olenin, as one of our officers has made a lady of a Cossack girl of
this place, whom he has married. If I could turn Cossack, become a Lukashka,
steal herds of horses, fill myself with red wine, troll songs, kill people,
and, when drunk, climb through the window to pass the night with her, without
asking myself who I am and why I am - it would be a different matter; then we
could understand each other, and I might be happy."
But he could not become
another Lukashka, and could not therefore find happiness in that direction.
In September he writes
a letter to his aunt, through which the future writer can already be clearly
seen. It is his serious attitude in the expression of thought that particularly
strikes one; probably by that time numberless thoughts and images were
overcrowding in his mind, and he chose only those which he could set forth on
paper. He thus expresses this sensation:
"You have told me
several times that you are not in the habit of writing drafts of your letters;
I follow your example, but I don’t manage it as well as you do, for it very
often happens that I tear up my letters after rereading them. I do not do so
from vanity - a mistake in spelling, a blot, a sentence badly turned do not
trouble me, but it is that I cannot manage to learn to direct my pen and my
ideas. I have just torn up a letter to you which I had finished, because I had
said in it many things I did not wish to say to you, and nothing of what I did
wish to say. perhaps you will think that this is dissimulation, and you may say
that it is wrong to dissimulate with those one loves and by whom one knows one
is loved. I agree, but you will also agree that one says everything to a person
toward whom one is indifferent, but that the more a person is dear to one, the
more things there are one would like to conceal from him."
Feeling an excess of
youthful energy, and having no outlet for it. Tolstoy often risked his life in
taking part in dangerous excursions.
Thus, in company of his
friend, the Cossack Epishka (described in The Cossacks as Yeroshka), he once
went to the village Hossaf-Yurt, in the mountains. The journey was a dangerous
one, for the mountaineers sometimes attacked travelers.
On his safe return from
the excursion Tolstoy met the commander-in-chief of the left wing, Prince
Baryatinskiy, accompanied by his own relation, Ilya Tolstoy. The latter invited
Tolstoy to join their company, and this gave him a chance of getting well
acquainted with the commander-in-chief. He expressed on one occasion his
satisfaction and praise at Tolstoy’s cheerful and brave appearance, which he
noticed on seeing him once after a raid. Then and there he advised him to enter
military service at once, as Tolstoy still remained a civilian, but took part
in all the expeditions as a volunteer. The flattering opinion of the
commander-in-chief and the advice of his relations induced Tolstoy at last to
hasten his decision and send in his petition to join the army.
He remained at
Starogladovskaya during August and September. In September he went with his
brother Nikolay to Tiflis. His brother soon returned, but Tolstoy stayed on in
Tiflis to pass his examinations and enter the service.
"We did indeed
leave on the 25th, and after a seven days’ journey, very dull owing to the want
of horses at almost every posting-house, and very agreeable owing to the beauty
of the country through we passed, we arrived on the first of the present month.
"Tiflis is a very
civilized town, which to a great extent apes St. Petersburg, and greatly
succeeds in the imitation. The society is choice and rather numerous; there is
a Russian theater and an Italian Opera, of which I avail myself as much as my
restricted means allow. I am living in the German colony. It is a suburb, but
has for me two great advantages, one of being a very pretty place surrounded by
gardens and vineyards, so that one feels more in the country than in town. It
is still very warm and very fine, and up to the present there is neither snow
nor front. The second advantage is that for two tolerably clean rooms I pay
five rubles a month, whereas in town one could not have similar apartments for
less than forty rubles a month. Into the bargain I get practice in the German
language for nothing, have books, occupations, and leisure, since no one comes
to disturb me, so that on the whole I am not dull.
"Do you remember,
good Aunt, some advice you gave me in bygone days - that I should write novels?
Well, I am following your advice, and the occupations I am speaking of consist
in literary work. I do not know whether what I write will ever see the light,
but it is work which amuses me, and in which I have persevered too long to
abandon it."
This letter is
interesting, because it shows us with what modesty this great talent was
developing its unsuspected excellence. He was ailing and doctoring himself for
two months, and wrote his first story, availing himself of occasional leisure
and solitude. Besides, part of his time was occupied with attempts to get an
official appointment, which was a difficult matter owing to the want of the
necessary papers.
December 23, 1851, he
writes the following letter to his brother Sergey, giving characteristic
details concerning life in Tiflis and the village:
"In a few days the
long-desired announcement is to be gazetted of my nomination as volunteer
private in the 4th Battery, and I shall have the pleasure of saluting and
following with my eyes passing officers and generals. Even here, when walking
about the streets in my fashionable overcoat and opera hat, which I bought here
for ten ruble, despite all my splendor in this attire, I have become so
accustomed to the idea of putting on a gray soldier’s coat that my hand
involuntarily wishes to seize my hat by the springs and flatten it down.
However, if my nomination takes place, on that very day I will leave
Stargladovskaya and proceed thence immediately for the front, where I will walk
or ride in a soldier’s cloak or a Sackashan coat and will, according to my
powers, contribute, by the aid of the cannon, to the slaughter of the wild,
rebellious Asiatics.
"Seryozha.--You
see by my letter that I am at Tiflis, where I arrived as long ago as the 9th of
November, so that I have had time to hunt a little with the dogs I bought there
(Stargladovskaya), but the dogs that have been sent here I have not yet seen.
Sport here (i.e., in Sackashan village) is splendid: open fields, marshy
ground, full of hares, clusters, not of trees, but of rushes, in which foxes
find cover. I have been out hunting nine times in all, about ten or fifteen
versts from the village, with two dogs, of which one is excellent and the other
a good-for-nothing. I caught two foxes and upward of sixty hares. In course of
time I shall attempt to hunt deer. I have more than once been present in
shooting expeditions for wild boar and stags, but have killed nothing myself. This
sport is also very pleasant, but, after becoming accustomed to hunt with
greyhounds, one cannot care for it. Even as he who has become accustomed to
smoke Turkish tobacco cannot care for the common zhukov, although one may argue
that the latter is the best.
"I know your
weakness. You will probably wish to know who have been and are my acquaintances
here and in what relations I stand toward them. I must tell you here that this
point does not in the least interest me, but I will hasten to satisfy you. In battery
here there are not many officers; I am therefore acquainted with all of them,
but very superficially, although I enjoy their general cordiality, as Nikolenka
and myself always have brandy, wine, and refreshments for visitors. On these
same principles my acquaintance has been made and maintained with officers of
other regiments with whom I had occasion to become acquainted at Stariy Yurt, a
watering-place where I lived in summer, and during the expedition in which I
took part. There are among them some more or less decent fellows, yet, as I
always have more interesting occupations than talking to officers, I remain
with all of them in good relations. Lieutenant-Colonel Alekseyev, commander of
the battery I enter, is a very kind and very vain man. by this latter weakness
of his I have, I confess, profited and thrown some dust unintentionally in his
eyes--I need him. But this also I do involuntarily and repent of it. With vain
people one becomes vain oneself.
"Here at Tiflis I
have three acquaintances. I did not make more, first, because I did not wish,
and secondly because I had not the opportunity - I have been ill almost all the
time and it is only since last week that I have been out. My first acquaintance
is Bagration of st. Petersburg (Ferzen’s comrade). The second, Prince
Baryatinskiy. I made his acquaintance during the expedition I took part in
under his command and, later, spent a day with him in a fort with Ilya Tolstoy
whom I met here. This acquaintance naturally does not afford me much recreation,
for you understand on what footing a volunteer private may be acquainted with a
general. My third acquaintance is an apothecary’s assistant, a Pole reduced to
the ranks - a most amusing creature. I am sure Prince Baryatinskiy never
imagined that he could in any kind of list whatever stand by the side of an
apothecary’s assistant, but so it has happened. nikolenka is on a very good
footing here; the commanders and fellow-officers love and respect him. He
enjoys, moreover, the reputation of a brave officer. I love him more than ever,
and when I am with him I am completely happy, and without him I feel dull.
"If you want to
boast of news from the Caucasus you may announce that the second personage
after Shamil, a certain Hadji-Murat, gave himself up the other day to the
Russian Government. He was the first horseman and hero in all Checheniya, but
committed a base act. You may further relate with grief that the other day the
well-known brave and clever general, Sleptsov, was killed. If you wish to know
whether it hurt him--I cannot tell you."
January 6, 1852,
Tolstoy writes a remarkable letter from Tiflis to his aunt, which is full of
tenderness and love for his guardian.
"I have just
received your letter of 24th November, and I am answering you immediately, as
is now my custom. Lately, I wrote you that your letter made me shed tears, and
I attributed this weakness to my illness. I was wrong. For some time back all
your letters have produced the same effect on me. I have always been a
cry-baby. Formerly I was ashamed of this weakness, but the tears I shed in
thinking of you and your love for us are so sweet that I let them flow without
any scruples or false shame. Your letter is too full of sadness for it not to
produce the same effect upon me. It is you who have always given me advice, and
although, unfortunately, I have not always followed it, I would wish to act all
my life only according to your views. For the present allow me to tell you what
effect your letter had on me, and the thoughts that came to me upon reading it.
If I speak too frankly, I know you will pardon it in view of the love I have
for your. In saying that it is your turn to leave us, in order to join those
who are no more, and whom you have so loved; in saying that your pray God to
put a limit to your existence, which seems to you so insupportable and
isolated, pardon me, dear Aunt, but it seems to me, in saying this, you offend
God and me and all of us who so love you. You ask God for death, i.e., the
greatest misfortune which could happen to me. (this is not a phrase; God is
witness that the two greatest misfortunes which could happen to me would be
your death or that of Nikolay - the two persons I love more than myself.) What
would remain for me were God to fulfill your prayer? To give pleasure to whom
would I desire to become better, to be virtuous, to have a good reputation in
the world. When I make plans of happiness for myself, the idea that you will
share and enjoy my happiness is always present. When I do anything good, I am
satisfied with myself, because I know that you will be satisfied with me. When
I act badly, what I most fear is to pain you. Your love is everything for me,
and you ask God to separate us! I cannot tell you the feeling I have toward
you, speech does not suffice to express it, and I am afraid you will think I am
exaggerating, and yet I am weeping with burning tears in writing to you. It is
to this painful separation I am indebted for knowing what a friend I have in
you and how much I love you. But am I the only one who has this feeling for
you? and you ask of God to die! You say you are isolated. Although I am
separated from you, yet, if you believe in my love, this idea might
counterbalance your pain. As for myself, wherever I am, I shall not feel
isolated, as long as I know I am loved by you as I am.
"However, I know
that is a bad feeling that dictates these words to me; I am jealous of your
grief."
Further on, in the same
letter, he relates an incident as interesting for its practical as for its
psychological bearing:
"Today one of
those things happened to me which would have made me believe in god, did I not
already, for some time past, firmly believe in Him.
"I was at Stariy
Yurt. All the officers who were there did nothing but play and at rather high
stakes. As it is impossible for us when living in camp not to see each other
often, I have very often taken part in card-playing, and, notwithstanding the
importunity I was subject to, I had stood firm for a month, but one day for fun
I placed a small stake: I lost. I began again: I again lost. I was in bad luck;
the passion for play had awakened, and in two days I had lost all the money I
had and that which Nikolay had given me (about 250 rubles), and into the
bargain 500 rubles for which I gave a promissory note payable in January, ’52.
I must tell you that near the camp there is a native village inhabited by the
Chechens. A young lad from there, Sado, used to come to the camp and play, but,
as he could not count or write, there were rascals who cheated him. For this
reason I have never wished to play against Sado, and I have even told him that
he should not play because he was being cheated, and I have myself offered to
play for him. He was very grateful to me for this and made me a present of a
purse, it being the custom of these people to give each other mutual presents.
I gave him a worthless gun I had bought for eight rubles. I must tell you that
in order to become a ‘Kunak,’ which means friend, it is customary to make each
other presents and then to have a meal in the house of the ‘Kunak.’ After this,
according to the ancient custom of this people (which now exists almost only by
tradition), you become friends for life and death, i.e., if I demand of him his
money or his wife or his arms, or all that is most precious to him, he must
give it to me, and I also must refuse him nothing. Sado had engaged me to come
to him and become his ‘Kunak.’ I went, and, after having regaled me in the
native manner, he offered to let me choose anything in his house I wished - his
arms, his horse, all....I wished to choose what was of the least value there,
and I took a horse bridle mounted in silver, but he told me that I offended him
and compelled me to take a sword which cost at least a hundred rubles. His
father is rather a rich man, but one who keeps his money buried and does not
give a penny to his son. The son, in order to have money, goes and steals
horses and cows from the enemy; sometimes he has risked his life twenty times
over in order to steal something not worth ten rubles, but it is not through
greed he does it, but by fashion. The greatest thief is highly esteemed and
called ‘Dzhighit,’ ‘plucky fellow.’ At one moment Sado has a thousand rubles,
at another not a penny. After a visit to him I made him a present of Nikolay’s
silver watch, and we became the best of friends in the world. Several times he
has proved his devotion to me in exposing himself to dangers for me; but this
for him is nothing - it has become a habit and a pleasure.
"When I left
Stariy Yurt and Nikolay remained there, Sado used to go to him every day saying
he did not know what to do without me and that he felt terribly dull. By letter
I communicated to Nikolay that, my horse being ill, I begged him to find one at
Stariy Yurt. Sado, having learned this, made haste to come to me and to give me
his horse, notwithstanding all I did to decline it.
"After my silly
action of playing cards at Stariy Yurt I had not touched cards, and I was
continually moralizing to Sado, who had a passion for gambling, and although he
does not know the game has wonderfully good luck. Yesterday evening I occupied
myself in considering my financial affairs and my debts. I was thinking what I
could do to pay them. Having thought over these things, I saw that, if I do not
spend too much, all my debts would not embarrass me and might be covered little
by little in the course of two or three years; but the 500 rubles I had to pay
this month threw me into despair. It was impossible for me to pay them, and at
that moment they embarrassed me much more than did previously the 4,000 of
Ogorev. The stupidity, after having contracted those debts in Russia, of coming
here and making new ones cast me into despair. That evening, during my prayers,
I begged God to extricate me from this disagreeable position, and prayed with
much fervor. ‘But how can I get out of this business?’ I thought on going to
bed. ‘Nothing can happen which can give me any chance of meeting this debt.’ I
already represented to myself all the unpleasantness I should have to go
through in consequence - how my creditor would present the note for payment,
how the military authorities would demand an explanation why I do not pay, etc.
‘God help me,’ I said, and fell asleep.
"The next day I
received a letter from Nikolay, together with yours and several others. He
wrote:
"‘the other day
Sado came to see me, he won your notes from Knoring and brought them to me. He
was so glad of this prize, so happy, and kept asking so repeatedly, "What
do you think? Your brother will be glad I have done this," that I was
inspired with a great affection for him. This man is indeed attached to you.’
"Is it not
astonishing to see one’s desire fulfilled the very next day, i.e., is there
anything so astonishing as the divine goodness for a being who deserves it so
little as I? and is not this feature of attachment in Sado admirable? He knows
I have a brother, Serge, who loves horses, and as I have promised to take him
to Russia when I return, he told me that, were it to cost him his life a
hundred times over, he would steal the best horse to be found in the mountains
and would bring it to him.
"Please get a
six-chambered revolver purchased at tula and send it to me, also a little
musical-box, if this does not cost too much; they are things which will give
him much pleasure."
This story is
especially interesting because it shows what ground Tolstoy has traveled over
in his spiritual development. It reaches from his naive mystical belief in God’s
interference with his gambling and monetary affairs, to the perfect religious
freedom confessed by him now.
Finally, a few days
after this letter was written and his official matters arranged, Tolstoy
returned to Starogladovskaya. On his journey from Mozdok station, probably while
waiting for horses, he wrote a long letter to his aunt, full of the most
profound religious thoughts and, as usual, overflowing with tenderness to this
beloved relative, and with visions and plans concerning a future of simple
family happiness.
"Here are the
thoughts which occurred to me. I will try to express them to you, as I was
thinking of you. I find myself greatly changed morally, and this has been the
case so very often. However I believe such is every one’s fate. The longer one
lives the more one changes: you who have got the experience tell me, is not
this true? I think that the defects and the good qualities - the background of
one’s character - will always remain the same, but the say of regarding life
and happiness must change with age. A year ago I thought I should find
happiness in pleasure, in movement; now, on the contrary, rest, both physical
and moral, is the state I desire. But I imagine that the state of rest without
worry, and with the quiet enjoyments of love and friendship, is the acme of
happiness for me! But one feels the charm of rest only after fatigue, and of
the enjoyment of love only after being without it. Here I am deprived for some
time both of the one and of the other; this is why I long for them so keenly. I
must be deprived of them yet longer - for how long, God knows. I cannot say
why, but I feel that I must. Religion and the experience I have of life,
however small this be, have taught me that life is a trial. In my case, it is
more than a trial, it is also the expiation of my mistakes.
"I have an inkling
that the seemingly frivolous idea I had of going for a journey to the Caucasus
was an idea inspired in me from above. It was the hand of God which guided me -
I do not cease to be thankful for it. I feel I have become better here (though
that is not saying much, since I had been very bad), and I am firmly persuaded
that that can happen to me here will only be for my good, since it is God
Himself who has willed thus. Perhaps the idea is too presumptuous. Nevertheless
I have this conviction. for this reason I bear the fatigues and the privations
of which I speak (they are not physical privations - such do not exist for a
young man of twenty-three who is in good health) without suffering from them,
even with a kind of pleasure in thinking of the happiness awaiting me.
"This is how I
represent it to myself:
"After an
indefinite number of years, neither young nor old, I am at Yasnaya, my affairs
are in order, I have no anxieties, no worries. You are also living at Yasnaya.
You have become a little older, but are still fresh and in good health. We lead
the life we have led; I work in the morning, but we see each other almost all
the day. We dine. In the evening I read to you something which does not weary
you, then we talk - I relate to you my life in the Caucasus, you relate your
memories of my father and my mother, you tell those ‘dreadful’ stories which we
used to listen to with frightened eyes and open mouth. We remind each other of
those who have been dear to us and are with us no longer; you weep, I shall do
the same, but these tears shall be sweet; we will talk about my brothers, who
will come to see us from time to time; of dear Marie, who will also pass some
months of the year with her children at Yasnaya, which she so likes. We shall
have no acquaintances - no one will come to bore us and to gossip. It is a fine
dream, but it is not yet all I allow myself to dream of. I am married. My wife
is a sweet, good, loving person; she has the same affection for you as I have; we
have children who call you Grandmamma; you live in the big house upstairs in
the same room which Grandmother occupied in past times. All the house is
arranged in the same way as it was in Papa’s time, and we recommence the same
life, only changing our parts. You take the character of Grandmamma, but you
are yet better; I take the character of Papa, but I despair of ever deserving
it; my wife the place of Mamma, the children ours; Marie the role of the Aunts,
their misfortunes excepted; even Gasha takes the role of Praskovya Ilyinishna.
But some one will be wanted to take the part which you have played in our
family - never will there be found a soul so beautiful, so loving as yours. You
have no successor. There will be three new personages who will appear from time
to time on the scene, the brothers, especially the one who will often be with
you; Nikolas, an old bachelor, bald, retired from service, always as good as he
is noble.
"I can imagine how
he will, as in the old days, tell the children stories of his own invention,
how the children will kiss his greasy hands (but which are worthy of it), how
he will play with them, how my wife will take pains to prepare his dish for
him, how he and I will talk over common memories of days long past, how you
will sit in your customary place and listen to us with pleasure; how you will
call us old men, but, as of yore, Lyovochka and Nikolenka, and will scold me
for eating with my fingers and him for his hands not being clean.
"Were I to be made
Emperor of Russia, or were some one to give me Peru--in a word, were a fairy
with a wand to come and ask me what I would like to have, with my hand on my
heart I should answer, I only desire that this dream might become a reality. I
know you do not like to forecast, but what harm is there in it? And it gives so
much pleasure. I am afraid I have been egotistical and have made your portion
of happiness too small. I am afraid that misfortunes which have passed, but
have left too tender chords in your heart, will hinder you from enjoying this
future which would have made my happiness. Dear Aunt, tell me, would you be
happy? All I have said may happen, and hope is such a delicious thing.
"I am weeping
again. Why do I weep when I think of you? They are tears of happiness; I am
happy to know I love you. Were all calamities to afflict me, I should never
call myself quite unhappy as long as you existed. Do you remember our parting
in the chapel of Uverskaya when we left for Kazan? Then, as if by inspiration,
at the moment of leaving you, I understood all you were to me, and although yet
a child, I was able to make you understand what I felt by my tears and a few
incoherent words. I have never ceased to love you, but the feeling I
experienced in that chapel and the one I now have for you are quite different;
this one is much stronger, more elevated than I have had at any other time. I
must confess to you something which makes me feel ashamed, but which I must
tell you in order to free my conscience. Formerly, on reading your letters, in
which you spoke to me of the feelings you had for us, I thought I saw some
exaggeration, but only now, on reading them, do I understand you - your
unlimited love for us and your elevated soul. I am sure that any one else but
you on reading this letter and the last one would have cast the same reproach
on me; but I am not afraid of your doing this, you know me too well, and you
know that perhaps sensibility is my only virtue. It is to this quality that I
owe the happiest moments of my life. At all events this is the last letter in
which I shall allow myself to express such high-flown sentiments, high-flown in
the eyes of the indifferent, but you will be able to appreciate them."
In January 1852,
Tolstoy returned to Starogladovsk already a non-commissioned officer, and in
the following February he took part as a gunner in a campaign.
In March he was again
in Starogladovsk. It is interesting to note the few thought written down by him
in his diary of that time.
He realized that three
passions were hindering him on his way toward the moral idea which he placed
before himself. These passions were card-playing, sensuality or lust, and
vanity. He thus defined and characterized these respective passions:
"(1) Passion for
gambling is a greedy passion which gradually develops a craving for strong
excitement. But it is possible to resist it.
"(2) The
indulgence of sensual passion is a physical need, a need of the body excited by
the imagination; abstinence increases the desire and makes it very difficult to
contend with. the best method is labor and occupation.
"(3) Vanity: this
passion is the one by which we do least injury to others and the most to
ourselves."
Further on are the
following reflections:
"For some time
back I have been greatly tormented by regrets at the loss of the best years of
my life. It may be interesting to describe the progress of my moral development
ever since I have begun to feel that I could have done something good; but I
will use no more words, even thought itself is insufficient.
"There are no
limits for a great thought, but writers have long ago reached the absolute
limits of its expression....There is something in me which compels me to
believe that I am not born to be like every one."
These last words
represent his first vague consciousness of his vocation. It should be observed
that they were written before he had finished "Childhood," and
therefore before he had been praised and congratulated on a successful literary
performance. It was rather an internal independent consciousness of that
mysterious power he had which has since placed him so high as one of the best
representatives of the moral consciousness of humanity.
In the month of May
[1852] he got leave of absence and went to Pyatigorsk, to drink the waters and
to be treated for rheumatism.
From there he writes a
letter to his aunt which gives a picture of his spiritual growth, and points to
the incessant activity of his inner life.
"Since my journey
and stay at Tiflis my way of life has not changed; I endeavor to make as few acquaintances
as possible, and to avoid intimacy with those whose acquaintance I have made.
People have become accustomed to my manner, they no longer importune me, and I
am sure they say he is a ‘strange’ or a ‘proud’ man.
"It is not from
pride that I behave thus, but it has come of itself. There is too great a
difference between the education, the sentiments, and the point of view of
those whom I meet here and my own for me to find any pleasure in their society.
It is Nikolay who has the talent, notwithstanding the enormous difference there
is between him and all these gentlemen, to amuse himself with them and be liked
by all. I envy him this talent, but feel I cannot do the same. It is true that
this kind of life is not adapted for one’s amusement, and for a very long time
I have not thought about pleasures. I think about being quiet and contented.
some time ago I began to appreciate historical reading (it was a point of
contention between us, but I am at present quite of your opinion); my literary
occupations also advance in their little way although I do not yet contemplate
publishing anything. I have written three times over a work I had begun a very
long time ago, and In intend rewriting it once more in order to be satisfied
with it. Perhaps the task will be like that of Penelope, but that does not
deter me, I do not write from ambition, but because I enjoy it; I find pleasure
and profit in working, and I work. Although I am far from amusing myself, as I
have told you, I am also very far from being dull, as I have got something to
do; besides this, I enjoy a pleasure sweeter and more elevated than any that
society could have given me -- that of feeling at rest in my conscience; of
knowing myself, of understanding myself better than I did formerly, and of feeling
good and generous sentiments stirring within me.
"There was a time
when I was vain of my intelligence, of my position in this world, and of my
name, but now I know and feel that if there is anything good in me, and if I
have to thank Providence for it, it is a kind heart, sensitive and capable of
love, that it has pleased God to give me and to keep for me.
"It is to this
alone that I owe the brightest moments I have, and the fact that,
notwithstanding the absence of pleasures and society, I am not only at my ease
but often happy."
In a letter of June 24,
1852, to his brother Sergey, he gives characteristic details of his life in
Pyatigorsk:
"What shall I tell
you about my life? I have written three letters, and in each have described the
same thing. I should like to tell to you the spirit of Pyatigorsk, but it is as
difficult as it is to tell to a stranger in what Tula consists, which we
unfortunately understand very well. Pyatigorsk is also something of a tula, but
of a special kind -- the Caucasian; for instance, here the chief feature is
family houses and public promenades. society consists of landowners (this is
the technical term for all visitors to the place), who look down upon the local
civilization and of officers, who look upon the local pleasures as the height
of bliss. along with me there arrived from headquarters an officer of our
battery. You should have seen his delight and excitement when we entered the
town! He had already told me a great deal about the distractions of
watering-places, how everyone walks up and down the boulevards to the sound of music,
and then, as he declared, all go to the pastry cook’s, and there make
acquaintance even with family houses. There is the theater, there are the
clubs, every year marriages take place, duels, etc.... -- in one word, it is
quite a Parisian life. the moment we got out of our traveling cart, my officer
put on blue trousers with fearfully tight riding-straps, boots with enormous
spurs, epaulets, and so got himself up and went for a walk along the boulevard
to the sound of music, then to the pastry cook’s, the theater, and the club,
but, so far as I know, instead of an acquaintance with family houses, and a
bride who owned 1,000 serfs, he -- in the course of a whole month -- only made
acquaintance with three shabby officers who emptied his pockets to the last
penny at cards, and with one family house, in which, however, two families live
in one room, and tea is served with little scraps of sugar to put in one’s
mouth. This officer, moreover, spent in one month about 20 rubles on porter and
sweets, and purchased a bronze mirror for the adornment of his toilet table.
Now he is walking in an old jacket without epaulets, is drinking brimstone
water as hard as he can, and appears to be taking a serious cure; but he is
astonished that, although he waked every day on the boulevard, frequented the
pastry cook’s and did not spare money on the theater, as well as on cabs and
gloves, he could not get acquainted with the aristocracy (here in every little
fort there is an aristocracy), while the aristocracy, as if to spite him,
arranges rides and picnics, and he is not admitted anywhere. Almost all the
officers who come here suffer a like fate, but they pretend they came only for ‘treatment’,
so they limp on crutches, wear slings and bandages, get drunk, and tell strange
stories about the Cherkessi. Yet at headquarters they will again tell people
how they were acquainted with family houses, and amused themselves
tremendously; and every season they go to the watering-places in crowds to
amuse themselves."
As is evident from his
letter to his aunt, Tolstoy continued writing "Childhood" in
Pyatigorsk. At the same time his self-scrutiny never stopped. On June 29th
[1852] he wrote in his diary a thought which might well serve as a short
expression of his present view of life:
"Conscience is our
best and surest guide, but where are the marks distinguishing this voice from
the other voices?...The voice of vanity speaks no less powerfully. For instance
-- an unrevenged offense.
"The man whose
object is his own happiness is bad; he whose aim is to get the good opinion of
others is bad too, he is weak; one whose object is the happiness of others is
virtuous; he whose object is god is great."
This again is a thought
which we find further developed in his later works:
"Justice is the least
measure of virtue to which every one is bound. Anything higher than justice
shows an aspiration to perfection, anything lower is (no better than)
vice."
July 2nd [1852] Tolstoy
finished "Childhood," and in a few days sent the manuscript to the
editor of "The Contemporary" in St. Petersburg.
The original title of
his first literary work was "the Story of My childhood." It was
signed with the three letters LNT, and the editor for a considerable time did
not know the name of the author.
In Pyatigorsk Tolstoy
saw his sister and her husband. Marya was undergoing treatment for rheumatism
at the watering-place. According to her account, Tolstoy was then carried away
by spiritualistic experiments such as the turning of tables; he even carried
this on in the boulevard, taking chairs for it from the cafe.
On August 5th [1852],
Tolstoy left Pyatigorsk and returned to his outpost.
On his journey he wrote
down the following interesting thought, which is one of the leading principles
of his present view of life:
The future occupies us
more than the present. This is a good thing if we think of a future in another
world. To live in the present, i.e., to act in the best way in the present --
that is wisdom."
On August 7th [1852] he
arrived in Starogladovsk, and on returning to his beloved and familiar
patriarchal surroundings of Cossack life, he wrote in his diary:
"Simplicity --
that is the virtue I desire above all others to acquire."
On August 28th [1852]
he at last received the long-expected letter from the editor of "The
Contemporary." "It made me silly with joy," he noted in his
diary.
Here is the celebrated
letter of Nekrasov, who was the sponsor of the newly born talent:
"Sir--I have read
your manuscript (Childhood). It is so far interesting, and I will print it. It
seems to me, though I cannot say positively, not having seen the continuation,
that the author is a man of talent. At any rate, the author’s tendencies, the
simplicity and lifelike character of the story are incontestable merits. If the
following parts contain (as one may expect they will) more vivacity and
movement, it will turn out a very good novel. Please forward the continuation.
Your novel and your talent interest me. I would advise you not to conceal your
identity under initials, but to appear with your full name at once, if only you
are not a casual visitor in the domain of literature. I hope to hear from you.
Accept my best respects,
"N.
Nekrasov." [Footnote: Literary supplement to the magazine
"Niva," February 1898, p337.] After this, in a month’s time, followed
a second letter.
"St. Petersburg,
September 5, 1852.
"Sir--I wrote to
you about your novel, and now I consider it my duty to add a few more words. I
sent it to be printed in the ninth number of ‘The contemporary,’ and, after
reading it carefully, this time not in manuscript but in proof form, I came to
the conclusion that the novel is much better than it appeared to me at first. I
can positively say that the author is a man of talent. It is most important for
you yourself to be convinced o this now, when you are a beginner. The number of
‘The Contemporary’ with your contribution in it will appear tomorrow in St.
Petersburg, but you will only get it in three weeks’ time, not before. I will
send it on to your address. I have omitted some parts of your novel, but very
little; however...I have not added anything. I will write again before long in
detail, but I am busy just now. I expect your answer, and beg you to forward me
the continuation, if ready for the press.
N. Nekrasov.
P.S.--Though I believe
I have guessed the name of the author, still I beg you to inform me of it. In
fact i must know it, because of the rules of our censorship."
Of this letter Tolstoy
wrote in his diary, "September 30, Received a letter from Nekrasov, but no
money."
He was in need of money
at that time, and expected his honorarium for his first literary work. He
probably wrote about it to Nekrasov, for he received a third letter from him,
of which the contents were as follows:
"St. Petersburg,
October 30, 1852.
"Dear Dir--I beg
to be excused for my delay in answering your last letter--I was very busy. As
to the money matter, I said nothing about it in my previous letters for the
following reason; our best periodicals have long made it a custom not to pay
anything for the first novel to a commencing author, who is first introduced to
the public by the periodical itself. All who began their literary career in ‘The
Contemporary,’ such as Goncharov, Druzhinin, Ardeyev, and others, had to submit
to this custom. When it came out, my own first work, as well as one of Panayev’s,
had to submit to the same custom. I propose to you to do the same thing, and
you can make it a condition that for your subsequent works I will pay you the
best honorarium, which is given only to our best-known (very few) novel
writers, that is to say, fifty rubles for sixteen pages of printed matter. I
should add that I put off writing to you, because I could not make such an
offer before verifying my impression by the judgment of the reading public.
This judgment turned out very favorable to you, and I am very glad to make no
mistake in my estimate of your first work, so I offer you now with pleasure the
above-mentioned conditions of payment.
"Please let me
know what you think about it. In any case I can guarantee that we will come to
an agreement on this point. As your novel has had so much success, we should be
very glad soon to get your second work. Please send what you have now ready for
print.
"I wanted to send
you the ninth number of ‘The Contemporary,’ but unfortunately I forgot to order
extra copies to be printed, and the whole of this year’s issues are sold out.
However, if you like, I can send you one or two reprints of your novel -- this
can be done by making use of the defective copies.
"Once more allow
me to ask you to send us a novel, or a tale of some kind. I remain, in
expectation of your answer, yours truly,
N. Nekrasov.
"P.S.--We are
bound to know the names of all the authors whose works we publish, so please
give me exact information concerning this point. If you wish it, no one but the
publishers shall know it."
Thus, judging by
Nekrasov’s letter, on the 6th of September, 1852, an event of great
significance occurred in this history of Russian literature: Tolstoy’s first
work appeared in print that day.
Tolstoy mentions this
episode, with his usual modesty, in a letter to his aunt Tatyana, dated October
28, 1952.
"On my return from
the baths I passed a month rather disagreeably owing to the review which the
general was going to hold. Marching and discharging different kinds of guns are
not very pleasant, especially as the exercise interferes with any settled
habits of my life. Fortunately it did not last long, and I have again resumed
my way of life, consisting in sport, writing, reading, and conversations with
Nikolay. I have taken to shooting, and as I have turned out to be a tolerably
good shot, this occupation takes up two or three hours a day. In Russia they
have no idea how much and what excellent game is to be found here. A hundred
yards from where I live I find pheasants, and in half an hour I bag two, three
or four. Besides the pleasure, the exercise is good for my health, which, in
spite of the waters, is not in first-rate condition. I am not ill, but I very
often suffer from colds, at one time from a bad throat, at another from
toothache, which I have still got; at times from rheumatism, so that at least
for two days a week I keep my room. Do not think I am concealing anything from
you: I am, as I have always been, of a strong constitution, but of weak health.
In intend passing next summer again at the waters. If I am not cured by them, I
am sure they have done me good--‘there is no evil without good.’ When I am indisposed,
I can work, with less fear of being distracted, at another novel which I have
begun. The one I sent to St. Petersburg is published in the September number of
the "Sovremennik" for 1852 under the title of "Childhood".
I have signed it LNT and no one except Nikolay knows who is the author. I
should not like it to be known."
Marya, Tolstoy’s
sister, told me about the impression which this thing produced in the family
circle. They lived on their estate, not far from that of Turgenev - Spasskoye,
who used to visit them. On one occasion turgenev arrived at their place with
the latest number of "The Contemporary," and read out a novel by an
unknown author which he praised highly. Marya heard with surprise the story of
events of her own family, wondering who could be aware of the intimate details
of their life. How little idea they had that their own Lyovochka might be the
author of this novel was shown by the fact of Nikolay Nikolayevich being
suspected to have written it; the fact was he had manifested literary
inclinations from his childhood, and was a splendid story-teller. Evidently his
devoted aunt Tatyana knew how to keep the secret entrusted to her, and it
probably leaked out only on Tolstoy’s arrival from the Caucasus.
In her reminiscences
Mme. Golovachov-Panayev gives an interesting description of the impression made
by the first novel of Tolstoy on both readers and authors.
"On all sides
praises were showered upon the hew author by the reading public, and everybody
wanted to know his name. as to the men of letters, they treated the newly born
talent more or less indifferently, with the exception of Panayev, who was so
delighted with ‘The History of My Childhood’ that he read it aloud every
evening to some of his friends. Turgenev laughed at Panayev to his face, and
said that his friends, when meeting him at the Nevsky Prospect, hid themselves
for fear lest he should start reading passages from the new novel, which he had
already managed to learn by heart.
"The literary
critics were slow to notice Tolstoy. At least in Zelinsky’s volume of literary
criticisms upon Tolstoy -- a carefully written book -- the first critical
review is mentioned as having appeared in 1854. It was printed in the monthly
serial, "Memoirs of the Fatherland," in November of that year, that
is to say more than two years after "Childhood" appeared in print.
The article was written a propos of the publication of "Boyhood," and
both novels were reviewed in it."
We quote here the short
but striking critique of Tolstoy’s first work:
"‘Childhood’ -- an
immense chain of various poetical and unconscious conceptions of the
surroundings, enabled the author to view country life in the same poetical
light. He selected from this life all that strikes the mind and imagination of
the child, and with the author’s powerful talent this life is presented just as
the child sees it. Of the environment he introduces into his story as much as
strikes the imagination of the child; that is why all the chapters of the
novel, though apparently disconnected, have a perfect unity: they show the
child’s standpoint of the world. But the great talent of the author is further
seen in what follows. It might be thought that in depicting the world from the
impressions of a child one could hardly present life and mankind from other
than a childish point of view. We are the more surprised to find after reading
these tales, that they leave in the imagination the lifelike portraiture of
father, mother, nurse, and tutor, in short the whole family, and all represented
in the most poetical colors." [Footnote: "Memoirs of the Fatherland,
1854, No. 11 (Journalism).]
In proportion to the
growing circulation of "The Contemporary" grew the interest of the
reading public in the newly rising talent.
When copies of
"The Contemporary" containing the stories "Childhood" and
"Boyhood" reached Dostoyevsky in Siberia they deeply impressed him.
In a letter to one of his friends in Semipalatinsk he insisted on being told
who this mysterious LNT was.
But the mysterious LNT,
as if of set purpose, declined to reveal his identity, and only watched from
the outside the sensation he had made.
In October, while
living in the village Starogladovsk, he sketched the plan for a work, "The
Novel of a Russian Landlord," of which the fundamental idea was as
follows:
"The hoer seeks
for the realization of his ideal of happiness and justice in the conditions of
country life. Not finding it, he is disillusioned and searches for it in family
life. His friend suggests to him the idea that happiness does not consist in
any ideal, but in one’s continual work with the happiness of others for its
object."
Unfortunately the plan
was not realized, but the same ideas are developed in many of his following
works.
In spite of his
prominent position, a military career proved not to his taste. It was evidently
a burden to him, and he only waited to get his commission in order to be
allowed to leave.
But this promotion was
slow n coming, and it looked as if the delay was intentional. When he entered
the service he expected to be promoted in about eighteen months, but after
nearly a year’s service he received at the end of October [1852] a notice
informing him that he must first serve three more years.
The reason for the
delay turned out to be his negligence in sending in his papers.
In the memoirs of
countess S. A. Tolstoy we read the following:
"The promotion of
Tolstoy as well as his service had been full of great difficulties and
failures. Before his departure for the Caucasus he lived in Yasnaya Polyana
with his aunt Tatyana. He often met his brother Sergey, who at that time was
very much interested in gypsies and their singing. The gypsies used to come to
yasnaya Polyana, and would sing, and turn the heads of the two brothers. When
Tolstoy realized that this might lead to some foolish action, he suddenly,
without warning to any one, left for the Caucasus and took no papers with
him."
This carelessness, or
rather hatred of all kinds of business documents, more than once caused a great
deal of embarrassment to Tolstoy.
In his impatience he
sent a complaint to his aunt P. Yushkova, who wrote to certain high officials,
and so managed to hasten his promotion to the rank of officer.
On December 24th of the
same year [1852] he finished his tale "The Invaders," and two days
later sent it to the editor of "The Contemporary."
In January 1853,
Tolstoy’s battery had to march Shamyl.
In the history of the
20th Artillery Brigade, in the description of this campaign, we find the
following passage:
"At one of the
guns of the chief detachment at No. 4 Battery there acted as gunner Count L.
Tolstoy, afterward author of the immortal works ‘A Wood-Cutting Expedition,’ ‘The
Cossacks,’ ‘War and Peace,’ etc."
The detachment was
settled in the fortress Groznaya where, according to Tolstoy, card-playing and
carousals constantly went on.
"January 18, as
stated in the history of the brigade, the detachment returned from Kurinskoye.
during the last three days the seven guns of the column discharged about 800 volleys,
and of these about 600 were discharged by five guns of the Battery No. 4 of the
Brigade No. 20, which were under the command of Lieutenant Maklinskiy and
Sub-Lieutenants Sulimovskiy and Ladizhenskiy, under whose authority count L.
Tolstoy served as gunner of the 4th Division. On January 19 he was despatched
with a howitzer to the fort and village of Gerzel." [Footnote: Yanzhul,
"The History of the Artillery Brigade No.20."]
Tolstoy also took part
n the engagement of February 18th, when he was exposed to great danger, being
only a hair’s breadth from death. As he was sighting a gun, the enemy’s shell
broke the gun-carriage and burst at his feet. Fortunately, it did him no harm.
On April 1st he
returned with his detachment to Starogladovsk.
From the first steps of
his literary activity Tolstoy had to come into contact with the senseless
cruelty of that irresponsible power, which has now for more than a century been
obstructing without intermission the free development of Russian thought. I
mean what is called the censorship.
In a letter to his
brother Sergey of May 1853, Tolstoy writes:
"I am writing in a
hurry so please excuse this letter being short and disorderly. ‘Childhood’ has
been spoiled by the censorship, and the ‘Expedition’ has quite perished under
it. All that was good in them is deleted or mutilated. I have handed in my
resignation, and one of these days, i.e., in about six weeks, I hope to go as a
free man to Pyatigorsk and so on to Russia."
But getting leave of
absence was no such easy matter, and in the summer of 1853, Tolstoy was again
in a dangerous position, and with great difficulty was saved from being taken
prisoner.
We take the description
of this incident from the Memoirs of Poltoratsky:
"On June 13, 1853,
I joined the 5th and 6th squads of Kurinsky and a company of battalion of the
line with two guns, and we set out on an expedition for which we were drafted
off [footnote 2: During the war with the mountaineers, military expeditions
were very dangerous. Such operations usually took place under the protection of
a strong convoy of soldiers. Naturally, all kinds of errands for those in
service were combined with these movements, which for that reason were called
"occasions".] to the fortress of Groznaya. After a halt at Yermolov’s
Knoll, the column started in marching order. When I came up to the middle of
the column, which stretched out along the road, I suddenly noticed, not far
from the advanced guard, to the left of the upper plain between Khan Kale and
the Tower of Groznaya, a party of from twenty to twenty-five Chechen horsemen
heedlessly galloping down the incline and across the line of our column.
"I rushed onward
to the advanced guard and soon heard a volley of gun-shots, but before I had
time to reach the 5th Company I saw at a distance of about forty yards the gun
unlimbered and the linseed over it. "Put it back, put it back, our men are
there!" I shouted at the top of my voice, and fortunately succeeded in
stopping the discharge, which was aimed at the group of horsemen huddled
together, among whom were evidently some of our men. Upon my order the 3rd
platoon rushed forward, but they hardly made a few steps when the Chechens
turned to flight down the plain to Argun, and then two shells were discharged
in their pursuit. At the same time, from the spot where the conflict took
place, Baron Rosen, deadly pale and very shaky, rode up to the column. He was
almost immediately followed by a horse without a saddle, which was recognized
as belonging to a platoon officer. At that moment, from behind the short bushes
growing on the road, there appeared the artillery ensign Scherbachov. this
young, ruddy-complexioned man of nineteen summers, who only a few months before
had left the artillery school and struck everybody by his appearance of good
health and his extraordinary frame and strength, at this moment shocked us all.
"He came up with
deliberate but firm steps, without limping or groaning, and only when he calmly
came quite near did we see how badly he had been hurt by the Chechens. Blood
was spouting like a fountain from bullet wounds in his chest and both his legs,
from a grape-shot wound in the abdomen, and a slash on the neck from a sabre.
There was not doctor and no medical assistant with the column, so the barbers
of the company had to do what they could, and one of them skillfully and
quickly dressed the wounds. Meanwhile, Rosen, who had recovered a little from
his fright, explained that five of them rode on in advance of the column and,
at the moment of the attack by the mountaineers, Count Lev Tolstoy, Pavel
Poltoratskiy and the Tartar Sado probably escaped to Groznaya, while he and
Sherbachov turned their horses back to the column which was moving up behind
them. ‘Your honor,’ interrupted an artillery soldier lying on a high pile of
hay, ‘there is another man lying on the road, and I believe he is moving.’ I
shouted to the third platoon, ‘Forward, double quick!’ and rushed down the
road. At a distance of about one hundred yards from the guns of the advanced
guard lay a dead raven-hued horse well known to us, and almost buried beneath
him was the maimed body of Pavel. [Footnote: Pavel Poltoratskiy, the nephew of
the writer.] He moaned aloud, and in a heartrending voice begged to be set free
from the unbearable weight of the dead horse. I sprang from my horse and,
throwing the bridle to a Cossack, with one haul, which cost me an extraordinary
effort, I turned over the carcass of the horse and freed the sufferer, who was
bleeding to death. He had been wounded by sidearms, having received three blows
on the head and four on the shoulder. The latter were so deep that they
literally divided the shoulder in two, exposing a wide extent of flesh. I sent
by a Cossack an order for the whole column to move on to where we were, and
here the dressing of the wounds was begun, and the stretchers were made ready.
"All this happened
in a few minutes, during which we managed, however, to render first help to the
wounded, while the cavalry of the Groznaya fortress was induced to rush out.
The commander of the garrison, seeing from the heights our column in prefect
order and the Chechens disappearing in the horizon, concluded that it was
useless to pursue them, and ordered the soldiers to return to the fortress. But
a few horsemen, having separated from the rest, galloped onward to reach our
column, which was at a distance of about four versts from Groznaya. These were
Pistolkorse and several of his Circassian friends, from the friendly Chechens
inhabiting the villages about Groznaya. By common efforts we constructed a kind
of stretcher out of the soldiers’ overcoats, placed both the wounded thereon,
and started on our journey. Pistolkorse informed us the Count Lev Tolstoy and
the Tartar Sado were hotly pursued by seven of the Chechens, but, thanks to the
speed of their horses, they reached the gates of the fortress unhurt, leaving
the enemies a trophy in the shape of a saddle cushion.
"Tolstoy and his
friend Sado and three companions were impatient to arrive before the rest at
Groznaya, and detached themselves from the column at Yermolov’s Knoll. This
maneuver is unfortunately only known too well in the Caucasus! Who of us, if
mounted on a spirited horse, but obliged to move on step by step in the
occasion with the infantry, would not gallop away in advance? This is a
temptation to which old and young often yielded, contrary to the strict
prohibitions and discipline of the authorities. And our five brave fellows did
the same. Leaving the column thirty yards behind them, they agreed that two of
them, for the purpose of reconnoitering, should ride along the upper recess and
the remaining three by the lower road. No sooner did Tolstoy and Sado mount the
ridge than they descried a crowd of Chechen riders, who from the Khan-Kalsky
forest were flying straight upon them. Not having time to descend without great
risk, Tolstoy shouted from above informing his comrades of the enemy’s
appearance, and himself with Sado galloped away at full speed along the ridge
of the recess to the fortress. Those below did not at first believe the news,
and not being able to see the mountaineers had lost a few minutes; when the
Chenchens (seven of them started pursuing Tolstoy and Sado) appeared on the
recess and rushed downward, Baron Rosen turned his horse and galloped back to the
column and reached it safely. Shcherbachov followed him, but his horse, given
by the Government, galloped badly, and the Chechens overtook him, wounded him,
and threw him off the saddle, after which he managed to reach the column on
foot. Pavel’s turned out the worse case. Having caught sight of the Chechens,
he instinctively rushed forward in the direction of Groznaya, but at once
realized that his young, well-fed and petted horse could not in hot weather
gallop the five versts dividing him from the fortress, so he abruptly turned
backward at the very moment when the enemy had already come down the recess on
the road, and, with his sabre unsheathed, as a last resource he intended to
force his was back to the column. But one of the mountaineers aimed his carbine
well, and, waiting for pavel’s approach, lodged a bullet in the forehead of his
raven horse; it fell down dead, burying its rider underneath. One Chechen bent
from his horse toward Pavel, and snatching out of his hands the silver-mounted
sabre, he pulled off the sheath, but seeing the third platoon, which was
hurrying to Pavel’s assistance, he slashed him with his sabre on the head and
ran away. His example was followed by the remaining six mountaineers one after
another, who, riding by in full speed, each dealt heavy blows on the head and
shoulders of Pavel, who lay motionless under the weight of his dead horse and
bleeding to death, up to the very moment of our arrival." [Footnote:
"Reminiscences of V. A. Poltoratskiy." "Historical Review,"
June 1893, p. 672.]
In the reminiscences of
Bers we learn one more detail of this affair characterizing Tolstoy:
"The peaceful
Chechen Sado, with whom Tolstoy rode out that day, was his great friend. They
had only recently exchanged horses. Sado had bought a young horse, and after
having given it a trial, gave it to his friend Tolstoy, and himself mounted the
latter’s ambler, which, as it is well known, cannot gallop. When they were
overtaken by the Chechens, Tolstoy could have galloped away on the spirited horse
of his friend, but he did not leave him. Sado, like all mountaineers, never
parted from his gun, but unfortunately this time it was not loaded. Still, he
aimed it at the pursuers, and shouted threateningly at them. Judging by the
actions of the pursuers, they intended to take both as prisoners, especially
Sado, out of revenge; for that reason, they did not shoot. this saved them.
They managed to approach Groznaya, where a vigilant sentinel noticed the
pursuit afar and sounded the alarm. The appearance of the Cossacks on the road
induced the Chechens to stop the pursuit."
This incident served
Tolstoy as a basis for his story, "A Prisoner in the Caucasus."
But neither the dangers
of the military career, nor the fits of vice and gambling which burst like hurricanes
into his peaceful life, arrested the general development of Tolstoy’s
character, and soon after the incident just described, he writes down the
following thoughts or maxims:
"Be
straightforward, and, even if brusque, be frank with all, but not childishly
frank without due occasion.
"Refrain from wine
and women.
"Delight is rare
and imperfect, but repentance is complete.
"Give thyself up
completely to every work thou doest. Under a strong feeling pause always before
action, but having once made thy mind up, even wrongly, act with
resolution."
In the middle of July,
1853, Tolstoy went to Pyatigorsk and remained there until October, returning
afterward to Starogladovsk. Evidently the monotonous service began to be very
wearisome, and he was looking forward to a change in his life.
Meantime, he wrote from
Pyatigorsk to his brother as follows:
"I think I have
already written to you about my having handed in my resignation. God knows,
however, whether it will be accepted, and when, in view of the war with Turkey.
This disturbs me very much, as I have now become so accustomed to the happy
thought of soon settling down in the country, that to return again to
Staroglavosk and wait till eternity, as I do for everything connected with my
service, it is very unpleasant."
The same frame of mind
is perceptible in a letter from Staroglavosk, written in December, 1853.
"Please write to
me quickly about my papers. This is necessary. When shall I arrive? [sentence
emphasized] god only knows, for it will soon be a year since I have considered
how I can resheath my sword, and still I cannot do it. However, as I must fight
somewhere, I find it pleasanter to fight in Turkey than here, and have
accordingly applied to Prince Sergey Dmitriyevich, who wrote me that he had
already written to his brother, but did not know what the result might be.
"At all events,
before the New Year I expect a change in my way of life, which I confess has
become inexpressibly wearisome to me. Silly officers, silly conversations,
nothing else. If there were only one man with whom one might have a talk from
one’s soul! Turgenev is right in speaking of the ‘irony of solitude,’ when one
is by oneself one becomes perceptibly stupid. Though Nikolenka took away with
him - God knows why - the greyhounds (we, Epishka and I, often call him a pig
for this), still, during whole days from morning till night, I go out shooting
alone with a dog. And this is my only pleasure; indeed, not a pleasure, but a
means of stupefaction. You get tired and hungry, and fall dead asleep, and the
day is passed. If you have an opportunity, or should be in Moscow, buy for me
Dickens’ ‘David Copperfield’ in English, and send me Saddler’s English
Dictionary, which is among my books."
During this time
Tolstoy was writing his "Boyhood," and had finished a tale called
"The Recollections of a Billiard-Marker," which was sent to the
editor of "The Contemporary," expressing at the same time his
dissatisfaction with his work, and the hurry in which it was done.
About the same time,
one of his occupations was reading Schiller’s biography.
After having returned
from a short journey to the village of Khassav-Yurt, Tolstoy put down in his
diary:
"For all the
prayers I have invented, I substitute a single one, ‘Our Father.’ All the
petitions I am able to address to God are expressed in a way much more elevated
and much worthier of him in the words: ‘Thy will be done on earth as it is in
heaven.’"
In her memoirs, the
Countess S. A. Tolstaya describes another interesting incident of his Caucasian
life - the attitude of Tolstoy to the St. George’s Cross.
Readers are already
aware that Tolstoy had distinguished himself several times in military
exploits, and that he coveted the reward of the soldier’s St. George’s Cross.
The commander of his battery, Colonel Alekseyev, was very fond of Tolstoy.
After one of the engagements, several St. George’s Crosses had been sent to the
battery. These crosses were to be distributed next day, but on the eve of this
day Tolstoy had to be on duty on the island where the guns were placed.
With his usual
inclination to be carried away by everything, he, instead of going, played
chess till late at night, and was not on duty. The commander of the division,
Olifer, not finding him on duty, was very angry, reprimanded him severely, and
put him under arrest.
The following day the
crosses were distributed in the regiment, and the bands played. Tolstoy knew
that he was to have had one, but, instead of enjoying the grand event, he was
in prison and in despair at the time.
Another opportunity
presented itself for receiving the cross, but it again proved a failure, the
reason of the failure being, however, more to his credit.
Crosses were sent to
the battery for good conduct in a certain engagement with mountaineers. This
time Tolstoy knew beforehand that he was to get one.
But just before the
distribution, Colonel Alekseyev spoke to him in the following terms: "You
know that St. George’s Crosses are mostly given to old, deserving soldiers, to
whom they give a right to life pensions in proportions to the salary they have
been receiving during service. On the other hand, crosses are given to those
non-commissioned officers who are in favor with their superiors. The more
crosses that are received by the non-commissioned officers, the more are taken
away from the old, deserving soldiers. I will give you one if you like, but, if
you are willing to decline it, it will be given to an old and very worthy
soldier who deserves such a cross and who is looking forward to it as a means
of livelihood." Notwithstanding his passionate desire to own the cross,
Tolstoy immediately gave up his claim, and after this he had no further
opportunity of getting it.
To conclude our
description of Tolstoy’s life in the Caucasus, we will quote a few lines from
the reminiscences of an officer, M. A. Yanzhul, who served in the seventies in
the village Starogladovsk, and came across traces of Tolstoy’s sojourn there.
"In 1871 I was
made officer of the 20th Artillery Brigade, of the same brigade and village of
Starogladovsk in which seventeen years before Count L. N. Tolstoy had lived and
served in the army. The village of Starogladovsk with its handsome women of
striking local type, its valiant Grebenskiy Cossacks, and ‘the commander’s
house surrounded by old poplars,’ described by Tolstoy in his well-known story,
‘The Cossacks,’ had been familiar to me for more than twenty years. At my time
the memory of Lev Nikolayevich, as they called him there, was still fresh in
the village. They used to point out to me the old Maryana, the heroine of the
story, and several old Cossack sportsmen, who knew Tolstoy personally and had
with him shot pheasants, and hunted wild boars. One of these Cossacks, as all
know, went on horseback in the eighties from the village to Yasnaya Polyana to
pay Tolstoy a visit. At the battery I met Captain Trolov (now deceased), who
had know Tolstoy as a quarter-gunner, and related incidentally that even then
the Count possessed the marvelous capacity of a story-teller who carried away
the listeners by his interesting conversation." [Footnote: "Notices
of L. N. Tolstoy," by M. A. Yanzhul, "Russian Olden Times,"
February 1890, p.335.]
Further on Yanzhul
gives a short sketch of the character of Tolstoy’s superior, the commander of
his battery:
"Nikita petrovich
Alekseyev, the commander of the battery in which Count Tolstoy served, was
loved and respected by all for his kindness. He enjoyed the reputation of a
scholarly ‘artillerist,’ a universalist, was distinguished for his extreme
piety, and was particularly fond of going to church, where he spent hours
kneeling and making bows. To this is to be added, that he had lost one ear,
which a horse had bitten off. One of his peculiarities was this: he could not
bear to see officers drinking, especially young ones. In accordance with the
customs of the good old times, all officers dined with their commander. And
here Tolstoy, by way of a joke, often pretended to want some drink. On these
occasions Petrovich, in a solemn fashion, persuaded him not to take any, and
used to offer some sweets instead of spirits."
The description of
Tolstoy’s life in the Caucasus would not be complete if we omitted his two
comrades, the dogs Bulka and Milton. He tells their history in his "Books
For Reading," in a series of charming idyllic pictures of Caucasian life
with which almost all Russian school-children are familiar.
At last there arrived
the long-expected order, promoting Tolstoy to the rank of an officer.
January 13, 1854, he
passed his officer’s examination, which at that time was a meaningless
formality, and began to prepare for his departure.
January 19th he started
fro Russia. February 2nd he arrived in Yasnaya Polyana. On a journey, which
took in those days about a fortnight, he met with a very violent snowstorm that
probably gave him the subject for his tale of that name. The short time of his
stay in Russia he spent with his brothers, his aunt, and his friend
Perfilliyev.
An order to join the
Danube army was already awaiting him, and he accordingly arrived in Bucharest,
march 14, 1854.
Having finished the
description of the Caucasian period of Tolstoy’s life, I think it will interest
the reader if I give his own opinion of that period such as it is at present.
Tolstoy looks back upon that time with pleasure, considering it one of the best
periods of his life, notwithstanding all his lapses from his then vaguely
realized ideal. He thinks that his subsequent military service, and especially
his literary activity, were injurious to his character, and that it was only
his return to the country and his work at school with the peasant children that
helped him to feel as if he were born again and renewed his spirit within him.
Before entering upon
the narrative of this period, I must say a few words concerning the chain of
political events which brought about the changes in Tolstoy’s life.
The reign of Nicholas
was approaching its end. Despotism was at its height, and the oppression of
both the higher classes and the masses proviked a desire to revolt. As always
happens, the government, instinctively feeling the threatening storm, turned
recklessly to adventures abroad. The potentially accumulated energy of violence
is thus discharged in the bloody slaughter of an obedient herd of soldiers,
trained for the purpose of making them able and willing tocome to the rescue of
governments in the difficult moments of their criminal existence. The populace
and the higher classes also half consciously participate in such massacres,
just as a man in misery seeks to stay his anguish by drinking.
Thus, ruined and
demoralized by the tyranny of Nicholas I, on November 4, 1853, russia declared
war with turkey. At first the russian army scored successes, entering the
turkish dominion and occupying Moldavia, and the Russian Black Sea fleet, under
the command of the celebrated Nakhimov, destroyed the turkis fleet at Synope.
At this juncture two
Eruopean powers, France and England, interfered, and then began the well-known
Crimean campaign, which was marked by the heroic defence of Sebastopol, a feat
unprecedented in history. As is usual in such a crisis, along with the noisy movements
of outward life, the inner life ran its course in the hearts of the best men,
both of the people and of the higher classes, and took shape in new ideals --
in liberal social reforms of a certain kind, which, however, so far only
faintly reflected the needs of the people. These two agencies, the direction of
the energy of the people into heroic military exploits and the fact of the
national spiritual life being stirred by the new ideals, gave a character to
the creative activity of Tolstoy during this period.
Almost from the first
these two great phenomena came into opposition one with the other, and
consequently Tolstoy’s works took that form of high poetic tragedy which is so
marked in his tales of Sebastopol.
Tolstoy, as has been
stated above, was sent out to the army of the Danube, after having seen his
relations.
On reaching Bucharest,
he writes a letter to his aunt Tatyana, in the shape of a diary, describing in
a concise way the journey and first impressions on arriving.
"From Kursk I have
made about 2,000 versts instead of the 1,000 I intended, and I went through
Poltava, Balta, Kishinev, and not by Kiev, which would have been our of the
way. As far as the province of Cherson I had excellent sleighing, but there I
was obliged to give up sleighing, and to do a thousand versts in a perekladnaya
[Footnote: Term indicating a travelling vehicle without springs which was
ordinarily used for travelling in russia, and is somewhat similar to a small
working cart.] over dreadful roads, as far as the frontier, and from the
frontier to Bucharest it is impossible to describe the state of the roads; in
order to understand it, one must have tasted the pleasure of doing a thousand
versts in a cart smaller and worse than those in which we transport manure. Not
understanding a word in Moldavian, and finding no one who understood Russian,
and moreover paying for eight horses instead of two, although my journey lasted
only nine days, I spent more than 200 rubles, and arrived almost sick from
fatigue.
"19th March.--The
prince was not here, but he arrived yesterday, and I have just seen him. He
received me better than I expected, really as a relation. He embraced me; he
has invited me to come to dine with him every day, and he wants to keep me
attached to his person, but that is not yet decided.
"Pardon me, dear
aunt, for writing so little--I have not yet collected my ideas--this big and
beautiful town, all these introductions, the Italian opera, the French theater,
the two young Gorchakovs, who are very nice fellows...so that I have not
remained for two hours at home, and I have not thought of my occupations.
"22nd
March.--Yesterday I learned that I am not to remain with the prince, but am
going to Oltenitsa to rejoin my battery."
Two months later he
agains writes, but now in another frame of mind:
"While you imagine
me exposed to all the dangers of war, I have not yet smelled Turkish powder,
and I am staying very quietly at Bucharest, walking about, enjoying music, and
taking ices. Indeed all this time, with the exception of two weeks I passed at
Oltenitsa, where I was attached to a battery, and a week I passed journeying
about Moldavia, Wallachia, and Bessarabia by order of the General Serzhputovsky
, to whom I am not attached for special commissions, I have remained at
Bucharest, and, to speak the truth, the kind of life which I lead here, being,
as it is, somewhat dissipated, quite idle, and very expensive, displeases me
infinitely. Before this it was the service which kept me here, but now I have
remained for three weeks owing to a fever I contracted during my journey, but
from which, thank God, I am now sufficiently recovered to join--in two or three
days’ time--my general, who is in camp near Silistria. Speaking of my general,
he appears to be a very good fellow, and, although we know each other very
little, to be well disposed toward me. What is, movover, pleasant is that his
staff is composed for the most part of gentlemen. The two sons of the Prince
Serge, whom I have found here, are nice fellows, especially the younger, who,
although not particularly clever, has much nobility of character and a very
kind heart. I like him very much."
We next quote from a
letter which refers to events on the Danube, though written from Sebastopol. As
the reader will notice, Tolstoy first addresses his aunt tatyana, and then his
brother Nikolay. To our mind, this letter should form a page in a history of
Russia.
"I will speak to
you of the past, of my memories of Silistria. I saw there so much that was
interesting, poetic, and touching that the time I passed there will never be
effaced from my memory. Our camp was stationed on the other side of the Danube,
i.e., on the right bank, on the very elevated ground among beautiful gardens
belonging to Mustafa Pasha, the governor of Silistria. The view from this place
is not only magnificent but of the greatest interest for all of us; not to
mention the Danube, its isles and its shores, some occupied by us, others by
the Turks, one saw the town, the fortress, and the little forts of Silistria as
it were on the palm of one’s hand. One heard the booming of cannon and guns
unceasingly, day and night, and with a glass one could distinguish the turkish
soldiers. It is true, it is a curious kind of pleasure to see people killing
each other, nevertheless every evening and every morning I got on to my cart
and remained for whole hours observing, and I was not the only person who did.
The spectacle was really fine, especially at night. During the night my
soldiers generally undertook trench work, and the Turks threw themselves at
them in order tohinder them, then you should have seen and heard the fusillade.
The first night I passed in the camp this terrible noise awoke and frightened
me; I thought an assault had commenced, and I got my horse ready very quickly;
but those who had already passed some time in the camp told me that I had only
to keep quiet, that this cannonade and fusillade were ordinary things, and that
they joikingly called them ‘Allah.’ Then I lay down again, but being unable to sleep
I amused myself by counting, watch in hand, the number of discharges of cannon
I heard, and I counted 110 explosions in the space of one minute. Yet all this
at close quarters had not the frightful character it would appear to have. At
night, when nothing could be seen, it was a question of who could burn most
powder, and, with these thousands of cannon-shots, a score and a half of men at
most were killed on both sides. You will allow me, dear aunt, to address myself
in this lettter to Nikolay, for since I have begun to give details of war, I
should like to continue and address myself to a man who understands and can
give you explanations of what may be obscure to you. Well, this was an ordinary
spectacle which we had every day, and in which, when I was sent with orders
into the trenches, I took my share; but we also had extraordinary spectacles
such as the one the day before the assault, when a mine of 240 lbs. of powder
was exploded under one of the enemy’s forts. On the morning of this day the
prince had been to the trenches with all his staff (as the general I am
attached to belongs to it, I was there too) in order to give definite
instructions in view of the assault of the next day. The plan, too long for me
to be able to explain it here, was so well combined, and everything had been so
well anticipated, that no one doubted as to its success. By the bye, I ought,
besides, to tell you that I am beginning to feel admiration for the prince (you
ought to hear what is said about him among the officers and the men; not only
have I never heard any evil spoken of him, but he is universally worshipped). I
saw him under fire for the first time that morning.
"You should see
his figure, somewhat ridiculous with his high stature, his hands behind his
back, his cap on the back of his head, his spectacles, and the way he has of
speaking like a turkey cock. One could see he was so absorbed in the general
progress of affairs that the shells and bullets did not exist for him; he
exposed himself to danger with such simplicity that one would have thought he
was unconscious of it, and involuntarily one was more afraid for him than for
oneself; and then he gave his orders with such clearness and precision, and at
the same time was always affable with every one. He is a great, i.e., a capable
and honest man, as I understand the words; a man who has devoted all his life
to the service of his country, and not through ambition, but as a duty. I will
tell you a feature of his connected with the history of this assault I had begun
to describe. In the afternoon of the same day that they exploded the mine,
about 600 pieces of artillery opened fire on the fort which they wished to
take, and this was continued all night. It was one of those sights, and it
caused on of those emotions which one never forgets. In the evening again the
prince, amid all the commotion, went to sleep in the trenches, in order himself
to direct the assault which was to commence at three o’clock of the same night.
We were all there, and, as is always the case on the eve of a battle, we all
pretended to be no more concerned with the morrow than with any ordinary day,
and I am certain that all, in the depth of their hearts, felt a little nervous,
and not even a little but very much so, at the idea of this assault. As you are
aware, Nikolay, the time which precedes an engagement is the most
unpleasant--it is only then that one has time for fear, and fear is one of the
most disagreeable of feelings. Toward the morning, the nearer the moment
approached the more did this feeling diminish, and toward three o’clock, when
we were all waiting to see fired the batch of rockets which were to be the
signal for the attack--I was in such good spirits that, had they come to tell
me the assault would not take place, it would have greatly grieved me. And lo
and behold, exactly an hour before the time fixed for the assault, an
aide-de-camp arrived from the Field-Marshal with the order to raise the siege
of Silistria! I may say, without fear of being mistaken, that this news was
received by all, men, officers, and soldiers, as a veritable misfortune, the
more so that it was known through spies who often come to us from Silistria and
with whom I myself often had opportunity to talk--it was known that, if once
this fort were captured--an event which no one doubted--Silistria could not
hold out for more than two or three days. Do not you think that if this news
was caluclated to pain any one it must have been the prince, who throughout all
this campaign had done everything for the best, yet saw in the very middle of
the action of the Field-Marshal arrive on top of him and spoil the whole thing?
And then, having in this assault his only chance of repairing our reverses, he
receives a counter order from the Field-Marshal at the instant of commencing.
Well, the prince had not a moment’s ill-feeling, he who is so impressionable;
on the contrary, he was glad to be able to avoid the slaughter, for which he
would have had to accept the responsibility, and during all the time of the
retreat, which he himself directed, though he did not go back till the last
soldier was through it, and which was accomplished with remarkable order and
precision, he was in better spirits than he had ever been before. What greatly
contributed to his good humor was the emigration of about 7,000 families of
Bulgarians whom we took with us, mindful of the ferocity of the Turks--a
ferocity in which, notwithstanding my incredulity, I was compelled to believe.
The moment we had abandoned the various Bulgarian villages we had occupied, the
Turks made away with every one who remained with the exception of women young
enough for their harems. There was a village to which I had gone from the camp
to get milk and fruit, in which the population had been exterminated in the way
I have described. But no sooner did the prince communicate to the Bulgarians
that those who desired could cross the Danube with the army and become Russian
subjects, than all the country rose, and all, with their women, children,
horses, and cattle approached the bridge; but as it was impossible to take them
all, the prince was compelled to refuse those who came the last, and you should
have seen their sorrow. He received all the deputations which came from these
poor people, he talked with each of them, he endeavored to explain to them the
impossibility of the thing, he offered to let them cross without their wagons
and their cattle, undertaking to maintain the people themselves until they
should reach Russia, and to pay out of his own pocket for private ships to transport
them; in a word, doing all he possibly could to give help to these people.
"Yes, dear aunt, I
would greatly desire the realization of your prophecy. The thing which I most
crave is to be the aide-de-camp of a man like him, whom I love and whom I
esteem from the depth of my heart. Good-by, and, dear aunt, I kiss your
hands."
In the midst of these
strong and new sensations, Tolstoy does not forsake his regular habit, that of
self-reproach; this is reflected in the entries of his diary.
"7th July--I have
no modesty. This is my great deficiency. What am I? One of the four sons of a
retired lieutenant-colonel, left from the age of seven without parents, and
who, under the guardianship of women and strangers, received neither a worldly
nor scientific education, and then became emancipated at seventeen; a man
without any great wealth, without any social position, and, above all, without
principle, who has let his affairs get out of order to the last extremity, who
has passed the best years of his life without aim or pleasure; who has finally
banished himself to the Caucasus in order to run away from his debts, and,
above all, from his habits, and who, having taken advantage of some connection
or other which had existed between his father and a commander-in-chief, has got
himself transferred, at the age of twenty-six, to the Army of the Danube as
lieutenant, with hardly any means but his pay (having to use such means as he
possesses for the payment of his remaining debts), without patrons, without
knowledge of worldly manners, without knowledge of the service, without
practical capacities, but with enormous vanity. Yes, such is my social
position. Let us see what is my personality.
"I am ugly
awkward, uncleanly, and, in the worldly sense, uneducated; I am irritable, a
bore to others, rude, intolerant, and as bashful as a child. I am almost
completely ignorant. What I do know I have learned anyhow, independently, by
snatches, incoherently, in a disorderly way, and all comes to--so little. I am
self-indulgent, irresolute, inconstant, stupidly vain and hot-headed, as are ll
people with a weak character. I am not brave, I am not methodical in my life,
and am so lazy that for me idleness has become almost a necessary habit.
"I am intelligent,
but my intelligence has not yet been thoroughly tried on anything. I have
neigher a practical nor a worldly nor a business intelligence."
"I am honest,
i.e., I love what is right, have got myself into the habit of loving it; and
when I deviate from it I am dissatisfied with myself, and return to it with
pleasure; but there are things I like more than what is right--fame. I am so
vain, and so little has this feeling been gratified that often I am afraid
lest, between fame and virtue, I might, if the choice were given me, choose the
former.
"Yes, I am
arrogant, because I am inwardly proud, though I am shy in society."
At times a softened
mood would come over him, and he would write with some poetic feeling, as the
following entry in his diary shows:
"After dinner I
leaned upon the balcony and looked at my favorite lamp which gleams so nicely
through the foliage. Just then, after a few storm-clouds which have today
passed and moistened the ground, there lingered one big cloud covering the
whole of the southern portion of the sky, and there was a peculiar pleasant
lightness and humidity in the air. The landlady’s pretty daughter, like myself,
was reclining in the window leaning on her elbows. A barrel-organ came along
the street, and when the sounds of a good ancient waltz, after gradually
retreating, completely vanished, the girl gave a sigh from the depths of her
soul, rose quickly, and left the window. I felt so happy that I could not help
smiling, and continued a long time gazing at my lamp--the light of which was
ever and anon hidden as the wind moved the branches of the tree--gazing at the
tree, at the fence, at the sky; and everything assumed a beauty such as I had
never seen it wear before."
The unsuccessful
campaign of the Army of the Danube, the dull life of the staff, all this
wasunsatisfactory to tolstoy. He wanted more vigorous activity, greater
excitement, and he begged to be sent to join the army in the Crimea.
After the retreat from
Silistria (July 20th) he went to the Crimea. His journey lay through the towns
of Tekuchi, Berlad, Yassi, Kherson, and Odessa. He reached Sebastopol November
7, 1854. On his way he fell ill and was in a hospital, which explains the
length of time he spent on his journey.
On his arrival he was
attached to the 3rd Light Battery of the 14th Artillery Brigade.
Here he was overwhelmed
with such a flood of new impressions that for some time he could not master
them. At the end of a fortnight, on November 20th, he writes to his brother
Seryozha:
"Dear Friend
Seryozha: I have behaved very ill to you all ever since my leave began, and how
this happened I myself do not know; at one time a distracted life, at another
the dulness of my life and disposition, at another war, at another some one in
the way, and so on; but the chief reason has been a distracted life, full of
outside interferences. So much have I learned, experienced, and felt during
this year that one positively does not know what to begin to describe, or
whether one will be able to describe it as one would like. To aunty I wrote about
Silistria, but to you and Nikolenka I will not write like that--I would like to
communicate with you so that you may understand me as I wish. Silistria is now
an old song; now it is all Sebastopos, about which I dare say you have yourself
read with a beating heart, such as I had four days ago. Well, how can I tell
you all that I saw there, and where I went, and what I did, and what the French
and English say - the wounded prisoners - and whether they suffer and suffer
much, and what heroes our foes are, especially the English. We can talk over
all this some day at Yasnaya or Pirigovo; and about much of it you will learn
from myself through the press. I will explain later what I mean, but now I will
give you an idea of the position of our affairs at Sebastopol. The town is
besieged from one side only - from the south side - on which, when the enemy
approached, we had no fortifications. Now we have on this side more than 500
guns of enormous calibre, and several lines of earthworks, positively
impregnable.
"I passed a week
in the fortress, and up to the last day kept losing my way among these
labyrinths of batteries as in a forest. the enemy has for more than three weeks
in one place been only 180 yards off, and does not advance; at his slightest
forward movement he is covered with a hail of shot.
"The spirit of the
troops is beyond description. There was not so much heroism in the time of
ancient Greece. Kornilov, when making the round of the troops, instead of, ‘I
greet you, boys!’ said: ‘One must die, boys; will you die?’ and the troops
shouted, ‘We will die, your Excellency! Hurrah!’ and this was not mere show,
but on the face of each one could see that it was not in jest but in earnest,
and 22,000 men have already fulfilled this promise.
"A wounded and
almost dying soldier told me how they attacked the 24th French Battery and were
not reinforced; he wept aloud. A company of marines almost revolted because
they wanted to relieve them from a battery on which they had remained thirty days
under shell fire. Soldiers snatch the fuses out of the shells. Women carry
water to the bastion for the soldiers, and many of them are killed and wounded.
Priests with crosses go to the bastions and read prayers under fire. In one
brigade, the 24th, there were 160 men wounded who would not leave the ranks.
Wonderful time! Now, however, after the 24th, we have somewhat quieted down,
and it has become splendid at Sebastopol. The enemy has almost ceased to fire,
and all are convinced that he will not take the town; indeed, it would be
impossible. There are three possible events: either he will make a general
attack, or else he is diverting us with false works, or else fortifying himself
in order to winter. The first is the least and the second the most probable. I
did not succeed in being even once in action; but I thank God that I have seen
these men and live in this glorious time. The bombardment of the 5th will
remain the most brilliant and glorious exploit, not only of Russian but of
universal history. More than 1,500 guns for two days played upon the town, and
they not only did not force it to surrender, but they did not even silence one
gun in two hundred of our batteries. It seems to me that if this campaign is
not favorably looked upon in Russia, posterity will place it higher than all
others. Do not forget that with equal, even inferior forces, with bayonets
alone, and with the worst troops of the Russian army (such is the 6th Corps),
we are fighting with a more numerous foe, possessing a fleet and armed with
3,000 guns, excellently made rifles, and with his best troops. I do not mention
the superiority of the enemy’s generals.
"Our army alone
can stand and conquer under these conditions, and conquer shall yet, this I am
convinced of. You should see the French and English prisoners (especially the
latter): each one is better than the last, I mean morally and physically; they
are a splendid people. The Cossacks say that even they feel pity in sabring
them, and by their side you should see any one of our riflemen: small, lousy,
and shrivelled up, in a way.
"Now I will tell
you how it is that you will learn from me through the press about the xplooits
of these lousy and shrivelled up heroes. In our artillery staff office,
consisting, as I think I wrote to you, of very good and honorable men, the idea
has been started of publishing a military periodical for the purpose of
maintaining a good spirit in the troops, a cheap review (at three rubles), and
in popular language, so that the soldiers could read it. We have written a
prospectus of the paper and presented it to the Prince. The idea pleased him
very much, and he submitted the prospectus and a specimen number, which we had
composed, to the Emperor for sanction. The money for the publication has been
advanced by myself and Stolypin. They have made me editor, together with a
certain Mr. Konstantinovich, who has published ‘The Caucasus,’ and is an
experienced man in this line. In the review will be published descriptions of
battles, not so dry and untruthful as in other papers, exploits of bravery,
biograpnies and obituaries of good men, and particularly of the rank and file;
military stories, soldiers’ songs, popular articles about engineering and
artillery, arts, etc. This thing pleases me very much; first, I like this
occupation, and, secondly, I hope that the periodical will be useful and not at
all bad. All this remains presumptive until we get the Emperor’s answer, and I
confess I am anxious about it. In the trial copy we sent to St. Petersburg we
carelessly inserted two articles, one by myself and the other by Rostovtsev,
which are not quite orthodox. for this business I shall require 1,500 rubles,
which are lying in the office, and which I have asked Valeryan to send to me.
As I have already gossipped this to you, tell it to him too. Thank God I am
well, and I have been living happily and pleasantly from the very time I
returned from abroad. In general, my life in the army is divided into two
periods: abroad a bad one, where I was ill and poor and lonely, and at home a
pleasant one. Now I am well and have got good comrades, but I am still poor,
for money is soon gone.
"I do not write,
but I instinctively feel how Aunty is bantering me. One thing troubles me: this
is the fourth year of my life without female society; I may become quite
uncouth and unfit for family life, which I so enjoy.
"Well, good-by.
God knows when we shall see each other, unless you and Nikolenka take it into
your heads some day, when out hunting, to look in from Tambov at our
headquarters."
I have given the whole
of this remarkable letter, because it shows how young in his spirit Tolstoy was
at that time, how liable to be carried away by his feelings, and how this stood
in the way of any clear understanding of what was going on around him. But
glimpses of vivid consciousness and prophetic inspiration appear with all the
greater force in the background.
However, these powerful
outward impressions did not occupy the whole of tolstoy’s soul, and while
alone, writing his diary, possibly in the tents of the 4th battalion, he was
still the same as he had always been and as he is now, ever seeking for and
striving after the ideal. His frame of mind at that time found vent in the
following poetical form:
"When, oh when,
shall I at last cease to pass my time without aim or enthusiasm, and to feel a
deep wound in my heart without knowing how to heal it? Who made this wound? God
alone knows, but from birth I have been bitterly tormented by a sense of the
insignificance which threatened my future and by painful sadness and
doubt." [Footnote: We translate the verses in prose.--Translator]
He moved to Simferopol
on November 23rd.
January 6, 1855, he
writes a pacifying letter to his aunt Tatiana:
"I have not taken
part in the two bloody battles which have taken place in the Crimea, but I went
to Sebastopol immediately after the battle of the 24th, and I passed a month
there. They no longer fight - they devastate the country because of the winter,
whick is exceptionally severe, especially at the present moment; but the siege
goes on. What will be the issue of this campaign? God only knows; but, in any
case, the Crimean campaign must come to an end in three or four months one way
or another. But, alas! the end of the Crimean campaign does not mean the end of
the war, which, on the contrary, it appears will last very long. I had
mentioned in my letters to Sergey, and, I think, to Valerian, an occupation
which I had in view, and which greatly attracted me; now that there is an end
of the notion, I may explain it. I had the idea of founding a military journal.
This plan, at which I had worked with the cooperation of many very
distinguished persons, was approved by the Prince and sent to the Emperor for
confirmation; but, as in our country there are intrigues against everything,
people were found who were afraid of the competition of this journal; and
perhaps, too, the idea did not fall in with the views of the Government. The
Emperor has refused.
"I confess this
disappointment gave me infinite pain, and has greatly altered my plans. If god
will that the Crimean campaign should terminate in our favor, and I do not
receive an appointment with which I can be satisfied, and if there be no war in
Russia, I shall leave the army and go to St. Petersburg to the Military Academy.
This plan occurred to me, first, because I should not like to abandon
literature, with which it is impossible for me to occupy myself in this camp
life; and, secondly, because it seems to me I am beginning to become ambitious,
or rather, not ambitious, but I should like to do some good, and, in order to
do that, it is necessary to be something more than a sublieutenant; thirdly,
because I should like to see you all and all my friends. Nikolay writes tha
tTurgenev has made the acquaintance of Marie. I am very glad of it; if you see
him, tell Varinka that I beg him to embrace him on my baahelf, and to tell him
that, although I know him only by correspondence, I should have had a lot of
things to say to him."
The life which followed
is very well pictured in his letter to his brother, written in May 1855. In it
he gives a chronological summary of the events of his military life during the
preceding winter of 1854-55.
"Although you
probably know through our folks where I am and what I have been doing, I will
repeat to you my adventures since Kishinev, the more so that my story may be
interesting to you, and you will learn from it in what phase I now am - for it
seems that my fate is always in some phase or other. From Kishinev I petitioned
to be transferred to the Crimea, partly for the purpose of seeing this war, and
partly in order to tear myself away from the staff of Serzhputovskiy, which I
did not like, but chiefly from patriotism, which at that time I confess took
hold of me strongly. I did not request to be sent to any particular point, but
left the authorities to dispose of my fate. In the Crimea I was attached to a
battery in Sebastopol itself, where I passed a month very pleasantly in the
circle of simple and kind comrades, who are especially engaging during real war
and danger. In December our battery was removed to Simferopol, and there I
lived six weeks in the comfortable home of a landowner, going to Simferopol to
dance and play the piano with young ladies, and, with the Government officials,
to shoot deer on the Chaterdag. In January there was another redistribution of
officers, and I was transferred to a battery encamped at ten versts from
Sebastopol. There j’ai fait la connaissance de la mere de Kousma [Footnote: A
jocular translation into French of a Russian slang byword "Kousma’s
Mother," popularly used to indicate a difficult plight.--Translator]--the
nasty circle of officers in the battery, the commander, though a kind creature,
yet harsh and coarse; no comfort, cold earth huts; not one book, not one man
with whom one could speak. Here I received 1,500 rubles for the periodical, the
sanction of which had already been refused; and here I lost 2,500 rubles, thus
proving to the whole world that I am still a frivolous fellow, although the above
circumstances may be accepted comme circonstances attenuantes. [Footnote:
French for extenuating circumstances.--Translator] But still it was very, very
disgraceful. In March it became warmer, and a good fellow and most excellent
man arrived and joined the battery, one Brenevskiy; so I began to recover
myself, and on the first of April my battery, during the actual bombardment,
went to Sebastopol, where I quite recovered myself. there, until May 15th,
although in serious danger, having been on duty four successive days in a
battery of the 4th bastion, yet we had the spring and excellent weather, a mass
of impressions and of people, all the conveniences of life, and the company of
well-bred men like ourselves, so that these six weeks will remain one of my pleasantest
recollections. On May 15th Gorchakov, or the commander of the artillery, was
pleased to intrust me with the formation and command of a mountain detachment
at Belbek, twenty versts from Sebastopol, with which I am up to now very well
satisfied in many respects.
"This is a general
description. In the next letter I will write about the present more in
detail."
To this short
description we may add that its jocular tone does not harmonize with the
serious thoughts and feelings which beset him at the time.
In his diary of march
5, 1855, he puts down the following prophecy about himself:
"A conversation
about divinity and faith suggested to me a great, a stupendous idea, to the
realization of which I feel myself capable of devoting my life. this idea is
the foundation of a new religion corresponding to the present state of mankind
- the religion of Jesus but purified from dogma and mysticism, a practical
religion, not promising future bliss, but giving bliss upon earth. I feel that
this idea can be realized only by generations consciously looking toward it as
a goal. One generation will hand on the idea to the next and, some day,
enthusiasm or reason will bring it into being. To act with a deliberate view to
the religious union of mankind, this is the leading principle of the idea which
I hope will command my enthusiasm."
Of course when a man
first writes the above words, and after that is engaged for fifty years, with
the resolution and ability shown by Tolstoy, in elaborating the means of
realizing his idea, we may be sure his place was not in the artillery.
He had a vague
consciousness of this, and from time to time the idea struck him that he was
born not for a military career, but for a literary life.
Moreover, he never
wholly forsook his literary activity.
On his way from Romania
to Sebastopol he went on with "The Wood-Cutting Expedition"; in
Sebastopol he began to write "Youth" and "Tales from
Sebastopol."
From the 11th to the
14th of April [1855] he remained in bastion No. 4. The sense of danger was a
spiritual awakening to him, and he addresses God with the following prayer:
"Lord, I thank
thee for Thy continual protection. How surely Thou leadest me to that which is
right! and what an insignificant creature should I be wert Thou to abandon me!
Leave me not, Lord; direct me, and not for the satisfaction of my poor desires,
but for the attainment of the eternal and might object of existence, unknown to
me and yet recognized by me."
On August 4, 1855,
Tolstoy took part, although indirectly, in the battle of the Black River. He
hastens to reasure his relatives, and in a letter to his brother, of August 7,
1855, says, by the way:
"I am writing you
a few lines to reassure you about myself with reference to the battle on the
4th, in which I took part and was not hurt; but I did not do anything, because
my mountain artillery had no occasion to fire."
At the same time, as is
seen from Tolstoy’s correspondence with Nekrasov, he kept his eye on Russian
literature, and actively supported the editors of "The Contemporary";
in fact he got together at Sebastopol a group of contributors. This is what he
wrote to Nekrasov:
"Respected Nikolay
Alekseyevich - You must have already received my articie, ‘Sebastopol In
December,’ and the promise of Stolypin’s article. Here it is, notwithstanding
the wild orthography of this manuscript, which you will yourself get corrected,
if it is to be published without erasures by the censor, which the author has
tried his best to avoid. You will, I hope, agree that such military articles
are unfortunately very scarce with us or else do not get published. Perhaps, by
this same courier, an article by Saken may be sent, of which I say nothing, and
which I hope you will not print. The corrections in Stolypin’s article in black
ink are made by Horulef with his left hand, his right hand being wounded.
Stolypin requests that they should be put in footnotes. Please insert, if
possible, mine as well as Stolypin’s in the June issue. Now we are all
together, and the literary society of the fallen Journal is beginning to be
organized, and, as I told you, you will receive from me every month two, three,
or four articles of a contemporary military character. The best contributors,
Bakunin and Rostvortsev, have not yet had time to finish their articles. Be so
kind as to direct your answer to me, and in general write by this courier, an
adjutant of Gorchakov’s, and by the others who are continually going to and fro
between you and us." [Footnote: The Literary Reminiscences of J. Panayev.]
Sebastopol, april 30, 1855.
On June 15th [1855], in
Bakhchisaray, he received a letter from Panayev and a copy of "The
Contemporary," with his printed tale "Sebastopol In December."
From this letter he learned that the tale had been read by the Emperor
Aleksandr II.
Evidently it had made a
deep impression on the Emperor, for he ordered it to be translated into French.
In the same month of June [1855] Tolstoy finished the tale "The
Wood-Cutting Expedition," and sent it to "The Contemporary."
In July he completed
and sent to the editors his new tale, "Sebastopol In May."
In his letter from St.
Petersburg, dated August 28, 1858, Panayev relates the following incident in
connection with this story:
"In my letter,
delivered to you by Stolypin, I wrote you that your article had been passed by
the censorship with a few slight changes, and begged you not to be angry with
me, because it was necessary to add a few words at the end so as to mollify an
expression. Nearly 3,000 copies of the article, "Night In Sebastopol"
[as "Sebastopol In May" was then called], were printed, when the
censor prevented publication of the number by ordering a copy to be brought him
from the printing-office; hence the August issued appeared on the 18th of
January, and during my absence - I went to Moscow for a few days - it was
presented to the president of the committee of Censors, Pushkin, whom you
should know in connection with Kazan. If you know Pushkin, you may imagine what
followed. Pushkin became wild; he was very angry with the censor as well as
with me for presenting such articles to the censorship, and he made corrections
in it himself. In the meantime I returned to St. Petersburg, and was
horror-struck when I saw the changes made. I did not want to print the article
at all, but Pushkin, in an interview with me, said that I must publish it in
its transformed shape. Nothing could be done, and your mutilated article will
appear in the September number, omitting the letters L.N.T., which I should
hate to see at the bottom of it after that. But the article was so good that
even after it was completely destroyed by the censor I gave it to Milutin,
Krasnokutskiy, and others to read. Everybody likes it very much, and Milutin
wrote me that I should commit a sin by depriving readers of this article and by
not publishing it even in its present form.
"At any rate, do
not blame me because your article has been published in such a shape. I was
forced to do it. If it is god’s will that we should meet some day, for which I
long, I will clear up the matter to you. Now I will say a few words in regard
to the impression generally made on us, and on everybody else to whom I have
read it, by your story, ‘Night,’ in its original shape...Censorship is out of
the question here.
"Everybody thinks
this story more forcible than the first one, owing to the minute and profound
analysis of the emotions and feelings of men who are constantly in the face of
death, owing to the accuracy with which army officers are depicted, their
intercourse with members of the nobility, and their mutual relations. In short,
everything is perfect - described in a masterly way; but the whole thing is so
full of bitterness, everything is so keen and biting, merciless and cheerless,
that at this moment, when the scene of this story is held almost sacred, it hurts
those that are far from it. The very events of the story might make a
disagreeable impression.
"‘The Wood-Cutting
Expedition,’ with its dedication to Turgenev, will also appear in September
(turgenev begged me to thank you very much for your remembering him and being
so attentive)....Even in this story, which passed three censors - the Caucasian
censor (Secretary of State Butkov), the military censor (Major-General Stefen),
and one civil censor (consisting of Pushkin and us) - the types of officers have
been tampered with, and unfortunately some parts have been struck out."
In September Nekrasov
wrote to Tolstoy:
"Dear Sir Lev
Nikolayevich - I arrived in Petersburg in the middle of August to find ‘The
Contemporary’ in a very sad plight.
"the shocking
state to which your article [Footnote: Evidently he means tolstoy’s tale
"Sebastopol In May," 1855.] was brought turned my last drop of blood.
At this moment I cannot think of it without pain and indignation. Your work, to
be sure, will not be lost....It will always bear witness to the power capable
of such deep and sober truth in circumstances in which it is not everybody who
could have kept it unimpaired. I need not say how highly I value this article
and the trend of your talent in general as well as its power and freshness as a
whole. It is just what the russian public needs; the truth - the truth, of
which so little remains in Russian literature since the death of Gogol. You are
quite right in caring most of all for this side of your capacity. Truth in the
form presented by you in our literature is something quite new to us. I do not
know of any author at the present moment who could make one love and sympathize
with him so deeply as the one to whom I now write. But I have one dread - lest
the course of time, the abominations of real life, and the deaf and dumb
environment should affect you in the same way as they have affected most of us,
and destroy that energy which is indispensable to an author, at least to those
authors who are necessary for russia at present. You are young; certain changes
are taking place; they may - let us hope - end in good, and then a wide arena
may be opened before you. Your beginning is such that the least sanguine
persons are carried far away in their hopes. But I have turned from the purpose
of my letter. I shall not console you by telling you, true as it is, that the
printed fragments of your article are very much appreciated by many; for to
those who know the article in its real shape they are nothing but a string of
phrases without sense or inner meaning. But it cannot be helped. I must say one
thing, the article would not have been printed in this shape were it not
necessary. But it is not signed by your name. ‘Felling Wood’ passed the
censorship fairly well, though a few precious criticisms are lost. My opinion
of the work is this: in form it may resemble Turgenev, but the resemblance ends
there; the rest belongs to you and could be written by no one but you. In this
sketch there are many wonderfully striking observations and it is entirely new,
interesting, and judicious. Don’t disdain this type of sketches: in our
literature hitherto nothing but trivialities have appeared about the soldier.
You are only opening the subject, and, in whatever way you choose to tell us
what you know of it, all will be exceedingly interesting and useful. Panayev
handed me your letter in which you primise soon to send us ‘Youth.’ Please do.
Setting aside the review, I am personally interested in the continuation of
your first production. We will keep space for ‘Youth’ in the tenth or eleventh
number, according to the time it arrives.
"The money will be
forwarded to you one of these days. I have settled for the winter in
Petersburg, and shall be glad to hear from occasionally. Accept my sincere respect,
N. Nekrassov." [Footnote: Four letters by N. A. Nekrasov to Count L. N.
Tolstoy. "Niva Monthly Literary Supplement," No. 2, 1898.]
But, needless to say,
literary work was not Tolstoy’s chief occupation at that time. He was leading
the conventional life of an officer, and was "a good comrade," as is
certified by his contemporaries and fellow-officers.
Nazarev quotes in his
reminiscences the narrative of a former comrade of Tolstoy, who evidently
recalled with delight the time he had spent together with Count Tolstoy in the
battery. He even recognized himself as one of the characters in the
"Sebastopol Tales." "I may say," related the old man, with
a smile of pleasure on his face, "Tolstoy, with his stories and his impromptu
verses, encouraged us all in the direst moments of our military life. In the
full meaning of the word he was the soul of our battery. When we were in his
company, we did not notice how time flew, and there was no end to the general
good spirits. When the Count was not there - he had left for Simferopol - all
were downcast. No news of him for a day, two, three...At last he came
back...looking exactly like the prodigal son - gloomy, worn out, dissatisfied
with himself. He would take me aside out of the way, and begin to do penance.
He would tell everything about his carousing, playing cards, as to where he
spent the days and nights, and, would you believe it? his repentence and
sufferings were as deep as if he had been a great culprit. It was pitiful to
see him, so great was his distress....This is the kind of man he was. He was,
in a word, peculiar, and, to tell you the truth, not quite comprehensible to
me; but, on the other hand, he was a rare comrade, an honest soul, and to
forget him is quite impossible."
Tolstoy’s conduct as a
brave officer, and his familiarity with higher circles, could readily have
secured for him an advantageous military career. The publication of his
Sebastopol sketches, which had attracted the attention of Nicholas, and of the
Empress Aleksandra Fedorovna - who, it was said, shed tears while reading the
first tale - would have contributed to the same end. But his very gifts put an
end to his military advancement. The obstacle to a briliant military career
proved to be "The Sebastopol Song."
This is the history of
this song:
The version we quote is
from the "Olden Times," where it appeared in full. The well-known
author and scholar, M. T. Venyukov, wrote with the text of the song the
following note:
"In the years from
1854 to 1856 I was studying military science in the Academy of the general
staff, and there I received from the Crimea - the theatre of war - through one
of my comrades of the battery, Iv. Vas. Anossov, an officer in the 14th
Artillery Brigade, a copy of the following song:
The Sebastopol Song
The fourth day [4
August 1855, the Battle of the Black River], we were gone
To fight them on the
mountain,
The devil drove us on,
The devil drove us on.
It was old General
Vrevsky [Baron P. A. vrevsky, late Chief of the Chancery of the Minister of War,
while in the Crimea, urged Gorchakov to give a decisive battle to the allied
Powers.]
He used to say to
Gorchakov,
When he had had his
whiskey:
"Prince, we must
have that hill;
I’ll tell a tale about
it,
If I don’t have my
will."
The grandees, great and
small,
They’ve put their heads
together,
The place Becoque and
all;
But Becoque had some
doubt,
And what it was he’d
better say
He wouldn’t quite make
out.
As they made up their
mind
the topographers were
spoiling
The best paper they
could find;
At last they got it
right;
But there were three
ravines to pass,
And they forgot that
quite.
Well, Prince and Count
rode out;
The topographers were
left behind
Upon the great redoubt.
The Prince said,
"Now, Liprandi!"
Said he, "I can’t
go on just yet,
Hold hard a bit,
attendez;
"You don’t want
clever men,
You’d better send a man
like Read
I’ll have a look
again."
Read’s not a man who
fears;
He led us to the bridge
at once,
"So here you go,
three cheers!"
But Martineau cried
"Stop!
Let’s wait till the
reserves are here."
"No, make the men
come up."
Hurrah! we made a
noise,
but there must have
been some mistake,
For we never saw the
boys.
Upon Fedyukhin’s height
Only three companies
arrived,
But the whole did start
all right.
Our host was very
small!
The French were fourt
to one,
Besides the thousands
within call.
The garrison, we said,
Must surely come and
help us
when they heard the
shouts we made.
But General Sacken hied
To praise the Holy
Mother
At the very time we
cried!
General Belevkov shook
The flag quite
fiercely; but that face
You should have seen
his look.
So it was "Right
about!"
But oh! the men who
sent us out
The men who sent us
out!
"As to the
authorship of this witty, farcical song," continued Venyukov, Anossov in
his letter, informed me that the general opinion of the army ascribed it to our
gifted author, Count L. N. Tolstoy ‘but you understand,’ wrote Anossov, ‘one
cannot exactly assert it, were it only for fear of injuring Tolstoy, supposing
him to be really the author.’"
Later on the same
version of the song was again printed in the "Olden Times" under the
signature of "One of the authors of ‘The Sebastopol Song.’"
This is how the part
author relates the history of the song:
"Count L. N.
Tolstoy no doubt took part in the compilation of this song, but he did not
compose all its verses. It would not be fair to ascribe to him the whole of
this witty production.
"Therefore, in the
interest of historical truth, I will tell you, as a witness, how it originated:
"During the
Crimean War, very often - almost every evening - the members of the artillery
staff and some other officers used to meet at Krizhanovsky’s, who commanded the
artillery staff.
"Lieutenant-Colonel
Balyuzek usually sat at the piano, all the rest standing round and imporvising
verses. Each introduced his thought and word. Count L. N. Tolstoy introduced
his own too, but not all. Onc may say therefore that this improvisation was a
common act, which expressed the modd of the military circle."
Here following the
names of the authors of "The Sebastopol song": Lieutenant-Colonel
Balyuzek (afterward governor of turgai, now deceased), who used to sit at the
piano; Captain A. Y. Friede, at present commander of the Caucasian Artillery;
Lieutenant-Captain Count L. N. Tolstoy; Lieutenant V. Lughinin; Lieutenant
Shulein; Lieutenant-Captain Surzhputovsky; Lieutenant Shklyarsky, an officer of
the Uhlan Regiment; N. F. Koslyoninov, No. 2, and an officer of the Hussar
regiment, N. S. Mussin-Pushkin.
"We received a
copy of a similar song written probably under the same circumstances, but
somewhat later. The music of it was given us by Sergey Tolstoy from memory.
this song contains many popular expressions not fit for print. Where a change
was possible, we replaced them, without changing rhythm or meaning, by more
polite language. Where this was impossible, dots were put in place of the
expressions.
September, the eighth
day,
For the faith and for
the Czar
Before the French we
ran away,
Before the French we
ran away.
and our Prince
aleksandr
Let all the fleet sink
out at sea,
Our admiral and
commander.
And then he said
"Good-by;
Go on all you and fight
your best,
I’m for
Bakhchisari."
In our rear St. Arnault
lay;
He was kind enought to
wait a bit,
And then he blazed
away.
We were obliged to call
For help on Tuesday’s
holy Saint,
Or he’d have caught us
all.
What was Liprandi at?
He captured all the
forts he could,
But what’s the use of
that?
From Kishinev was
passed
The word, an army would
come up,
And in they marched at
last.
’Twas Danneberg that
led;
They told him,
"Never spare your men,
You’ve got to go
ahead."
Pavlov marched off
uphill,
And Soymonov went to
meet him,
But they may be
climbing still.
Liprandi, when he knew
The French had got the
upper hand,
Was puzzled what to do.
No doubt the grand
dukes came,
But the French, instead
of being afraid,
Kept firing all the
same.
Ten thousand men there
fell;
What the Czar ever did
for them
Is more than I can tell
The prince, he did
complain;
He said the soldiers
were no good,
And faced about again.
And on that fatal day
Of heroes there were
only two,
And the grand dukes
were they.
They had their St. George
too,
And were taken to St.
Petersburg
For all the world to
view.
And the priests, as
they were bound,
Prayed that a hurricane
might come
And all the French be
drowned.
The wind was very
rough,
But the Frenchmen
stayed and faced it out,
They were of better
stuff.
In winter they made
sorties -
And many a man they
killed of us -
From up there where the
fort is.
Ket Khrulev come and
lead,
And drive the Turk from
Kozlov, as
We never could succeed.
"More
soldiers," Menshchik prayed;
Till the Czar, to keep
his spirits up,
Sent Saken to his aid.
Menshchik was great
sea,
And he wrote bluntly to
the Czar,
"Father, our
Czar," said he,
"Your Yeroveyich
was never
Much more use than your
youngsters.
And I’m sure they’re
none whatever!"
The Czar upon this flew
Into a rage, and so
fell ill,
When holding a review.
He went to heaven, we
know,
Most likely he was
wanted there;
’Twas well he had to
go.
But when on his
deathbed,
"You’d better just
be on your guard,"
Unto his son he said.
The son was not too
kind;
"Dear
Menshchik," he wrote, "you can go
To the devil if you don’t
mind.
"I know who’ll do
the work;
The man I mean’s Prince
Gorchakov,
The same as fought the
Turk.
He won’t much beg for
men;
I’ll send for him
promotion,
And he won’t ask
again."
[Footnote: this soldier’s
song, as well as the first one, a few pages back, has been translated very
freely, as it would have been impossible to render in English the peculiar
vernacular of Russian soldiers.--Trans.]
If one thinks of the
circumstances in which these songs were written, of all the horrors of death,
groans of the wounded, bloodshed, fires, murders, filling the atmosphere in
Sebastopol, one cannot help being struck with admiration of the moral strength
of those men who could indulge in good-natured jests at their own cost in the
face of constant threat of sufferings and death.
Meanwhile in literary
circles in St. Petersburg Tolstoy became more and more known. He conquered his
first severe critic, Turgenev. Readers will remember the account of Mme.
Golovachov-Panayev, which we quite at the beginning of this chapter, how
Turgenev checked Panayev’s enthusiasm by his reasonings.
In 1854 Turgenev wrote
from his estate, Spasskoye, to E. Y. Kolbassin, a collaborator of "The
Contemporary":
"I am very glad to
hear of the success of ‘Boyhood’. Let Tolstoy only survive, and I hope he will
yet astonish us all - his is a first-rate gift. I met his sister (she is
married to a Count Tolstoy, too) - a very charming woman..." [Footnote:
The First Collection of T. S. Turgenev’s Letters, p. 9. Published by the
Society of Help to authors, 1885, St. Petersburg.]
When the
"Sebastopol Tales" were printed turgenev became most enthusiastic,
and thus expressed his enthusiasm in a letter to Panayev:
"Tolstoy’s article
on Sebastopol is a gem. Tears came into my eyes when I read it, and I shouted
hurrah! I am much flattered by his desire to dedicate his new tale to me. I saw
in the ‘Moscow News’ the advertisement of "The Contemporary." Very
good; God grant you may keep your promises, that is to say, that articles may
safely pass the censorship, that Tolstoy may not be killed, and so on. It will
help you greatly. Tolstoy’a article made a great sensation here....Spasskoye,
July 10, 1855." [Literary Reminiscences" by Panayev, 1888.
One may sat that after
the appearance of the "Sebastopol Tales" Tolstoy had risen to the
rank of a foremost author. A. E. Kony, in his biography of T. F. Gorbunov,
quotes the following interesting opinion of Pissemskiy concerning these tales:
About this time,
Pissemskiy -- who was then writing his remarkable novel, "The Thousand
Souls -- after having listened to some passages out of the "Sebastopol
Tales" by the then "only promising great writer of the Russian
Land," gruffly said to Gorbunov: "This young officer will eclipse us
all -- one might as well give up writing..." [Biographical Sketch of I. F.
Gorbunov, by A. E. Kony. (Preface and Works, p115)]
After the fall of
Sebastopol, Tolstoy was sent as a courier to St. Petersburg and was attached to
a rocket battery.
Before leaving
Sebastopol, Tolstoy had applied his literary abilities to making a report of
the last battle. Of this report, he himself says in his article, "A few words
concerning ‘War and Peace,’":
After the loss of
Sebastopol, the commander of the artillery, Krizhanovskiy, sent me the reports
of the artillery officers from all the bastions, and requested me to compose an
account from more than twenty of these reports. I regret that I did not copy
them. They were the best specimen of the kind of naive, unfailing military
falsehood which always furnishes the material for descriptions. I believe that
many of these comrades of mine who composed these reports, if they read these
lines, will laugh as they call to mind how, by the orders of the authorities,
they wrote of matters about which they could not know anything. [A few words
about the book "War and Peace". The Russian Archives, 1868]
During his military
service, Tolstoy had disagreements with his superior officers and comrades
owing to his love for justice.
In accordance with the
custom of those days, commanders of different parts of the battery, as well as
the commander of the whole battery, used to save up part of the money given
them from the treasury to spend on keeping the battery. The money thus saved
they generally kept for themselves, getting a certain regular income which led
to many abuses.
Tolstoy, on making his
accounts, found a surplus over the expenses; he added it to the sum allotted
for the battery instead of appropriating it. This practice was viewed with
great disfavor by other commanders, and General Krizhanovskiy reproved him for
it. N. A. Krilov bears testimony to this in his reminiscences. In 1856 he was
transferred to the 14th Battery, which tolstoy had recently quitted. Tolstoy is
remembered in the brigade as a good horseman, a genial companion, and an
athlete. he would lie on the floor, a man weighing 5 poods would be placed on
his hands, and he would lift him up by straightening his arms; in tugging a
stick nobody could beat him. A great many witty anecdotes are attributed to
him, which he used to tell in a masterly way. The Count was accused of
preaching to the officers to refund to the Government the excess of forage
money in case an officer’s horse does not consume the quantity of fodder it is
suposed to eat. [Russkiye Vedomosti, p136, 1900]
In St. Petersburg quite
a different life awaited Tolstoy, into which he plunged with his unfailing
youthful energy.
Tolstoy was sent to St.
Petersburg as a despatch bearer. There he was attached to a rocket battery
under General Konstantinov and returned to the front no more.
In St. Petersburg,
where he arrived November 21, 1855, he found himself at once in the circle of
"The Contemporary," and was received there with open arms.
In his
"Confession," Tolstoy thus speaks of that period: "During that
time I began to write, out of vanity, love of gain, and pride. I followed as a
writer the same path which I had chosen as a man. In order to obtain the fame
and money for which I wore, I was obliged to hide what was good and bow down
before what was evil. How often while writing have I cudgelled my brains to
conceal, under the mask of indifference or pleasantry, those yearnings for
something better which formed the real problem of my life! I succeeded in my
object and was praised. At twenty-six years of age, on the close of the war, I
came to St. Petersburg, and made the acquaintance of the authors of the day.
"I met with a
hearty reception and much flattery."
Naturally, during the
twenty years before he wrote those lines, Tolstoy was beset by various
feelings, though even then his unsparing self-analysis and skepticism were pushed
so far as to astonish his companions.
"The
contemporary" was a review founded by A. S. Pushkin and Plentev. Its first
number was issued in 1836. After Pushkin’s death, the review was published from
1838 to 1846 by Plentev alone and lost all its importance. In 1847 N. A.
Nekrasov and T. T. Panayev became the proprietors of the review. In
Collaboration with the well-known literary critic Belinskiy, they managed in a
short time to attract the best authors, and until its suppression by the
authorities in 1866, this review was the chief organ of progressive russian
art, criticism and sociology.
At the time of Tolstoy’s
appearance in Petersburg, the more intimate members of this literary circle are
to be seen in the two well-known photo-groups of authors - Panayev, Nekrasov,
Turgenev, Tolstoy, Druzhinin, Ostrovskiy, Goncharov, and Grigorovich and
Sollogulo. One may add to the circle V. P. Botkin, Fet, and others not included
in the two groups.
Members of the staff of
"The Contemporary" were bound by certain obligations as to honoraria
as well as the contribution of articles. These obligations were sometimes found
too burdensome, and caused many unpleasant frictions among literary men.
Publishers and editors of other reviews would, by urgent entreaties, obtain "copy"
from the celebrated authors belonging to the personnel of "The
Contemporary." The administration of that review resented such proceedings
very much, a feeling which was reciprocated by the rival publishers.
[no para]Tolstoy’s
German biographer, Loewenfeld, gives a description of one such incident as
follows:
Turgenev and Katkov had
a quarrel in which Tolstoy was involved, partly by his own fault. Turgenev had
been for some time an assiduous contributor of Katkov’s and the latter was
naturally loath to part with such an author. He commissioned his brother to
call daily on both the young authors and solicit from them articles for his
review. Turgenev, growing tired of these endless petitions, on a sudden impulse
promised to write something for Katkov, but could not keep his promise. Katkov
was furious and attacked Turgenev in public, arguing that since Turgenev
promised to write for him, he could not at the same time give his services ‘exclusively’
to ‘The Contemporary.’ On the other hand, as a member of ‘The Contemporary’
staff, he was precluded from contributing to Katkov’s review. His gentle and
compliant nature played him a bat turn this time.
Tolstoy took the part
of his friend. He wrote a long letter to Katkov in defense of Turgenev. The
gentle nature of Turgenev, as well as his politeness, had induced him to make
promises to both parties. Tolstoy requested Katkov to publish his letter.
Katkov agreed, on the condition that his answer should be printed as well, and
he therewith sent a rough sketch of it. But it was of such a character that
Tolstoy thought it wiser to give up his part of mediator. [Loewenfeld. Count L.
N. Tolstoy, p.125, Moscow.]
The association of
"The Contemporary" ceased long before, and it became an ordinary
publishing concern.
Tolstoy did not meet
Belinskiy in the circle of "The Contemporary." The latter died in
1848, after having worked hard to put the "Review" on a satisfactory
footing. His enthusiasm breathed new life into the dying periodical, and made its
existence secure for a long while to come. But Tolstoy was not influenced
directly by Belinskiy. The reason for this was, in the first place, the
different character of their respective times. Belinskiy was a man of the
forties, in the full sense of the word, whereas Tolstoy entered upon his
literary career in the fifties, and moved among Belinskiy’s followers, who
lacked his attractive power; though, on the other hand, the social surroundings
in which Tolstoy had been reared could not be favorable to his intimacy with
these representatives of the republic of letters - "raznochintsy," as
they called themselves, all sorts and conditions of men. He kept company with
men of his own standard of breeding, and even with them was always reserved,
independent, mostly in opposition, and trying to influence others, while
himself little responsive to outside influence. Once may point out a more
serious cause, that underlying difference in general views. Though Tolstoy had
not yet definitely formed his views of life, still the tendency of "The
Contemporary" had never attracted him.
Moreover, as Tolstoy
has acknowledged in his literary work, he was more attracted by talent that was
simply artistic than by that of a social tendency.
In his youth he had
been under the sway of rousseau’s philosophical teaching.
Discussing the subject
of French literature with Professor Boyer from Paris, who paid him a visit in
the spring of 1901, Tolstoy thus expressed his opinion of his two teachers -
Rousseau and Stendhal:
People have been unjust
to rousseau, the greatness of his thought was not recognized, and he was
calumniated. I have read the whole of rousseau, all the twenty volumes,
including the dictionary of music. I admired him with more than enthusiasm, I
worshipped him. At fifteen I wore on my neck, instead of the usual cross, a
medallion with his portrait. with some of his pages I am so familiar that I
feel as if I had written them myself. As to Stendhal, I will speak of him only
as the author of "Chartreuse de Parme" and "rouge et Noir."
These are two great, inimitable works of art. I am, more than any one else,
indebted for much to Stendhal. He taught me to understand war. Read once more
"Chartreuse de Parme," his account of the Battle of Waterloo. Who
before him had so described war -- i.e., as it is in reality? Do you remember
Fabracius crossing the battle field and "understanding nothing," and
how the hussars threw him with ease over the back of his horse, his splendid
general’s horse?
Subsequently my
brother, who had served in the Caucasus before me, confirmed the faithfulness
of Stendhal’s descriptions. He enjoyed war very much, but did not belong to
those who believed in the Bridge of Arcole. He used to say to me, "All
that is embellishment, and in war there is no embellishment." Soon
afterward in the Crimea I easily verified all this with my own eyes. I repeat,
all I know about war I learned first of all from Stendhal." [Paul Boyer,
"Le Tempes, 28 August 1901]
From twenty to
thirty-five years of age tolstoy was chiefly influenced by the following works:
Titles Degree of
Influence
Goethe, Hermann und
Dorothea Very great
V. Hugo, Notre Dame de
Paris Very great
Tyuchev, Verses Great
Koltsov, Verses Great
Fet, Verses Great
Plato, Phaedo and the
Symposium Very great
(Golitsyn’s translation)
Odyssey and Iliad Very great
Thus we have the more
or less complete list of Tolstoy’s literary guides.
Tolstoy entered the
circle of St. Petersburg authors, his powerful artistic personality and
obstinate, often aggressive temperament creating a storm in their hitherto
quiet and peaceful atmosphere.
The following is from
Fet’s reminiscences of Tolstoy’s first appearance in St. Petersburg:
Turgenev used to get up
and take his tea in the St. Petersburg fashion, very early, and during my short
stay in town I called every morning about ten to have a quiet talk with him. On
the second morning when Zakhar opened the door I saw in the hall a dress sword
with a ribbon of St. Anne.
"Whose sword is
this?" I inquired, as I proceeded to the drawing room.
"If you please,
come this way," said Zakhar in a low voice, pointing to the left of the
corridor. "This is Count Tolstoy’s sword, and his excellency is asleep in
the drawing room. Ivan Sergeyevich is drinking tea in the study."
During the hour I spend
with Turgenev, we conversed in a low voice, being afraid to awaken Tolstoy, who
was asleep in the next room.
"He is like this
all the time," said Turgenev, smiling. "He came from Sebastopol,
straight from the battery, stopped here at my place, and then and there plunged
into dissipation. Carousals, gypsies, and card-playing all night; and afterward
he sleeps like a top till two in the afternoon. At first I tried to restrain
him, but after a while I gave it up."
About this time I was
introduced to Tolstoy, but our acquaintance was a formal one, I not having yet
read a single line of his nor even heard of him as an author, although Turgenev
mentioned to me his tale of "Childhood." But from the first I noticed
in young Tolstoy a kind of unconscious antagonism to all accepted rules in the
domain of reasoning. During this short period I saw him only once at Nekrasov’s,
at our bachelor’s literary party. There I witnessed how Turgenev, eager and
breathless in discussion, was driven to despair by the apparently calm, but all
the more sarcastic, replies of Tolstoy.
"I cannot
accept," said Tolstoy, "what you said just now as your conviction. I
stand at the door with a dagger or sword in hand and say, ‘while I am alive, no
one shall enter this door.’ That is conviction. but you two are trying to
conceal the real meaning of your thoughts from each other, and you call this
conviction.
"Then why do you
come here?" said turgenev, panting and in a tin falsetto, his voice during
warm discussions always reaching this high pitch. "Ours is not your
banner! Go to Princess B-e-b-e."
"Why should I ask
you where I am to go?" returned Tolstoy. "Besides, idle talk will by
no means beget convictions, wherever I go."
As far as I can
remember, this was the only encounter between Turgenev and tolstoy at which I
was present, and I cannot help saying that, although I understood that the
controversy related to politics, I took too little interest in the subject to
pay attention to it. I must add that, from what I heard in our circle, Tolstoy
was in the right, and, if indeed men suffering from the "regime" then
in force were to try to describe their ideal, they would find the greatest
difficulty in formulating their wants.
Who of us at that time
did not know the boon-companion, the partner in all sorts of frolics, and the
capital fellow at telling amusing anecdotes, Dmitriy Vasiliyevich Grigorovich,
celebrated for his novels and stories? This is how he, by the way, told me of
the encounters between Turgenev and Tolstoy in the same house of Nekrasov:
"My dear boy, by dear boy," said Grigorovich, choking with laughter
till tears came to his eyes, and stroking me on the shoulder, "you cannot
imagine what scenes we had here. Mercy on us! Turgenev speaks shriller and
shriller, then pressing his hand to his throat, and with a look of a dying
gazelle, whispers: ‘I cannot talk any longer! It will give me bronchitis!’ and
with enormous strides begins to walk up and down the three rooms. ‘Bronchitis!’
sneers Tolstoy, ‘it’s an imaginary illness. Bronchitis is a metal!’ Of course
the host Nekrasov is trembling heart and soul: he is afraid to lose both
Turgenev and tolstoy, in whom he foresees a powerful support for "The
Contemporary," so he is bound to maneuver. We are all upset and at a loss
what to say. Tolstoy is lying down in the middle of the room on a leather sofa
and sulks; Turgenev, with the lappets of his jacket asunder and his hands in
his pockets, continues to walk up and down all the three rooms. To prevent a
catastrophe, I approached the sofa and said: ‘My dear Tolstoy, don’t get
excited! You have no idea how he appreciates and loves you!’ ‘I will not allow
him,’ says Tolstoy, his nostrils dilating, ‘to be spiteful to me. And now he
walks up and down the room on purpose, crossing his democratic legs close to
me.’" [A. Fet, My Reminiscences, Part I, p. 105.]
D. V. Grigorovich, in
his "Literary Reminiscences," tells a similar story of the earlier
period of Tolstoy’s acquaintance with St. Petersburg authors:
On my return from
Marynskiy to St. Petersburg, I met Count Tolstoy. I was first introduced to him
in Moscow at the house of the Sushkov family, where he still wore his military
uniform. He lived in St. Petersburg, in Ofitsskiy Street, on the lower floor of
a small set of chambers next to the lodgings of M. L. Mikhailov, the author. It
seems they were not acquainted. His keeping permanent rooms in St. Petersburg
was incomprehensible to me, for from the very first he not only disliked St.
Petersburg itself, but was irritated with everything connected with it.
Having learned from him
during our interview that he was invited to dine that very day with the
editorial staff of "The Contemporary," and that though he had already
written for that review, he yet knew very little the members of its staff, I
agreed to go with him. On the way I warned him to be careful and not touch
certain subjects, and in particular not to attack Georges Sand, who at that
time was the idol of most of the members. The dinner went off quietly. Tolstoy
was rather taciturn, but toward the end he could no longer control himself.
Hearing praise bestowed on a new novel by Georges Sand, he abruptly declared
his hatred of her, adding that her heroines, if they existed in reality, ought
to be tied to the hangman’s cart and driven through the streets of St.
Petersburg as an example. Even at that time he had formed that personal
standpoint about women and the woman question which he so forcibly expressed in
his novel "Anna Karenina."
The incident at that
dinner party may have been caused by his dissatisfaction with everything that
bore the cachet of St. Petersburg, but more probably by his tendency to
contradiction. Whatever judgment might have been passed, and the greater the
authority of his interlocutor, the more he would insist on asserting an
opposite view and in retorting sharply. Watching how he listened to his
interlocutor, how he scrutinized him, how sarcastically he screwed up his lips,
one would have thought he was thinking not so much how to answer a question as
how to express an opinion which should be a puzzle and surprise to the
questioner. this is how Tolstoy impressed me in his youth. In discussion he
pushed his arguments to the furthest extreme. I happened once to be in the next
room when he and Turgenev were having a discussion; hearing their loud voices I
went into the room. Turgenev was pacing up and down showing signs of great
embarrassment; he profited by the door I opened and went out immediately.
Tolstoy was lying on the sofa, and his excitement was so great that it was only
with great difficulty that I managed to calm him and take him home. The subject
of their discussion remains unknown to me at the present moment. [Complete
edition of the Works of D. V. Grigorovich, vol. xii, p. 326.]
This tendency of
Tolstoy to contradiction is also illustrated in the following episode related
in the reminiscences of G. P. Danilevskiy:
At the end of the
fifties I met Tolstoy in St. Petersburg in the family of a well-known sculptor
and painter. The author of the "Sebastopol Tales" had just arrived in
St. Petersburg; he was a young, stately artillery officer. A very good likeness
of him at that time is to be found in the well-known group of photographs by
Levitskiy, where he is taken together with Turgenev, Goncharov, Ostrovskiy, and
Druzhinin. I remember well how Count Tolstoy entered the drawing room of the
lady of the house during the reading aloud of a new work of Herzen’s. Quietly
standing behind the reader’s chair, and waiting till the end of the reading, he
began at first softly and shyly, but then boldly and hotly to attack Herzen and
the enthusiasm with which his writings were accepted. He spoke with such
sincerity and force, that in this family I did not come across Herzen’s publications
any more. ["A Visit to Yasnaya Polyana," by G. P. Danilevskiy,
"Historical Review," March, 1886, p.529.]
We know that Tolstoy
changed his opinion of Herzen later on, and this will be mentioned in due
place.
E. Garshin, in his
reminiscences of Turgenev, gives the following interesting account of Turgenev’s
opinion of tolstoy. It shows the early element of mutual incompatibility which
almost brought their relations to a fatal end.
"Tolstoy,"
said Turgenev, "developed early a trait of character which, as the
foundation of his gloomy view on life, causes in the first place much suffering
to himself. He never believed in the sincerity of men. Any kind of emotion
seemed false to him, and he had the habit, by the extraordinary penetrating
glance of his eyes, of piercing through the man who struck him as false."
Turgenev told me that
never in his life had he experienced anything more depressing that the effect
of that penetrating glance, which, combined with two or three venomous remarks,
could exasperate one who had no great self-control to the verge of madness.
This subject of Tolstoy’s casual experiments, and almost the exclusive subject,
was his friend Turgenev. He was, so the latter said, greatly annoyed by
Turgenev’s self-possession and his serenely calm attitude at that period of
brilliant literary achievement, and Count Tolstoy seemed to have made up his
mind to exasperate this quite, kind-hearted man, who was working with full
conviction of doing the right thing. The worst of it was that Tolstoy did not
believe this, he thought that the men whom we consider good are only hypocrites
or try to display their goodness, and that they affect to be convinced that
they are doing their work for a good cause.
Turgenev recognized
Count Tolstoy’s attitude, but resolved by all means to keep his own ground and
remain self-possessed. He tried to avoid Tolstoy, and with this object went to
Moscow, then went to his country place, but Count Tolstoy followed him step by
step, "like a woman in love," to use Turgenev’s words as he told the
story. [E. Garshin, Reminiscences of I. S. Turgenev, "Historical Review,
November 1883]
All these facts as to
the mutual relations of the two authors show that any real spiritual intimacy
between them was impossible. But the liberal movement carried both of them in
the same direction, and they considered themselves fellow-workers for the same
cause. Besides, their aristocratic origin, their education, their prominent
position in the literary circle -- all this, though against their will, was
bringing them, outwardly at any rate, together. But, as readers will see from
the following incident, whenever they tried to be more than simple companions,
a conflict was the result, and this sometimes exposed their priceless lives to
danger. To do them justice, they both clearly realized the distance dividing
them, they owned it openly to each other and to others, and, what is more
important, they made great moral efforts to keep up, if not cordial, at least
amicable relations based on mutual respect. On this ground, they present a
suggestive example to following generations.
We may insert here the
account given by Mme. Golovachov- Panayev of the early days of the acquaintance
of Turgenev and Tolstoy, which confirms our assertion.
I must go back and tell
of the appearance of Count Tolstoy in the circle of "The
Contemporary." He was then still an officer, and the only collaborator of
"The Contemporary" who wore a military uniform. His literary talent
had by this time made such a mark that all the leaders in literature had to
accept him as their equal. Besides, Count Tolstoy was not a shy man, he was
aware of his talent, and behaved, as I thought, with a certain more or less
ease of manner or nonchalance.
I never entered into
conversation with the authors when they met at our house, I only listened in
silence and observed them. I was particularly interested in watching Turgenev
and Tolstoy, when they happened to be together and had a discussion or made
remarks to one another, for they were both very clever and observant.
I never heard Tolstoy
express his opinion of Turgenev, and as a rule he said nothing of any of the
authors, at least before me. Turgenev, on the other hand, seemed impelled to
pour out observations about everybody.
When Turgenev made
Tolstoy’s acquaintance, he said of him: "There is not a word, not a
movement, which is natural in him. He is constantly posing, and I am at a loss
to understand in so intelligent a man this foolish pride in his wretched title
of Count!"
"I did not notice
it in Tolstoy," said Panayev.
"But there are
many things you don’t notice," said Turgenev.
After a time, Turgenev
came to the conclusion that Tolstoy had the ambition to be considered a Don
Juan. Count Tolstoy one day related to us certain interesting episodes which
had happened to him during the war. When he went away, Turgenev said: "You
may boil a Russian officer for three days in strong suds and you won’t succeed
in getting rid of the braggadocio of a Junker; you may cover him with a thick
veneer of education, still his brutality will shine through."
And Turgenev began to
criticize every sentence of Tolstoy’s the tone of his voice, the expression of
his face, and finally said: "And only to think that at the bottom of all
this brutality lies merely the desire to get promoted."
"Look here,
Turgenev," remarked Panayev, "if I did not know you so well, I should
think, when I listen to your abuse of Tolstoy, that you are jealous of
him."
"On what grounds
can I be jealous of him? Of what, tell me!" cried Turgenev.
"Oh, no doubt, you
have no reason; your talent is equal to his...But people may think..."
Turgenev laughed, and
with a kind of pity in his voice remarked: "Panayev, you are a good
observer when it concerns coxcombs, but I don’t advise you to go beyond the
proper sphere of your observations."
Panayev was hurt.
"It’s for your own
good that I said that," he added, and went out of the room.
Turgenev was very much
excited and repeated with vexation: "Only Panayev’s head could entertain
such nonsense -- that I am jealous of Tolstoy! Is it his title that I am
jealous of?"
Nekrasov spoke very
little all this time, suffering as he was from a sore throat. He merely said to
Turgenev: "Do leave it alone, whatever Panayev may have said; as if indeed
any one would suspect you of such an absurdity." [Reminiscences of Mme. A.
Golovachov- Panayev, p279]
Turgenev, with his
honest, truthful nature, had many times publicly declared his great admiration
of Tolstoy’s talent, and more than that, he once said to a French publisher,
using the expression of John the Baptist in relation to Jesus Christ: "I
am unworthy to untie his shoe." Their relations nevertheless were never
cordial.
Only on his death-bed,
in his last letter to Tolstoy, while with touching tenderness imploring him to
return to literary activity, he gave him the name with which no Russian author
had been hitherto honored, the name of "the great writer of the Russian
land." And this glorious name will follow him into eternity.
To give the reader an
idea of the relations between Tolstoy and Turgenev at the early period of their
acquaintance, we will interrupt the chronological order of our work and quote
several setters of Turgenev to Tolstoy, written in the same year.
To Leo Tolstoy.
Paris, November 16,
1856.
My dear Tolstoy -- Your
letter of October 15th was crawling toward me for a whole month. I received it
only yesterday. I have thought it well over what you write to me, and I believe
you are mistaken. It is a fact that I cannot be quite straightforward with you,
because I cannot be quite frank with you. It seems to me that we became
acquainted in an awkward way, and at an evil moment, but, when we meet again,
all will be much easier and smoother. I feel I love you as a man (as to my love
for the author--needless to mention it); yet many things in you jar upon me,
and in the end I have found out that it is better for me to keep aloof from
you. At our next meeting let us try again to go hand in hand -- perhaps it will
come off better. But at a distance, however strange it sounds, my heart is
disposed to you as to a brother, and I feel a tenderness for you. In a word, I
love you - - there is no doubt about it; let us hope that in time something
good will come of it.
I have heard of your
illness and I was grieved, and now I beg you to dismiss the thought of it from
your mind. You are imagining things yourself and probably think of consumption,
but I can assure you, you have not got it.
I am very sorry for
your sister; she is one who ought to enjoy good health; I mean, if there is
anybody who deserves to be quite well, it is she; instead, she is a constant
sufferer. Let us hope the Moscow treatment may help her. Why don’t you recall
your brother? Why should he stay in the Caucasus? Does he intend to become a
great warrior? My uncle informed me that you have all of you gone off to
Moscow, and I therefore forward this letter to Botkin, Moscow.
French conversation is
as distasteful to me as it is to you, and never did Paris appear to me so
flatly prosaic. Contentment does not suit it; I saw this city in other days,
and then I liked it better. I am kept here by an old indissoluble tie with a
particular family, and by my daughter, of whom I am very fond; she is a good, intelligent
girl. Were it not for this, I would have long ago joined Nekrasov in Rome. I
have received from him two letters -- he is a little bored in Rome, and no
wonder -- all that is great in rome only he surrounds him; he does not share in
it. And one cannot exist for long on a diet of sympathy and admiration when
those feelings occur involuntarily only ar rare intervals. Yet he is better off
there than in St. Petersburg, and his health is improving. For the present, Fed
is staying in Rome with him. He had written a few graceful verses, and a
detailed account of his travels containing much that is childish, but also many
clever, sensible sayings -- and a kind of touching simplicity and sincerity if
impression. He is, in fact, a darling, as you call him.
Now as to Chenishevskiy’s
articles. I don’t like their arrogant, dry tone, the expression of a harsh
nature. But I rejoice at their being printed, rejoice over the reminiscences of
B., and the quotations from his articles; I rejoice that at last his name is
uttered with respect. However, you cannot sympathize with me in this joy.
Annenkov assures me that I derive these impressions from living aborad; that
with them this is already a thing of the past, they now want something else.
Perhaps he is a better judge, as he is on the spot; still I am pleased.
You have finished the
first part of "Youth" -- that is glorious. What a pity I cannot hear
you read it! If you don’t turn aside from your path (and there is no reason why
you should), you will go far ahead. I wish you health, activity, and freedom --
spiritual freedom.
As to my
"Faust", I don’t suppose you will like it very much. My writings
might have pleased you and perhaps influenced you in some way, but only up to
the time when you became quite independent. There s no need for you to study me
now, you will only see my difference of manner, my faults and omissions. It
remains for you to study man, your own heart, and the really great authors. I
am a writer of a transition period, and am of use only to men who are in a
transitory state. Well, good-by and be well. Write to me. My present address:
Rue de Rivoli, No. 206.
Thanks to your sister
for the two added words; remember me to her and her husband. I am grateful to
Varenko for remembering me.
I intended to tell you
something of the authors here, but keep this for the next letter. I shake your
hand warmly. I do not stamp my letter, do the same with yours." [Letters
of I.S. Turgenev (First Collection), p27] December 8, 1856, he wrote to
Tolstoy:
Dear Tolstoy --
Yesterday my good fairy took me past the post office, and it occurred to me to
inquire about letters at the post-restante for me, though by this time all my
friends ought to know of my Parisian address. There I found your letter, in
which you speak of my "Faust"; you can easily imagine what a pleasant
reading I had. Your sympathy caused me great and sincere delight. And besides,
the whole of your letter breathed gentleness and frankness and a kind of
friendly serenity. It remains for me to hold out my hand across the
"ravine" which long ago turned into a hardly perceptible chink; we
won’t mention it, it is not worth it.
I dare not speak to you
on a subject which you mention; these are delicate things. They are killed with
a word before they are ripe, but when they are ripe a hammer cannot break them.
God grant everything may come off successfully and well. It may bring you that
spiritual equilibrium you needed so much when I first knew you. I see you are
very friendly with Druzhinin and under his influence. this is well, only mind
not to feast on him too much. When I was your age I was more influenced by
enthusiastic natures, but you are a different man from me; moreover, perhaps,
the times are now different. I am eagerly looking forward to get the "Reading
Library." I am anxious to read the article on Belinsky, although I don’t
expect to derive much pleasure from it. As to "The Contemporary"
being in bad hands, that is beyond doubt. At first Panayev used to write very
often and assure me he would not act "heedlessly," underlining this
word, but he is subdued now and keeps silent like a child who has misbehaved at
mealtime. I have written to Nekrasov with full details about it, and this will
very likely induce him to leave Rome and return earlier than he intended.
Please let me know in what number of "The Contemporary" your
"Youth" will appear, and, by the way, give me your final impression
of "Lear," which you have probably read if only for the sake of
Druzhinin." [Letters of I. S. Turgenev (First Collection), p33]
We do not possess exact
information as to Tolstoy s opinion of "King Lear" in Druzhinin’s
translation, but from the letter of Botkin to Druzhinin quoted below, one can
see that Tolstoy liked Druzhinin’s translation.
Here is the letter:
What a success your
"Lear" proves. To me it was certain; still, how the pleasure
increases when the inner conviction becomes a reality. There it is, the well-
known antipathy of Tolstoy to shakespeare which Turgenev so much fought
against! I must do myself the justice to state that I was convinced that at the
first opportunity this antipathy would disappear; but I am glad that your
excellent translation brought that opportunity. [From Druzhinin’s papers,
"Twenty-five Years," a volume published by the Society of assistance
to Authors and Scholars, St. Petersburg, 1884]
It seems the joy of
Botkin was premature, for Tolstoy persisted in his dislike of Shakespeare, but
on this we shall have occasion to remark in one of the following chapters.
On the 5th of December
1856, Turgenev wrote to Druzhinin from Paris:
By the way, I am told
you are very intimate with Tolstoy, and he is now so nice and open. I am very
glad. When this new wine has been through the fermenting process it will turn
out a beverage worthy of the gods. What about his "Youth," which was
submitted to your judgment. I wrote to him twice, the second time c/o Vasenka
[Botkin]. [Letters of I.S. Turgenev (First Collection), p32]
"Youth"
really was forwarded to Druzhinin to be criticized by him; he read it and wrote
the following interesting letter in answer:
Twenty sheets should be
written about "Youth." I read it with wrath, shouting and swearing;
not on account of its want of literary worth, but owing to the copy and the
handwriting. This mixing together of two different handwritings distracted my
attention and prevented an intelligence perusal; it was just as if two voices
were shouting in my ear and purposely confusing me, and I know that the
impression was not as complete as it should have been. However, I will say to
you what I can. Your task was awful, but you have accomplished it well. None of
the present-day writers could have grasped the unintelligible, fleeting period
of youth and depicted it in such a manner. Cultured people will derive great enjoyment
from your "Youth"; if anybody tells you that this work in inferior to
"Childhood" and "Boyhood", you may spit in his face. There
are depths of poetry in your work; all the first chapters are excellent, only,
until the description of spring and the removal of double windows, the
introduction is rather dry. After that the arrival at the village is fine, just
before that the description of the Nekhludov family, the father’s explanation
of his reasons for marrying, the chapters "New Comrades" and "I
am falling through." Many chapters breathe the poetry of ancient Moscow,
which nobody had observed in the proper way. Baron Z.’s coachman is admirable
(I speak as one who understands). Some chapters are prosy and dry, as, for
instance, all about the stipulations to Varenka, and the chapter on family
understanding. The feast at Yar’s is also rather long, as well as the Count’s
visit with Ilinka, which comes before it. The recruiting of Semenov will not
pass the censor. You must not be afraid of arguing; it’s all clever and
original. You are apt to analyze to minutely, which might become a great
defect. Sometimes you are ready to say, "Such and such a fellow’s thigh
indicated that he desired to travel in India." You must curb this
inclination, but on no account should it be suppressed. All your analytical
work should be conducted in this way. Every one of your defects has elements of
force and beauty; nearly all your merits contain grains of defect.
Your style is in
harmony with your matter. You are illiterate in a marked degree. Sometimes your
illiteracy is that of neologist or a great poet who is perpetually
reconstructing a language in his own manner, or that of an officer who sits in
his tent and writes to a friend. It may be said for certain that all the pages
written by you in a kindly mood are excellent, but as soon as you grow cold,
your style gets confused and diabolical forms of speech bubble up. Therefore
passages written unsympathetically should be looked through and corrected. I
tried to make corrections at times, but I gave up the idea; you alone can do
this task and you should do it. It is of importance that you should avoid long
sentences. Chop them into two or three...don’t be afraid to use
full-stops...use with scant ceremony words like that, which, and this; they
should be struck out by tens. If you are in a difficulty, take a sentence and
imagine that you want to communicate it to somebody in a fluent familiar way.
It is time to close,
but there are still a good many things to be said. The bulk of the less
educated readers will like "Youth" less than "Childhood"
and "Boyhood." The small size of these two works and some episodes,
such as the tale of Karl Ivanovich are in their favor. The dullest man
cherishes a few childish memories and rejoices when their poetry is made clear
to him, but the period of youth (of that confused and disconnected youth which
is full of hard knocks and humiliation which you unveil for us) is usually
buried in the soul, and hence it loses its vividness and becomes obliterated.
It would mean much
labor to make your work reach the understanding of the masses, by inserting two
or three amusing incidents, etc., but hardly anybody could make it suit the
taste of the majority.
The plot and the
framework of your "Youth" will provide a feast for thinking people
who understand poetry.
Let me know if I should
forward the MS. to you or hand it over to Panayev. You have not made a large
stride in a new direction with this work, but you have shown what there is in
you and what can be effected by you.
The fact that Druzhinin
could have written to tolstoy in such a manner shows that they really were on
familiar terms, and that Druzhinin could influence him.
Tolstoy’s stay in St.
Petersburg -- from November until May -- was interrupted by a short visit to
Orel on business connected with family affairs.
February 2nd Tolstoy
received the news of his brother Dmitriy’s death; he drew a vivid picture of
the latter’s personality in his Reminiscences, quoted by us in the chapter on
"Youth". Here we quote the second part of those Reminiscences,
referring to his brother’s subsequent life, illness and death:
When we made a
partition of our property the estate Yasnaya Polyana, on which we lived, fell
to my lot. Seryozha was a lover of horses, and as there was a stud at Pirogovo,
he received that estate, which was what he desired. To Mitenka and Nikolenka
were given the other two estates -- to Nikolenka, Nikoleskoye; to Mitenka, the
Kursk of Shcherbachovka, which came to us from Perovskaya. I have kept a
statement from Mitenka explaining what were his views as to the possession of
serfs. The idea that this sort of thing ought not to be, but that serfs should
be set free, was quite unknown in our circle in the forties; the possession of
serfs by inheritance appeared a necessary condition of life, and it was thought
that the only thing that could be done to prevent this possession from being an
evil was that the landowner should concern himself with the moral welfare of
the peasants as well as their material condition. From this point of view,
Mitenka explained his project very seriously, naively, and sincerely. He, a lad
of twenty when he left the university, took upon himself the duties -- thinking
that he could not do otherwise -- of directing the morality of hundreds of
peasant families, and thought to do this by threats of punishments and
punishments, as is recommended by Gogol in his letters to a landowner. I think
I remember that Mitenka had these letters, which had been pointed out to him by
the prudent priest -- thus did Mitenka commence his landlord’s duties. But
besides these duties toward the serfs, there was at that time another duty
which it was deemed impossible to neglect -- that was military or civil
service, and Mitenka, having finished with the university, decided to enter the
civil service. In order to decide which branch to select, he purchased an
almanac, and having examined all the branches of civil service, he came to the
conclusion that the most important one was legislation, whereupon he went to
St. Petersburg and there applied to the officials at the head of that
department. I can imagine Tanayev’s astonishment when, on giving his reception,
he stopped in front of a high, round-shouldered, badly dressed man among the
supplicants (Mitenka always dressed merely for the purpose of covering his
body), a man with quiet, fine eyes; and on inquiring what he wanted, received
for an answer that he was a Russian nobleman who had gone through the
university, and being desirous of being useful to his country, had chosen
legislation as his province.
"Your name?"
"Count
Tolstoy."
"You have not yet
served anywhere?"
"I have only just
finished my university course, and my desire is merely to be useful."
"Then what post do
you desire to have?"
"It is all the
same; any one in which I can be useful."
His gravity and
sincerity so struck Tanayev that he drove Mitenka to the department of
legislation and there handed him over to an official.
Probably the official’s
attitude toward him, and above all toward the work, repelled Mitenka, for he
did not enter that department. He had no acquaintance in St. Petersburg except
the student Obolenskiy, whom he had known at Kazan. Mitenka called on him at
his summer residence. Obolenskiy told me about it laughing.
Obolenskiy was a very
worldly, ambitious man, but gifted with tact. He related how on that occasion
he had guests (probably of the aristocracy, with whom Obolenskiy associated),
and Mitenka came to him through the garden in a nankeen coat. "At first I
did not recognize him, but, when I did, I tried to put him at his ease. I
introduced him to my guests and asked him to take his coat off, but it turned
out that there was nothing under the coat; he did not think anything
necessary." He sat down, and immediately, without being disconcerted by
the presence of the guests, he turned to Obolenskiy with the same question he
had put to Tanayev: Where was it best to serve in order to be useful?
To Obolenskiy, with his
views on service as merely a means of satisfying ambition, such a question had
probably never occurred. But with the tact which he possessed and with external
good nature he answered, mentioning various posts, and offered his assistance. Mitenka
was evidently dissatisfied both with Obolenskiy and Tanayev, and he left St.
Petersburg without entering the civil service. He went to his country place,
and at Soudja, I think it was, he accepted some local post and busied himself
with rural work, especially among the peasants.
After we had both left
the university, I lost sight of him. I know that he lived the same severe,
abstemious life, knowing neither wine, tobacco, nor, above all, women, up to
twenty-six years of age, which was very rare at that time. I know that he
associated with monks and pilgrims, and he became very intimate with an
extremely singular man -- our guardian -- who lived at Voyekov’s place, a man
whose origin no one knew. This man was called Father Luke. He walked about in a
cassock, was very ugly, small of stature, one-eyed, but clean in his person and
exceptionally strong. When he shook hands, he gripped your hand as if with
pincers, and he always spoke very solemnly and mysteriously. He lived at
Voyekov’s, near the mill, where he had built himself a little house, and
cultivated a remarkable flower garden. It is this Father Luke whom Mitenka used
to take about with him. I heard also that he associated with an old-fashioned
old man, a miserly neighboring landowner, one Samoyloy.
I think I was already
in the Caucasus when an extraordinary alteration took place in Mitenka. He
suddenly took to drinking, smoking, wasting money, and going with women. How
this came to pass with him, I do not know; I did not see him at the time. I only
know that his seducer was a deeply immoral man, very attractive externally, the
youngest son of Islenyev. I will tell about him later. In this life, Mitenka
remained the same serious, religious man he was in everything. A prostitute
named Masha, who was the first woman he knew, he ransomed from her abode and
took into his house. But this life did not last for long. I believe it was not
so much the vicious and unhealthy life which he led for some months in Moscow
as the internal struggle and the qualms of conscience which suddenly destroyed
his powerful organization. He contracted consumption, went to the country, was
treated in towns, and took to his bed at Orel, where I saw him for the last
time, immediately after the Crimean War. He was in a dreadful state: the
enormous palm of his hand appeared visibly attached to the two bones of the
lower arm, his face was all eyes, and they were the same beautiful, serious
eyes, with a penetrating expression of inquiry in them. He was constantly
coughing and spitting, but he was loath to die, did not wish to believe he was
dying. Poor pox-marked Masha, whom he had rescued, wearing a kerchief round her
head, was with him and nursed him. In my presence, at his own wish, a
miraculous icon was brought. I remember the expression of his face when he
prayed to it.
At that time I was
particularly odious. I had arrived at Orel from St. Petersburg, in which city I
was moving in society, and I was full of vanity. I was sorry for Mitenka, but
not much. I just looked about me in Orel and went away again; he died a few
days later.
I really think that
what troubled me most in his death was that it prevented me from taking part in
some private theatricals which were then being organized at court and to which
I had been invited. [From Tolstoy’s Reminiscences.]
Peace was concluded on
March 12 [1856], and this circumstance made it easier for Tolstoy to get his
leave.
During the winter he
finished "Lost on the Steppe; or, The Snowstorm"; "Two
Hussars"; "an Old Acquaintance"; and "A Russian
Landowner". Tolstoy had to distribute his works among three periodicals;
thus the first two novels appeared in "The Contemporary", the third
in the "Reading Library", and the fourth in "Memoirs of the
Fatherland."
Among other things,
Tolstoy wrote to his Aunt Tatayana at this period:
I have finished my
"Hussars" (a novel), and have not taken up anything else; besides,
Turgenev, whom I have begun to live (I realize it now), notwithstanding that we
always quarrelled, is gone. Hence, I feel terribly lonely.
This letter shows that
Tolstoy’s relation to Turgenev varied from time to time.
St. Petersburg life was
evidently not to Tolstoy’s liking. Soon after his arrival, he did his best to
get away and prepared to go abroad.
In the letter to his
brother of March 25, 1856, he says incidentally:
I shall start for
abroad in eight months; if I can get leave I shall go. I have already written
about this to Nikolenka and asked him to come with me. If we were all three to
arrange to go together, that would be excellent. If we each take 1,000 rubles,
we could do the trip very well. Please write. How did you like "The
Snowstorm"? I am dissatisfied with it, seriously, and now there is much I
should like to write, but there is really no time in this accursed St. Petersburg.
At all events, whether I am allowed or not to go abroad in April, I intend to
take leave of absence and stay in the country.
On the 12th of May
[1856], while yet in St. Petersburg, he put down in his diary:
A powerful means to
secure true happiness in life is -- without any rules -- to spin in all
directions, like a spider, a whole web of love and catch in it all that one can
-- old women, children, women, and constables.
* * * * * * * *
It may be supposed that
"The Contemporary’s" business, as well as literary affairs, gave
little satisfaction to its chief supporters; this was perhaps due to the
individual diversity of convictions, views, habits, education, and surroundings
of the contributors, as this always hinders any common work devised by educated
people. In every circle composed of "intellectuals", division into
groups very soon takes place: a tolerant attitude is very soon replaced by
indifference; after that rivalry asserts itself, culminating in open enmity.
That was the case with "The Contemporary."
As far back as the
beginning of 1856, the idea struck some of the contributors of separating and
founding a new magazine. Druzhinin’s letter to Tolstoy bears testimony to this.
In it he says, among other things:
Availing myself of some
surplus energy, I hasten to have a talk with you concerning a matter which
occupied us at our last meeting and which is now being favorably considered by
many of our comrades in St. Petersburg. The want of a journal which should be
purely literary and critical, and counteract all the frenzies and indecencies
of the present time, is felt in a marked degree. Goncharov, Yermin, Turgenev,
Annenkov, Maikov, Mikhaylov, Avdeyev, and many others back up this idea with
their hearty approval. If you, Ostrovskiy, Turgenev, and perhaps our
half-insane Grigorovich (though we could get along without him), would join
this group, it may be taken for granted that the whole of the belles-lettres
will be concentrated in one journal. What this organ shall be, whether a new
journal, or a reading library on premises hired by the company, as to all this,
you might devise some scheme and let us know what it is. Here the majority is
bent on taking a lease on moderate terms, and the publisher consents. For my
part, I have nothing to say either for or against, but offer my services to a
purely literary journal, on whatever principles it got up.
As to the department of
science, the following professors could be regarded as willing contributors:
Gorlov, Oostryalov, Blagoveshchenskiy, Berezin, Zernin, as well as those who
contribute now -- I am naming the most talented -- Lavrov, Lkhovskiy, Kenevich,
Vodovozov, Dumilin. Although Turgenev is a hopeless worker, he will be a
valuable man, considering his activity, as well as his position in literature.
However, the details have to be left in the background now; we must agree as to
the whole and decide the main points.
Judging by the interest
you have manifested in this matter, I count on your support. By the way, I have
a request to make of you, as I am still following my old occupation, and
starting a new journal might take up a good deal of time, I beg your permission
to have you in the meantime included in the number of contributors to the
"Reading Library". Do not dispose of all your articles, but leave
some work for me toward the autumn, making your own choice and stipulating for
your own condition. I won’t worry you about this, being aware that without my
entreaties you will do everything for me that you can.
Write me a few lines
about all this and about your life in general, your anticipations, and Marie’s
Health; give her my best and sincere regards. Also let me know your address. We
must keep up correspondence about the new journal; I am afraid that our forces
will get scattered, we have only enough for one edition. It is immaterial what
was the idea of the undertaking, as long as we all unite in working at it. So,
in summer, as you often go to see Turgenev, try to influence him and direct
this delightful but unreliable...toward our common goal. Judging by what he has
said to me a hundred time, the idea of such a journal should please him; but
how can one rely on anything he says? Let him consider to what a low stage our
journals have been reduced by the splitting of forces; "Russkiy
Vestnik" alone has kept its ground well, but it has a jaded appearance now
owing to the falling off of "Ateney"; "Ateney", however, is
very dull. There is nothing to say about St. Petersburg.
On May 17th [1856],
Tolstoy set off for Moscow.
May 26th [1856] he
spent in the house of Dr. Bers, married to a friend of Tolstoy’s childhood,
Mademoiselle Islenev; there were then living at Pokrovskoye, not far from
Moscow. In tolstoy’s diary there are a few words about this visit.
"The children were
all there. What jolly, charming little girls!" One of them, the youngest,
became Tolstoy’s wife six years later.
After that he proceeded
on his journey, and on May 28th [1856] arrived at Yasnaya Polyana.
Next day he wrote a
letter to his brother Sergey, in which, among other things, he remarked:
In Moscow I passed ten
days...exceedingly pleasantly, without champagne and gypsies but a little in
love -- with whom I will tell you later.
On his arrival at
Yasnaya, he naturally goes to greet his neighbors, his sister Marie, Turgenev,
and others.
From the two following
letters to his brother, we see that at the end of the summer he was seriously
ill. Thus, at the beginning of September 1856 he writes:
Only now, at nine o’clock
in the evening, Monday, can I give you a good answer; before this I kept
getting worse and worse. Two doctors have been called, forty leeches have been
applied, but it is only a little while ago that I fell asleep, and I have
awakened feeling considerably better. Still, for five or six days I cannot
think of going. So, au revoir. Please let me know when you start, and whether
there really are great arrears in the farming work of your estate, and do not
devastate the sporting places too much without me; the dogs I may perhaps send
tomorrow.
In his letter of
September 15th [1856] he says:
My dear friend
Seryozha: My health has improved and it has not. The pains and the inflammation
have passed, but there remains some kind of oppression in the chest. I feel
shooting sensations and toward the evening pains. Perhaps it will pass off
gradually of itself, but I shall not soon make up my mind to go to Kursk, and
if not soon, then it is no good going at all. If I am not better in a fortnight
or so, I would rather go to Moscow.
Soon after he again
removed to St. Petersburg, whence he wrote to his brother the 10th of November
1856:
Excuse me, dear friend
Seryozha, for writing only two words. I have no time. Since my departure,
illness pursues me. Of those I love not one is here. In the
"Otechestvenniya Zapiski" they say Ii have been abused for the
"Military Stories". I have not yet read it, but Konstantinov made a
point of informing me the moment I arrived that the Grand Duke Mikhail [brother
of the Emperor Nicholas I], having learned that I was reported to have composed
a song, is displeased, especially for my having, as it was said, taught it to
the soldiers. that is too bad. I have had an explanation upon the subject with
the Chief of Staff. There is only one thing as it should be -- my health is all
right, and Shipulinskiy says my lungs are in perfect order.
On November 26, 1856,
Tolstoy retired from Military service. We may mention a good act done by him at
the close of his service.
The commander of the
battery where Tolstoy served, Captain Lieutenant Korenitskiy, was to be tried
by courtmartial after the war, but thanks to Tolstoy’s influence and exertions
he was spared.
With the retirement of
Tolstoy from service begins a new period of his life, full of social and literary
interests, with strivings after personal happiness.
Notwithstanding his
uncompromising views and his rejection of literary authorities, Tolstoy was a
welcome guest and a valued member of the literary circle of "The
Contemporary."
But Tolstoy himself was
far from pleased with that circle. It could not be otherwise. One need only
read the reminiscences of authors belonging to that period, for example,
Herzen, Panayev, Fet, and others, men of different schools, to come to very sad
conclusions as to the moral weakness of those men, though they pretended to be
leaders of humanity. When we think of the dinner parties of Nekrasov, the
carousals of Herzen, Ketcher and Ogarel, Turgenev’s love for the culinary art,
all those friendly parties, incomplete without a great deal of champagne,
hunting, card- playing, etc. -- we are pained to think of the idleness, the
mental blindness of these men, who could not see the evil of their revels, with
all the love for democracy and progress which they mixed up with them. In the
midst of this shamelessness, which is perhaps still going on in some shape or
other even at the present day, only one voice of accusation and self-correction
resounded -- the voice of a man whose soul could not endure that
self-deception. That voice was Tolstoy’s.
In his
"Confession" he gives the following picture of the manners of the
literary people, i.e., of society, at the end of the fifties and beginning of
the sixties:
Before I had time to
look around, the prejudices and views of life common to the writers of the
class with which I associated became my own and completely put an end to all my
former struggles for a better life. These views, under the influence of the
dissipation into which I plunged, issued in a theory of life which justified it.
The view taken by my fellow-writers was that life is a development, and the
principal part in that development is played by ourselves, the thinkers, while
among the thinkers the chief influence is again due to ourselves, the poets.
Our vocation is to teach mankind.
In order to avoid
answering the very natural question "What do I know and what can I
teach?" the theory in question is made to contain this formula, that the
answer is not required, but that the thinker and the poet teach unconsciously.
I was myself considered a marvelous litterateur and poet, and I therefore very
naturally adopted this theory. Meanwhile, thinker and poet though I was, I
wrote and taught I knew not what. For doing this, I received large sums of
money; I kept a splendid table, had an excellent lodging, associated with loose
women, and received my friends handsomely; moreover, I had fame. It would seem,
then, that what I taught must have been good, the faith in poetry and the
development of life was a true faith, and I was one of its high priests, a post
of great importance and profit. I long remained in this belief, and for a year
never once doubted its truth.
In the second year,
however, and especially in the third of this way of life, I began to doubt the
absolute truth of the doctrine and to examine it more closely. The first
suspicious fact which attracted my attention was that the apostles of this
belief did not agree among themselves. Some proclaimed that they were the only
good and useful teachers and all the others worthless; while those opposed to
them said the same of themselves. they disputed, quarrelled, abused, deceived,
and cheated one another.
Moreover, there were
many among us who, quite indifferent to right or wrong, only cared for their
own private interests. All this forced on me doubts as to the truth of our
belief. Again, when I doubted this faith in the influence of literary men, I
began to examine more closely into the character and conduct of its chief
professors, and I convinced myself that they were men who led immoral lives and
were most of the worthless and insignificant individuals and far beneath the
moral level of those with whom I had associated during my former dissipated and
military career; these men, however, had none the less an amount of self-
confidence only to be expected in those who are conscious of being saints, or
for whom holiness is an empty name.
I grew disgusted with
mankind and with myself and discovered that the belief which I had accepted was
a delusion. The strangest thing of all was that though I soon saw the falseness
of the belief and renounced it, I did not renounce the position I had gained by
it; I still called myself a thinker, a poet, and a teacher. I was simple enough
to imagine that I, the poet and thinker, was able to teach other men without
knowing myself what it was I attempted to teach. I had only gained a new vice
by my companionship; it had developed pride in me to a morbid extreme, and the
self-confidence with which I taught what I did not know amounted almost to
insanity.
However, while living
in the same circle with these men, Tolstoy had taken part in all their affairs
and was one of the most active members in their common enterprises. Thus, one
of the most important schemes of the Society of Assistance to Authors and Scholars,
the so-called "Literary Fund," is in many respects indebted to him
for its foundation. Druzhinin is generally considered the founder of the
society. But in Tolstoy’s diary there is the following note:
January 2, 1857. I
wrote a project of the fund at Druzhinin’s.
The name of Tolstoy
must therefore be added to the list of the founders of the "Literary
Fund."
To this period belong
his more thorough study and admiration of Pushkin’s works.
According to Tolstoy,
he seriously appreciated Pushkin after having read Merimee’s French translation
of his "Gypsies". The reading of this work, thus expounded in prose
form, gave Tolstoy a very strong impression of the greatness of Pushkin’s
poetical genius.
In Tolstoy’s diary for
January 4, 1857, there is the following remark:
I dined at botkin’s
house alone with Panayev; he read Pushkin to me. I went into Botkin’s study and
there wrote a letter to Turgenev; then I sat down on a couch and wept with
joyful tears. I am of late decidedly happy, rejoicing in the advance of my
moral development.
The advance of moral
development to which he refers did not allow Tolstoy to find satisfaction in
that society and in its work, and he eagerly looked for another outlet. As a
restless spirit usually manifests its uneasiness in action, so Tolstoy showed
restless activity, and one way in which his impatience found vent was foreign
travel, apparently without a fixed plan. This is what he says about the matter
in his "Confession", judging himself and those surrounding him with
his characteristic plainness of speech:
I had lived in this
senseless manner another six years, up to the time of my marriage. During this
time I was abroad. My life in Europe and my acquaintance with many eminent and
learned foreigners, confirmed my belief in the doctrine of general
perfectibility, and I found the same theory prevailed among them. This belief
took the form which is common among most of the cultivated men of the day. It
may be summed up in the word "progress." I believed at that time that
this word had a real meaning. I did not understand that, when on being
tormented like other men by the question how I was to better my life, I
answered that I must live for progress, I was only repeating the reply of one
who is carried away in a boat by the waves and the wind, and who, to the one
important question "Where are we to steer?" should answer, "We
are being carried somewhere or the other."
But, before going
abroad, Tolstoy gave up a great deal of time to the search for personal and
family happiness.
I have now to relate
one of the most important passages of Tolstoy’s life, embracing the history of
his falling in love. It did not lead to marriage, still, in my opinion, it must
have had a very great influence on his life. Like many other episodes, it
brings out very clearly certain traits of his character, such as, in the first
place, his ardent, impulsive nature, and next the power exercised by his
supreme guide, reason, which keeps the passions under control and directs them
to a good end; lastly, the simplicity, sincerity, and chivalry of his
character. We see this both where his actions are determined by the highest
principles, and also in connection with the petty details of everyday life. The
story is interesting in itself as dealing with the relations between a man and
a woman, and giving in connection therewith a grave and instructive experience,
by attention to which young people might be saved from a great deal of
unhappiness.
In Tolstoy’s life up to
this time there had already been a few incipient love affairs, but they had led
to nothing. The strongest case was that of his boyish affection for Sonichka
Kaloshin. this was followed by the affair of Z. N. while he was at the
University; but the love really only existed in his own imagination, Z. N.
herself hardly knew anything about it. The Cossack girls has been mentioned
already. After this there was a kind of a society love affair with Madame S.,
of which she herself probably was scarcely conscious; Tolstoy was always shy and
reserved in connection with such matters.
However, his love for
V. A. was a more powerful and serious feeling. Their relations had become
thoroughly understood and avowed and had been declared to a circle of relatives
and acquaintances as those of lovers.
Unfortunately, Tolstoy’s
extensive and interesting correspondence with this girl cannot yet be published
owing to circumstances beyond my control, and I have to confine myself to a
short summary of its contents.
Let us remember how, in
a letter from Sebastopol, Tolstoy complained of the want of female society and
expressed his fear of becoming incapacitated for it and thus depriving himself
of the possibility of married life, which he held in high honor.
Thoughts of women and
family life were constantly in his mind after he returned from the campaign,
and on his way through Moscow he was struck by a good-looking girl, the
daughter of a landowner of the neighborhood, the result being, in no long time,
a romantic mutual attachment.
The first letter is written
by Tolstoy from Yasnaya Polyana to Moscow where the young lady was staying. the
family she live in comprised an aunt, a fashionable lady who was fond of court
life, and three sisters; besides this lady’s nieces and Zh., and also a French
governess. After spending the summer Sudakovo, a country place not far from
Yasnaya Polyana, they moved to Moscow in August to be present at the coronation
festivities of Aleksandr II on August 26, 1856.
The young lady enjoyed
herself very much during the festivities, and in a letter to Tolstoy’s aunt,
she described them in enthusiastic language. This letter was the first
disappointment to Tolstoy. As he was attracted by the girl, he could not help
looking upon her as his possible life-companion, and he thought he ought to
explain to her his views of social and family life; but he was disagreeably
surprised by finding himself completely misunderstood, the lady’s attitude
toward sundry questions of the highest importance being one of absolute
indifference. However, he still hoped to influence her in the right direction,
in reliance on her young and susceptible nature, and finding her by no means
unsympathetic, he used all his eloquence to make her take a serious view of
their relations. Consequently, his letters breathe the most tender solicitude
for her, are full of precepts relating to trifles, but leading incidentally to
general questions of philosophy. Now and then, in distress at her lack of
comprehension, he would write in a bitter sarcastic tone; then, again, he would
soften down to a tender caress as from a father to his child.
In one letter he
expresses his horror and despair at the discovery how unworthy of her, as he
held, were the objects in which she took an interest. In fact, he mercilessly
jeers at the young lady’s passion for coronation festivities, balls, parades,
and flirtations with aides-de-camp, and ends his letter with a portentously
affected sentence.
For a long time he got
no answer. He was agitated, wrote again, begged for forgiveness, and at last
succeeded in eliciting a good-humored reply.
It appears from his
letters that after the coronation the family returned to Sudakovo, where
Tolstoy was often in their house, and that the mutual inclination grew and
strengthened.
But Tolstoy was not the
man to be carried away blindly and heedlessly by his feelings. He resolved to
submit their attachment to the test of time and distance, and he went to stay
at St. Petersburg for two months.
From Moscow he wrote a
letter in which he attempted a sort of education of the young lady, which
letter makes it plain that what is called the passion of love did not exist
between them.
He goes very fully into
the question of mutual attraction and insists upon the very great significance
of marriage, and finally he explains his determination to put their friendship
to the test of a temporary separation. Though this did not appeal to the young
lady, whose affections were strongly engaged, yet she agreed, and they kept up
a correspondence.
Before long, Tolstoy
had to go through a new trial not imposed by himself, but coming from without.
While in St. Petersburg, he learned from a trustworthy source that this
"charming girl" allowed her pianoforte teacher, Mortier, to make love
to her, and that, in fact, she fell in love with him. And all this took place
during those unfortunate coronation fetes. It is true she tried hard to
counteract this feeling, and she even broke off all relations with Mortier, but
the very fact of this sudden love affair was a frightful shock to Tolstoy.
Under the impulse of the bitter feeling called forth by this discovery, he
wrote to her a letter full of reproaches, but evidently relenting, he never
posted it. Then he wrote another, which was posted. In this he also referred
somewhat severely to the flirtation with Mortier.
One can, of course,
easily notice that the discovery made by Tolstoy of the continued relations of
the lady with Mortier caused an incurable wound to his developing love, and
that he did not cut short his relations with her only because he thought nature
and time would fulfil the operation better. From that time they became more of
comrades, and only at rare intervals, and then, I presume, more in imagination,
did the flame of love show itself.
Getting no answer to
his letter, and having very probably satisfied himself with the argument that
"pas de nouvelles -- bonnes nouvelles," he continued to influence her
life rather as her teacher than as her lover and wrote her a detailed letter
concerning their possible relations in the future, setting forth for her a
minute plan of their duties, surroundings, circle of acquaintances, and
apportionment of time, and trying to get his future life-companion interested
in serious and vital questions.
He did not receive any
answer to his letters for a long time and remained somewhat in doubt.
At last he was rewarded
for his patience by receiving several belated letters all at once, and the
relations between the two friends became again very loving.
He initiates her in his
literary plans, describes his life in St. Petersburg and continues to develop
his pure and high ideals of family life to her.
However, the beginning
of doubt which had crept into Tolstoy’s mind is more evident in these last
letters. Through the expressions of love a kind of oppressive feeling betrays
itself, as the outcome of their somewhat artificial relations. This false not
becomes obvious also to her, the intensity of their mutual feeling grew less,
and both were on the lookout for an honorable escape.
In a letter to his aunt
Tatyana, Tolstoy confessed the cooling down of his love and asked her advice in
this difficulty. The letter was written in Moscow, to which place he went early
in December and remained till the end of the month.
Moscow, Dec. 5, 1856.
You again write to me
about V. in the same tone in which you have always spoken to me about her, and
I again answer in the way in which I have always answered. Just as I had left,
and for a week later, it appeared to me that I was in love, as it is called,
but with my imagination, that is not difficult. At present, and especially
since I have strenuously taken to work, I would like, and very much like, to
say that I am in love with or simply love her, but this is not the case. The
one feeling I have toward her is gratitude for her love, and also the thought
that of all the girls I have known and do know, she would have been the best
for my wife, as I understand married life. It is in this that I would like to
know your candid opinion as to whether I am mistaken or not, and I desire your
advice, firstly, because you know both her and me, and, above all, because you
love me, and those who love are never mistaken. It is true that I have tested
myself very unsatisfactorily, for since I left I have been leading a solitary
life, rather than a dissipated one, and have seen very little of women, but
notwithstanding this, I have often had minutes of vexation with myself for
having so closely approached her and have repented of it. Still, I say that
were I once convinced of the constancy of her nature and sure that she would
always love, if not as much as she does now, at least more than she does any
one else, I would not hesitate a minute to marry her. I am sure that in that
case my love toward her would continually increase, and that by means of this
feeling she could become a noble woman."
His letter to the young
lady had now become cool and argumentative. He still used the words "in
love," but, it seemed, only playfully, without the former enthusiasm. He
addressed his letters to St. Petersburg, where she went to spend the winter
season -- an ambition she had cherished for a long time.
The coldness in the
tone of his letters did not escape her, and she wrote to him with loving
reproach. Two kind letters from her resulted in some return of love on his
part; he sent her a letter written in a soft tone, and with some warmth of
expression. In a subsequent letter, Tolstoy confesses that he is "losing
his head," and tries to define "love" by reference to the mutual
education that comes of it. However, as may be seen, they could never a tree as
to what love precisely was, and the more sincerely and cordially Tolstoy
expressed his thoughts and his feeling for her, the less they penetrated her
soul and the more resistance she offered. This same resistance his last letter
failed to overcome, and her reply made him change his tone, and friendship took
the place of love.
After this there
followed and interruption of three weeks. Very evidently their relations had
changed and turned into friendship. Tolstoy meanwhile settled in St. Petersburg
in order to prosecute his literary work. They exchanged letters once more;
however, nothing was arranged, and she forbade him to write to her. But he
continued to write, confessing his guilt toward her and himself.
He further tells her
that he is going abroad and gives her his address in Paris, begging her to
write to him there, were it even for the last time.
Finally, before he left
Moscow for abroad, he wrote to his aunt about the whole matter.
Dear Aunt -- I have
received my passport for abroad and have come to Moscow, intending to pass a
few days with marie and then go to Yasnaya to arrange my affairs and take leave
of you.
But I have now changed
my mind, chiefly on Mashinka’s advice, and have decided to remain with her here
a week or two and then go direct by Warsaw to Paris. You probably understand,
dear Aunt, why I do not wish to come to Yasnaya now, or rather to Sudakovo, and
even ought not to do so. I think I have behaved very badly in relation to V.,
but by seeing her now, I should behave yet worse still. As I have written to
you, I am more than indifferent to her and fear I can no longer deceive either
myself or her. Whereas, if I came, I might perhaps, owing to weakness of
character, again deceive myself.
Do you remember, dear
Aunt, how you laughed at me when I told you that I was leaving for St.
Petersburg that I might test myself, yet it is to this idea that I owe the fact
of not having made the unhappiness of this young lady and myself, for do not
think that it was inconstancy or infidelity. No one has taken my fancy during
these two months, but I have simply come to see that I was deceiving myself,
and that I have not only never had, but never shall have, the slightest feeling
of true love for V. The only thing which greatly pains me is that I have
injured the young lady, and that I shall not be able to take leave of you
before my departure. I intend returning to Russia in July, but should you
desire it, I will come to Yasnaya to embrace you, for I shall have time to get
your answer at Moscow.
After this, Tolstoy
really got away, and from Paris, in reply to a letter from his old sweetheart,
which he received there, he wrote to her his last friendly letter, in which he
speaks of his feeling as of a mistake belonging to the past, thanks her for her
friendship, and wishes her happiness.
Tolstoy’s aunt
evidently did not approve of this rupture, as she was desirous to see her
nephew married, and before long she reproached him for his inconstancy, even
accusing him of having acted dishonorably toward the girl who had been
tormented with doubts and expectations on his account. In reply to this,
Tolstoy wrote the following interesting letter:
By your letter, dear
Aunt, I see that we do not at all understand each other in regard to this
affair. Although I confess that I was to blame, in having been inconstant, and
that everything might have happened quite differently, yet I think I have acted
quite honestly. I have never ceased to say that I did not know the feeling that
I had for the young lady, but that it was not love, and that I was anxious to
test myself. The experience showed me that I was mistaken in my feeling, and I
wrote about it to V. as plainly as I could.
After this, my relations
with her have been so sincere that I am sure the memory of them will never be
disagreeable, were she to marry, and it is for this reason that I wrote to her,
saying that I would like to hear from her. I do not see why a young man should
necessarily either be in love with a girl and marry her or have no friendly
relation with her at all, for as to friendship and sympathy for her, I have
always retained a great deal. Mademoiselle Vorgani, who wrote to me such a
ridiculous letter, should have realized all my conduct in regard to V., how I
endeavored to come as seldom as possible, how it was she who engaged me to come
oftener and to enter into nearer relations. I understand her being vexed that a
thing she had greatly desired did not take place (I am perhaps more vexed than
she), but that is no reason for telling a man who has endeavored to act in the
best way possible, and who had made sacrifices for fear of rendering others
unhappy, that he is a brute, and making every one else think so. I am sure Tula
is convinced I am the greatest monster."
Judging by this letter,
one can imagine what impression the rupture made on the lady and her friends.
A short time afterward,
having learned from his aunt’s letter that his old sweetheart’s sister was
getting married, his former feeling reawoke, and he wrote as follows:
As to V., I never lover
her with a real love, but I allowed myself to be drawn into tasting the evil
pleasure of inspiring love, which afforded me an enjoyment which I had never
know before.
But the time I have
passed away from her has proved to me that I have no longing to see her again,
much less to marry her. I feel only fear at the thought of the duties I should
be obliged to fulfill toward her without loving her, and it is for this reason
that I made up my mind to go away sooner than I intended. I have behaved very
ill; I have asked pardon of God, and I ask it of all those I have grieved, but
it is impossible to repair matters, and now nothing in the world could make the
thing begin anew. I desire all happiness to Olga; I am enchanted with her
marriage, but to you, my aunt, I confess that of all things in this world, that
which wold give me the greatest pleasure would be to learn that V. was going to
marry a man whom she loved and who was worthy of her; for although I have not
got in the depth of my heart the slightest atom of love for her, I still regard
her as a good and honorable girl.
Thus ended this short
but pathetic affair, a most interesting passage in Tolstoy’s life. Having known
a period of strong agitation and outlived it, he, so to speak, turned to
account this episode of his life, with the sensations which he experienced, by
describing them in his novel "Family Happiness", in an artistic form,
as anyone can see who compares the work of art with the author’s actual life.
We may in fact say that what is represented as taking place in the novel is the
course of events which might have occurred in his real life, and the real
romance was the commencement or prologue of the fiction.
After this unsuccessful
affair, Tolstoy resumed his literary and social activity.
January 29th [1857]
Tolstoy left Moscow and traveled by mail post to Warsaw and from Warsaw by rail
to Paris, where he arrived on February 21 [1857].
There turgenev awaited
him. As early as January 23rd the latter wrote to Druzhinin:
Tolstoy writes that he
intends coming over here, and then going in the spring from here to Italy. Tell
him to make haste, if he wishes to find me. Anyhow, I will write to him myself.
Judging from his letters, I see that he is going through most beneficial
changes, and I am rejoicing at it like an "old nurse". I have read
his "A Russian Landowner" which pleased me very much by its frankness
and almost full freedom of conviction; I say "almost", because in the
way he states the problem to himself lies (perhaps unknown to him) a certain
prejudice. The essential moral impression of the tale (I don’t speak of the
artistic one) is this, that until serfdom ceases to exist, there would be no
possibility of rapprochement and mutual understanding in spite of the most
disinterested, honest desire to meet, and this impression is good and true; but
side by side with it runs another secondary impression -- namely, that on the
whole, teaching the peasant or improving his position is useless, and I cannot
agree with this impression. But his mastery of the language, of the tale, of
characteristics is very great.
After meeting Tolstoy,
Turgenev wrote to Polonskiy:
Tolstoy is here. A
change for the better has taken place in him, and a very considerable one.
This man will go far
and will leave a deep trail after him.
In a letter to Kalbasin
dated March 8, 1857, from Paris, Turgenev said:
I very often see
Tolstoy here, and I had the other day a very nice letter from Nekrasov dated
from Rome.
But I cannot become
intimate with Tolstoy, we take such different views.
This is Tolstoy’s
estimate at that time of Turgenev and Nekrasov, whom Tolstoy found in Paris, as
quoted by Botkin in his letter to Druzhinin of March 8, 1857.
Tolstoy writes thus
about his interview with him:
They are both roaming
in a sort of darkness, they are dejected and complain of life, do nothing, and
apparently both feel the weight of their mutual relations.
Turgenev writes that
Nekrasov suddenly went away again to Rome. Tolstoy’s letter is only a page but
full of vitality and freshness. Germany interests him very much and he intends
to study that country more fully by-and-by. In a month’s time he starts for
Rome. [From papers by Druzhinin, "Twenty-five Years’ Manual", St.
Petersburg, 1884.
This correspondence
shows that the relations between Tolstoy and Turgenev were always
unsatisfactory, and that with all their efforts, they could not become cordial
friends.
In March, Tolstoy and
Turgenev made a journey to Dijon and spent a few days together there. While
there, Tolstoy wrote the tale about the musician Albert. Then they came back to
Paris, where Tolstoy witnessed an execution which he described in his
"Confession," and which made an indelible impression upon him, of
which he made a brief entry in his diary:
6th April 1857: I rose
before seven and went to see an execution. A stout, white, health neck and
breast: he kissed the Gospel and then--death. What a senseless thing! It made a
strong impression, which has not been in vain. I am not a political man.
Morality and Art I know that I love and can...The guillotine for a long time
prevented me from sleeping, forcing me to look round.
This is what he says on
the subject in "How I Came to Believe":
Thus, during my stay in
Paris, the sight of a public execution revealed to me the weakness of my
superstitious belief in progress. When I saw the head divided from the body and
heard the sound with which they fell separately into the box, I understood, not
with my reason, but with my whole being, that no theory of the wisdom of all
established things, nor of progress, could justify such an act; and that if all
the men in the world from the day of creation, by whatever theory, had found
this thing necessary, it was not so, it was an evil thing. and that, therefore,
I must judge of what was right and necessary, not by what men said and did, not
by progress. but what I felt to be true in my heart.
Tolstoy put off his
journey to Rome till the autumn, and in the spring set out from Paris for
Geneva, from which place he writes to his aunt Tatyana:
I have passed a month
and a half in Paris, and so pleasantly that I say to myself every day that I
did well to come abroad. I have gone very little either into society or the
literary world, or the world of cafes and public entertainments, but
nevertheless, I have found so much here that is new and interesting to me that
every day, when I go to bed, I say to myself: "what a pity it is the day
has passed so quickly!" I have not even had time to work as I intended.
Poor Turgenev is very
ill physically and still more so morally. His unfortunate connection with
Madame V. and her daughter keeps him here in a climate which is very bad for
him, and it is piteous to see him. I should never have thought he could so
love!
From Geneva, Tolstoy
went on foot to Piedmont with botkin and Druzhinin, who had come there; after
that he settled down on the banks of Lake Geneva at the little village of
Clarens, from which he wrote an enthusiastic letter to his Aunt Tatyana:
I have just received
your letter, dear Aunt, which has found me, as you must know by my last letter,
in the neighborhood of Geneva, at Clarens, in the same village as that in which
rousseau’s Julie lived....I will not attempt to describe the beauty of the country,
especially at the present time, when all is in leaf and flower; I will merely
tell you that it is literally impossible to tear oneself away from this lake
and these shores, and that I pass most of my time in gazing and admiring as I
walk about, or else merely as I sit by the window in my room. I do not cease to
congratulate myself on the idea I had of leaving Paris and coming to pass the
spring here, although it brought upon me your reproach of inconsistency. I am
really happy, and I begin to feel the advantages of having been born with a
sliver spoon in my mouth.
There is here a
charming society of Russians -- Pushkins, Karamzins, and Meshcherskiys; and
all, God knows why, have taken affectionately to me. I feel this and the month
I have passed here so pleasantly, and I am so well and hearty that I am quite
in low spirits at the thought of leaving.
Besides these friends
in the neighborhood of Geneva, there lived at that time in the village Baucage,
near the lake, Tolstoy’s friend, the Countess A. A. Tolstaya, who was maid of
honor to the grand duchess Marya Nikolayevna, who there gave birth to a son
Count Stroganov. It was a very great pleasure to Tolstoy to visit them.
He spend about two
months at Clarens and resolved to continue his journey on foot. Having made the
acquaintance of a Russian family there, he invited one of them, a boy named
Sasha, of the age of ten, to go up the mountains with him. At first they were
to have walked to Friburg, crossing the gorge Jaman, but after having crossed it,
they changed their minds and turned in the direction of the Chateau d’Oex, from
which they proceeded to Thun by the mail post.
among the unpublished
manuscripts of Tolstoy are his notes of this journey, from which a few
descriptions of Swiss landscape may be quoted. He first of all went by steamer
from Clarens to Montreux.
15th May 1857. the
weather was clear, the light blue and brilliantly dark blue Leman, spotted
white and black with sails and boats, shone before our eyes almost on three
sides of us; behind Geneva, some way from the bright lake, the hot atmosphere
trembled and darkened; on the opposite shore the green Savoy mountains rose
abruptly, with little white houses at their base and with jagged rocks, one of
which looked like an enormous white woman in an ancient costume. To the left,
near the red vines in the dark-green thicket of fruit trees, was distinctly
seen Montreux with its graceful church standing half-way down the slope,
Villeneuve on the Vevey shore with the iron roofs of its houses brightly
shining in the midday sun, the mysterious cleft of the Vallais with its
mountains heaped one upon another, the white Col de Chillon over the water near
Vevey, and the much- belauded little island artificially yet beautifully placed
in front of villeneuve. The lake was slightly rippled, the sun beat down
perpendicularly upon its blue surface, and the sails, scattered about the lake,
appeared motionless.
It is wonderful how,
having lived in Clarens two months, still each time, when in the morning and
still more in the evening after dinner I open the shutters of the windows
already in the shade and look out on the lake and the distant blue mountains
reflected in it, their beauty blinds me and startles me with a thrill. I
immediately wish to love and even feel the love of others for myself, and
regret the past, hope for the future, and feel it become a joy to be alive. I
desire to live long, very long, and the thought of death fills me with a
childish, poetic awe. Sometimes, sitting alone in the shady little garden and
gazing, as I constantly do, on these shores and this lake, I even feel, as it
were, the physical impression of their beauty pouring into my soul through my
eyes.
Again, as they climbed
up the mountains:
Above us the wood birds
were pouring out their songs such as are not heard on the lake. Here one feels
the smell of the damp of the forest and of felled pine trees. The walk was so
pleasant that we were loath to hurry on. suddenly we were struck by a curious,
delightful spring smell. Sasha ran into the wood and gathered some cherry
blossom, but it was almost scentless. On both sides were seen green trees and
shrubs without bloom. The sweet overpowering odor kept on increasing. After we
had advanced a hundred yards, the shrubs opened to the right and an immense
sloping valley, flecked with white and green, with a few cottages over it, was
disclosed before our eyes. Sasha ran to the meadow to gather white narcissus
with both hands, and brought me an enormous bouquet, with a very strong scent, but,
with the love of destruction natural to children, he ran back to trample and
tear the tender and beautiful young succulent flowers which gave him so much
pleasure.
They passed the night
at Avants. After the ascent, Tolstoy wrote the following reflections:
16/28 May [1857]: what
I was told is true -- the higher you ascend the mountains, the easier it is to
advance. We had already been walking more than an hour and neither of us felt
either the weight of his bags or any fatigue. Although we did not yet see the
sun, it threw its rays over us on to the opposite height, touching on its way a
few peaks and pines on the horizon. The torrents beneath were all audible where
we stood. Close to us only snow water soaked through the soil, and at a turning
of the road, we again saw the Lake Valle at an appalling depth beneath us. The
base of the Savoy mountains was completely blue, like the lake, only darker;
the summits, lighted by the sun, were throughout of a pale pink. There were
more snow-clad peaks, which seemed higher and of a more varied shape. Sails and
boats like scarcely visible spots were seen on the lake. It was a beautiful
sight, beautiful beyond measure, but this is not Nature, although it is
something good. I do not like what are called glorious and magnificent views -
- somehow they are cold.
...I like Nature when
it surrounds me on all sides, and then unfolds in infinite distance -- but
still when I am myself in it. I like it when the warm air is first all about me
and then recedes in volume into infinite distance; when those same tender
leaves of grass which I crush as I sit on them give their greenness to
boundless meadows; when those same leaves which, stirred by the wind, move the
shadows about my face, give their hue to the distant wood; when the very air
you breathe makes the dark blue of the limitless sky; when you are not
rejoicing and revelling in the inanimate Nature alone; when round about you
buzz and dance myriads of insects, lady-birds crawl, and birds are pouring out
their songs.
But this is a bare,
cold, desolate, gray little plateau, and somewhere there something veiled with
the mist of distance. But this something is so far off that I do not feel the
chief delight of Nature -- do not feel myself a part of this infinite and
beautiful distance. I have nothing to do with this distance.
Continuing his journey,
in July [1857] Tolstoy reached Lucerene, from which he wrote to his aunt:
"Lucerne, July 8
[1857]: I think I have told you, dear Aunt, that I have left Clarens with the
intention of undertaking rather a long journey through the north of
Switzerland, along the Rhine, and from Holland to England. From there I intend
again passing through France and Paris, and in August making a short stay at
Rome and Naples. If I can stand the sea crossings which I shall encounter in
going from The Hague to London, I think of returning by the Mediterranean,
Constantinople, the Black Sea, and Odessa. But all these are plans which I
shall perhaps not carry out owing to my changeable disposition, with which you,
my dear Aunt, justly reproach me. I have arrived at Lucerne. It is a town in
the north of Switzerland, not far from the rhine, and I am already postponing
my departure, so as to remain a few days in this delicious little town....I am
again all alone, and I will confess to you that very often this solitude is
painful to me, as the acquaintances one makes in hotels and trains are not a
resource; yet this isolation has at least the advantage of prompting me to
work. I am working a little, but it advances badly, as it usually does in
summer.
During his stay at
Lucerne, he had an adventure, which he describes in "The memoirs of Prince
Nekhludov". The tale referred to the year 1857 and is therefore connected
with his own journey.
In this tale, as we know,
the lovely description of Swiss nature is interrupted by expressions of
indignation at the way in which its harmony is spoiled in order to please the
well-to-do tourists, chiefly English.
What strikes him
especially is the contrast between the dull respectability of the "table d’hote"
and the wild, but soft and exhilarating beauty of the lake. The feeling is
intensified in him when he hears the song of a street singer with a harp. As if
by magic, this song attracts general attention and strikes a chord in his soul
to which he is unable to give tone.
All the confused and
involuntary impressions of life suddenly received meaning and charm for me, as
though a fresh and fragrant flower had bloomed in my soul. Instead of the
fatigue, distraction, and indifference for everything in the world which I had
felt but a minute before, I suddenly was conscious of a need of love, a
fullness of hope, and a joy of life, which I could not account for. "What
is there to wish, what to desire?" I uttered involuntarily. "Here it
is -- you are on all sides surrounded by beauty and poetry. Inhale it in broad,
full draughts with all the strength you have! Enjoy yourself! What else do you
require? All is yours, all the bliss."
The same dull,
respectable English surround this beautiful flower of poetry like a black
frame.
The singer finished and
held out his hat beneath the windows of a grand hotel, on the veranda of which
stood a crowd of smartly dressed listeners, who non of them gave him anything.
Amazed at the stony
indifference of these people, Tolstoy ran after the musician and invited him to
the hotel to partake of a bottle of wine. This defiant action created a
sensation in the hotel, but that was precisely what he wanted. His object was
to wound those self-satisfied tourists; he wanted to express his indignation at
their heartlessness. However, the sensation passed away and was almost
forgotten, leaving the author with a bitter feeling against the injustice of
men and their incapacity to understand the highest happiness, the simple,
humane, and at the same time sympathetic attitude toward nature.
How could you, children
of a free, humane nation, you Christians, you, simply men, even, answer with
coldness and ridicule to a pure enjoyment afforded you by an unfortunate mendicant?
But no; there are refuges for beggars in your country. There are not beggars,
there must not be, and there must not be the feeling of compassion upon which
beggars depend.
But he labored, gave
you pleasure; he implored you to give him something of your superabundance for
his labor, which you made use of, and then you looked down at him with a cold
smile from your high, shining palaces, as at a curiosity, and among hundreds of
you, happy and rich people, there was not found one man or woman to throw
anything to him! Put to shame, he walked away from you - - and the senseless
crowd pursued and insulted with its laughter, not you, but him, because you are
cold, cruel, and dishonest; because you stole enjoyment from him, which he had
afforded you, they offended him.
On the 7th of July
1857, an itinerant singer for half an hour sang songs and played the guitar in
Lucerne in front of the Schweizerhof, where the richest people stop. About one
hundred persons listened to him. The singer three times asked all to give him
something. Not one person gave him anything, and a great many laughed at him.
This is not fiction but
a positive fact, which those who wish may find out from the permanent inmates
of Schweizerhof, and by looking up in the newspapers who the foreigners were on
the 7th of July stopped at the Schweizerhof.
This is an occurrence
which the historians of our time ought to note down with fiery, indelible
letters.
An outcry of
astonishment broke forth from his heart in the presence of the riddle of the
tangled chain of men’s relations to each other and their petty feelings as
compared with the harmonious grandeur of sovereign nature. The author expressed
his feelings in a pathetic artistic form and thus finished his tale:
What an unfortunate,
miserable being is man with his need of positive solutions, cast into this
eternally moving, endless ocean of good and evil, of facts, of reflections and
contradictions! Men have been struggling and laboring for ages to put the good
all on one side and the evil on the other. Ages pass, and no matter what the
unprejudiced mind may have added to the scales of good and evil, there is
always the same equilibrium, and on each side there is just as much good as
evil.
If man could only learn
not to judge, not to conclude sharply and positively, and not to give answers
to questions put before him only that they might always remain questions! If he
only understood that every idea is both just and false! False -- on account of
its one- sidedness, on account of the impossibility of man’s embracing the
whole truth; and just -- as an expression of one side of human tendencies. They
have made subdivisions for themselves in this eternally moving, endless,
endlessly mixed chaos of good and evil; they have drawn imaginary lines on this
sea, and now they are waiting for this sea to be parted asunder, as though
there were not millions of other subdivisions from an entirely different point
of view in another plane. It is true -- these new subdivisions are worked out
by the ages, but millions of these ages have passed and will pass yet.
Civilization is good,
barbarism evil; freedom is good, enslavement evil. It is this imaginary
knowledge which destroys the instinctive, most blissful primitive demands of
good in human nature. And who will define to me what freedom is, what
despotism, what civilization, what barbarism? And where are the limits of the
one and of the other? In whose soul is this measure of good and evil so
imperturbable that he can measure with it this fleeting medley of facts? Whose
mind is so large as to embrace and weigh all the facts even of the immovable
past? And who has seen a condition such that good and evil did not exist side
by side in it? And how do I know but what I see more of the one that of the
other only because I do not stand in the proper place? and who is able so
completely to tear his mind away from life, even for a moment, as to take an
independent bird’s-eye view of it?
There is one, but one
sinless leader, the Universal Spirit, who penetrates us all as he does one and
each separately, who imparts to each the tendency toward that which is right;
that same Spirit who orders the tree to grow toward the sun, orders the flower
to cast seeds in the autumn, and orders us to hold together unconsciously.
This one, sinless
blissful voice is drowned by the boisterous hurry of growing civilization. Who
is the greater man and the greater barbarian -- the lord, who upon seeing the
singer’s soiled garment angrily rushed away from the table, who did not give
him for his labor one-millionth of his worldly goods, and who now, well-fed and
sitting in a lighted, comfortable room, calmly judges of the affairs of China,
finding all the murders committed there justified, or the little singer, who,
risking imprisonment, with a franc in his pocket, has for twenty years
harmlessly wandered through mountains and valleys, bringing consolation to
people with his singing, who has been insulted, who today was almost kicked
out, and who then, there, hungry, humiliated, went away to sleep somewhere on
rotting straw?
Just then I heard in
the town, amid the dead silence of the night, far, far away, the guitar and the
voice of the little man.
No, I involuntarily
said to myself, you have no right to pity him and to be indignant at the lord’s
well being. Who has weighed the internal happiness which lies in the soul of
each of these men? He is sitting somewhere on a dirty threshold, looking into
the gleaming, moonlit heaven, and joyfully singing in the soft, fragrant night;
in his heart there is no reproach, no malice, no regret. And who knows what is
going on now in the souls of all these people, behind these rich, high walls?
Who knows whether there is in all of them as much careless, humble joy of life
and harmony with the world as lives in the soul of this little man?
Endless is the mercy
and all-wisdom of Him who has permitted and has commanded all these
contradictions to exist. Only to you, insignificant worm, who are boldly,
unlawfully trying to penetrate His laws, His intentions, only to you do they
appear as contradictions. He looks calmly down from His bright, immeasurable
height and enjoys the endless harmony in which you all with your contradictions
are endlessly moving. In your pride you thought you could tear yourself away
from the universal law. No, even you, with your petty little indignation at the
waiters, even you have responded to the harmonious necessity of the endless and
the eternal.
From Lucerne Tolstoy
continued his journey up the Rhine, Schaffhausen, Baden, Stuttgart, Frankfort,
and Berlin.
On August 8th [1857] he
was in Stettin, and from there arrived in St. Petersburg by boat on August 11th
(July 30th, O.S.).
He remained in St.
Petersburg a week, visited the circle of "The Contemporary", called
on Nekrasov and read to him his tale "Lucerne", which was printed in
the September number of "The Contemporary" in 1857. On August 6th he
left for Moscow and then went straight on to tula.
Soon after his arrival
at Yasnaya Polyana he plunged into business in connection with his estate.
In his diary of that
period the following entry is found:
This is how during my
journey I divided my day: I put, first of all, literary work, then family
duties, then the estates; but the estates I must leave in the hands of the
steward as much as possible; but I must educate and improve him, and I must
only spend two thousand rubles, the rest should be used in the interests of the
peasants. My great stumbling block is the vanity of Liberalism. One should live
for oneself and a good deed a day is sufficient.
A little later he
wrote:
Self-abnegation does
not consist in saying, "Take from me what you like"; but in laboring
and thinking in concert with others, so as to give oneself to them.
August [1857] he
devoted to reading and studied two remarkable subjects, Homer’s
"Iliad" and the Gospels. Both produced a strong impression upon him.
"I have finished
reading the inexpressibly beautiful conclusion of the ‘Iliad’. Thus he
expresses himself, and the beauty of both these subjects makes him regret that
there is no connection between them. "How could Homer fail to know that
the only good is love?" he exclaims, mentally comparing these two books.
And he himself answers: "He knew of no revelation -- there is no better
explanation."
In the middle of
October [1857], Tolstoy moved to Moscow, together with his eldest brother
Nikolay and his sister Marie. His diary shows that he arrived there on the
17th. On October 23 [1857], he left that city for St. Petersburg, intending to
stay there a few days.
His tale
"Lucerne" (Memoirs of Prince Nekhludov), printed in "The
Contemporary", was not appreciated by the critics and therefore made no
impression.
The silence of the
critics gives striking and obvious proof how narrow-minded, short-sighted, and
incapable they were. On the whole, from 1857 up to 1861, according to the
opinion of Zelinskiy, who published a collection of critical essays on Tolstoy,
there were no criticisms on Tolstoy’s works in spite of the fact that during
that time he printed such remarkable works as "Youth,"
"Lucerne," "Albert," "Three Deaths," and
"Family Happiness."
Tolstoy was aware of
the indifference of the critics, and after his return from St. Petersburg in
October 1857, he wrote in his diary:
St. Petersburg at first
grieved and then put me right. My reputation has fallen or just lingers, and I
have been much grieved inwardly; but now I am at peace. I know that I have got
something to say, and the power of saying it strongly; as for the rest, the
public may say what it likes. But it is necessary to work conscientiously, to
lay out all one’s power, then...let them spit on the altar.
Tolstoy returned to
Moscow on October 30 [1857]. During his stay there, he very often saw Fet, who
in his Reminiscences thus described his visits:
One evening while were
taking tea, Tolstoy appeared quite unexpectedly and informed us that they, the
Tolstoys, i.e., his elder brother Nikolay and his sister Countess Marie, had
all three settled in the furnished rooms of Verighin, in Pyatnitskiy Street.
Before long we all became intimate.
I don’t know how the
Tolstoy brothers, Nikolay and Lev, became acquainted with S. Gromeka; it
occurred probably in our house. All three very soon became great friends, being
all of them enthusiastic sportsmen. [A. Fet, "My Reminiscences,
1848-1889", Part I, p. 214]
The Moscow life of
Tolstoy at this period (the end of the 1850s) had no remarkable feature. At
this time his physical nature was in full glow and strength and drew him in the
direction of ambitious enterprises, amusements, and society life in general.
Fet relates that
sometimes in the evening they had concerts in which Countess Marie Tolstaya
joined, herself a pianoforte player and a lover of music. Sometimes she would
arrive accompanied by Lev and Nikolay, sometimes by the latter only, who would
say, "Lev has put on his evening suit again and gone to a ball." [A.
Fet, "My Reminiscences, 1848-1889", Part I, p. 216]
Fet gives the following
account of these recreations:
I.P. Borisov had known
Tolstoy in the Caucasus, and being himself far superior to the average man, he
could not, from their first meeting in hour house, resist the influence of that
giant. But at that time, Tolstoy’s love for gaiety was more striking, and when
he saw him going out for a walk in his new coat with a gray beaver collar, his
dark curly hair showing under a fashionable hat worn on one side, with a smart
cane in hand, Borisov quoted these words from a popular song: "He leans on
his stick, and he boasts that it is made of hazel."
Gymnastics were very
popular with the fashionable young people at that time, the favorite exercise
being that of jumping over a wooden horse.
If anyone desired to
get hold of Tolstoy between one and two in the afternoon, he had to go to the
gymnasium hall at the Great Dmitrovka. It was interesting to watch how Tolstoy,
in his tights, eagerly tried to jump over the horse without catching the leather
cone stuffed with wool and placed on the horse’s back. No wonder that the
active, energetic nature of a young man of twenty-nine demanded such violent
exercise, but it was strange to see next to him old men with bald heads and
protruding stomachs. One young man would wait for his turn and every time run
and touch the back of the horse with his chest, then quietly go aside, giving
way to the next one. [A. Fet, "My Reminiscences, 1848-1889", Part I,
p216]
In the beginning of
January 1858, Countess Aleksandra Alekseyevna Tolstaya, a friend of Tolstoy in
his youth, paid a visit to Moscow. He saw her off to Klin by the Nikolayevskiy
railway, and then went to stay at the house of the Princess Volkonskaya, whose
name was introduced in the chapter of Tolstoy’s forefathers on his mother’s
side. This Princess Volkonskaya was the cousin of Tolstoy’s mother; she used to
pay long occasional visits at Yasnaya Polyana, and she was able to tell Tolstoy
many things of great interest about his father and mother.
Tolstoy cherished a
most pleasant remembrance of this visit; it was during his stay that he wrote
the tale "Three Deaths".
The idea of death began
seriously to absorb his attention, and, as usual, his desire was to make the
solution of the great problem consist in a harmony of the human soul with
nature. Any divergence from this solution involves unutterable suffering; its
attainment, eternal good; "the sting" of death therefore then
disappears.
He returned to Yasnaya
Polyana in February [1858]. Then he went again to Moscow, and in March to St.
Petersburg for a fortnight. In April he again returned to Yasnaya Polyana, and
he remained there the whole summer. During this period, Tolstoy devoted much of
his time to music, and in Moscow, in association with Botkin, Perfilev,
Mortier, and others, founded a Musical Association. Madame Kareyevskaya lent
her hall for the concerts got up by this association, which eventually resolved
itself into the Conservatoir of Moscow. In the same year, while in Moscow,
Tolstoy became very intimate with the family of S. T. Aksakov, the elder.
Springtime generally
exhilarated Tolstoy. The influx of energy which he experienced is well
described in a letter to his aunt, A. A. Tolstaya, written in 1858.
Auntie, it is
spring....For good people it is very good to be alive on earth; even for such
as me it is sometimes good. In nature, in the air, in everything -- hope,
future, and exquisite future...sometimes one is mistaken and thinks that it is
not only for nature that a future and happiness wait but also for oneself, and
then one feels happy. I am now in such a state, and with the egotism peculiar
to me, I hasten to write to you about things interesting only to myself. I very
well know when I bethink myself that I am an old frozen-out potato, boiled with
sauce into the bargain; but spring so acts upon me that I sometimes catch
myself in the full swing of visions that I am a plant which, together with
others, has only just opened and will peacefully, simply, and joyously grow in
God’s world. Accordingly at these times, there takes place such an inner
elaboration -- a purifying and an ordering of which no one who has not
experienced this feeling can form any idea. All the old -- away! All worldly
conventionalities, all laziness, all egotism, all vices, all confused,
indefinite attachments, all regrets, even repentance -- all this, away! ...
give place to a wonderful little flower which is budding and growing along with
spring...
This letter is rather
long but very interesting. It would, in fact, be interesting for its close
alone, at which Tolstoy makes the following request:
Goodby, dear Auntie, do
not be angry with me for this nonsense, and answer me with wise words imbued
with kindness -- and Christian kindness. I have long ago wished to write to you
that it is more convenient for you to write in French, and for me feminine
thought is more comprehensible in French.
During this spring, Fet
and his wife, while on their way through Moscow to their country abode, paid a
visit to Tolstoy in Yasnaya Polyana.
In his Reminiscences,
Fet thus described this visit, giving at the same time an interesting notice of
Tolstoy’s aunt, Tatyana Aleksandrovna Yergolskaya:
Having bought a warm
and comfortable kibitka [Kirghiz tent] covered with matting, we started, in
company with Mariushka (idealized by Tolstoy in his "Family
Happiness"), by mail post for Mtsensk. Nobody dreamed of a railway at that
time; as to the bare telegraph posts along the roads, people said the wire
would be first attached and after that freedom for the serfs will be sent down
the wire from St. Petersburg. By this time we were on such good terms with
Tolstoy that it would have been a great deprivation to us not to call on him
and stay for a day at Yasnaya Polyana to rest a little. There we were
introduced to the charming old lady, Tolstoy’s aunt, Tatyana Aleksandrovna
Yergolskaya, who received us with that old-fashioned hospitality which at once
makes the entrance under a new roof so pleasant. Tatyana Aleksandrovna was not
absorbed in the things of the past but fully shared the life of the present.
She mentioned that
Seryozhenka Tolstoy had gone to his house at Pirogovo and Nokolanka might yet
stay on for a while in Moscow with Mashenka, but Lyovochka’s friend D., she
said, came in the other day and complained of his wife’s neuralgia. In any
difficulties she always used to consult Lyovochka and was quite satisfied with
his explanations. Thus, driving in the autumn with him to Tula, looking out of
the carriage window, she suddenly asked, "Mon cher Leon, how is it people
write their letters by telegraph?" "I had," said Tolstoy,
"to explain as simply as possible the action of a telegraph instrument
similarly arranged at both ends of the wire, and as I was concluding, I heard
her say, ‘Oui, oui, je comprends, mon cher.’"
Having kept her eyes
fixed on the wire for more than half an hour, she at last asked, "Mon cher
Leon, how can this be? For a whole half-hour I have not seen a single letter
pass along the telegraph?"
"Sometimes,"
relates Tolstoy, "we used to sit at home with my aunt for a whole month
without seeing any one, and suddenly, while serving the soup, she would begin, ‘But
do you know, dear Leo, they say ---’"
The long autumn and
winter evenings have remained for me as a wonderful recollection. To these
evenings I owe my best thoughts and best impulses of my soul. I sit in an
armchair reading, thinking, and at times listening to her conversation with
Natalya Petrovna or Dunechka the maid, which was always good and kind; I
exchange a few words with her and again sit and read and think. This wonderful
armchair still stands in my home, though it is not what it was, and another
couch on which slept the kind old woman Natalya Petrovna, who lived with her,
not for her sake but because she had nowhere else to live. Between the windows
under the looking glass was her small writing table, with little china jars and
a small vase, in which were held the sweets, cakes, and dates, to which she
treated me. By the window tow armchairs, and to the right of the door a
comfortable embroidered armchair, on which she liked me to sit of an evening.
The chief delight of
this life was the absence of material worry, the affectionate terms on which we
all were, in the strong mutual attachment free from all doubt and misgiving by
which close kinsfolk and household were bound together, and the consciousness
of the flight of time.
Indeed, I was truly
happy when seated in that armchair. After leading a bad life at Tula, playing
cards with the neighbors, after the gypsy singers, as well as my shooting and
hunting -- silly vanity -- I would return home, go to her (my aunt) by old
habit and we would kiss each other’s hands, I -- her dear, energetic hand; she
-- my impure, vicious hand; and having greeted each one in French, also by old
habit, one would exchange a joke with Natalya Petrovna and seat oneself in the
cozy armchair. She (my aunt) knows all I have been doing, regrets it, but never
reproaches me, always treats me with the same love and affection. Seated in my armchair,
I read and meditate, and I listen to her conversation with Natalya Petrovna.
They either recall old times, or play at Patience, or make prognostics, or joke
about something, and both old ladies laugh -- especially auntie, with her dear,
childlike laugh, which I can hear at this moment. I tell them how the wife of
an acquaintance ha been unfaithful to her husband, adding that the husband must
have been glad to have got rid of her. And suddenly auntie, who has just been
talking with Natalya Petrovna about an excrescence of wax droppings on a candle
foreshadowing a guest, raises her eyebrows and says, as a thing long settled in
her soul, that a husband should not feel thus, because he would quite ruin his
wife. Then she tells me about a drama among the servants, of which Dunechka has
told her. Then she reads out a letter from my sister Mashenka, whom she loves,
if not more, at least as much as myself, and speaks about her husband, her own
nephew, without condemnation, yet grieving over the suffering he has caused
Mashenka. Then I again read, and she examines her little collection of sundries
-- all souvenirs.
But the chief feature
of her life which involuntarily insinuated itself into me was her wonderful,
universal kindness to everyone without exception. I try to recall any one case
when she got angry or said a rough word or condemned anybody, and I am unable
to do so. I cannot call to mind one such word during thirty years. She spoke
well of another aunt of ours who had cruelly hurt her feelings by taking us
away from her; and she did not condemn my sister’s husband, who had acted so
badly. as to what her goodness was to the servants, it goes without saying. She
grew up with the knowledge that there are masters and servants, but she used
her own position only to serve others. She never reproached me directly for my
bad life, although she was pained at it. Neither did she reproach my brother
Sergey, whom she also warmly loved, when he formed a connection with a gypsy
girl. The only indication of anxiety which she gave on occasions when he was
very late in coming home was that she used to say, "What’s the matter with
our Sergey?" Instead of Seryozha, merely Sergey. She never in words taught
how one should live; she never moralized. All her moral work was worked out
within her, and externally appeared only deeds -- indeed, not deeds -- there
were none of these, but all her peaceful, humble, submissive life of love, not
an agitated self-admiring passion, but a quiet unobtrusive love.
She fulfilled the inner
work of love, and therefore she had no cause to hurry anywhere. And these two
features, love and repose, imperceptibly attracted one into her society and
gave a special delight to intimacy with her.
And, as I know no case
when she hurt any one, so also I know no one who did not love her. She never
spoke about herself; never about religion, as to what one should believe or
what she herself believed and prayed for. She believed all, save that she
repudiated one single dogma -- that of eternal punishment. "Dier, qui est
la bonte meme, ne peut pas vouloir nos souffrances."
Except at Te Deums and
Requiems, I never saw her pray. Only through a special affability with which
she sometimes met me when I, occasionally late at night, after having said
goodby, returned to her, did I guess that I had interrupted her prayer.
"Come in, come in!" she used to say. "And I had just been saying
to Natalya Petrovna that Nicolas would look in again." She often called me
by my father’s name, and this was specially pleasant to me, as it showed that
her conceptions of me and of my father were blended in one love of both. At
this late time of the evening, she was already in her nightdress, with a shawl
thrown over her shoulders, with little spindle-like legs, in her slippers --
Natalya Petrovna was in a similar negligee.
Sit down, sit
down," she used to say when she saw that I could not sleep or was
suffering from solitude. And the memory of these irregular late sittings-up are
especially dear to me. It often happened that Natalya Petrovna, or else myself,
would say something funny, and she would laugh good-naturedly, and immediately
Natalya Petrovna would laugh too, and both old ladies would laugh for a long
time, themselves not knowing at what, but like children, merely because they loved
everyone and felt happy.
It was not only the
love for me which was joyous. The atmosphere was joyous, an atmosphere of love
to all present, absent, living and dead, and even to animals.
I will, if I have
occasion to dig up my past life, say a good deal more about her. Now I will
mention only the attitude of the poor, of the peasants of Yasnaya Polyana
toward her, as manifested at her funeral; when we carried her through the
village there was not one homestead among the sixty from which the dwellers did
not come out and demand a halt and a requiem. "She was a good lady, she
did no one any harm," said all. and for this she was loved, greatly loved.
Laotze says that things are valuable through what is absent from them. So also
with life -- the best feature it can have is that is should not contain evil.
In the life of my aunt Tatyana Aleksandrovna there was no evil. This is easy to
say, but the character is difficult to exemplify. And I have known only one
individual who exemplified it.
She died quietly,
gradually falling asleep, and died as she wished to die, not in the room where
she lived, so as not to sadden it for us.
In her last moments she
recognized scarcely any one. Me she always recognized, smiling, and her face
glowing like a lamp when the button is pressed, and sometimes she moved her
lips endeavoring to pronounce the name "Nicholas" thus, just before
her death, quite inseparably uniting me with the one she had loved all her
life.
And it was to her -- to
her -- that I refused that little joy which dates and chocolates afforded her,
and that not so much on her own account as for the pleasure she took in
treating me to them -- and refused her the possibility of giving a little money
to those who asked from her. I cannot recall this without an acute pang of
conscience. Dear, dear Auntie, pardon me. "Si jeunesse savait, si
viellesse pouvait" -- not in regard of the welfare which one has missed
for oneself in youth but of the welfare one has not given -- of the evil one
has done to those that are no more. [From Tolstoy’s Manuscript Memoirs]
The scanty but valuable
information which Tolstoy gives about the servants who surrounded him during
his childhood is exceedingly interesting. This information may serve as a
supplement to what is described in his published story "Childhood".
We find this description in his Reminiscences as well.
Though Tolstoy did not
spend the whole of the summer of 1858 in Yasnaya Polyana, being often away in
Moscow, yet peasant life interested him more and more, and he made an effort to
get in touch with "common" people.
In his Reminiscences
Fet quotes the words of Tolstoy’s brother Nikolay, full of fine humor
concerning those efforts:
In answer to our
inquires, the Count gave with undisguised delight the following account of his
beloved brother: "Lyovochka," he said, "tries hard to become
better acquainted with the life of the peasant and his way of managing his
land, of which we all know very little. However, I really cannot tell how far
the acquaintance will go. Lyovochka desires to take in all, not to miss
anything, not even gymnastics. That is why there is a bar placed under the
window of his study. To be sure, setting aside prejudices with which he is so much
at war, he is right; the gymnastics don’t interfere with his estate affairs,
but his bailiff views the matter somewhat differently. ‘I would come,’ he said,
‘for orders, but the master had got hold of a perch with one knee and was
hanging in his red tights with his head downward swinging, his hair falling
down dishevelled, and his red face bursting. I did not know whether to listen
to his orders or to stand and wonder at him.’ Lyovochka was pleased to see how
Yufan would spread wide his arms when he was ploughing. And now Yufan became
the emblem of the country’s power, something like Mikula Selyaninovich.
Spreading out his elbows, he too stuck to the plough and tried to imitate
Yufan."
In May of the same year
[1858], Tolstoy wrote to Fet from Yasnaya Polyana:
Dearest Old Fellow -- I
am writing two words only to say that I embrace you with all my might, that I
have received your letter, that I kiss Maria Petrovna’s hands, send a greeting
to all yours. Auntie is very thankful for your remembering her and she greets
you; and so does my sister. What a splendid spring it has been and is still. In
my solitude I have enjoyed it immensely. My brother Nikolay must be at
Nikolskoye; catch him there and do not let him go. This month I intend coming
to see you. Turgenev has gone to Winzig until August to treat himself. The
deuce take him! I am tired of loving him. He will not cure himself, but us he
will deprive of his company. With this, goodby dear friend. If before my
arrival you will write no verses, I will manage to squeeze them out of you.
Yours, Count L. Tolstoy."
What a Whitsuntide we
had yesterday! What a service at church, with fading wild cherry blossom, white
hair, bright red cretonne, and a hot sun!
And then another:
Hallo, old man! Hallo!
First, you yourself give no sign of life, when it is spring and you know that
we are thinking of you, and that I am chained, like Prometheus, to a rock, and
nevertheless thirst to see and hear you. You should either come or write,
decidedly. Secondly, you have appropriated my brother, and a very good one. The
chief culprit, I think, is Maria Petrovna, to whom I send my best greetings,
and whom I beg to return my own brother. Joking apart, he sent to say he was
coming back next week. And Druzhinin will also be here, so do come too, dear
old fellow.
After discharging his
summer duties at the estate, Tolstoy would take his share in works of public
interest.
A meeting of noblemen
of the Tula province was held in the autumn of 1858, from September 1 to
September 4, for the election of representatives to the Tula Committee for the
Improvement of the Status of the Peasantry. At that meeting, in virtue of the
statute regulating elections, by which the nobles have a right to express their
opinion on the wants of their province and on provincial affairs generally, a
hundred and five noblemen handed over to the Tula Marshal of nobility the
following resolution, to be presented to the Provincial Committee:
Having in view the
improvement of the status of the peasant, the security of the landowner’s
position in respect of his property, and the safety of both peasants and
landowners, we, the undersigned, are of opinion that the peasants ought to be
liberated and a certain amount of land allotted to them and their descendants,
and that the landowners should be compensated fully and fairly in money by
means of some financial operation which will not result in compulsory relations
between landowner and peasant; all such relations the nobility consider should
be abolished. (There follow the signatures of a hundred and five noblemen of
Tula Province, among which, of course, was the name of the Krapovna landowner,
Count L. N. Tolstoy.) ["The Contemporary" 1858, vol. lxxii, p300]
We must return to Fet’s
Reminiscences.
Since my wife and I
left Moscow in the autumn of 1858, Tolstoy contrived, as may be seen from the
following letter to me forwarded from Novoselki to Moscow, to go out hunting
with Borisov, who lent Tolstoy his whipper-in, together with a horse and dogs.
October 24th [1858] he
wrote from Moscow: Dearest old chap, Fetinka -- Indeed you are a dear fellow,
and I love you dreadfully. That’s all. To write stories is silly - - a shame.
To write verses...well, you may do so; but love a good man is very pleasant.
And yet perhaps against my will and consciousness, it is not myself but an
unripe story working in me, that makes me love. I sometimes think so. However,
one may avoid it, still from time to time between manure and this Kapoemon, one
finds oneself writing a story. I am glad, however, that I have not yet allowed
myself to write, and will not. Thank you most heartily for your trouble about
the veterinary, etc. I have found the Tula one, and he has begun the treatment.
What will come of it I don’t know. And the deuce take them all. Druzhinin
requests me to write a story for him like a friend. And I really intend to
compose one. I will compose such a one that there will be nothing in it: The
Shah of Persia is smoking a pipe, and I love you. That will be a poser. Joking
apart, how is you "Hafiz"? Whatever may be said, the height of wisdom
and firmness for me is to rejoice at other people’s writing, but not to let one’s
own out into the world in an ugly garb, but to consume it oneself with one’s
daily bread. Yet sometimes one suddenly feels such a desire to be a great man,
and so annoyed that hitherto this has not been realized. One even hurries to
get up, or finish one’s dinner in order to begin. One couldn’t express all one’s
frivolous thoughts, but it is pleasant to communicate at least one to such a
dear old fellow as you are, who lives entirely in such frivolity; send me one
of the longest pieces of poetry by "Hafiz" you have translated, me
faire venir l’eau á la bouche, and I will send you a sample of wheat. Sport has
bored me to death. The weather is excellent, but I do not go hunting alone.
In December 1858,
during a hunting expedition, Tolstoy met with an accident which nearly cost him
his life. Fed describes it this way:
Gromeka wrote on
December 15, 1858: "As you desired me, I hasten to inform you, deaf
Afanasy Afanasyevich, that one of these days, about the 18th or 20th, I mean to
go out bear-hunting. Tell Tolstoy that I have bought a she-bear with two young
ones, and that if he cares to take part in the hunt, he must come to Volochok
about the 18th or 19th, straight on to my place, without ceremony, and that I
will meet him with open arms, and a room will be ready for him. If he is not
coming, please let me know at once.
"I think the hunt
will certainly take place on the 19th. It will be best, therefore, indeed
necessary, to come on the 18th.
"If Tolstoy would
like to put off to the 21st, then let me know; it would be impossible to wait
longer."
For greater inducement,
the well-known leader in hear hunts, Ostashkov, paid Tolstoy a visit. On his
appearance in the hunting field, the scene can only be compared to the plunging
of a red-hot iron into cold water. Wild excitement and uproar followed. Seeing
that each bear hunter must possess two guns, Tolstoy borrowed my German double-barrelled
gun, intended for small shot. At the appointed day, our hunter Lev Nikolayevich
started for the Nikolayevskiy railway station. I will try to repeat correctly
all I heard from Tolstoy and his companions in the bear hunt.
When the hunters, each
carrying two loaded guns, gook their places along the meadow running through
the wood, which looked like a chess board from its openings, they were advised
to tread the deep snow as wide as possible round them so as to get more freedom
of movement. But Tolstoy remained at his post in snow almost up to his waist,
declaring that there was no need to tread the snow at all, as they were going
to shoot the bear and not to fight her. Accordingly, the Count placed one of
the guns against the trunk of a tree, so that when he had fired off the two
charges of his gun, he could throw it away and, holding out his hand, catch
mine. Presently the she-bear was startled out of her den by Ostashkov and made
her appearance. She rushed out down the valley along which the hunters were
placed in a direction at right angles to it, by one of the openings. This alley
opened on to the spot where was standing the hunter nearest to Tolstoy, so that
the latter could not even see the approach of the bear. But she, probably
scenting the hunter she was after all the time, swiftly rushed to the cross
opening and suddenly appeared at a very short distance from Tolstoy and quickly
flew at him. Tolstoy deliberately aimed and pulled the trigger, but probably
missed, for in the cloud of smoke he saw something huge approaching. He gave
another shot almost face to face, and the bullet hit the bear’s jaw, where it
stuck between the teeth. The Count could not move aside, the untrodden snow
giving him no room, and he had no time to snatch my gun, for he was knocked
down and fell with his face in the snow. At a run the bear crossed over him.
"There," thought the Count, "all is over with me. I missed now
and shall have no time to shoot at her again!"
At this moment he saw
something dark over his head. It was the she-bear, who had instantly returned,
and who tried to bite the head of the hunter who had wounded her. Lying with
his face downward in the thick snow, Tolstoy could only offer passive
resistance, trying as much as he could to draw his head between his shoulders
and expose his thick fur cap to the beast’s mouth. Perhaps in consequence of
these instinctive maneuvers, the bear, being twice unsuccessful, managed to
give only one considerable bite, with her upper teeth tearing the cheek under
his left eye, and with the lower the whole skin of the left part of his
forehead. At that moment Ostashkov arrived near, and running up with his small
switch in his hand, he approached the bear with his usual "Where are you
getting to? Where are you getting to?" At the sound of this exclamation,
the bear ran away as quickly as she could. It seems the next day she was
surrounded and killed.
The first words of
Tolstoy, when he got up with the skin hanging down his face, which had to be
bandaged with handkerchiefs on the spot, were: "What will Fet say?" I
am proud of it still. [A. Fet, "My Reminiscences, Part I" p226]
Having got over the
shock, Tolstoy hastened to inform his aunt of the incident and, in his letter
of December 25th [1858] thus described what had happened.
First of all I
congratulate you, secondly I am afraid that news of an adventure I have had may
in some way reach you in an exaggerated form, and therefore I make haste to
inform you of it myself.
I have been hunting
bears with Nicolas. On the 21st I shot a bear; on the 22nd, when we again went
out, an extraordinary thing happened to me. The bear, without seeing me,
charged me; I shot at it at a distance of six yards, missed it the first time,
the second mortally wounded it; but it rushed at me, knocked me down, and while
my companions were running up, it bit me twice in the forehead over the eye and
under the eye. Fortunately, this lasted only ten or fifteen seconds; the bear
made its escape and I rose up with a slight injury which neither disfigures me nor
causes pain; neither the skull nor the eye is injured, so that I have escaped
with merely a little scar, which will remain on my forehead. I am now in Moscow
and feel perfectly well. I am writing you the whole truth without concealing
anything, so that you may not be anxious. Everything is now over, and it only
remains to thank God, who has saved me in such an extraordinary way.
This episode served as
a subject for his tale "The Wish Is Stronger Than Bondage", published
in the "Books to Read". There are many artistic details left out by
Fet with which the fancy of the artist adorned the real facts of the incident.
That is why, in relating it, we preferred to use the reminiscences of Tolstoy’s
friend and his own letter, as better serving our purpose.
The early months of
1859 Tolstoy spent in Moscow, and in April he went to st. Petersburg, where he
spent ten days in the company of his friend A. A. Tolstaya. He cherished the
most grateful memories of this visit.
At the end of April
[1859], Tolstoy was again at Yasnaya Polyana, and there he remained for the
whole summer.
During the summer,
Tolstoy paid a visit to Turgenev at his house at Spasskoye.
In verses sent to Fet
on July 16, 1859, Turgenev wrote:
Embrace, please,
Nikolay Tolstoy,
And give to Lev Tolstoy
my compliments, and to his sister too.
He rightly says in his
postscript:
I have "no
cause" to write to him. I know
He loves me slightly
and I love him slightly--
Too different in us are
our elements,
But many are the roads
across this world,
We need not stand in
one another’s way.
[A. Fet, "My
Reminiscences, Part I" p305]
These lines show that
their relations continued mutually respectful and amiably cold.
However, the visit went
off smoothly. In his letter to Fet of october 9th of the same year [1859],
Turgenev thus speaks of their meeting:
Our ladies send their
best greetings to all of you. I had a quiet talk with Tolstoy, and we parted on
friendly terms. It seems there can be no misunderstanding between us, because
we know each other too well, and we understand that it is impossible for us to
become intimate. We are modelled in different clay.
In August [1859],
Tolstoy is again in Moscow, where he spent the autumn.
The year 1860 found him
again in a perturbed mood.
Yet during the winter
of 1859-60 he enjoyed rest and pleasure in his schools. In his
"Confession" he speaks of that time in the following terms:
On my return from
aborad, I settled in the country and occupied myself with the organization of
schools for the peasantry. This occupation was especially grateful to me,
because it was free from the spirit of imposture which so strikes me in the
career of a literary teacher.
Here again I acted in
the name of progress, this time I brought a spirit of critical inquiry to bear
on the system on which the progress rested. I said to myself that progress was
often attempted in an irrational manner, and that it was necessary to leave a
primitive people and the children of peasants perfectly free to choose the way
of progress which they thought best. In reality, I was still bent on the
solution of the same impossible problem, how to teach without knowing what it
was I had to teach. In the highest sphere of literature I had understood that
it was impossible to do this, because I had seen that everybody had his own way
of teaching, and that the teachers quarrelled among themselves, and scarcely
succeeded in concealing their ignorance. Having now to deal with peasant
children, I thought I could get over this difficulty by allowing the children
to learn whatever they liked. It seems now absurd, when I remember the
experiments by which I carried out this whim of mine as to teaching, thought I
knew in my heart that I could teach nothing useful, because I myself did not
know what it was necessary to teach.
This constant feeling
of dissatisfaction with himself, this searching for the meaning of life, was a
permanently active force, leading him forward on the path of his moral
progress.
In February [1859],
Tolstoy was admitted a member of the Moscow Society of Admirers of Russian
Literature.
On February 4, 1859, a
meeting of the Society was held, under the presidency of A. S. Khomyakov.
Tolstoy was present at
this meeting and was one of the newly elected members; and, in accordance with
the rules of the Society, he had to make an inaugural address. In it, as stated
in the records of the Society, he mentioned the advantage of the purely
artistic element in literature over all temporary tendencies. Unfortunately,
this speech has never been preserved. In the minutes of the sitting it is
stated that at first it was resolved to have the address printed, together with
the works of the Society, but afterward, the works not being published, the
speech was returned to the author, who has probably mislaid it along with
useless papers. [The Moscow Society of Admirers of Russian Literature,
"The Collection of Minutes." One of the few remaining copies is in
the British Museum.]
We can get some idea of
this speech from the excellent reply made by A. S. Khomyakov, which we quote in
toto:
The Society of the
Admirers of Russian Literature, in adding you, Count Tolstoy, to the number of
its members, bids you welcome as a worker in the field of pure art. In your
address you defend the tendency of pure art, placing it above all other
temporary and casual tendencies of literary activity. It would be strange if
the Society did not sympathize with you, but I beg leave to say that the
justice of your views, so skillfully expounded by you, does not exclude the rights
of the contemporary and the casual in the domain of letters. That which is
always just, that which is always beautiful, that which is unchangeable like
the fundamental laws of the soul -- that undoubtedly occupies, and must occupy,
the foremost place in the thoughts, in the impulses, and therefore in the words
of man. That, and that alone, is handed down from generation to generation,
from nation to nation, as a precious inheritance, always being multiplied and
never forgotten. But, on the other hand, there exists in the nature of man, and
in the nature of society, as I had the honor to state, a constant demand for
self-exposure; there are moments, important moments, in history when this
self-denunciation acquires special decisive rights, and comes forward in the
domain of letters with greater precision and greater sharpness.
In the historic process
of the life of a nation, the temporary and the casual acquire the significance
of the universal, of the all-human, if only for the reason that all generations,
all people, can and do understand the painful cries and the painful confessions
peculiar to a particular generation or a particular people. The rights of
literature, as subordinate to eternal beauty, do not annihilate the rights of
literature as the instrument of criticism and of the disclosure of human
defects, while at the same time they help to heal social sores. There is
boundless beauty in the serene truth and harmony of the soul; but there is also
true and high beauty in the penitence which restores truth and guides men or
communities to moral perfection. Let me add that I cannot share the one-sided
views (as they seem to me) of German aesthetics.
Of course, art is quite
free: in itself it finds its justification and its aim. But freedom of art, abstractedly
understood, has nothing to do with the inner life of the artist.
The artist is not the
theory, not the domain of thought and intellectual activity: he is a man, and
always a man of his time, usually its best representative, steeped in its spirit,
and that both in its established and its still developing tendencies.
By the very
sensitiveness of his organization, without which he could not be an artist, he,
more than others, enters into all the painful as well as joyful sensations of
the world which surrounds him.
By always devoting
himself to the true and the beautiful, he involuntarily reflects in word,
thought, and imagination the contemporary epoch in its mixture of truth, which
gladdens a pure heart, and falsehood, which perturbs its harmonious repose.
Thus flow together the
two streams of literature of which we spoke; thus a writer, a servant of pure
art, becomes at times a trenchant social critic, and that unwittingly and
sometimes even against his will. I beg leave, Count, to take you as an example.
You are treading the particular path of literary art unflinchingly and rightly,
but are you really quite alien to the tendency which you call denunciatory
literature?
Now in the picture of
the consumptive driver dying on the stove in the midst of a group of comrades,
who are evidently indifferent to his sufferings, is it not possible that you
revealed some social disease, some kind of vice? In describing this death, did
you not feel pain at the callous indifference of those good-natured but
unawakened human souls? Yes, and therefore you were and must be an involuntary
teacher. I wish you good speed on the grand path you have chosen.
Success be with you in
the future as it has been hitherto, or let it be still greater, for your gift
is not a transitory gift, not one to be soon exhausted. But, believe me, in
letters the eternal and artistic constantly absorb the temporary and transient,
developing and ennobling them, and all the various streams of the domain of
human letters constantly flow together, forming one harmonious current.
["Russian Archive", 1986, No. 11 p491. Article of V. N. Lyaskovskiy,
"A.S. Khomyakov: His Biography and His Teaching."]
The prophecy of
Khomyakov was fulfilled. Apart from the denunicatory element of all Tolstoy’s
work of the first period, twenty years later Tolstoy came forward with his own
penitence, and then with his denunciation of contemporary evils. And in this
cause he has concentrated all his powerful artistic gifts.
In February 1860, Fet
wrote to Tolstoy to consult him as to an intention which he had of buying some
land and devoting himself to agriculture. Tolstoy’s answer was very
sympathetic, he approved of Fet’s plans, offered his help, mentioning certain
lands for sale, and after this businesslike part of the letter, of no general
interest, he expressed the following important thoughts about some works of
Turgenev and Ostrovskiy:
I have read "On
the Eve". This is my opinion. To write stories isin general a mistake, and
especially so on the part of those who feel unhappy and do not exactly know
what they desire from life. However, "On the Eve" is much better than
"A Nest of Nobles", and there are in it excellent negative
characters: the artist and the father. The other characters not only fail to be
types, but their conception, their situation, is not typical, or else they are
quite trivial. However, this is Turgenev’s usual mistake. the young lady is
wretchedly drawn: "Oh,how I love you...she had long eyelashes...." In
general, it always astonishes me in Turgenev that with his intelligence and
poetic sensitiveness he is not able to avoid insipidity, and that even in his
methods. There is more of this insipidity in his negative methods, reminding
one of Gogol. There isno humanity, no sympathy with the characters, but
monsters are represented whom he abuses but does not pity. This painfully jars
with the liberal tone and bearing of all the rest. This method may have been
good in times gone by and in those of Gogol. Besides, one must add that if one
does not pity one’s most insignificant characters, then one should cut them up
like mincemeat, or else laugh them down till one’s sides ache; but not treat
them as Turgenev does, filled with spleen and dyspepsia. In general, however,
no one else now could write such a story, although it will not meet with
success.
"The Tempest"
by Ostrovskiy is to my mind a pitiful work, but it will succeed. Neither
Ostrovskiy nor Turgenev is to blame, but the times....Another thing is now
required. It is not for us to learn but to teach Tommy and Mary at least a
little of what we know. Goodby dear friend.
Tolstoy had arrived at
the conclusion that a man endowed with brains and enriched with knowledge must,
before deriving pleasure from them for himself, give a share in the benefit of
them to those who are deprived of both. Accordingly, he had devoted to the
school the time he had free from his work on the estate. In these occupations he
passed the winter of 1859-60. At the same time, while doing reading, serious
reading, he had come to the following conclusions:
1st February [1860] --
I have read La degenerescence de l’esprit humain, and about there being
physically a higher degree of intellectual development. In this state I
mechanically thought of prayer. Prayer to whom? What! is God conceived so
clearly that one can beseech and communicate with Him? If I do conceive such a
one He loses all magesty for me. A God whom one can beseech and serve is the
expression of the weakness of one’s mind. God is God precisely because I cannot
imagine the whole of His being. Besides, He is not a being but a Law and a
Power.
Let these lines remain
as an indication of my conviction of the power of the mind.
Then he reads Auerbah’s
storie, "Reynard the Fox" by Goethe, and finally about the same time
he jots down the following thought:
A strange religion is
mine and that of our time, the religion of progress. Who said that progress was
good? It is merely the absence of faith and the striving after lines of
activity -- represented as faith. Man requires an impulse - Schwung -- Yes,
that is it.
These thoughts were
fully developed in his educational works, as we shall see later on, and also in
the self-analysis contained in his confession quoted above.
Tolstoy’s friends were
watching his literary career with intense interest, treating condescendingly
and half-jokingly "the foolishness and eccentricity", as they called
them, of those manifestations of the deep inner growth in Tolstoy, which most
of them wholly failed to understand.
Thus, Botkin casually
wrote to Fet on March 6, 1860:
I learned with joy from
Turgenev’s letter that Tolstoy has again set to work at his Caucasian novel. He
may play the fool as long as he likes, still I maintain he is a man with great
gifts. Any portion of his foolishness is of more value to me than the wisest
acts of others. [A. Fet, "My Reminiscences, Part I" p324]
Turgenev’s attitude was
the same: here is part of his letter to Fet of the same year:
But Lev Tolstoy still
goes on in his queer way. Such is evidently his destiny. When will he make his
last somersault and stand on his feet? [A. Fet, "My Reminiscences, Part
I" p325]
In the spring of 1860,
Fet and his wife paid their usual visit at Yasnaya Polyana on their way from
town to the country Fet made a short not of his stay there on this occasion.
Of course, we could not
refuse ourselves the pleasure of spending a couple of days in Yasnaya Polyana,
where to add to our joy, we found dear N. N. Tolstoy, who for his original
Oriental wisdom has earned the nickname of Firdusi. How many delightful plans
of staying in the gable in Yasnaya Polyana were discussed in great detail by us
during those two days! It did not occur to any one of us how unsound all those
plans were.
Further on, Fet tells
of the coming of Nikolay Tolstoy to their place:
Once Nikolay Tolstoy
arrived here in the middle of May and told us that his sister Marie Tolstaya
and his brothers had persuaded him to go abroad on account of his unbearable
fits of coughing. He was very thin at this time, apart from his usual slimness.
From time to time in his good-natured laughter could be heard that note of
irritability which is habitual with consumptive people. I remember how he once
got angry and pulled his hand from the coachman, who had tried to kiss it.
True, he said nothing in the presence of the serf, but when the latter went out
to see to the horses, he began to complain with annoyance in his voice to me
and Borisov: "What made the idiot kiss my hand? It never happened
before." [A. Fet, "My Reminiscences, Part I" p326]
Since we have to speak
of Tolstoy’s relations to his brother during his life and at his death, it may
be well to quote Fet’s character sketch of this remarkable man:
Count N. N. Tolstoy,
who called on us almost every evening, used to bring with him a moral interest
and vivacity, which it is difficult to describe in a few words. At that time he
was still wearing his uniform as an artillery officer, and it was sufficient to
give a glance at his thin hands, his great thoughtful eyes and hollow cheeks to
be convinced that cruel consumption had laid its merciless hold on this good
natured and kindly humorous man. Unfortunately, this remarkable man, of whom to
say that he was loved by those who knew him is not enough, for they simply
worshipped him, this man, while in the Caucasus, had acquired that habit of
indulgence in alcoholic liquors which at that time was common among officers.
Though I afterwart knew N. Tolstoy intimately and spent with him much time in
far off hunting fields, where it would have been easier to drink than at
evening parties, yet during our three years’ friendship I never noticed the
slightest symptom of his being overcome by wine or spirits. He would sit in an
armchair close to the table and sip his tea with some cognac added to it. Being
of a very modest disposition, he needed a great deal of questioning to make him
talk. But once launched on any subject, he would reveal all the acutness and
mirth of his kind- hearted sense of humor. He evidently adored his youngest
borther Lev. But one had to hear how ironically he described his society
adventures. He could so definitely separate what is the real substance of life
from its gauzy outer seeming, that he treated with equal irony the higher and
lower strata of Caucasian life. The celebrated hunter of the sect of old
believers, Uncle Epishka (in Tolstoy’s "Cossacks" Yeroshka), was
evidently discovered and defined with the mastery of an artist by N. Tolstoy.
[A. Fet, "My Reminiscences, Part I" p217]
N. N. Tolstoy wrote
very little. We only know of his "Memoirs of a Sportsman."
E. Garshin in his
"Reminiscences of Turgenev" quotes the following opinion of his
concerning N. Tolstoy:
The humility of life
[said Turgenev] which was theoretically worked out by Lev Tolstoy, was really
practised by his brother. He always lived somewhere in the outskirts of Moscow,
in poor lodgings were were more like a hut, and gladly shared what he had with
the poorest man. He was a delightful character and a good story-teller, but
writing was almost physically impossible for him. The very process of writing
was a difficulty with him, just as it is with a laborer whose hands are so
roughened by work that he can scarcely hold the pen between his fingers. [E.
Garshin, "Reminiscences of Turgenev" Historical Review, November
1883.]
To the general joy of
his friends, N. Tolstoy’s journey abroad was actually settled. This joy,
however, was of short duration.
He left Russia via St.
Petersburg with his brother Sergey.
Turgenev, who had a
strong regard for him, felt very anxious and wrote to Fet fromSodene on June 1,
1860:
What you tell me of
Nikolay Tolstoy’s illness grieves me deeply. Is it possible that this dear,
good fellow must perish? How could any one neglect such an illness? Is it
possible that he did not try to overcome his indolence and go abroad for his
health? He used to travel to the Caucasus in most infernally uncomfortable
vehicles. Why not make him come to Sodene? One meets here dozens of sufferers
from chest complaints: the Sodene waters are almost the best, if not the best
for such cases. I say all this to you at a distance of two thousand versts, as
if my words were of some help....If Tolstoy has not yet started, he will not
go....This is how fate plays with us all. [A. Fet, "My Reminiscences, Part
I", pp 328, 329]
He repeats the same in
the postscript of the same letter:
If N. Tolstoy has not
yet gone, throw yourself at his feet and implore him, then drive him by force
abroad. The air here, for instance, is so mild, nothing of the kind exists in
Russia. [Ibid]
Of course Tolstoy was
very much alarmed by his brother’s illness. Here is a letter written about that
time by him to Fet, in which, besides his anxiety about his brother, he
expressed certain views on agricultural work:
...That besides your
literary work you wish to find a place on the earth and burrow about in it like
an ant - - such an idea was not only bound to suggest itself to you, but you
are sure to realize it better than myself, being, as you are, a good man with a
healthy outlook on life. However, it is not for me at the present moment to
patronizingly approve or disapprove of you, for I am burdened with a sense of
great inconsistency. Farming in the big way I am doing, oppresses me; personal
labor on the land I can only as yet contemplate at a distance. On the other
hand, I am oppressed by family worries, the illness of Nikolenka, of whom there
is yet no news from abroad, and the departure of my sister in three days’ time
depress me. In general, I feel undone. Owing to my sister’s helplessness and
the desire to see Nikolas, I will tomorrow procure a passport for abroad and
will perhaps accompany them, especially if I do not get any news or get bad
news from Nikolas.
At that time a pause
ensued in the literary activity of both Tolstoy and his friend Fet, who, though
feebly, yet accurately reflected the inner process going on in Tolstoy’s life.
The following are
examples of the well-reasoned letters written by Druzhinin to Tolstoy and Fet,
inciting them to literary work. His letter to Tolstoy is particularly
interesting:
I hasten, my amiable
friend Tolstoy, to answer your letter concerning your attitude to literature.
As you will probably understand, every writer is attacked by moments of doubt
and dissatisfaction with himself; it does not matter how strong and natural
this feeling is, nobody relinquishes literature in consequence, but all write
on till the end of life. But all your good and evil impulses stick to you with
peculiar tenacity, and therefore you are more bound to think over it than
anybody else, and you should consider the whole matter in a genial manner.
"In the first
place, remember that, compared with the labor of poetry and thought, all other
labors seem trivial. Qui a bu, boira, and for a writer to give up his activity
at the age of thirty means depriving himself of one-half of all the interests
of life. And this is only one of the difficulties of the matter; there is much
of wider significance.
"On all of us
there rests a responsibility attached to the extreme importance of literature
to Russian society. An Englishman or an American would laugh, if told that in
Russia not only men who are thirty years old, but gray-haired landowners
possessing two thousand serfs, pore over a novelette of a hundred pages which
has appeared in a magazine, is being devoured by everybody, and provokes talk
in society for a whole day. It does not matter by what art you try to explain this
matter, it is not to be explained by means of art. What in other countries is
only talk of careless dilettantism, in ours takes a different shape. In our
country things have come to this, that a novelette a diversion and the lowest
kind of literature becomes either useless trash or the voice of a new mind for
the whole Empire. For instance, we all know Turgenef’s weakness, but a whole
ocean separates his poorest novelette from the very best novels of Mrs. Eugenie
Toor’s with her half-talent. The Russian public, having a peculiar taste, has
from a crowd of writers chosen four or five as superior to the rest, and values
them as new minds, disregarding all considerations and inferences. Partly
through your talents, partly owing to the bright traits of your spirit, and
partly to the lucky concurrence of circumstances, you are placed in a favorable
position for influencing the public; consequently it is impossible to retire
and hide oneself, one must work on till one’s strength and This is one side of
the matter, but are a member of a literary circle, which is honest,
independent, and influential, as far as possible, and which, during ten years
of persecution and reverses, still, in spite of its own shortcomings, firmly
upholds the banner of everything that makes for Liberalism and enlightenment,
and bares all the pressure of the ironies of life without ever committing a
mean action.
" In spite of all
the coldness of society, its want of enlightenment, and its tendency to treat
literature with mere condescension, ¨his circle has gained respect and moral
force, and even if, as no doubt is the case, there are shallow, not to say
foolish and insignificant people in it, still they add something to the whole,
and are not quite useless. Notwithstanding the short time it is since you
arrived, you have a place and a voice in this circle, such as, for instance,
Ostrovsky does not possess, though he has great talent, and is as much
respected for his moral attitude as you are for yours. It would take too long
to find out how this has come about, but that is not the chief thing. Once
having cut yourself off from the literary circle and surrendered yourself to
inactivity, you will feel lonely, and will deprive yourself of an important
role in society. Here I finish my dissertation owing to lack of space in the
letter; if these suggestions of interest to you, you will develop and complete
them yourself."
With the same friendly
advice he addresses Fet:
"DEAR FET What I
said to Tolstoy I to your intention to write no more. Stick to your resolution
till you are ready to write something good; but when you are able to write,
then you will change your mind without outside influence.
"To keep good
poetry and a good book unpublished is impossible, had you sworn a thousand
oaths to do so; so you need not trouble. For these last two or three years you
and Tolstoy have been in an uninspired mood, and you act wisely in keeping
silent; but as soon as the soul is stirred and something good is created, you
will both break silence. Therefore don’t bind yourselves with promises, the
more so because nobody expects any from either of you. What is not right in
Tolstoy’s resolution and yours is this they have originated under the influence
of a certain grudge against literature and the public. But if an author is to
be offended at every manifestation of indifference and every piece of harsh
criticism, there will be no one left to do any writing except Turgenef, who
manages somehow to be everybody’s friend. To take to heart literary squabbles
is, in my opinion, the same thing as to get angry with the horse you are riding
for misbehaving while you are in a poetic mood. I may tell you that I have been
abused and offended to a degree, yet this has not deprived me of a particle of
my appetite; on the contrary, I have found a peculiar pleasure in my
determination to sit firmly and move forward, and I shall certainly not stop
writing till I have said all I think necessary to say."
Druzhinin was certainly
mistaken in thus attributing his friends’ silence to irritation against the
public. If such an irritation existed, it was but the outcome of the same cause
which kept them from writing, the conviction that neither the reader nor the
author had any firm moral basis and bond of union for mutual understanding.
The authors did not
know what to write; the readers, ac represented by the critics, did not know
what to demand from the authors. This would continue to be the case till some
great event of life or history would stir the brain and feeling of the author
and incite him to activity.
Let us return to N.
Tolstoy’s illness.
On his way abroad he
wrote to Fet from St. Petersburg:
" My dear friends,
Fet and Ivan Petrovich, I keep my promise even before I gave it. I intended to
write from abroad, and now I write from St. Petersburg. We are off on Saturday
I. e., to-morrow. I consulted Zdekauer, he is a St. Petersburg doctor, and not
a Berlin man, as I made out from Turgenef’s letter. The watering-place Turgenef
is staying at, Sodene, is the same that we are sent to, consequently my
address, too, is Francfort on Main."
Following this, Fet
received his second letter sent from Sodene itself:
" Not having heard
from you, I write to inform you that I reached Sodene safely; however, they did
not fire any cannon at my arrival. In Sodene we found Turgenef, who is alive
and well, so well that he himself owns he is ’perfectly’ well. He has
discovered a certain German girl, and is very enthusiastic about her. We (it
refers to dear old Turgenef) play at chess, but somehow it does not work: he is
thinking about his German girl, and I about getting well. As I have sacrificed
this autumn, I must become a giant by next autumn. Sodene is an excellent
place. I have been scarcely a week here, and feel already a great deal better.
We are, my brother and I, in lodgings. rooms we pay twenty guldens is a week,
table d’hote = one gulden, wine forbidden. From this you can infer what an
unpretending place Sodene is, but I like it. Facing my windows grows a not
exactly beautiful tree, still a bird has made its home there and sings on it
every evening; it reminds me of the wing of the building at Novosyolky.
" Give my regards
to Marya Petrovna and be well, my friends, and write to me often. I believe I
shall stay a long time at Sodene, about six weeks at least. I do the journey,
because I was ill all the time. Once more, good-by.’’
On July 3d Tolstoy,
with his sister and her children, took the steamer at St. Petersburg to go to
Stettin for Berlin.
The illness of his
brother was the reason which hastened Tolstoy’s departure abroad, though he had
been ready long before. His purpose was to get acquainted with what had been
done in Europe for popular education.
" After a year
spent by me in work among the schools (in Russia)," says Tolstoy in his
Confession, " I went abroad for the second time in order there to find out
how I could manage to learn to teach others without knowing anything myself."
But Tolstoy could thus
severely criticize the object of his journey only twenty years later, when he
gave himself up to the study of this subject with all the passionate fervor of
his temperament.
The illness and death
of his brother did not stop this work, it only divided the journey in two
parts.
We will try to describe
more fully what took place.
From Stettin Tolstoy
arrived in Berlin with his sister, who continued her journey to join her
brother at Sodene, while Tolstoy remained for a few days in Berlin.
He attended the
university, and was present at the lectures given by Droysen, the Professor of
History, and also at those of Dubois-Raymond, the Professor of Physics and
Physiology. Besides this, Tolstoy went to the evening classes for artisans
Handwerksverein and got very much interested in the popular lectures of one
prominent professor, especially in the system of " query-boxes." This
method of national education was till then unknown to Tolstoy, and it struck
him by its animation and the freedom of intercourse which it encouraged between
the representatives of science and the people at large. Unfortunately, forty
years have since gone by, but Russia has not yet reached this simple method of
educating the people. The police censorship, theological and lay, makes the
application of the system impossible.
After this Tolstoy
visited the Moabit Prison, with its newly introduced method of scientific
torture, known by the name of solitary confinement. Needless to say, this new
invention did not produce a favorable impression on him.
He left Berlin on July
14th.
He stopped for a day in
Leipsic to examine the schools, and, having crossed the so-called "
Swiss-Saxony," which impressed him very much by its beauty, he paused at
Dresden, where he met the well-known popular writer Berthold Auerbach.
The American writer,
Schuyler, in gives Tolstoy’s account of this interview, amplifying it by a few
details collected afterward:
" In helping
Tolstoy to arrange his library, I noticed that the works of Auerbach occupied
the honored place on the first shelf. He took the two volumes of Ein Neues
Leben, and told me to read that very remarkable book when I went to bed,
adding:
" To this author I
was indebted for the opening of a school for my peasants, and for so becoming
interested in national education. When I went abroad for the second time, I
visited Auerbach without naming myself. When he came into the room I only said,
’ I am Eugene Baumann," and when he showed astonishment I made haste to
add, ’not actually by name, but by character.’ And then I told him who I was,
how his writings had compelled me to think, and what a good effect they had
upon me.
" In the following
winter," continues Schuyler, " I had an opportunity of spending a few
days in Berlin. While there, under the hospitable roof of the American
ambassador, Mr. Bancroft, I had the pleasure of meeting Auerbach, with whom I
got very well acquainted during that time. In speaking of Russia, we turned to
Tolstoy, and I reminded him of the incident.
"’Yes,’ he said, ’I
remember how I was taken aback by the odd-looking gentleman, when he told me he
was Eugene Baumann, for I was afraid he would threaten me with prosecution for
defamation or libel.’"
The examination of the
schools in Saxony did not satisfy Tolstoy.
In his travelling notes
we find the following short description of these schools:
" I visited a
school. It was dreadful. Prayers for the King, whippings, everything learned by
heart, frightened, mentally distorted children."
On July 19th he
continued his journey, and arrived at Kissingen, where he was near his brother.
In Kissingen he
continued to read a great deal; on natural science he read Bacon; on religion,
Luther; on politics, Riehl. He probably read Herzen at the same time, for there
is a short entry about him in his diary.
" Herzen a
scattered intellect, sick with vanity, but broad, agile and kind,
distinguished, purely Russian."
In Kissingen Tolstoy
made the acquaintance of Julius Froebel, the German sociologist, author of The
System of National Politics, and nephew of the educationist Froebel, the
founder of the Kindergarten.
According to Froebel,
Tolstoy astonished him by his strong views, which were quite new to the German
scholar, and seemed not to harmonize with his " system."
" Progress in
Russia," Tolstoy said, " must emanate from national education, which
will give better results in our country than in Germany, because the Russian
people are not yet perverted, whereas the Germans resemble a child who has been
for several years undergoing a wrong education."
Popular instruction
must not be compulsory, such was his idea. If it is good, he said, then the
need of it must be born of itself, just as the desire of nutrition is created
by hunger.
He expressed with great
animation his views upon communal peasant ownership of land, and saw in the
" artel " the future of social organization. Froebel often smiled as
he listened to similar views expressed by Tolstoy with reference to the German
people. Tolstoy was struck by not finding in a single German peasant household
either Village Tales or the works of Goebel. Russian peasants, he declared,
would have shed tears over such books.
The impressions
received by him from Berthold Auerbach in Dresden, and from Froebel during
their walks together, confirmed him in a task the outline of which had only
existed vaguely in his mind. The author of The System of Social Politics
pointed out to him that the works of Riehl were more in sympathy with his
(Tolstoy’s) views, and Tolstoy, with all the ardor of youth, began to study The
Natural History of the People as the Foundation of German Social Policy.
The nephew of Frederic
Froebel was also by vocation an educationist. He made Tolstoy acquainted with
the ideas of the founder of the Kindergarten system.
In Kissingen Tolstoy
visited all the suburbs, which are rich in natural beauty and historical
reminiscences. He crossed the Harz, stopped at some towns in Thuringia, and
from Eisenach went on to Wartburg.
The personality of the
German reformer, whose hard struggle is recalled by Wartburg, interested
Tolstoy very much. Luther’s rupture with the old traditions, his bold and
upright progressive activity, and the ideas of which he was a representative,
carried Tolstoy completely away, and after a visit to the room in which were
written the first words of the Bible in German, he wrote this short sentence:
" Luther is great."
Meanwhile the invalid
N. Tolstoy wrote to Fet on July 19th:
I would have written
long ago, my dear friends, only I wanted to give you the news of all our
Tolstoy household, but a great muddle ensued some time ago, which at last
cleared up in this way: my sister and her children arrived at Sodene, where she
will stay and pursue her cure; Uncle Lyovochka remains at Kissingen, five hours
distant from Sodene, and is not coming to Sodene, so that I shall not see him.
Your letter I have sent to Lyovochka, by my brother Sergey, who will call at
Kissingen on his way to Russia. He will call on you soon, and tell you
everything in detail. Forgive me, dear Afanasy Afanasyevich, I have read your
letter to my brother. There is much truth in it, when you speak of things in
general; but when you mention yourself, you are not right; there is always the
same defect of being unbusinesslike; you do not know yourself, and you know
nothing of what is around you. But pots are not boiled by the gods; now, be
practical, go unhesitatingly into business, and I am sure it will drive the
babbler out of you; besides, it will probably squeeze out of you some lyrical
verses, more fellows would read with pleasure. As to the rest of the world
forget it. What I love you for, my dear Afanasy Afanasyevich, is this, that
what comes out of you is in you, and is as is the case with dear old Ivan
Sergeyevich. Yet I feel quite lonely without him in Sodene, apart from the fact
that our chess club has come to grief. Even my appetite is not the same, since
I have ceased to sit beside his stout and healthy figure, asking either for
carrots to add to the meat, or meat to add to the carrots. I have often talked
with him of you, especially lately. ’ Now Fet is starting, now Fet is coming,
now Fet is shooting at last.’ Ivan Sergeyevich has bought a dog a black pointer
half-breed. I have finished my water cure and intend to undertake a few
excursions. Yet my chief quarters will be Sodene and the address the
same."
Nicolay Tolstoy left so
few literary works that we quote below some of his letters to the common friend
of the Tolstoy brothers, Dimitri Alexeyevich Diakof. Although their contents
are not very rich, still they reflect his kindheartedness.
He wrote to Diakof
twice from Sodene:
I. DEAR DIAKOF Did you
get my letter from St. Petersburg? If you did, you are committing a crime by
not answering. What is the matter with you ? I hope all your folks are well for
Christ’s sake answer me if Darya Alexandrovna is going abroad. When, to what
place, or is she gone already? If I knew all this I would go to meet her
straight off. I have done taking mineral waters and now I am resting. My sister
is at Sodene too, she will stay four weeks. My address is: Sodene, near
Francfort-on-Main, Landlust House, etc.
" My health has
improved, but I am not well yet; I dare say I could say the same about your
people. For Christ’s sake, let me know how you are managing your household,
what plans you have made, etc. Lyovochka is in Kissingen; Seryozha was with me
in Solene; he got stumped by playing roulette and went back to Russia; he will
probably call at your place. Yours, COUNT N. TOLSTOY."
" July 19th.
2. " I don’t know
how to thank you, Darya Alexandrovna, for your postscript; it means that you
have not forgotten your neighbor. How is your health? How is Masha? I expect we
shall meet this year, and I look forward to it with delight; only let me know
where you are, and I will look you up at once. My sister is at Sodene with me,
and begs me to remember her to you. We are both of us cursing the weather just
fancy, we had no summer here. The wind blows and it rains all the time, not
only in Sodene but all over Europe. Do not let this frighten you; do come and
bring us some nice weather. With esteem and respect, your faithfully.
COUNT N. TOLSTOY.
I am afraid, dear
Dimitri, that this letter will not reach you in time; if you get it, let me
know immediately where you are going. Where will you pass the autumn? That’s
the chief point. My address is the same as before Sodene as I don’t know myself
where I shall go after this. I have been prescribed grapes and a good climate,
however neither of them can be found in Europe this year. My sister’s regards
to you. Yours, N. TOLSTOY.
"August
28th."
After this, very
unsatisfactory news began to arrive from Sodene. N. Tolstoy had enjoyed a few
weeks in a beautiful spot, in company with his sister and her children and his
brother Sergey, but his health did not improve. The doctors advised him to move
to Italy.
On August 6th Sergey
Nicolayevich Tolstoy returned home. Naturally, he took the opportunity to stop
at Kissingen, which takes a five hours’ journey, to see his brother Lyof and
inform him of the serious fears they entertained concerning the health of
Nicolay. Three days after, on the very date when Sergey Nicolayevich had to
start for Russia, his brother Nicolay arrived at Kissingen. Their sister and
her children remained at cure.
Nicolay Tolstoy stayed
a short time in Kissingen and went back to Sodene, but Lyof Tolstoy remained
for some time on the Garz, enjoying nature and devoting his leisure to reading.
At last he came to
Sodene on August 26th. everything was ready for departure, and on August 29th
Tolstoy with his brother went to Freiburg.
Evidently powerful
idiosyncrasies had made Tolstoy very original even in appearance. We frightened
Auerbach. In Francfort a similar incident hap- pened. His aunt A. A. Tolstoy
speaks of it thus:
" We arrived at
Francfort. One day Prince Alexander of Hessen and his wife called on me, and
during their visit and Tolstoy appeared in a most singular dress, reminding one
of Spanish robbers as seen in pictures. I simply gasped, so great was my
astonishment.... Tolstoy was not pleased with my visitors and soon went away.
"’ Qui est done ce
singulier personnage’’ asked my astonished guests.
" ’Mais c’est Leon
Tolstoy.’
"’Ah, mon Dieu,
pourquoi ne l’avez vous pas nomme? Apres avoir lu ses admirables ecrits nous
mourions d’envie de le voir,’ they reproached me."
From Francfort all the
Tolstoy family, by advice of their doctors, moved to Hyeres on the
Mediterranean. But poor Nicolay Tolstoy did not benefit by it and died shortly
afterward.
A few days after his
arrival Tolstoy wrote his aunt Tatiana a letter in which the hope that his
brother would recover is still perceptible.
" The state of
Nicolay’s health is still the same, but it is only here that we can expect any
improvement, for the kind of life he led in Sodene, the journey, and the bad
weather were on the contrary sure to injure him. Here the weather has been
splendid these three days, and they say it has been fine all along. There is
here a certain Princess Galitzin who has been living in the country for nine
years. Marie has made her acquaintance, and this princess says she arrived here
in a much worse state than that of Nicolay, and now she is a sturdy woman in
perfectly good health."
But Nicolay was getting
worse and worse. A few days before his death he wrote to Diakof in Paris; his
handwriting had become faint and straggling, and he himself confessed that his
strength was failing him.
" I write you a
few lines to let you know where I am. I and my sister are passing the winter at
Hyeres. Here is my address and that of Lyovochka as well Mme. Senequier’s
House, Rue du Midi, Hyeres. Alas! I could not go to Paris, such a journey is
beyond my strength, I an. too weak. As soon as you arrive and find my letter,
let me know where you stopped, how you completed the journey, etc. If we cannot
see each other, let us keep up correspondence. Yours entirely, N. TOLSTOY.’’
September 20, 1860 (N.
S.), he died, and Tolstoy thus informs his aunt Tatiana of it:
" DEAR AUNT The
black seal will expecting from hour to has happened to-day at nine in the
morning. Only yesterday evening did he for the first time allow me to help him
to undress; this morning for the first time he returned to bed and asked for a
nurse. He was conscious the whole time. A quarter of an hour before his death
he drank some milk and told me he felt well. This morning he even joked and
showed interest in my plans of education. Only a few minutes before death he murmured
several times, ’ My God, my God!’ I think he felt his position, but deceived us
and himself.... I have only just closed his eyes. I shall now soon be with you
and personally relate everything to you. I do not think of bringing back his
body. The Princess Galitzin has undertaken to arrange everything concerning the
burial.
" Good-by, dear
Aunt. I cannot console you. It is the will of God, that is all. I am not now
writing to Sergey. He is probably out hunting him or send him this
letter."
On the day following
the funeral he also brother Sergey concerning it:
" You have, I
presume, heard of Nicolenka’s death. I am sorry for you that you were not here.
However painful it is, I am glad all this took place in my presence, and that
it has affected me as it should have done. Not like the death of Mitenka, of
which I learned when I was not thinking at all about him. However, this is
quite a different thing. With Mitenka were associated memories of childhood and
family feeling and no more; but this was, for you and for me, a man whom we
loved and respected positively more than any one on earth. You know the selfish
feeling which used latterly to take hold of us ’the sooner it is finished the
better ’; but now it is dreadful to write and to recall those thoughts. Till
the last day, with his extraordinary force of character and concentration of
mind, he did everything to avoid being a burden to me. On the day of his death
he dressed and washed himself, and in the morning I found him dressed in his arm-chair.
It was only about nine hours before his death that he surrendered to his
illness and requested to be undressed. The first time was in the lavatory. I
had ~one downstairs when I heard his door open; I returned, he was nowhere to
be found. At first I was afraid of entering the lavatory; he did not like it,
but I heard him out, ’ Help me! ’
" And on that day
he gave himself up and became subdued and submissive; he did not groan, did not
criticize any one, praised all, and kept saying to me: ’Thank you, my friend.’
You understand what this means in our relations. I told him I had heard how he
was coughing in the morning, but I shrank from coming in from a foolish kind of
shyness. ’I am sorry, it would have consoled me.’ He did suffer, but only once,
two days before his death, he said: ’ What dreadful, sleepless nights! Toward
the morning the cough chokes one, a whole month! and what visions one had God
only knows. Again two nights more like this it is awful.’ Never once did he
clearly say he felt the approach of death. But I only mean he did not express
it. On the day of his death he ordered an indoor suit; yet, at the same time,
when I said that, if he did not get better, Mashenka and myself would not go to
Switzerland, he replied, ’Do you really imagine I shall get better?’ And that
in such a tone that it was evident he felt his position, but did not speak of
it for my sake, and I did not show what I thought for his. Yet, when that day
came, I seemed to know, and I was with him all the time. He died without any
suffering, at least so far as we could see. His breath became slower and slower
and all was over. The next day I went into his room and was afraid to uncover
the face. I thought it would show still greater marks of suffering and fill me
with more awe than during his illness, but you cannot imagine what a beautiful
face it was, with his best expression of happiness and peace.
" Yesterday he was
buried I thought of removing him and of telegraphing to you, but changed my
mind. There is no use irritating the wound. I am sorry for you that the news
will reach you while at sport and entirely taken up with your usual
distraction, and will not affect you as it did us. It is well that it should be
so. I now feel what I have often heard, that when one loses such a one as he
was, it becomes much less painful to think of one’s own death.
" Your letter came
at the very moment of the funeral service. No, you will not water the garden
with him any more.
" Two days before
his death he read to me his memoirs about sport and spoke much about you. He
said that God had made you a happy man in every way, and yet you torment
yourself. Only on the second day did I bethink of getting his portrait taken
and a mould of his face. The portrait does not catch now his remarkable expression,
but the mould is beautiful."
This death produced a
strong impression on Tolstoy, and at first repelled him from life and shook his
faith in good. This is the entry he makes in his diary:
" 13th Oct., 1860.
It will soon be a month since Nicolenka died. Dreadfully has this event torn me
away from life. Again the question: Why? I am not far from going there. Where?
Nowhere. I am trying to write, compelling myself, but unsuccessfully, for the
sole reason that I cannot attribute to my work that significance which is
necessary to have the power and the patience to work. During the funeral itself
the thought came to me to write a materialistic gospel, the life of Christ a
Materialist."
In a letter to Fet of
the 17th October, 1860, when the first impressions of the bereavement had
already settled down and his inert consciousness again took the ascendency,
Tolstoy thus describes his brother’s death:
" I presume you
already know what has happened. On the 20th of September he died, literally in
my arms. Nothing in life has ever produced such an impression upon me. He spoke
the truth when he used to say there is nothing worse than death. And when one
clearly realizes that it is the end of all, then there is nothing worse than
life either. What should’ one worry about or strive for, if of that which was
Nicolas Tolstoy nothing has remained? He did not say that he felt the approach
of death, but I know that he followed its every step and knew for certain how
much yet remained. A few minutes before death he fell into a doze and suddenly
awoke and murmured with horror: ’ But what is this ? ’ He had seen it, this
absorption of oneself in nothing. And if he found nothing to catch hold of,
what can I find? Still less. And it is certain that neither myself nor any one
will so struggle with it to the last moment as he did. Two days before his
death I offered to place a convenience in his room. ’No,’ he said, ’I am weak,
but not so weak as that; we will yet struggle on.’
" Until the last
moment he did not surrender to death, he did everything himself, kept
endeavoring to work, wrote, questioned me about my writings, gave advice. But
all this, as it appeared to me, he did, not from inner impulse but on
principle. One thing, Nature that remained until the last. The day before his
death he was in his room and fell exhausted on his bed by the open window. I
came in. He said with tears in his eyes:
"’ How I have been
enjoying this view for the last hour. " From dust thou art and to dust
thou shalt return." Only one thing remains the vague hope that there is in
Nature, of which in the earth one will become a part, something which will
abide and will be found.’
" All who knew him
and saw his last moments say: How wonderfully, peacefully, and quietly he died.
But I know how dreadfully painful his end was, for not a single feeling of his
escaped me. A thousand times did I say to myself, ’Let the dead bury their
dead,’ but let us use to some pur- pose our remaining strength. One cannot
attempt to persuade a stone to fall upward instead of downward, as attraction
takes it. One cannot laugh at a joke one is tired of. One cannot eat when one
has no appetite. Of what avail is anything when to-morrow will begin the
agonies of death with all the abomination of falsehood and selfdelusion, and
when all will end in nothing, in absolute nought for oneself. An amusing
situation indeed. ’Be useful, be virtuous, be happy while you are alive,’
people say to each other; but thyself and happiness and virtue and utility
consist in truth. And the truth I have gathered out of a life of thirty-two
years is that the position we are placed in is dreadful. ’ Take life as it is,’
they continue, you have yourselves put yourselves in this position.’ Quite
right! I do take life as it is. As soon as men reach the highest degree of
development, they clearly see that all is bunkum, deceit; and that truth, which
after all they value most that this truth is awful, that when you see it well
and rlistinctly you awake with horror and say as my brother did:
But what is this?’ But,
of course, so long as there is a desire to know and express the truth, one
endeavors to know and express it. This is all that has remained for me out of
the moral world, and higher than which self. And this only shall I do, but not
in the form of your art. Art is a lie, and I can no longer love a beautiful
lie.
" I shall pass the
winter here for the reason that it matters not where one lives. Please write to
me. I love you as my brother did. He remembered you until the last
moment."
Tolstoy, who had
witnessed thousands of deaths at Sebastopol, had noted them then only with his
" bodily " But here the death of a beloved brother made him see death
for the first time with his " spiritual " eyes, and he felt quite
overcome. Being a sincere man, he frankly acknowledged that he was quite
crushed by it, and was helpless before its power. This truthfulness saved him.
From that moment one may say the idea of death never left him. It led him to
the inevitable spiritual crisis and to final victory.
A month later he wrote
the following in relation to another death:
" A boy of
thirteen has had a painful death from consumption. What for? The only
explanation is given by belief in restitution in the hereafter. If that does
not exist, then neither does justice, and justice is not necessary, and the
desire of it is a superstition.
" Justice answers
to the most essential demand in man’s relation to man. The same also does man
search for in his relation to the universe. Without future life this does not
exist. The adaptation of the means to the end is the only irrefragable law of
nature, naturalists will say. But this does not exist in the sphere of the
human soul love, poetry; in the best spheres this law does not apply. All these
features have been and have gone without finding expression. Nature has far
overreached her end in giving man his aspiration toward poetry and love, if her
one law is the adaptation of the means to the end."
Twenty-seven years
later he wrote a book, Life, which he concluded with these words:
" The life of man
is an aspiration toward welfare; what he aspires to is given to him; a life
which cannot be death, and a welfare that cannot be evil."
Interesting facts of
Tolstoy’s life in his sister’s at Hyeres after the death of their brother are
given by Sergey Plaksin, then a little boy living in the same boarding-house
with his mother. He thus relates the settlement and life of the Tolstoys in the
Villa Tosh:
" The Count’s
family occupied the upper floor of the villa, and Tolstoy had his writing-table
in the glass-house, with a view over the sea. During his stay in Hyeres,
Toloften visited his sister at her summer residence, spending many days there.
" Being an
indefatigable walker, Tolstoy would make out our itinerary, always discovering
new places for our rambles. One day we would go to see the boiling of salt on
the peninsula Porquerolle; another day we would climb up the S. M. to a small
chapel with a statue of the Blessed Virgin, or we marched off to see the ruins
of a castle called, nobody knew why, ’ Trou des fees.’
" On the way
Tolstoy used to tell us children all kinds of tales. I remember one about a
golden horse, and a gigantic tree from the top of which could be seen all seas
and towns. my weak chest, he often put me on his shoulders, and went on with
his tales as he walked. Need I add that we simply worshipped him ?
" At dinner in the
evening Tolstoy used to good-natured hosts all sorts of amusing nonsense about
Russia, which they did not know whether to believe or not, unless the Countess
or my mother sifted the truth from the fiction.
" Directly after
dinner we used to collect, according to the weather, either on the wide terrace
or in the drawingand the bustle would begin. We presented a ballet with a piano
mercilessly torturing the ears of our audience; ’we ’ being the mothers, Count
Tolstoy, and my nurse Liza. The ballet and opera were replaced by gymnastics,
when Tolstoy himself appeared as our professor, and insisted chiefly on the
development of muscle.
" He would lie
stretched on the floor and make us do the same, and then aue had to get up
without using our arms. He arranged a certain construction made of strings, and
to our greatest delight and joy himself took part in the exercise.
" Whenever we made
too much noise, and the mothers appealed to Tolstoy to keep us quiet, he would
place us all round the table, and order us to bring ink and pens.
" Here is a sample
of our work with Tolstoy.
"’Look here,’ he
said to us once, ’ I will teach you.’
"’Teach us what?’
inquired the bright-eyed Lizanka, the lady of my heart.
" Giving no answer
to his niece, Tolstoy continued:
" ’ Write! ’
"’What about,
uncle?’ insisted Lizanka.
"’Listen, I will
give you a theme.’
"’What will you
give us?’ went on Lizanka.
"’A theme! ’
repeated Tolstoy firmly. ’Write an answer to the question: What is the
difference between Russia and other countries? Write here, in my presence, and
nobody is to copy from anybody else! Do you hear ? ’ he added sternly.
" So writing
began, as they say, d qui mieux mieux. However much Kolia would bend his head
on one side, the lines always crawled to the right upper corner of the sheet.
He panted and puffed, producing strange sounds through his nose, but it was of
no use for the poor fellow; yet Tol- stoy had strictly forbidden us to write on
lined paper, declaring it was nonsense. ’You must write without lines.’ While
we were engaged in writing our essays, the Countess and my mother would sit
down on the sofa and read in a low voice some new French book, while Count
Tolstoy walked up and down the room, sometimes making the nervous Countess
exclaim:
" ’ Why,
Lyovochka, you are moving about like a pendulum! I wish you would sit down! ’"
"In half an hour
our ’ essays ’ were ready, and mine happened to be the first that our mentor
got hold of. He read it; but it was hopeless trying to make out anything in the
lines, all running, as they did, up to the top of the page, so he returned me
the manuscript, saying:
" ’ Read aloud yourself
’; and I loudly proclaimed that Russia differs from other countries in this,
that at Shrovetide people eat pancakes and go out toboganning, and at Easter
they like to color eggs.
" ’ Bravo,’
exclaimed Tolstoy, and began to decipher the manuscript of Kolya, who asserted
that Russia’s distinction in ’snow.’ With Liza it was the ’troika’ a team of
three horses.
" The best
definition was given by Varia, the eldest of us.
" As a reward for
our evening studies Tolstoy brought us water-colors from Marseilles, where he
used to go very often from Hyeres, and he taught us to paint.
" Tolstoy used to
spend nearly the whole day with us. He taught us, joined in our games, took
interest in our squabbles, discussed them, and decided who was,right and who
was wrong."
Here we shall quote a
story about Tolstoy’s life in Hyeres, as related by his sister Marie:
"Tolstoy was
always distinguished by his originality, which often amounted to extravagance.
" We lived on in
Hyeres after our brother s death. Tolstoy was already well known there, and the
Russian community at Hyeres and in its neighborhood sought his acquaintance.
Once we were invited to an evening party at the house of the Princess
Dandakof-Rorsakof. All those of any distinction were assembled there, and Tolstoy
should have been the ’ lion’ of the evening, but, just as if it were
intentional, he did not arrive till very late. The guests were getting
low-spirited, the hostess had exhausted her powers of entertainment, and she
thought with grief of her spoiled soire. However, at last, at a very late hour,
the arrival of the Count Tolstoy was announced. The hostess and the guests
cheered up, but one may imagine their surprise when Tolstoy entered the
drawing-room in his travelling dress He had just been for a long walk; after
the walk he came to the party without calling at his own house, and tried to
assure everybody that wooden shoes were the best and most convenient covering
for the feet, and advised everybody to get a pair. Even then everything was
forgiven him, and the evening party was the more interesting. Tolstoy was in
excellent spirits. singing at the party and Tolstoy had to play the
accompaniment."
In Hyeres Tolstoy gave
himself up literary work. He wrote there The Cossacks, and an article On
National Education. He remained in Hyeres till the beginning of December, and
then went via Marseilles to Geneva, there he parted from his sister, who had
moved there also with her children. From there he started once more on his
travels, first visiting Italy, Nice, Leghorn, Florence, Rome, Naples these were
the principal points of his journey. In‘Italy, according to his own words, he
ex- perienced his first lively impressions of antiquity. He went to Paris,
again via Marseilles, in fact he visited this last city several times during
his foreign travel. The life of the great French industrial town seems to have
attracted and interested him.
This is how Tolstoy, in
one of tion, describes his stay at Marseilles:
" Last year I was
in Marseilles, where I visited schools for the working people of that city. The
proportion of the pupils to the population is very great, and the children,
with few exceptions, attend school three, four, and even six years.
" The school
programme consists in learning by heart the catechism, biblical and universal
history, the four operations of arithmetic, French orthography, and
book-keeping. In what way book-keeping could form the subject of instruction I
was unable to comprehend, and not one teacher could explain it to me. The only
explanation I was able to make to myself, when I examined the books kept by the
students who had finished the course, was that they did not know even three
rules of arithmetic, but that heart to operate with figures, and that,
therefore, they had also learned by rote how to keep books. (It that there is
no need of proving that the tenue des livres, Buchhaltung, as it is taught in
Germany and England, is a science which only requires about four hours of
explanation in the case of a pupil who knows the four operations in arithmetic.
)
" Not one boy in
these schools was able to solve the simplest problem in addition and
subtraction. And yet they operated with abstract numbers, multiplying thousands
with ease and rapidity. To questions from the history of France they answered
well by rote, but if I asked anything at haphazard, I received such answers as
that Henry IV had been killed by Julius Caesar....
" In Marseilles I
also visited a lay school, and also a monastic school for grown persons. Out of
250,000 inhabitants, less than one thousand, of these only two hundred men,
attend these schools. The instruction is the same: mechanical reading, which is
acquired in a year or in a longer time, book-keeping without the knowledge of
arithmetic, religious instruction, and so forth. After the lay school I saw the
daily instruction offered in the churches; I saw the salles d’asile, in which
four-year-old children, at a given whistle, like soldiers, made evolutions
around the benches, at a given command lifted and folded their hands, and with
strange, quivering voice sang laudatory hymns to God and to their benefactors,
and I convinced myself that the educational institutions of the city of
Marseilles were exceedingly bad.
" If, by some
miracle, a person should visit all these establishments, without having seen
the people in the streets, in their shops, in the cafés, in their home
surroundings, what opinion would he form of a nation which was educated in such
a manner? He certainly would conclude that that nation was ignorant, rude,
hypocritical, full of prejudices, and almost barbarous. But it is enough to
enter into relations with, and talk to a common man, to be convinced that the
French nation is, on the contrary, almost such as it regards itself to be:
intelligent, clever, affable, free from prejudices, and really civilized. Look
at a city workman of about thirty years of age: he will write a letter without
such mistakes as are made at school, often without any mistakes at all; he has
an idea of politics, consequently of modern history and geography; he knows
more or less history from novels; he has some knowledge of the natural
sciences. He frequently draws and applies mathematical formulæ to his trade.
Where did he learn all this?
" I found an
answer to it in Marseilles without any trouble when, after the schools, I began
to stroll down the streets to frequent the dram-shops, cafés chantants,
museums, workshops, quays, and bookstalls. The very boy who told me that Henry
IV had been killed by Julius Caesar knew very well the story of the Three
Musketeers and of Monte Cristo. I found twenty-eight illustrated editions of
these in Marseilles, costing from five to ten centimes. To a population of
250,000 they sell 30,000 of them; consequently, if we suppose that ten people
read or listen to one copy, we find that all have read them. In addition there
are the museum, the public libraries, and the theatres. Then the cafes, two
large cafes chantants, where any one may enter for fifty centimes worth of food
or drink, and where there daily as many as 25,000 people, not counting the
smaller hold as many more: in each of these cafes they give little comedies and
scenes, and recite verses. Taking the lowest calculation, we get one-fifth of
the population get their daily oral instruction, just as the Greeks Romans were
instructed, in their amphitheatres.
" Whether this
education is good or bad is another rnatter; but here it is, this unconscious
education, which is so much more powerful than the one by compulsion; here is
the unconscious school which has undermined the compulsory school, and has made
its significance dwindle down almost to nothing. There is left of the latter
only the despotic form with hardly any inner significance. I say with ’hardly
any,’ because I exclude the mere mechanical ability of putting letters together
and writing down words the only knowledge which is carried away after
study."
In January, I86l,
Tolstoy was in Paris. As in every place, he here tried to observe the ways of
the people.
" When I was in
Paris," he said to Schuyler, " I generally passed half my time in
omnibuses, simply to amuse mvself in observing the people; and I can assure you
that in every passenger I recognized one of the de Kock."
In his conversation
with nied Paul de Kock’s alleged immorality.
" In French
literature," he said to Schuyler, " I highly value the novels of
Alexandre Dumas and Paul de Kock."
Upon Schuyler
expressing his consternation, Tolstoy continued:
" No," he
added, " don’t tell me any of that nonsense about Paul de Kock being
immoral. He is somewhat improper according to English ideas, he is more or less
what the French call leste and gaulois, but never immoral Whatever he may say
in his writings, and notwithstanding his slight jocose liberties, his tendency
is completely moral. He is a French Dickens; his characters are all taken from
life, and are as perfect as Dickens’s.
" As for Dumas,
every novelist must understand him. His plots are splendid, not to speak of
their finish. I can read them over and over again, but plots and intrigues are
his principal aim."
In Paris Tolstoy saw
Turgenef, and their interview brought them somewhat nearer together.
After this Tolstoy went
to London, and there met Herzen. He remained in London for six weeks, and saw
Herzen almost every day. They had long talks, and discussed the most
interesting subjects. Unfortunately neither Herzen nor Tolstoy made notes of
these conversations.
A few lines describing
their first meeting appear in the reminiscences of Mme. Tuchkof-Ogaref:
" Herzen was also
visited by L. N. Tolstoy, whose Childhood, Boyhood, and Youth were well known
all over the reading world. Herzen was delighted with them. He particularly
admired the boldness of Tolstoy in treating of delicate, deeply seated
feelings, experienced perhaps by many, but expressed by none. As to his
philosophic views, Herzen considered them weak, hazy, and often
unconvincing."
More is told by Herzen’s
daughter, Natalya Alexandrovna, who has a vague recollection of this meeting.
She was then a little girl, but had already read Tolstoy’s works and was
enthusiastic about them. Hearing from her father that Tolstoy was coming, she
asked permission to be pres- ent at the interview. At the appointed day and
hour she entered her father’s study and sat in a chair at the farthest corner,
so as not to be noticed. Soon after the man-servant announced the arrival of
Count Tolstoy. With a sinking heart she waited for his appearance, but great
was her disappointment when she beheld a man dressed in the latest fashion, of
society manners, and who began to talk enthusiastically about cock-fights and
prize-fights, of which he had seen a good deal in London. Not one word from the
heart, not one word which came up to her expectations did she hear during the
only meeting at which she was present.
However, we may surmise
that the intercourse of the two great Russian writers was not limited to the
subject of sport, considering that at their farewell meeting Herzen gave
Tolstoy a letter of introduction to Proudhon.
While in England,
Tolstoy, as always, visited schools; he went, too, to the House of Commons,
where he listened to a speech of three hours’ duration from Palmerston.
In England he learned
of his being appointed a Peace Mediator,’ and on February 19, 1861, the day of
the abolition of serfdom, he started for home via Brussels, where he visited
Proudhon. This energetic, independent thinker, himself from the ranks of the
people, made a powerful impression on Tolstoy, and probably influenced his
views. One day during a conversation Tolstoy said that Proudhon gave him the
impression of a strong man who has le courage de son opinion. The well-known
aphorism of Proudhon, La propriete c’est le vol, might well have been used as
an epigram in any of Tolstoy’s essays of economics.
While in Brussels,
Tolstoy also visited the Polish historian and politician Lelewel, who lived
there in old age and great poverty. In the same city Tolstoy the story
Polikushka. On April 13th to Russia via Germany.
In Germany the first
town There he was a guest of von Maltitz, the Russian ambassador, who
introduced him to the Knight-Marshal Bolisy- Morconet, and the latter in his
turn presented him to the Grand Duke, Charles Alexander. On April I¢th Maltitz
also furnished him with the means of visiting Goethe’s dwelling-place, which
was then closed to the public. But Tolstoy took more interest in Froebel’s
Kindergartens, which were conducted under the management of Minna Schelholm,
who was a direct pupil of Froebel’s; she gladly gave the Russian Count, who was
so fond of knowledge, information about her teaching and showed him how
children played and studied.
Dr. Von Bode recently
inserted an interesting article entitled " Tolstoy in Weima ," in a
Weimar educational journal named Der Saemann (The Sower), in which, besides
generally known facts, he relates a story by Julius Stoetrer, who knew Tolstoy
personally, and who died only this year. Tolstoy visited his school at Weimar.
Here is the story:
" On Good Friday,
just as lessons began, at one o’clock, I was in the second class and was about
to commence teaching, when a pupil of the seminary opened the door and said,
peeping in, ’A gentleman wants to see you.’
" A gentleman
followed without giving his name, and I took him for a German, as he spoke as
good German as any of us. ’What lesson are you going to have this afternoon?’
he asked. ’History first, then German,’ I replied.
" ’ I am very glad
to hear it! I have visited schools of Southern Germany, France, and England;
and should like to get acquainted with those of North Germany too. How many
grades are there in your school ? ’
" ’ Seven. This is
the second. However, I do not know my pupils yet, as I am just commencing, so
that I cannot gratify your curiosity.’
"’That makes no
difference to me. The plan and the method of instruction are what I care about.
Please tell me what plan you follow in teaching history ? ’
" I had worked out
my own plan of teaching history and explained it to the schoolmaster, which was
what I believed my guest to be.
" He produced his
memorandum-book from his pocket and began hurriedly making notes. Suddenly he
said:
" ’It looks as if
one thing had been left out in this rather elaborate plan. Native history.’
" ’ No, it is not
omitted. The next grade is devoted to the history of the Fatherland.’
" I had to begin
the lesson, so I started with telling about the four degrees of culture. The
foreigner went on making notes. When the lesson was over he asked: ’What comes
next?’
"’I really
intended beginning to you prefer something else it can be changed.’
"’I am glad of
this. You see, I’ve pondered a good deal how to make thoughts flow fluently.’
" This expression
of his I shall never forget. I gratify him, and asked the children to write a
short composition. I named a subject, and the children had to write a letter on
it in their copy-books. This seemed to interest the stranger very much; he
walked between the benches, took up the pupils’ copy-books by turns and tried
to make out how they wrote and what about.
" Not to distract
the children I kept my seat. When the work was coming to an end, the foreigner
said: ’ Can I take these compositions with me ? They are of the utmost interest
to me ? ’
" ’ Thats’ a
little too much,’ thought I, but told him politely that it was impossible. ’The
children,’ I said, ’have purchased their copy-books, and the price of each is
six groschen, Weimar is a poor town, and their parents will be angry if they
have to get new copy-books.’
"’That can be
overcome,’ he said, and stepped outside.
" I felt uneasy,
so I sent a pupil to ask Herr Monhaupt, the headmaster, and a friend of mine,
to come to our class, as something unusual was taking place. Monhaupt came.
"’You have played
a nice trick on me,’ said I; ’you have sent a queer fellow to me who wants to
deprive the scholars of their copy-books.’ ’ I never did such a thing,’ said
Monhaupt. ’ But,’ I replied, ’you are the director of the seminary, and he was
brought to me by one of your pupils.’
" Monhaupt
recollected then that during his absence an official of importance had called
at his place and told his wife that the gentleman who was accompanying him
should be assisted in every way and shown everything.
" In the meantime
the stranger came back carrying a large package of writing paper in his hands,
which he had bought in the nearest shop. When he came I had to introduce him to
the director, and they exchanged credentials.
"’ Monhaupt, the
director,’ said the one.
"’The Count
Tolstoy, from Russia,’ said the other.
" So this was a
Count and not a schoolmaster a Russian who spoke German quite fluently.
" We bade the
children rewrite their compositions on the sheets of paper that had been
bought. Tolstoy collected all the sheets, rolled them up, and gave them to his
servant, who was waiting outside.
" From my place he
went to the director of the professional school, Trebsti, whom he knew and who
had been in Russia."
Dr. Bode finished his
article with the following words, dedicated to the memory of his old teacher:
" One more word
concerning Julius Stoetrer. On Easter Sunday, 1905, he died, at the age of nearly
ninetythree. I considered him a remarkable man because he was acquainted with
the two people whose books have taught me the very best I know. He knew Tolstoy
and Goethe. It is a fact that Stoetrer had conversed with Goethe himself. In
1828 he was attending a gymnasium at Weimar, and lived with a school friend of
his and Eckermann in the same house, within a few steps of Goethe’s home. Both
boys often saw the old man sitting by the window. But they wanted to get a
closer look at him, so they asked Eckermann, who was good enough to give them
an opportunity.
" One summer day
in 1828 Eckermann admitted both boys to Goethe’s garden by the back door. The
poet was taking a stroll in the garden, dressed in a light, home-made coat;
having noticed the scholars, he came up to them, asked what their names were
and what they wanted; told them to be diligent in their studies, and walked on.
" There was
nothing striking about this conversation, but though Stoetrer, being a splendid
schoolmaster and an agreeable man, had been received with respect all his life
yet he had never encountered anything which gave him such lasting joy as this
talk with his greatest contemporary."
While continuing his
journey through Germany Tolstoy visited Gotha, saw the Froebel Kindergartens,
and made acquaintance with prominent educationists. In Jena he made the
acquaintance of the young mathematician, Keller, and persuaded him to go to
Russia to help him in his educational work. He stopped for a short time at
Dresden, where he again saw Auerbach. He makes the following short, fragmentary
description of him in his diary:
"Dresden, April
21st. Auerbach is a most delightful man. Ein Licht mir eingefangen. His
stories: A Juryman; On the First Impression of Nature; Versoehnung; Abend; The
Pastor Klauser.
" Christianity he
called the spirit of mankind, higher than which there is nothing. He reads
verse exquisitely. About music as Plqichtloser Genuss. A turning point,
according to his opinion, toward depravity. The story from SchatzAaestlein. He
is forty-nine years old. He is straightforward, young, believing, free from the
spirit of negation."
From Dresden he wrote
to his aunt Tatiana the following lines:
" I am well and
burning with a desire to return to Russia. Being in Europe, and not knowing
when I can return, you will understand that I wish to get as much good as
possible from my stay abroad. And this time I think I have succeeded. I am
bringing back so many impressions, so much information, that I shall have to
work a long time before I can put them all in order in my head. I intend to
remain at Dresden until the 1O/22, and, for Easter, I intend at all events
being at Yasnaya. From here should navigation not be resumed by the 25th I
shall go by Warsaw to St. Petersburg, where I must get the necessary sanction
for a periodical I intend editing at Yasnaya Polyana. I am bringing with me a
German from the university who is a teacher and clerk a very agreeable and
well-educated man, but still quite young and inexperienced."
On April 22d he was in
Berlin, and there met the son of the celebrated educationist Diesterweg, the
head of the Teachers’ Institute. He expected to find him a man of enlightenment
and free from prejudice, with original on the subject of education, but he
proved, to use Tolstoy’s expression, to be a cold, heartless prig, who thought
it possible to develop and guide children’s souls by means of and regulations.
During the hour they
spent in discussing schools and educational matters the chief subject of their
conversation was the difference in the conception of the words: education,
instruction, and teaching.
" Diesterweg spoke
with malicious sarcasm of people who made such subdivisions, as, according to
him, all these ran together. And yet we spoke of education, culture, and
instruction, and we clearly understood each other."
As we advance we shall
see that Tolstoy was dissatisfied not only with the views of this educationist,
but with all the methods he studied in the schools of Western Europe, and that
he made use of the experience gained in France, England, and Germany for his
Polyana only in the sense that he worked on still more independent lines than
before.
Berlin was the last
foreign town in which Tolstoy stayed. On April 23, 1861, after a nine months’
absence, he recrossed the Russian frontier.
As one might expect,
the heavy German Wissenschaft did not satisfy Tolstoy, though he applied his
best gifts and all his soul to the study of it theoretical as well as practical
enlarging and clearing up all, whatever was not evident, by means of conversations
with its most prominent representatives and by watching the application of its
methods in the schools.
The study of this
department of learning strengthened Tolstoy’s idea that it was necessary to
begin anew from the beginning, i. e., that he must, quite independently, start
the work of educating the people on lines of his own, and he plunged into it
heart and soul.
The German theories did
not help Tolstoy, because they did not satisfy his demands, which were too
high, and, with his uncompromising character, he could not lower them and could
not condescend to any hypocritical, half-hearted acceptance.
Notwithstanding the
rare scrupulousness of German scholars, their methods were not based on truth.
At the foundation of
their science, as indeed would be the case with any other European science,
lies the desire however rarely openly avowed, of acquiring a privileged
position for themselves and consequent leisure, to be used, no doubt, in the
interests of the people. But while they are in process of acquiring this
leisure, the people have to bear deep and unmeasured suffering, and the result,
genuine intercourse, becomes impossible. The people, exasperated, or at the
best, suffering in silence, keep aloof from those benefactors who, without
understanding them, offend them with their condescension, and the best these
latter can do is to patch up by some palliatives the cruel physical and moral
wounds they have caused to the people.
What new impulse
Tolstoy gave to the science of education we shall try to explain in one of the
following chapters.
After his return from
abroad, Tolstoy passed through St. Petersburg. In the beginning of May [1861],
he was in Moscow, and soon afterward in Yasnaya Polyana.
Russian was then celebrating
the coming of a new era, the liberation of the peasantry from serfdom.
All those who were
honest, educated, and of progressive opinions turned their energy in the
direction of social reform. One of the first among them was Lev Tolstoy.
With the beginning of
social work his life became so many- sided that one must turn away from the
strict chronology of the story and give a parallel description of his principal
kinds of contemporary activity. Every direction that his labors took was
connected with facts of his personal and family life.
At the beginning of the
1860s, the social activity of Tolstoy manifested itself chiefly in two spheres:
in the administrative as a peace mediator, and in the ducational as a teacher,
organizer of peasant schools, and educational writer.
We intend to give a
description of both branches of activity, but before that it is necessary to
narrate some facts of Tolstoy’s personal life.
On his return home, he
hastened to call on his good neighbors, Fet and Turgenev. A correspondence
ensued between them. Turgenev wrote to Fet from Spasskoye:
[Turgenev writes to
Fet} Fetti carissime! I send you a note from Tolstoy, to whom I wrote today
asking him to come at the beginning of next week without fail, so that we might
together invade you in hour Stepanovka while the nightingales are still singing
and the spring smiles "bright, beatific--impartial." Expect me at the
end of next week in any case, and till then be quite well, don’t worry, and
throw, if only a one-eyed glance, at your orphan muse.
The letter contained
the following note from Tolstoy:
I embrace you from all
my heart, dear friend, for your letter and your friendship, and for your being
Fet. Turgenev I would like to see, but you ten times more. It is so long since
we have seen each other, and so much has happened to both of us since. I am
very glad about your farming operations when I hear and think of them, and I am
a little proud that I have, in at least a small measure, contributed toward
them. We both of us are in a position to understand the advantage. A friend is
a good thing to have; yet he may die, may for one reason or other go away, or
one may be unable to keep up with him. But nature is still better...she is cold
and difficult to deal with, and important and exacting, but then she is such a
friend! One cannot lose her untiil death, and when one dies, one is absorbed in
her. I now, however, associate less with this friend, I have other interests
which engage me; and yet, without the consciousness that this friend is here at
hand, and that were one to stumble one could catch hold of her -- life would be
a sad thing ....
[Fet writes in his
"Reminiscences"] In spite of these kind promises, a carriage
appearing at the coppice and turning from the crossing to our porch was a
surprise to us, and we were delighted to embrace Turgenev and Tolstoy. The few
buildings on our estate at the time made Turgenev exclaim in wonder, spreading
out his large hands: "We look and look, where is Stepanovka, but in
reality we see a greasy pancake and on it a lump, and this is Stepanovka."
When the visitors had
rested a little from their journey, and the hostess had made use of the two
hours before dinner to give it a more substantial and cheering appearance, we
plunged into a most lively conversation, such as can be held only among men not
wearied by life. [A. Fet, "My Reminiscences, Part I" p368]
During this visit, an
unfortunate event occurred -- the quarrel between Turgenev and Tolstoy. It is
very fully described by Fet, from whom we borrow the greater part of the
description, adding a few corrections and filling some gaps, in accordance with
new materials at our disposal.
[Fet writes] In the
morning at the usual time, i.e., about eight o’clock, our visitors came down to
the dining room in which my wife was sitting at the samovar at one end of the
table and I at the other, waiting for my coffee, Turgenev at the right and
Tolstoy at the left of the hostess.
Being aware of the
importance which Turgenev attached to his daughter’s education, my wife
inquired whether he was pleased with his English governess.
Turgenev showered
praises on the governess and among other things related that the governess,
with truly English practicality, asked Turgenev to fix a sum of money which his
daughter could use for charitable purposes. "Now," said Turgenev,
"the governess requests my daughter to take the old clothes of the poor
and after mending them herself, to return them to the owners."
"And do you
consider this right?" asked Tolstoy.
"Of course I do;
it brings the charitable person nearer to real want."
"And I think that
a richly dressed girl who manipulates dirty, ill-smelling rags is acting a
false and theatrical farce."
"I beg you not to
say this," exclaimed Turgenev, his nostrils dilating.
"Why should not I
say what I am convinced of?" answered Tolstoy.
Turgenev said:
"Then you think that I do not bring up my daughter properly?"
Tolstoy’s answer to
this was that he thought what he said, and without venturing upon
personalities, expressed his thoughts. [Memoirs of Countess S. A. Tolstaya]
Fet had not time to cry
out to Turgenev to desist when, pale with wrath the latter said: "If you
persist in speaking in this way, I will box your ears." With these words
he left the table, and, catching hold of his head in great excitement, stepped
into the next room. He came back a second after and said, turning to Fet’s
wife: "For God’s sake, forgive my hasty action, which I deeply
repent."
He then left the room
again. After this, the visitors took their leave.
At the first halting
place from Novoselkiy, the property of P. N. Borisov, Tolstoy sent a letter to
Turgenev with a demand for satisfaction. then he went on further to Boguslav,
the halting place half way between Bet’s estate and his own estate Nikolskoye.
He sent for pistols and bullets to Nikolskoye and without waiting for an answer
to his first letter, sent a second one with a challenge.
In this letter to
Turgenev, he said that he did not care to fight in a vulgar manner, that is to
say, when two authors come with a third one, with pistols, and the duel ends in
champagne- drinking -- he wanted to fight in real earnest, and he asked
Turgenev to come to the frontier with pistols.
Tolstoy spent a
sleepless night waiting for an answer.
At last came a letter
-- Turgenev’s answer to the first letter. Turgenev wrote:
[Turgenev writes] L.N.
Tolstoy. Dear Sir -- In answer to yours, I can only repeat what I considered it
my duty to declar at Fet’s house. being carried away by a feeling of animosity
which I could not help, and the causes of which it is useless to enter into, I
offended you without any positive provocation on your part, and I asked pardon
for it. What happened this morning shows clearly that all attempts at
rapprochement between such different natures as mine and yours will lead to no
good, and I do my duty to you the more willingly as this letter will probably
be the last sign of any relations between us. With all my heart I trust it will
satisfy you, and I give my consent before hand to any use you may care to make
of it.
With my respects, I
have the honor to remain your faithful servant, Iv. Turgenev. Spasskoye, May
27, 1861.
A postscript followed
the same day.
[Turgenev writes] 10 o’clock
p.m. Ivan Petrovich has just brought me back my letter, which my servant sent
by mistake to Novoselkiy instead of forwarding it to Boguslav. I earnestly beg
you to forgive this unexpected and disagreeable misadventure. I hope my
messenger will still find you in Boguslav.
Tolstoy wrote to Fet,
probably on the same day:
[Tolstoy writes] I
could not refrain from opening yet another letter from Turgenev in answer to
mine. I wish you all that is good in your relations with this man, but I
despise him. I have written to him and how have nothing more to do with him,
except so far as, should he desire it, to give him satisfaction.
Notwithstanding all my apparent indifference, I did not feel at my ease, and I
felt that I ought to demand from Turgenev a more positive apology, which I did
in my letter from Novoselkiy. Here is his answer, which I accepted as
satisfactory, merely answering that the grounds upon which I excuse him are not
opposite features in our characters, but -- such as he can himself understand.
Besides this, owing to
his delay, I have sent another letter in rather harsher terms and with a
challenge: to this I have received no answer, but, if I do receive one, I will
send it to you unopened. So this is the end of an unfortunate business; if it
gets beyond the threshold of your house, please let it pass with this
accompaniment.
Meanwhile, Turgenev
thus answered his challenge:
[Turgenev writes] Your
servant says that you desire to receive an answer to your letter, but I don’t
see what I can add to what I have sais already. Maybe when I acknowledge your
right to deman satisfaction by arms, you will prefer to be satisfied with my
expressed and repeated apology. As to that, it is for you to choose. I can
without affectation that I would willingly face your fire in order to wipe out
the effect of my really insane words. The fact of my saying what I did is so
foreign to the habits of all my life that I can ascribe it to nothing but the
irritation caused by the extreme and constant antagonism of our views. This is
not an apology, I mean, not justification, but an explanation. Such incidents
being ineffaceable and irreparable, I consider it my duty, in parting from you
forever, to repeat once more that in this affair you were right and I was
wrong. Let me add, that it is no question of my willingness or unwillingness to
show myself a brave man simply, but whether I acknowledge your right to
challenge me to a duel -- according to usual formalities, of course, i.e., with
seconds -- as well as to forgive me. You have chosen what you prefer, and to me
remains to abide by your decision.
Again, allow me to
assure you of my respect. Iv. Turgenev.
In his desire to
reconcile his friends, Fet very likely attempted something of the kind, judging
by the following extract from his memoirs:
[Fet writes] L. Tolstoy
has sent me the following note:
Turgenev...which I beg
you to transmit to him as accurately as you transmit to me his nice utterances,
notwithstanding my repeated requests not to speak of him. Count L. Tolstoy
And I beg you yourlesf
not to write to me any more, as I will not open your letters, any more than
those of Turgenev.
I need not say [remarks
Fet] that I did my best to bring the affair, which unfortunately occurred in my
house, to a clear issue. For this purpose I went to Spasskoye.
I remember the
indesbribably sarcastic mood of the immortal Turgenev. "What an unheard-of
idea," he exclaimed, "to demand that all shall be of our opinion, and,
if that cannot be, to demand a formal apology and conclude the matter with
pistols." So said the uncle to me, but what he said to Ivan Sergeyich I
don’t know. As to my efforts to patch up the affair, then ended, as one sees,
in a formal rupture with Tolstoy, and at the present moment I cannot remember
how our friendly relations were renewed. [A. Fet, "My Reminiscences, Vol.
I" p368]
Some time elapsed, says
the Countess S. A. Tolstaya, and while in Moscow, Tolstoy was one day in one of
those charming moods which sometimes came over him, full of humility and love,
and wishing and striving for the good and great. While in this mood he could
not bear to have an enemy. Therefore he wrote a letter to Turgenev on September
25th [1861], in which he expressed his regret that their relations were
hostile. "If I offended you," he wrote, "forgive me; I am very
unhappy to know I have an enemy."
This letter was sent to
the bookseller Davidov, who had business transactions with Turgenev. For some
reason it was not delivered to Turgenev in time, and meanwhile he was alarmed
by certain silly rumors, which he thus related to Fed in his letter of November
8th [1861] from Paris:
[Turgenev writes to
Fet] Byb the by, one more tale the last one, concerning the unfortunate affair
with Tolstoy. On my way through St. Petersburg, I heard from "reliable
people" (Oh, those reliable people!) that copies of the last letter of
Tolstoy to me, the one in which he "despises" me are circulating all
over Moscow, and that these copies are spread about by Tolstoy himself. This
made me very angry, and I have sent him a challenge from here for the time of
my return to Russia. Tolstoy replied that the circulation of copies is a sheer
fiction, and at the same time enclosed a letter in which he asked forgiveness
and renounced his challenge. Of courst this must put an end to the affair, and
I only ask you to inform him (for he writes that my address to him on my part
he would consider an offence) that I renounce my challenge and so on, and I
hope that all this is buried forever. His letter (the apologetic one) I
destroyed, but the other one, which according to him had been sent through the
bookseller Davidov, I have not received at all. And now to all this affair de
profundis. [A. Fet, "My Reminiscences, Vol. I" p368]
We find the following
note in Tolstoy’s diary about this letter from Turgenev to Tolstoy:
[Tolstoy writes in his
diary] October. Yesterday I received a letter from Turgenev in which he accuses
me of telling peole that he is a coward, and he says that I distribute copies
of my letter. I wrote to him that this was nonsense, and I also sent him a letter
saying "You call my action dishonorable, and you desire to give me a
regular slap in the face, but I regard myself as to blame, I beg your pardon
and retract my challenge.
[Countess Tolstaya
writes in her memoirs] This letter was written under the impulse of the idea
that if Turgenev is devoid of the sense of personal honor and needs honor
before the public, he may use this letter; but that he (Tolstoy) is above it
and despises public opinion. Turgenev was weak enough to agree to it, and he
replied that he considered himself satisfied.
In another letter to
Fet of January 7, 1862, Turgenev writes about the same:
[Turgenev writes to
Fet] and now, to ask a plain question: have you seen Tolstoy? Only today have I
got the letter he sent me in September through the bookstores of Davidov (the
punctuality of Russian tradesmen is remarkable indeed!). In this letter he
speaks of his intention to offend me, apologizes, etc. But almost at the same
time, in consequence of different gossip, of which, I believe, I informed you,
I had sent him my chellenge, etc. All this drives one to the conclusion that
our constellations move discordantly in the ether, and it would be best for us,
as he proposes, not to meet. But you may write or tell him (when you see him)
that without phrases and witticisms, I like him very much at a distance, I
respect him and watch his career with sympathy, but when we come together
everything takes a different aspect. It cannot be helped! We must go on living
as if we existed on different planets or in different ages. [A. Fet, "My
Reminiscences" p384]
Probably Fet said
something to Tolstoy in the way of a message from Turgenev and again caused
irritation against himself, of which he informed Turgenev, for the latter wrote
to him, among other things, the following:
[Turgenev writes to
Fet] Paris, January 14, 1862. Dearest Afanasiy Afanasyevich -- In the first
place I feel it necessary to apologize to you for the utterly unexpected tile
(Tuile, as the French have it) which fell on your head because of my letter. It
is a slight consolation to me that I could not foresee such a sally from
Tolstoy, but intended it all for the best. It proves, however, that it is a
wound not to be touched at all. Once more please forgive my involuntary sin.
[A. Fet, "My Reminiscences" p384]
With this we may wind
up the narrative of a deplorable incident, which like a clap of thunder
discharged the tension of the atmosphere between the two great men and perhaps
helped afterward to bring them together on a more sincere and sounder basis.
We must add that the
description of this matter in Garshin’s "Reminiscences of Turgenev,"
printed in the "Historical Review" for November 1883, is full of
misstatements as to place and time and was probably not gathered from first-hand
sources.
In 1861 and 1862
Tolstoy occupied the post of a Peace Mediator of the fourth section of the
Krapivenskiy District. His employment in this capacity is hardly known in
literature -- fortunately its memory is still green among some contemporaries,
who were at that time intimate with him. Their remarks are undoubtedly of great
interest.
The reputation which
Tolstoy won as a manager of his own estate on new principles, i.e., those of
one who does not oppress and sweat his peasants, had almost proved an obstacle
to his getting the above-mentioned appointment. Correspondence passed and
information was given in a sense unfavorable to him in reference to the post.
We give here the more important extracts from the material in our possession
concerning this affair. The Marshal of Nobility of the province, V. P. Minin,
wrote to the Minister of the Interior, Valuyev, complaining of the Governor of
Tula province Lunskoy for having appointed Tolstoy Peace Mediator. These were
his words:
[Marshal of Nobility
writes to Minister of the Interior] Being aware of a hostile attitude to him on
the part of the Krapivenskiy Nobility, due to his management of his own estate,
the Marshal is afraid lest, with the Count’s appointment to the post, some
unpleasant conflicts may take place, which may hinder the peaceful settlement
of such an important matter.
Then the Marshal
pointed out the transgression by the Governor of certain formalities as regards
the appointment, hoping that these might serve to annul it.
The Minister of the
Interior replied to the Marshal of Nobility that there must be some
misunderstanding, and he would write about it to the Governor.
In reply to the
Minister’s inquiry, the Governor sent the following interesting confidential
report, which shows that at the time the high official spheres marched in
advance of Russian society, which had not yet awakened to the situation:
[Governor of Tula
province writes to the Minister of the Interior] (Confidential) To this I have
the honor to add, that what gave rise to the present correspondence may be the
appointment of Count L. Tolstoy as a Peace Mediator of the Krapivenskiy
district, contrary to the opinion of the Marshals of Nobility, both of the
province and the district, who object to his election on the alleged ground
that he is disliked by the local nobility.
Being acquainted with
Count Tolstoy, and knowing him for a well-educated man and one in great
sympathy with the present reform, and taking also into consideration the
expressed desire of some landowners of the Krapivenskiy district to have him as
their Peace Mediator, I cannot replace hiim by another person quite unknown to
me. The more so as Count Tolstoy was pointed out to me by your Excellency’s
predecessor [Lanskoy], among other persons, as one enjoying the best
reputation. Lieutenant-General Darogan.
After this followed the
confirmation of the appointment as Peace Mediator by the Senate.
Interesting papers have
lately appeared relating to Tolstoy’s activity as Peace Mediator.
These materials throw a
new light on his personal character, as in all the suits of which records are
produced he appears as a true champion of the peasants against the harsh
tyranny of the landowners and police officers, and one may easily believe that
the fears of the Marshal of the Nobility were not without foundation. Out of
the fifteen suits quoted in those papers, we will choose the most
characteristic.
In one case, the
landowner, one Mme. Artyukhova, complained of her late house servant, Makr
Grigoryev, that he had left her, considering himself a "free man".
On this Tolstoy wrote:
[Tolstoy, as Peace
Mediator, writes] Makr can go away immediately with his wife wherever he likes,
in virtue of my orders. I beg you (1) to compensate him for the three months
and a half he has worked for you illegally since the announcement of the Act,
and (2) to compensate his wife for the assault upon her, which was still more
illegal. If you are dissatisfied with my resolution, you have a right to lodge
a complaint with the Assembly of the Justices of the Peace and with the Council
of the Province. I can give you no further explanations. With my best respects,
I remain, yours faithfully, Count L. Tolstoy.
Mme. Artyukhova lodged
a complaint before the Assembly of Peace Mediators. As the Assembly consisted
of Peace Mediators who disapproved of Tolstoy’s proceedings, they set aside his
decision in this case, as in many others, and they forwarded the case to the
Provincial Court. Fortunately, his course was there viewed wity sympathy, and
his decision in this case, as in many others, was confirmed.
So Mark Grigoryev was
set free and his wife was compensated for the assault committed by Mme.
Artyukhova.
An interesting affair
is the case of the damage done by peasants to a field belonging to one
Mikhailovskiy.
The peasants tilled the
landowner’s field, and during their rest allowed the horses to graze in the
meadow of a neighboring landowner. The latter complained to Tolstoy. Tolstoy
first asked the landowner to forgive the peasants this trespass, hoping
probably thus to improve the relations between the landowner and the peasants,
who had cause to complain of him. The landowner refused to overlook the damage
done, and he requested an assessment of it to be made and the fine to be paid to
him, claiming that it should be eighty rubles.
A long correspondence
arose out of this case. The landowner Mikhailovskiy, in complaining to the
Assembly of Peace Mediators, described Tolstoy’s action in this way:
[Landowner
Mikhailovskiy writes] Hereupon Count Tolstoy arrived at the village Panino,
invited three peasants of the nearest village, Borodino, as referees, and they
went together to the damaged meadow. The referees to whom he proposed to assess
the damages due for the meadow declared that about three desyatins [a desyatin
is about three acres] of the meadow had been damaged, and the fine they
considered right would be ten rubles per desyatin. To this Count Tolstoy did
not agree and proposed to them to make it only five rubles. The referees did not
contradict Count Tolstoy, and so the case of the Panino peasants damaging the
landowner’s meadows was settled by Tolstoy in this way, that the peasants had
to pay the landowner Mikhailovskiy for the three desyatins five rubles each.
Considering this and
other proceedings of Count Tolstoy to be illegal, Mikhailovskiy said:
I am firmly convinced
that a just Government, in its solicitude for the improvement of the stauts of
the peasants, would not allow that such improvement and enrichment of the
peasants should be carried out in this manner put in practice by the Peace Mediator,
Count Tolstoy.
The District Assembly
of the Justices, in view of Mikhailovskiy’s petition, requested an explanation
from tolstoy, but in a paper under No. 323, of September 16, 1861, he replied
that "he did not think it necessary to give any information as regards the
petition of Mikhailovskiy, in virtue of paragraphs 29, 31, and 32 of the
regulation Act in connection with the courts of peasants’ affairs. The
resolution passed in this case by the District Assembly, and presented to the
Provincial Assembly, was dismissed by the latter without any written report,
with the following remark: "To be added to the case."
Another case, slight as
it is, shows us clearly how far Tolstoy was from having selfish aims in all
these proceedings, and how ready he was to acknowledge a mistake of his own,
being guided in his actions only by a sincere wish for justice.
A certain Mme.
Zaslonina, a landowner, complained of Tolstoy to the Assembly for having issued
a leave-of-absence passport to her house serf. Tolstoy was present at the
examination into the affair, and he owned that he committed a blunder and
offered to cimpensate the lady for the loss she had suffered.
However, these affairs
did not all end in such a satisfactory manner for Tolstoy, as, in making
himself the champion of the people’s right, he had to face a whole party of
serfowners who firmly stuck to their old customs and privileges. Thus the
landowner Ossipovich and his former serfs had a dispute as follows: Part of the
village had been burned and the landowner would not allow the peasants to build
on the same spot but requested them to move their homesteads, refusing at the
same time to give them proper allowance for new buildings and to free them from
obligatory work and give them the time necessary for restoring their ruined
homes.
Toldtoy could see that
on the one hand, the demands of the peasants were reasonable, but on the other
he knew the pitiful situation of the ruined small landowner, and he did not
think him able to satisfy the demands of the peasants. He appealed therefore to
the nobles of the district to help their colleague to extricate his needy
peasants out of the difficulty or simply to help the peasants directly. Both
his proposals were dismissed, and the peasants were urged to comply with all
the demands of their landowner.
The suit dragged on for
some time, going from one court of justice to another. Tolstoy saw that the
case would be decided against the peasants and that his opinion would be
disregarded. He then protested again, and when during the hearing of the case
before the Assembly he saw that the members of the tribunal intentionally
misrepresented the affair, he left the Assembly without signing the resolutions
relating to cases which had been heard in his presence, being determined to
exhaust all means to procure a decision in the peasants’ favor. The Assembly
lodged a complaint against him with the Provincial Assembly, but this complaint
met with no attention.
Again we see how
Kostomarov got possession of the peasants holdings by declaring them to be his
house servants; that is to say, to belong to a section of the peasants whom the
new law did not provide with land. Tolstoy took their part, and after many
trials he succeeded in securing their holdings for them.
The poorer landowners
resorted to all sorts of subterfuges in order to give to the peasants the
smaller allotments of land, and that of the worst quality. As soon as Tolstoy
noticed this tendency, he refused to confirm the charters regulating the mutual
relations of landowners and peasants, and he tried his best to annul them.
We need hardly say that
Tolstoy’s sympathy for the peasants was exceedingly distasteful to the
landowners. They proclaimed that Tolstoy had thrown a seed of discord between
the landowners and the peasantry, and had finally destroyed the patriarchal
relations between them; that he was provoking rebellion among the peasants, who
were encouraged by him to commit many unlawful acts; that even the officials of
the peasants’ administrations, in order to ingratiate themselves with Tolstoy,
did not perform the duties imposed upon them by the law, so that the result was
perfect anarchy in the villages and innumerable irregularities such as staling,
lawlessness, and so forth.
Of course, Tolstoy’s
proceedings as Peace Mediator made the peasants put implicit confidence in him,
and this annoyed the landowners still more, so that he was faced with growing
difficulties in his task, and had soon to cease his efforts in the hard
struggle.
He felt, in fact, very
much dissatisfied. As early as July 1861 he wrote in his diary:
[Tolstoy writes] The
post of arbitrator has given me little material for observation and has
definitely spoiled my relations with the landowners, besides upsetting my
health.
On February 12, 1862,
Tolstoy wrote to the provincial Court of Justice on peasant affairs:
[Tolstoy writes] As the
appeals against my decisions which have been made to the Provincial Court have
no valid ground, and yet these cases and many others have been and are still being
decided against my opinion, so that almost every judgment pronounced in the
district under my charge is set aside and even the Starshinas [elected peasant
officials over groups of villages] are removed by the Court of Arbitrators,
under such circumstances, giving rise to a want of confidence in the arbitrator
on the part of both peasants and landowners, it becomes not only useless but
impossible for the arbitrator to continue to act. I respectfully request the
Provincial Court to have the above-mentioned appeals investigated by one of its
members, and at the same time I find myself obliged to inform the provincial
Court that until such investigation takes place, I do not think it convenient
to carry on my duties and have therefore transferred them to a deputy.
It was on March 9th
that Tolstoy had accepted the office of Peace Mediator, but he only performed
his duties up to April 30th, when under the pretext of illness, he handed them
over to the eldest candidate for that post in the 4th Division. The Senate at
last informed the Governor of Tula on May 26th, in a document No. 24,124, that
a resolution had been passed to discharge the artillery lieutenant, Count Lev
Tolstoy, on the grounds of ill health, from the duties of Peace Mediator of the
Krapivenskiy District and that this had been confirmed by the Imperial Senate.
[Footnote: D.T. Uspenskiy, "Archive Materials for the Biography of Count
L. N. Tolstoy", "Russian Thought", 1903, vol. ix.]
The following story,
taken from the biography of Loewenfeld, shows how groundless were the
assertions of the landowners as to Tolstoy’s favoritism toward the peasants.
One can see from it that Tolstoy had defended the demands of the landowners
with equal fairness when he considered them just.
[From Lowenfeld’s
biography of Tolstoy] A witness of Tolstoy’s proceedings as a Peace Mediator, a
German from the Baltic Provinces and bailiff of a landowner in the Tuls
Province, had occasion to call upon him on a matter of business at Yasnaya
Polyana on his patron’s behalf. What gave occasion to the visit was a
disagreement on certain points relating to peasant allotments. This could only
be settled on the spot, and the Peace Mediator therefore went in April to the
estate of his neighbor, accompanied by a peasant boy of twelve years of age --
his little land surveyor, as the Count jokingly called him, because he always
carried with him the measuring chain. Tolstoy received a peasant deputation,
consisting of two elders and one member of the village council, who came to see
him to talk over the matter.
"Well, friends,
what do you want?" said Tolstoy.
The delegates stated
the request of the village. Instead of the pasture ground appointed to them,
they wanted another piece of land so as to increase their allotment.
"I am very sorry,
but I cannot do as you wish," said the Count. "If I did so, I should
cause a great loss to your landlord," and he proceeded to explain quietly
the position of the matter.
"Well, arrange it
somehow, little father," said one of the delegates.
"No, I can do
nothing," repeated the Count.
The peasants exchanged
glances, scratched their heads, and persisted, saying: "Do it somehow,
little father."
"If you only
would, little father," continued the spokesman, "you are sure to be
able to manage it."
The other two delegates
nodded their heads approvingly.
The Count crossed
himself and said: "In the name of holy God, I swear that I cannot help
you."
But even after this the
peasants still repeated, "Do it somehow, little father, be so kind,"
the count turned in vexation to the bailiff and said: "One may be an
Amphion and move mountains and forests sooner than convince these peasants.
During the whole
interview, which lasted about an hour, says our authority, the Count was the
personification of patience and friendliness. The obstinacy of the peasants did
not draw a harsh word from him. [G. Lowenfeld, Count Tolstoy, his Life and
Works, p228]
The memoirs of a friend
and relative of Tolstoy, Prince Dmitriy Dmitriyevich Obolenskiy, refer to the
same period:
[Obolenskiy writes]
"In 1861, new elections took place in Tula, and there was to be a dinner
in honor of those Peace Mediators who took part in the elections. In the very
same reception hall where Volotskiy and Prince Cherkasskiy had quarrelled and
were on the point of fighting a duel about something connected with the peasant
question, Volotskiy first expressed his sympathy with Cherkasskiy as his
colleague, also a Peace Mediator ... this dinner was memorable to me. My uncle,
T. A. Rayevskiy, as the oldest man present, was chairman. Some of the
landowners subscribed to the dinner, and, of course, I was one of the company.
I had to sit next to Count L. N. Tolstoy, a Peace Mediator at the time, whom I
then knew very well.
The first toast was
naturally to the Tsar-Liberator, and it was received with great enthusiasm.
"I drink to it
with particular pleasure," said Count Tolstoy to me. "No other toasts
are needed, for in truth it is to the Emperor only that we owe the
emancipation."
However, other toasts
followed. Especially successful was the toast proposed by P. F. Samarin to the
Russian people -- a very awkward subject at the time. But Petr Fedorovich had
cleverly pointed out in his speech that almost everywhere in the Tula Province
the relations with the peasants were on a very good foothin, because the
landowners, having used their power moderately, the relations in question
always had been good and at present were still better than before. And this was
true: the reform went off peacefully in our province, as compared with others.
In the year of the
abolition of serfdom, Count Tolstoy started his school in Yasnaya Polyana, in
which I took great interest. I was in the habit of visiting the Count pretty
often, and sometimes in the winter I would go out hunting with him, stopping
for rest in places a long way off. I have had delightful times with him. Who
would recognize in the present venerable philosopher the reckless sportsman who
used to leap ditches and ravines with great agility and to spend days at a
distance? It is difficult to imagine a better companion. But I believe the
Count was a poor Peace Mediator, because of his absence of mind. I very well
remember the first charger of regulations coming from him. It had been
subscribed in this way:
"At the request of
So-and-so, because of their illiteracy, the house serf So-and-so signed the
charger of regulations. No name was added. Just as the Count dictated:
"Write, I have signed for So-and-so," the house-serf had written word
for word, not mentioning the name either of the peasant or his owner. And the
Count, without reading what the house serf had written, sent off the charter,
duly sealed, to the Provincial Court. My stepfather, who was then a member of
the Court, and at whose house I lived, received this charter. He only shrugged
his shoulders over such a document. [Prince Obolenskiy,
"Reminiscences," "The Russian Archive," 1894.]
Tolstoy proved
incapable in chancellor’s office work, but his heart and brain worked well as
Peace Mediator, and he has left kind memories of his activity in this
direction. But he had greater success, though he met with no fewer obstacles,
in the matter of education, which we treat in the following chapters.
Tolstoy had several
times started on educational work.
As far back as 1849,
when he returned to Yasnaya Polyana from St. Petersburg, along with other
institutions and reforms by means of which he tried to approach the people, he
established a school for peasant children. From his "A Russian
Proprietor" we know how unsuccessful these first attempts were. With his
departure for the Caucasus, the school was closed. He reopened it on his return
to Yasnaya Polyana after his resignation and his first journey abroad, as was
mentioned in the proper place.
On recommencing his
school work, Tolstoy soon realized his lack of theoretical knowledge and
hastened to fill the void in his education by reading, foreign travel, personal
relations with prominent educationists, and practical work in different
schools. Feeling himself thus restored, he for the third time and with better
zeal turned to his school and carried it up to a remarkably high level.
In one of his
educational articles, he thus relates his endeavors and preparations to found a
school:
[Tolstoy writes]
Fifteen years ago, when I took up the matter of popular education without any
preconceived theories or views on the subject, with the one desire to advance
the matter in a direct and straightforward manner, I, as a teacher in my
school, was at once confronted with two questions: (1) What must I teach? and
(2) How must I teach it.?...
In the whole mass of
people who are interested in education, there exists, as there has existed
before, the greatest diversity of opinions. Formerly, just as now, some in
reply to the question of what ought to be taught, said that outside the
rudiments, the most useful information to give in a primary school is taken
from the natural sciences; others, even as now, that this was not necessary,
and was even injurious; while some, as now, proposed history or geography, and
others denied their necessity; some proposed the Ecclesiastic-Slavonic language
and grammar to be taken in connection with religion; others found that
superfluous and ascribed a prime importance to "development". On the
question of how to teach, there has always been a still greater diversity of
answers. The most diversified methods of instructing in reading and arithmetic
have been proposed...
When I encountered
these questions and found no answer for them in Russian literature, I turned to
the literature of Europe. After having read what had been written on the
subject, and having made the personal acquaintance of the so-called best
representatives of the science of education in Europe, I not only failed to
find anywhere an answer to the question I was interested in, but I convinced
myself that this question does not even exist in connection with any science of
Education as such; as every educationist of every given school firmly believed
that the methods he used were the best, because they were founded on absolute
truth, and that it would be useless for him to look at them with a critical
eye.
However, because, as I
said, I took up the matter of popular education without any preconceived
notions, or else because I took up the matter without getting hold of laws from
a distance as to how I ought to teach, but became a schoolmaster in a village
popular school in the backwoods -- I could not reject the idea that there must
of necessity exist some criterion by means of which I could solve the question
of what to teach and how to teach it. Should I teach by heart the psalter or
the classification of the organisms? Should I teach according to the
sound-alphabet, taken from the Germans, or simply use the prayer-book? In the
solution of this question I was aided by a certain tact in teaching, with which
I am gifted, and especially by that close and passionate interest which I took
in the subject.
When I entered at once
into the close and direct relations with those forty tiny peasants that formed
by school (I call them peasants because I found in them the same
characteristics of perspicacity, the same immense store of information from
practical life, of jocularity, simplicity, and loathing for everything false,
which distinguishes the Russian peasant), when I saw their susceptibility,
their readiness to acquire the information which they needed, I felt at once
that the antiquated church method of instruction had outlived its usefulness
and was of no use to them. I began to experiment on other proposed methods of
instruction; but because compulsion in education, both by my conviction and my
character, are repulsive to me, I did not exercise any pressure, and the moment
I noticed that something was not readily received, I did not put any compulsion
on the pupils but looked for something else. From these experiments it appeared
to me and to those teachers who gave instruction with me at Yasnaya Polyana and
in other schools on the same principles of freedom, that nearly everything
which in the educational world was written about schools was separated by an
immeasurable abyss from the truth, and that many of the proposed methods, such
as object-lessons, the teaching of natural sciences, the sound method, and
others, called forth contempt and ridicule, and were not accepted by the
pupils. We began to look for those contents and those methods which were
readily taken up by the pupils and hit upon that which forms my method of
instruction.
But this method stood
in a line with all other methods, and the question why it was better than the
rest remained unsolved as before....
At that time I found no
sympathy in all the educational literature, indeed not even any contradiction,
but simply complete indifference in regard to the question which I put. There
were some favorable criticisms of certain trifling details, but the question
itself evidently did not interest any one. I was young then, and this
indifference grieved me. I did not understand that with my question "How
do you know what to teach and how to teach?" I was like a man who, let us
say, in a gathering of Turkish pashas who were discussing the question in what
manner they could collect the greatest amount of revenue from the people,
should make them the following proposition: "Gentlemen, before considering
how much revenue to collect from each, we must first analyze the question on
what your right to exact that revenue is based." Obviously, all the pashas
would continue their discussion of the measures of extortion, and would reply
only with silence to his irrelevant remark.
Tolstoy’s letters from
abroad show the interest which he took in the school while he was away. During
the whole of the time the teaching in the school went on without ceasing. It
continued with greater regularity after his return to Yasnaya Polyana in the
spring of 1861, and in 1862, as Tolstoy says in his article on Education:
[Tolstoy writes]
Fourteen schools were opened in a district containing ten thousand souls when I
was a rural judge, besides which there existed about ten schools in the
district among the clericals and on the manors among the servants. In the three
remaining districts of the county there were fifteen large and thirty small
schools among the clericals and manorial servants....
Everybody will agree
that, leaving aside the question of the quality of instruction, such a relation
of the teacher to the parents and peasants is most just, natural and desirable.
Finally, we may mention
the names of the teachers of the schools under Tolstoy’s jurisdiction where his
views on the education of the people were supported. In the Golovenkovskiy
school, the teacher was one Aleksandr Serdobolskiy, a pupil of the Kazan
gymnasium; in the Trasnenskiy school, Ivan Aksentev, a pupil of the Penza
gymnasium; in Lomintsevok, Aleksey Shumilin, a pupil of the Kaluga gymnasium;
in the Bagucharov school, Boris Golovin, a pupil of the tula theological
seminary; in the Baburino school, Alfonse Erlenwein, a pupil of the Kishinev
gymnasium; and in Yassenki, Mitrofan Butovich, a pupil of the Kishinev
gymnasium; in the Kolpeno school, Anatoliy Tomashevskiy, who finished his
studies in the Saratov gymnasium; in the Gorodnya, Vladimir Tokaschevich, who
finished his studies in the Penza gymnasium; in the Plekhanovo school, Nikolay
Peterson, who finished his studies in the Penza gymnasium for the nobles; the
Bogucharov village community chose Sergey Gudim, an ex-student of the Kazan
University, in the place of its former teacher, Morozov. [Footnote: D.T.
Uspenskiy, "Archive Materials for Tolstoy’s Biography." "Russian
Thought", 1903, vol. ix.]
Perhaps some of these
men may come across this biography and its perusal may induce them to write
down memories of their collaboration with the great teacher.
In one of his articles
on education, Tolstoy himself sets forth in detail the organization of the
school at Yasnaya Polyana:
[Tolstoy writes] The
school is held in a two-storied stone building. Two rooms are given up to the
school, one is a cabinet of physical curiosities, and two are occupied by the
teachers. Under the roof of the porch hangs a bell with a rope attached to the
clapper; in the vestibule downstairs stand parallel and horizontal bars, while
in the vestibule upstairs there is a joiner’s bench. The staircase and the
floor of the vestibule are covered with snow or mud; here also hangs the
program.
The order of
instruction is as follows: at about eight o’clock, the teacher living in the
school, a lover of external order and the administrator of the school, sends
one of the boys, who nearly always stay overnight with him, to ring the bell.
In the village people
rise with the fires. From the school the fires have long been observed in the
windows, and half an hour after the ringing of the bell, there appear in the
mist, in the rain, or in the oblique rays of the autumnal sun, dark figures by
twos, threes, or singly on the mounds (the village is separated from the school
by a ravine). The necessity of herding together has long disappeared for the
pupils. A pupil no longer requires to wait and shout: "Oh boys, let’s go
to school. She has begun." He knows by this time that "school"
is neuter and he knows a few other things, and strange to say, for that very
reason, has no longer any need of a crowd...
The children have
nothing with them -- neither reading books nor copy books. No lessons are given
to take home.
Not only do they carry
nothing in their hands, but they have nothing to carry even in their heads.
They are not obliged to remember any lesson or anything that they were doing
the day before. They are not vexed by the thought of the impending lesson. They
bring with them nothing but their impressionable natures and their convictions
that today it will be as jolly in school as it was yesterday. They do not think
of their classes until they have begun.
No one is ever rebuked
for being late, and they never are late, except in the case of some of the
older ones, whose fathers now and then keep them back to do some work. In such
cases they come running to school at full speed, and all out of breath.
So long as the teacher
has not yet arrived, they gather near the porch, pushing each other off the
steps, or sliding on the frozen crust of the smooth road, while some go to the
school rooms. If it is cold, they read, write, or play, waiting for the
teacher.
The girls do not mix
with the boys. When the boys have anything to do with the girls, they never
address anyone in particular but always all collectively: "Oh, girls, why
don’t you skate?" or "I guess the girls are frozen," or
"Now girls, all of you against me!" There is only one girl, from the
manor, with very great general ability, about ten years of age, who is
beginning to make herself conspicuous among the herd. This girl alone the boys
treat as their equal and as a boy, except for a delicate shade of politeness,
condescension, and reserve.
Popular education has
always and everywhere been to me an incomprehensible phenomenon. The people
want education, and every separate individual unconsciously seeks education.
The more highly cultured class of people -- society, the officers of the
Government -- strive to transmit their knowledge and to educate the less
educated masses. One would think that such a coincidence of necessities would
lead to satisfaction being given to both the class which furnishes the
education and the one that receives it. But the very opposite takes place. The
masses continually counteract the efforts made for their education by society
or by the Government, as the representatives of a more highly cultured class,
so that these efforts are frequently frustrated.
As with every conflict,
so also here, it was necessary to solve the question: Which is more lawful, the
resistance or the action itself? Must the resistance be broken, or the action
be changed?
The question has been
somehow always settled in favor of violence. But some sound reasons ought to be
produced for the use of such violence. What are they? To this question Tolstoy
gives the following answer. The arguments may be religious, philosophical,
experimental, and historical, and then he discusses each of these kinds of arguments
separately:
[Tolstoy writes] But in
our time, when religious education forms but a small part of education, the
question what good ground the school has for compelling the young generation to
receive religious instruction in a certain fashion remains unanswered from the
religious point of view.
The philosophical
arguments cannot afford a reason for coercion.
All the philosophers,
beginning with Plato and ending with Kant, tend to this one thing, the
liberation of the school from the traditional fetters which weigh heavily upon
it. They wish to discover what it is that man needs, and on these more or less
correctly divined needs they build up their new school.
Luther wants people to
study Holy Writ in the original, and not according to the commentaries of the
holy fathers. Bacon enjoins the study of Nature from Nature, and not from the
books of Aristotle. Rousseau wants to teach life from life itself, as he
understands it, and not from previous experiments. Every step forward taken by
the philosophy of history consists only in freeing the school from the idea of
instructing the younger generation in that which the elder generations
considered to be science, in favor of the idea of instructing them in what they
themselves need. This one common and, at the same time, self-contradictory idea
is felt in the whole history of educational theories: it is common, because all
demand a greater measure of freedom for the school; contradictory, because
everybody prescribes laws based on his own theory, and by that very act that
freedom is curtailed.
The educational
experiments tend still less to convince us of the lawfulness of compulsory
education. Not only is the experiment sad in itself, but the school stupefies
the children by distorting their mental faculties; it tears them away from the
family during the most precious time of their development, deprives them of the
happiness of freedom, and converts the child into a jaded, crushed being,
wearing an expression of fatigue, fear, and ennui, repeating with its lips
strange words in a strange language; and in reality the experience of school
work gives nothing besides these, for it takes place amid conditions destroying
any possible value in the experiments.
School, so it would
appear to us, ought to be a means of education and at the same time, an
experiment on the young generation, constantly giving new results. Only when
experiment is at the foundation of school-work, and every school is, so to
speak, an educational laboratory, will the school keep pace with the universal
progress and experiment will be able to lay firm foundations for the science of
education.
The historical
arguments are as feeble as the philosophical. This progress of life, of
technical knowledge, of science, proceeds faster that the progress of the
school, and the school therefore remains more and more behind the social life,
and becomes ever worse and worse.
The argument that as
schools have existed and are existing, therefore they are good, Tolstoy meets
by describing his personal experience of schools in Marseilles, Paris and other
towns in Western Europe, which brought him to the conclusion that the greater
part of the people’s education is acquired not at school but in life, and that
free, open instruction by means of public lectures, sights, meetings, books,
exhibitions, and so on, quite surpasses all school tuition.
Finally, Tolstoy
addresses himself especially to Russian educationists, saying that if we are,
for example, to acknowledge the existence of German schools as desirable, in
spite of their defects, on the ground of historic experiment, still the
question remains: On what grounds are we Russians to defend the school for the
people, when no such schools yet exist with us? What historic reasons have we
to declare that our schools must be the same as those of the rest of Europe?
[Tolstoy writes] What
are we Russians to do at the present moment? Shall we all come to some
agreement and take as our basis the English, French, German, or North American
view of education and any one of their methods? Or shall we, by closely
examining philosophy and psychology discover what in general is necessary for
the development of a human soul, and for making out of the younger generation
the best men possible according to our conception? Or shall we make use of the
experience of history -- not in imitating those forms which history has
evolved, but in comprehending those laws which humanity has worked out through
suffering? Shall we say frankly and honestly to ourselves that we do not know
and cannot know what future generations may need but that we feel ourselves
obliged to study this need, and that we wish to do so; that we do not wish to
accuse the people of ignorance for not accepting our education, but that we
shall accuse ourselves of ignorance and self-conceit if we persist in educating
the people according to our ideas?
Let us cease looking
upon the people’s resistance to our education as upon a hostile element, but
let us rather see in it an expression of the people’s will, which alone ought
to guide us. Let us finally adopt the view which we are so plainly told, both
by the history of educational methods and the whole history of education, that
if the educating class is to know what is good and what is bad, the classes
which receive the education must have full power to express their
dissatisfaction, or, at least, to swerve from the education which instinctively
does not satisfy them -- that the only criterion of educational methods is
liberty.
The article ends in the
following avowal:
We know that our
arguments will not convince many. We know that our fundamental convictions that
the only method of education is experiment, and its only criterion freedom,
will sound to some like trite commonplace, to some like an indistinct abstraction,
to others again like a visionary dream. We should not have dared to disturb the
repose of the theoretical pedagogues and to express these convictions, which
are contrary to all experience, if we had to confine ourselves to the
reflections made in this article; but we feel ourselves able to prove step by
step, and taking one fact after another, the applicability and propriety of our
convictions however wild they may appear, and to this end alone do we devote
the publication of the periodical "Yasnaya Polyana".
The magazine
"Yasnaya Polyana", which was in fact itself an interesting
educational experiment, lasted for one year. Twelve numbers were issued.
The first issue began
with the following appeal to the public:
[Tolstoy writes in
"Yasnaya Polyana" No. 1] Entering on a new work, I am under some
fear, both for myself and for those thoughts which have been for years
developing in me, and which I regard as true. I am certain beforehand that many
of these thoughts will turn out to be mistaken. However carefully I have
endeavored to study the subject and have involuntarily looked upon it from one
side, I hope that my thoughts will call forth the expression of a contrary
opinion. I shall be glad to afford room for all opinions in my magazine. Of one
thing only am I afraid -- that these opinions may be expressed with acridity,
and that the discussion of a subject so dear and important to all as that of
national education may degenerate into sarcasms, personalities, and
journalistic polemics; and I will not say that sarcasms and personalities could
not affect me, or that I hope to be above them. On the contrary, I confess that
I fear as much for myself as for the cause itself; I fear being carried away by
personal polemics instead of quietly and persistently working at my subject.
I therefore beg all
future opponents of my views to express their thoughts so that I may explain
myself and substantiate my statements in those cases in which our disagreement
is caused by our not understanding one another, and might agree with my
opponents when the error of my view is proved. Count L. N. Tolstoy
Each issue contained
one or two theoretical articles, then reports of the progress of the schools
under the management of Tolstoy, bibliography, description of school libraries,
accounts of donations, and a supplement in the shape of a book for reading.
The motto of the
magazine was the saying: Glaubst zu schieben und wirst geschoben, that is to
say, "You mean to push, but in reality it is you who are pushed."
This magazine has
become a bibliographical rarity. True, Tolstoy’s own principal articles have
been included in the fourth volume of the full edition of his works, but
besides those articles, there appeared in the magazine many different short
notices, descriptions and reports of great interest for teachers in a
theoretical as well as in a practical sense.
In his article "On
methods of teaching to read and write," Tolstoy tries in the first place
to prove that reading is not the first step in instruction, but only an
intervening one.
[Tolstoy writes] Since
it is not the first, then it is not the principal one.
If we want to find the
foundation, the first step in education, why should we look for it perforce in
the rudiments instead of much deeper? Why should we stop at one of the endless
number of the instruments of education and see in it the alpha and the omega of
education, when it is only one of the incidental, unimportant circumstances of
education?
By
"Education" we do not mean merely a knowledge of "Reading and
Writing."
We see people who are
well acquainted with all the facts necessary to know for the purpose of
farming, and with a large number of interrelations of these facts, though they
can neither read nor write; or excellent military commanders, excellent
merchants, managers, superintendents of work, master mechanics, artisans,
contractors, and people simply educated by life, who possess a great store of
information and of sound reasoning based on that information, who can neither
read nor write. On the other hand we see those who can read and write, and who
have acquired no new information by means of those accomplishments.
Among the reasons which
cause a contradiction between the real needs of the people and the tuition
imposed upon the people by the cultured classes, Tolstoy points out certain
features in the historic development of educational institutions.
[Tolstoy writes] First
were founded, not the lower, but the higher schools: at first the monastic,
then the secondary, then the primary schools....The rudiments are in this
organized hierarchy of institutions the last step, or the first from the end,
and therefore the lower school is to respond only to the exigencies of the
higher schools.
But there is also
another point of view, from which the popular school appears as an independent
institution, which is not obliged to perpetuate the imperfections of the higher
institution of learning, but which has an aim of its own, viz., that of
supplying popular education.
The school for reading
and writing exists among the people in the shape of the workshop, and, as such,
satisfies the need for those accomplishments, and reading and writing are for
the people a certain kind of art or craft.
Having made clear the
gist of this matter of writing and reading, and pointed out its place in the
life of the people, Tolstoy goes on further to investigate different methods of
teaching to read and write.
After having examined
the defects and merits of the old fashioned methods of teaching to read letter
by letter, and the method of learning by sound; after having further discussed
the comical and pedantic German Lautieranschauungsunterrichtsmethode, he came
to the conclusion that all methods are good and all are bad, that the talent
and ability of the teacher are at the foundation of any method, and he finally
addresses to the teacher the following advice:
[Tolstoy writes] Every
teacher of reading must be well grounded in the one method which has been
evolved by the people, and must further verify it by his own experience; he
must endeavor to find out the greatest number of methods, employing them as
auxiliary means; must, by regarding every imperfection in the pupil’s
comprehension, not as showing a defect in the pupil, but a defect in his own
instruction, endeavor to develop in himself the ability of discovering new
methods. Every teacher must know that every method invented is only a step, on
which he must stand in order to go farther; he must know that if he himself
will not do it, another will adopt that method, and will, on its basis, go
farther, and that, as the business of teaching is an art, completeness and
perfection are not obtainable, while development and improvement are endless.
With still greater
detail and clearness does Tolstoy present his educational ideas in his article
"Education and Instruction".
In the first place, he
states the fact that the majority of educationists, Russian and European,
confuse these two ideas. Then he tries to restate the distinction between these
conceptions, giving his own definitions to the three principal educational
terms -- Education, Training, and Instruction.
[Tolstoy writes]
Education in the broad sense of the term is, according to our conviction, the
sum total of all those influences which develop man, give him a broader outlook
and new knowledge, children’s games and their sufferings, punishments inflicted
by their parents, books, work, study, whether compulsory or free, art, science,
life -- all these educate.
Training is the
influence exercised by one man on another for the purpose of making him adopt
certain moral habits.
Instruction is the
transmission of knowledge from one man to another (one can be instructed in
chess, or history, or boot-making). Teaching, an aspect of instruction, is the
influence exercised by one man upon another for the purpose of leading him to
acquire certain accomplishments (to sing, to do carpentering, to dance, to row,
to recite). Instruction and teaching are means of education when they are
exercised without compulsion, and means of training when teaching is
compulsory, and when instruction is directed in an exclusive way, i.e., when
only those subjects are given which the teacher regards as necessary.
There are no rights of
education. I do not acknowledge such, nor have they been acknowledged, nor will
they ever be, by the young generation under education, which always and
everywhere is set against compulsion in education.
Education is
compulsory, instruction is free. Where lies to right to compulsion?
Where do we find the
justification of any compulsion by humanity? [To this question Tolstoy gives
the following answer:]
If such an abnormal
condition as the use of force in culture -- education -- has existed for ages,
the causes of this phenomenon must be rooted in human nature. I see these
causes -- (1) in the family, (2) in religion, (3) in the State, and (4) in
society (in the narrower sense, which in our country embraces only the official
circles and the gentry).
While not approving of
the influence of the first three sources of compulsion, Tolstoy admitted that
it was intelligible.
It is difficult to
hinder parents from bringing up their children to be different from what they
are themselves; it is difficult for a believer not to strive to bring up his
child in his own faith; finally, it is difficult to claim that Governments
should not educate the officials whom they require
But by what right does
the privileged, progressive society educate by its own standard the people
alien to itself? this can be explained by nothing but gross egotistical error.
What is the reason of
this error?
I think it is that we
do not hear the voice of those who attack us; we do not hear it, because it
does not speak in print or down from the professor’s chair. But it is the
mighty voice of the people, which one must listen to carefully in order to hear
it.
Tolstoy then began the
examination of the methods of this educational compulsion, i.e., those
practiced in the schools from the lowest to the highest, and he found nothing
cheering in them. He criticized especially the organization of our
universities.
Without rejecting
university instruction on principle, Tolstoy declared:
[Tolstoy writes] I can
understand a university, corresponding to its name and its fundamental idea, as
a collection of men for the purpose of their mutual culture. Such universities,
unknown to us, spring up and exist in various corners of Russia; in the
universities themselves, in the students’ clubs, people come together, read and
discuss, until at last rules establish themselves when to meet and how to
discuss. There you have real universities! But our universities, in spite of
all the empty talk about the seeming freedom of their structure, are institutions
which, by their organization, in no way differ from female boarding schools and
cadet academies.
Besides the absence of
freedom, of independence, one of the chief defects of our university life is
its aloofness from real life.
See how the son of a
peasant learns to become a farmer; how the sexton’s son, reading in the choir,
learns to be a sexton; how the son of a Kirgiz cattle dealer becomes a herder;
he enters very early into direct relations with life, with Nature, and with
men; he learns early, while working, to make his work productive; and he
learns, being secure on the material side of life, that is, so far as to be
sure of a piece of bread, of clothes to wear, and of a lodging. Now look at a
student, who is torn away from home, from the family, cast into a strange city,
full of temptations for his youth, without means of support (because the
parents provide means only for bare necessities, while all is spent on
frivolity), in a circle of companions who by their society only intensify his
defects; without guides, without an aim, having pushed off from the old and
having not yet landed at the new. Such, with rare exceptions, is the position
of a student. From this results that which alone can result; you have officials
who are fit only for Government posts; or professional officials, fit for
society, or people aimlessly torn away from their former surroundings, with a
spoiled youth, and finding no place for themselves in life, so-called people
with university culture -- advanced, that is, irritable, sickly Liberals.
The university is our
first and our chief educational institution. It is the first to arrogate to
itself the right of education, and it is the first, so far as the results which
it obtains indicate, to prove the impropriety and impossibility of university
education. Only from the social point of view is it possible to justify the
fruits of the university. The university trains not such men as humanity needs,
but such as corrupt society needs.
Tolstoy foresaw the
timid objections to his radical solution of the question on the part of those
fearing a change, and he answered these at once, concluding his answer with the
following reply:
[Tolstoy writes]
"What are we to do then? shall there, really, be no county schools, no
gymnasia, no chairs of the history of Roman law? What will become of
humanity?" I hear.
There certainly shall
be none, if the pupils do not need them, and you are not able to make them
good.
"But children do
not always know what they need; children are mistaken," and so forth, I
hear.
I will not enter into
this discussion. this discussion would lead us to the question: Can man’s
nature be judged by a tribunal of men? and so forth. I do not know that, and do
not take that stand; all I can say is that if we know what to teach, you must
not keep me from teaching Russian children by force, French, medieval
genealogy, and the art of stealing. I can prove everything as you do.
"So there will be
no gymnasia and no Latin? Then what am I going to do?" I again hear.
Don’t be afraid! There
will be Latin and rhetoric, and they will exist another hundred years, simply
because the medicine is bought, so we must drink it (as a patient said). I
doubt whether the thought, which I have expressed, perhaps indistinctly,
awkwardly, inconclusively, will become a common possession in another hundred
years; it is not likely that within a hundred years will die those ready-made
institutions, schools, gymnasia, universities, and that within that time will
grow up freely formed institutions, having for their basis the freedom of the
learning generation.
Of course, such
audacious ideas could not be accepted by educationists, who during the 1860s
have been at the head of national instruction in russia. Offended science did
not even deign to take such ideas seriously. In "The Collection of
Criticisms Upon Tolstoy" by Zelinskiy, a book very carefully composed,
there are only two serious articles devoted to the magazine "Yasnaya
Polyana", and to the school of the same name. The are printed in "The
Contemporary" of 1862.
To one of these, the
article of E. Markov, Tolstoy replied in his magazine by an article, "the
Progress and Definition of Instruction."
The gist of markov’s
argument, given in a resume at the end of his article, consists in an open
acknowledgment of the right of compulsory education on the part of society, and
its right of rejecting free instruction, after making which he proceeds to
express his approval of contemporary systems of instruction. As to the school
in Yasnaya Polyana, he speaks with enthusiasm of its practice but holds that it
is inconsistent with the theories of its founder and guide, L.N. Tolstoy.
In his reply to Markov,
Tolstoy repeats and explains what has been said by him in his preceding
articles, and he comes to the conclusion that their principal difference is the
fact that Markov believes in progress and he does not.
In explanation of his
want of belief in progress, he says:
[Tolstoy writes] The
process of progress has taken place in all humanity from time immemorial, says
the historian who believes in progress, and he proves this assertion by
comparing, let us say, England of the year 1685 with the England of our time.
Even if it were possible to prove, by comparing Russia, france, and Italy of
our time with ancient rome, Greece, Carthage, and so forth, that the prosperity
of the modern nations is greater than that of antiquity, I am still struck by
one incomprehensible phenomenon; they deduce a general law for all humanity
from the comparison of one small part of European humanity in the present and
the past. Progress is a common law of humanity, they say, except for Asia,
Africa, America, and australia, except for one thousand mission people.
We have noticed the law
of progress in the dukedom of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, with its three thousand
inhabitants. We know China, with its two hundred million inhabitants, which
overthrows our whole theory of progress, and we do not for a moment doubt that
progress is the common law of all humanity, and that we, the believers in that
progress, are right, and those who do not believe in it are wrong, and so we go
with cannons and guns to impress the idea of progress upon the Chinese. Common
sense, however, tells us that if the history of the greater part of humanity,
the whole so- called East, does not confirm the law of progress, but on the
contrary, overthrows it, that law does not exist for all humanity, but only as
an article of faith for a certain part of it.
I, like all people who
are free from the superstition of progress, observe only that humanity lives,
that the memories of the past augment as much as they disappear; the labors of
the past frequently serve as a basis for the labors of the present, and just as
frequently as an impediment; that the well-being of people now increases in one
place, in one stratum, and in one sense, and now diminishes; that, not matter
how desirable it would be, I cannot find any common law in the life of
humanity; and that it is as easy to subordinate history to the idea of progress
as to any other idea or to any imaginable historical fancy.
I will say even more; I
see no necessity for finding common laws for history, independently of the
impossibility of finding them. The common eternal law is written in the soul of
each man. The law of progress, or perfectibility, is written in the soul of
each man, and is transferred to history only through error. As long as it
remains personal, this law is fruitful and accessible to all; when it is
transferred to history, it becomes an idle, empty prattle, leading to the
justification of every insipidity and to fatalism. Progress in general in all
humanity is an unproved fact, and does not exist for all the Eastern nations;
therefore, it is as unfounded to say that progress is the law of humanity as it
is to say that all people are fair except the dark-complexioned ones.
The propositions stated
are developed in detail by Tolstoy in his article, but as this subject over
steps the limits of our narrative, we will conclude by mentioning one more
paper entitled "A Project For A General Plan of People’s Schools
Organization." This article contains some witty criticisms, and a readable
review of the Government regulation concerning schools in 1862.
Tolstoy’s general
critical remarks on the regulation can be summed up thus: (1) The regulation is
based upon the American system; the people are to pay school rates, and the
schools are to be maintained by the Government with the sum collected. But what
is good in a democratic republic may turn out very bad in a despotic state,
where the law expressing the so-called "will of the people" becomes a
gross invasion of the rights of the people. (2) The general inefficiency of the
project follows from its inadaptability to the needs of the people, owing to
entire ignorance of Russian life on the part of the author. (3) The control of
popular education sanctioned by this regulation will prove an obstacle to the
popular education already existing, which is freely spreading.
After having finished
this brief summary of Tolstoy’s opinions on education, we must give our own
conclusion, which is in opposition to the conclusion of M. Markov and is this,
that the practice of the school at Yasnaya Polyana does not in the least
contradict Tolstoy’s views, but, on the contrary, amounts to their direct
application, which is accomplished with unique success.
In his educational
articles of practical interest, Tolstoy gives an artistic description of
several incidents in school life, a subject n which he took a warm and sincere
interest, not like a stern pedant demanding obedience, but like a boy joining
in the joys and sorrows of his school companions, giving them his whole soul,
and sharing his great spiritual riches with them.
By putting together the
incidents thus described, one sees the gigantic figure of the great
educationist in all its grandeur.
I. The Working of the
School
It was not cold outside
-- a moonless winter night with clouds in the sky. We stopped at the
cross-roads; the older, third-year pupils stopped near me, asking me to
accompany them farther; the younger ones looked awhile at me and then ran off
down hill. The young ones had begun to study with a new teacher, and they no
longer had that confidence in me that the older boys had.
"Come, let us go
to the preserve," (a small forest within two hundred steps of the house),
said one of them. Fedka, a small boy of ten, of a tender, impressionable,
poetical, and impetuous nature, was the most persistent in his demands. Danger
seemed to form his chief condition for enjoyment...
He knew that there were
wolves in the forest then, and so he wanted to go to the preserve. The rest
joined in, so we went, all four of us, into the wood. another boy, I shall call
him Semka, a physically and morally sound lad of about twelve, nicknamed
Vavilo, walked ahead and kept exchanging calls with somebody in his ringing
voice. Pronka, a sickly, meek, but uncommonly talented boy, the son of a poor
family -- sickly, I think, mainly on account of insufficient food -- was
walking by my side.
Fedka was walking
between me and Semka, talking all the time in his extremely soft voice, telling
us how he had herded horses here in the summer, or saying that he was not
afraid of anything, or asking, "Suppose some one were to jump out at
us!" and insisting on my answering him. We did not go into the forest
itself -- that would have been too terrible -- but even near the forest it was
getting darker; we could hardly see the path, and the fires of the village were
hidden from view.
Semka stopped and began
to listen.
"Stop, boys! What
is that?" he suddenly said.
We held our tongues,
but we could hear nothing; still it added terror to our fear.
"Well, what should
we do if one should jump out and make straight for us?" Fedka asked.
We began to talk about
robbers in the Caucasus. They recalled a story of the Caucasus I had told them
long ago, and I told them more stories about abreks, Cossacks, and Khadzhi
Murat. Semka was strutting ahead of us, stepping broadly in his big boots, and
evenly swaying his strong back. Pronka tried to walk by my side, but Fedka
pushed him off the path, and Pronka, who apparently always submitted to such
treatment on account of his poverty, still rushed up to my side during the most
interesting passages, though sinking knee-deep in the snow.
Everybody who knows
anything about peasant children has noticed that they are not accustomed to any
kind of caresses -- tender words, kisses, being fondly touched with the hand,
and so forth....It was for this reason that I was startled when Fedka, who was
walking by my side, in the most terrible part of the story suddenly touched me
lightly with his sleeve, and then grasped two of my fingers with his whole
hand, and did not let them go.
The moment I was
silent, Fedka begged me to proceed, and that in such an imploring tone and with
so much agitation that I could not refuse.
"Don’t get in my
way!" he once angrily called out to Pronka, who had run on in front; he
was really quite savage with him -- he had such a mingled feeling of terror and
joy, as he was holding on to my finger, that he could not bear any one daring
to interrupt his pleasure.
"More, more! That’s
fine!"
We passed the forest
and were approaching the village from the other end.
"Let us go back
again," all cried when the lights became visible. "Let us take
another walk!"
We walked in silence,
now and then sinking in the loose, untrodden snow; the white darkness seemed to
be swaying before our eyes; the clouds hung low, and seemed to be piled over us
-- there was no end to that whiteness over which we alone crunched through the
snow; the wind rustled through the bare tops of the aspens, but we were
protected from the wind behind the forest.
I finished my story by
telling them that the abrek, being surrounded, began to sing songs, and then
threw himself on his dagger. All were silent.
"Why did he sing a
song when he was surrounded?" asked Semka.
"Didn’t you hear?
He was getting ready to die!" Fedka replied sorrowfully.
"I think he sang a
prayer," added pronka.
All agreed....
We stopped in the
grove, beyond the threshing floors, at the very end of the village. Semka
picked up a stick from the snow and began to strike the frozen trunk of a lime
tree. The hoar frost fell from the branches upon his cap, and the lonely sound
of his beating was borne through the forest.
"Lev
Nikolayevich," Fedka said (I thought he wanted to say something again
about the countess), "why do people learn singing? I often wonder why they
really do?"...
It feels strange to me
to repeat what we spoke on that evening, but I remember we said everything, I
think, that there was to be said on utility and on plastic and moral beauty.
A rare happiness fell
to the writer of these lines, as to Fedka, who held Tolstoy by his fingers and
was rapt in ecstasy. I more than once walked with Tolstoy on the sam spot
(Zakas). Listening to his tales, I have experienced the same feeling, which
cannot be expressed in better words than those used by Fedka: "Go on, go
on! ah, how nice!"
2. The Lesson In
Composition
Once last winger
[Tolstoy goes on], I forgot everything after dinner as I read Snegirev’s book,
and even returned to the school with the book in my hands. It was a lesson in
the Russian language.
"Well, write
something on a proverb!" I said.
The best pupils, Fedka,
Semka, and a few others, pricked up their ears.
"What do you mean
by ‘on a proverb’? What is it? Tell us!" the questions ran.
I happened to open the
book at the proverb: "He feeds with the spoon and pricks his eye with the
handle."
"Now
imagine," I said, "that a peasant has taken a beggar to his house and
then begins to rebuke him for the good he has done him, and you will see that ‘he
feeds with spoon and pricks his eye with the handle.’"
"But how are you
going to write it?" asked Fedka and all the rest, who had pricked up their
ears. They retreated, having convinced themselves that this matter was beyond
their strength, and they betook themselves to the work which they had begun.
"Will you write it
yourself?" one of them said to me.
Everybody was busy with
his work; I took a pen and ink and began to write.
"Well," said
I, "who will write it best? I am with you.
I began the story,
printed in the fourth issue of the "Yasnaya Polyana" magazine, and I
wrote down the first page. Every unbiased man who has the artistic sense and
feels with the poorer classes will, upon reading this first page, written by
me, and the following pages of the story, written by the pupils themselves,
separate this page from the rest, as if he were taking a fly out of the milk;
it is so false, so artificial, and so badly expressed. I must remark that in
the original form it was more monstrous still, as much has been corrected,
thanks to the hints given by the pupils.
Fedka kept looking up
from his copy book to me, and upon meeting my eyes, he smiled, winked, and
repeated: "Write, write, or I’ll give it to you!" He was evidently
amused to see a grown person write a theme.
Having finished his
theme worse and faster than usual, he climbed on the back of my chair and began
to read over my shoulders. I could not proceed; others came up to us, and I
read out to them what I had written.
They did not like it,
and none of them praised it. I felt ashamed, and, to soothe my literary vanity,
I began to tell them the plan of what was to follow. The further I got in my
story, the more enthusiastic I became; I often corrected myself, and they kept
helping me out. One would say that the old man should be a magician; another
would remark: "No, that won’t do, he must be just a soldier; the best
thing will be if he steals from him; no, that won’t go with the proverb,"
and so forth.
All were exceedingly
interested. It was evidently a new and exciting sensation for them to be
present at the process of creation and to take part in it. Their judgments were
all, for the most part, to the same effect, and they were just, whether they spoke
of the very structure of the story or of the incidents and the characters given
to the personages. Nearly all of them took part in the composition; but, from
the outset, those who distinguished themselves were the positive Semka, by his
marked artistic power of description, and Fedka, by the correctness of his
poetical conception, and especially by the glow and rapidity of his
imagination.
Their demands had so
little of the accidental in them and were so definite, that more than once,
after beginning a discussion, I had to give way to them. I was strongly
possessed by the demands of a regular structure and of an exact correspondence
of the idea of the proverb to the story; while they, on the contrary, were only
concerned about the demands of artistic truth. I, for example, wanted that the
peasant, who had taken the old man to his house, should himself repent of his
good deed, while they regarded this as impossible and introduced a cross old
woman.
I said: "The
peasant was at first sorry for the old man and afterward did not like giving
away the bread."
Fedka replied that that
would make the story improbable. "From the first he did not obey the old
woman, and would not submit later on."
"What kind of a
man is he, according to you?" I asked.
"He is like Uncle
Timofey," said Fedka, smiling. "He has a scanty beard, goes to
church, and he has bees."
"Is he good but
stubborn?" I asked.
"Yes," said
Fedka, "he will not obey the old woman."
From that time the old
man was brought into the hut, the work became animated. They evidently for the
first time felt the charm of clothing artistic incidents in words. Semka
distinguished himself more than the rest in this respect; the correctest
details were poured forth one after the other. The only fault that could be found
with him was that these details sketched only the actual moment, without
connection with the general feeling of the story. I hardly could write their
descriptions as fast as they gave them, and only asked them to wait and not
forget what they had told me.
Semka seemed to see and
describe that which was before his eyes; the stiff, frozen bast shoes, with the
dirt oozing from them as they thawed, and the half-burned scraps into which
they were shrivelled when the old woman threw them into the oven.
Fedka, on the contrary,
saw only such details as brought out for him the particular feeling which he
had for particular individuals. Fedka saw the snow drifting behind the peasant’s
leg- rags, and the expression of compassion with which the peasant said,
"Lord, how it snows!" (Fedka’s face even showed how the peasant said
it, and besides this, he swung his hands and shook his head.) He saw the cloak,
all rags and patches, and the torn shirt, under which could be seen the
shrunken body of the old man, wet from the melting snow. He created the old
woman, who growled, as, at the command of her husband, she took off his bast
shoes, and the pitiful groan of the old man as he muttered through his teeth,
"Softly, motherkin, I have sores here."
Semka needed mainly objective
pictures; bast shoes, a cloak, an old man, a woman, all almost independent of
one another; but Fedka had to make others feel the pity with which he was
filled himself. He ran ahead of the story, telling how he would feed the old
man, how the latter would fall down at night, and would later teach a boy in
the field to read, so that I was obliged to ask him not to be in such a hurry
and not to forget what he had said. His eyes sparkled with positive hears; his
swarthy, thin little hands were clasped convulsively; he was angry with me, and
he kept urging me on: "Have you written it, have you written it?" he
kept asking me.
He treated all the rest
despotically; he wanted to talk all the time, giving the story not as a story
is told, but as it is written, that is, artistically clothing in words the
sensuous pictures. thus, for example, he would not allow words to be
transposed; if he once said, "I have sores on my feet," he would not
permit me to say, "On my feet I have sores." His soul, now softened
and irritated by the sentiment of pity, that is, of love, clothed every image
in an artistic form, and denied everything that did not correspond to the idea
of eternal beauty and harmony.
The moment Semka was
carried away into giving disproportionate details about the lambs in the
inclosure, and so forth, Fedka grew angry and said, "What a lot of
bosh!" I only needed to suggest what the peasant was doing, while his wife
went to the gossip, to call forth at once in Fedka’s imagination a picture with
lambs bleating at the inclosure, with the sighs of the old man and the delirium
of the boy Seryozhka; I only needed to suggest an artificial and false picture
to make him immediately remark angrily that that was not necessary.
For example, I
suggested the description of the peasant’s looks, to which he agreed; but to my
proposition to describe what the peasant was thinking when his wife had run
over to the gossip, there immediately rose before him this very way of
expressing his thought, "If you got in the way of Savoska, the corpse, he
would pull all your locks out!" He said this, leaning his head on his hand
the while, with such a tone of fatigue and quiet gravity -- although in his
usual good-natured voice -- that the boys shook with laughter.
The chief quality in
every art, the feeling of measure, was developed in him to an extraordinary
degree. He writhed at the suggestion of any superfluous feature, made by some
one of the boys.
He directed the
structure of the story so despotically, and with such right to this despotism,
that the boys soon went him, and only he and Semka, who would not give in to
him, though working in another direction, were left. We worked from seven to
eleven o’clock; they felt neither hunger nor fatigue, and even got angry at me
when I stopped writing; they undertook to relieve me in writing, but they soon
gave that up, as matters would not go well.
It was then for the
first time that Fedka asked my name. We laughed because he did not know.
"I know," he
said, "how to call you; but how do they call you in the manor? We have
such names as Fokanychev, Zyabrev, Yermilin."
I told him.
"Are we going to
print it?" he asked.
"Yes."
"Then we shall
have to print work by Makarov, Morozov, and Tolstoy."
He was agitated for a
long time and could not sleep and I cannot express the feeling of agitation,
joy, fear, and almost regret, which I experienced during that evening. I felt
that with that day a new world of enjoyment and suffering was opened up to him
-- the world of art; I thought that I had received and insight into what no one
has a right to see -- the germination of the mysterious flower of poetry.
I felt both dread and
joy, like the seeker after the treasure who suddenly sees the flower of the
fern -- I felt joy, because suddenly and quite unexpectedly there was revealed
to me that stone of the philosophers which I had vainly been trying to find for
two years -- the art of teaching the expression of thought; and dread, because
this art made new demands -- brought with it a whole world of desires, which
stood in no relation to the surroundings of the pupils, as I thought in the
first moment. There was no mistaking. It was not an accident, but a conscious
creation....
I gave up the lesson,
because I was to much agitated.
"What is the
matter with you? You are so pale -- are you ill?" my companion asked me.
Indeed, only two or three times in my life have I experienced such a strong
sensation as on that evening, and for a long time I was unable to render an
account to myself of what I was experiencing. I distinctly felt that I had
criminally looked through a glass hive at the work of the bees, concealed from
the gaze of mortal man; it seemed to me that I had vaguely felt something like
repentance for an act of sacrilege,...and at the same time I was happy as a man
must be happy who beholds that which no one has beheld before.
3. The First Lesson In
History
Tolstoy writes: I had
intended to explain in the first lesson in what way russia differed from other
countries, where its frontiers were, the nature of the structure of its
government, then to say who was the present ruler, and how and when the Emperor
ascended the throne.
"Teacher: Where do
we live, in what country?"
"A Pupil: In
Yasnaya Polyana."
"Another Pupil: In
the field."
"Teacher: No, in
what country is Yasnaya Polyana and the Government of Tula?"
"Pupil: the
Government of Tula is seventeen versts from us. Where is it? Government is a
Government, and that is all there is to say about it."
"Teacher: No. Tula
is the capital of the Government, but a Government is something different.
Well, what country is it?"
"Pupil (who has
learned some geography before): The earth is round like a ball."
By means of questions
as to what country a German, whom they knew, had lived in before and where they
would get if they were to keep traveling all the time in one direction, the
pupils were led up to answer they that lived in russia. Some, however, replied
to the question where we should get if we traveled all the time in one
direction, that we should get nowhere. Others said that we should get to the
end of the world.
"Teacher
(repeating the pupil’s answer): You said that we should come to some other
countries; where will Russia end and other countries begin?"
"Pupil: Where the
Germans begin."
"Teacher: So, if
you meet Gustav Ivanovich and Karl Fedorovich in Tula, you will say that the
Germans have begun and that there is a new country?"
"Pupil: No, when
the Germans begin thick."
"Teacher: No,
there are places in Russia where the Germans are thick. Ivan Fomich is from one
of them, and yet that is still russia. Why is it so?"
Silence.
"Teacher: Because
they obey the same laws with the Russians."
"Pupil: One law? How
so? The Germans don’t come to our church and they eat meat on fast-days."
"Teacher: I do not
mean that kind of law, but they obey one Tsar."
"Pupil (skeptical
Semka): That is funny. Why have they a different law, and yet obey the
Tsar?"
The teacher feels the
need of explaining what a law is, and so he asks what is meant by "obeying
a law," or "being under one law."
"Girl (independent
manorial girl, hurriedly and timidly): To accept the law means ‘to get married.’"
The pupils look inquiringly
at the teacher. The teacher begins to explain that the law consists in putting
a man in jail and in punishing him for stealing or killing.
"Skeptic Semka:
And have not the Germans such a law?"
"Teacher: There
are also laws with us about the gentry, the peasants, the merchants, the clergy
(the word ‘clergy’ perplexes them)."
"Skeptic Semka:
And have not the Germans such a law?"
"Teacher: In some
countries there are such laws, and in others there are not. We have a Russian
Tsar, and in the German countries there is a German Tsar."
This answer satisfies
all the people and even skeptical Semka.
Thinking it was now
time to pass on to explain what is meant by the classes, the teacher asks them
what classes of society they know. the pupils begin to enumerate them: the
gentry, the peasants, the popes, the soldiers. "Any more?" asks the
teacher. "The manorial servants, the burghers, the samovar-makers."
The teacher asks them to distinguish these classes.
"Pupils: The
peasants plough, the manorial servants serve their masters, the merchants
trade, the soldiers serve, the samovar-makers get the samovars ready, the popes
serve the mass, the gentry do nothing..."
Then in the same order
and under similar difficulties there follows an explanation of the idea of
"Classes of Society," "frontiers," and other terms applied
to the State.
The lesson lasts about
two hours. The teacher is convinced that the pupils have retained a great deal
of what has been said, and he continues his subsequent lessons in the same strain,
convincing himself only much later that his method was wrong, and that all that
he has been doing has been the merest nonsense.
4. The Second Lesson In
History
"The holding of
this class has remained a memorable event in my life, [says Tolstoy]. I shall
never forget it. The children had long been promised that I should tell them
history, going backward, while another teacher would begin from the beginning,
so that we should finally meet. My evening scholars had left me, and I came to
the class of Russian history. They were talking about Svyatoslav. They felt
dull. On a tall bench sat in a row, as they always put themselves, three
peasant girls, with their heads tied with kerchiefs. One was asleep. Mishka
pushed me. "Look there, our cuckoos are sitting there -- one is
asleep." And they were like cuckoos!
"You had better
tell us from the end," said some one, and all got up.
I sat down and began to
talk. As always, the hubbub, the groans, the tussling, lasted about two
minutes. Some were crawling under the table, some on the table, some under the
benches, and on their neighbors’ shoulders and knees, till at last all was
silent. I began with Aleksandr I, told them of the French Revolution, of
Napoleon’s successes, of his seizing the government, and of the war which ended
in the peace of Tilsit. The moment we reached Russia there were heard sounds
and words expressing lively interest on all sides.
"Well, is he going
to conquer us, too?"
"Never mind,
Aleksandr will give it to him!" said some one who knew about Aleksandr,
but I had to disappoint them -- the time had not yet come for that -- and they
felt uncomfortable when they heard that the Tsar’s sister was spoken of as a
bride for Napoleon, and that aleksandr spoke with him on the bridge, as if he
was his equal.
"Just wait!"
exclaimed Petka, with a threatening gesture.
"Go on and tell
us!"
When Aleksandr declined
to submit to him, that is, when Aleksandr declared war, all expressed their
approbation. When Napoleon came against us at the head of twelve nations and
stirred up the Germans and Poland, their hearts sank from agitation.
A German, a friend of
mine, was standing in the room.
"Ah, you were
against us, too," said Petka (the best storyteller).
"Keep quiet!"
cried the others.
The retreat of our army
tortured my audience, and on all sides were asked questions why? and curses
were heaped on Kutuzov and Barclay.
"Your Kutuzov is
no good!"
"Just wait,"
said another.
"Well, did he
surrender?" asked a third.
When we reached the
battle of Borodino, and when in the end I was obliged to say that we did not
gain a victory, I was sorry for them -- it was evident that I gave them all a
terrible blow.
"Though our side
did not win, theirs did not either!"
When Napoleon came to
Moscow and was waiting for the keys of the city and for submission, there was a
burst of protest, as they had thought they were unconquerable. The
conflagration of Moscow was, naturally, approved of by all. Then came the
victory, Napoleon’s retreat.
"When he came out
of Moscow, Kutuzov rushed after him and went to fight him," I said.
"He made him
rear!" Fedka corrected me.
Fedka, red in his face,
was sitting opposite me, and was bending his thin, tawny fingers with
excitement. That is his habit. The moment he said this, the whole room groaned
with pride and delight. A little fellow in the back row was being badly
squeezed, but nobody paid any attention.
"That’s better!
There, take the keys now!" and so forth. Then I continued, describing our pursuit
of the French. It pained the children to hear that some one was too late at
Berezina, and that we let them pass; Petka even groaned with pain. "I
should have shot him dead for being late."
Here we even had some
pity for the frozen Frenchmen. Then, when we crossed the border and the
Germans, who had been against us, joined us, some one remembered the German who
was standing in the room.
"How is that? At
first you are against us, and when the power is losing, you are with us!"
and suddenly all rose and shouted at the German, so that the noise could be
heard in the street. When they quieted down I went on, telling them about our
following up Napoleon as far as Paris, placing the real king on the throne,
celebrating our victory, and feasting. But the recollection of the Crimean War
spoiled the whole thing.
"Just wait,"
said Petka, shaking his fist; "let me grow up and I will show them!"
If we had at that
moment had a chance at the Shevardino redoubt and Mount Malakhov, we should
certainly have taken them back.
It was late when I
ended. As a rule the children are asleep at that time. No one was sleeping, and
the eyes of the little cuckoos were burning. Just as I got up, Taraska crawled
out from underneath my chair, to my great astonishment, and look vivaciously,
and, at the same time, seriously at me.
"How did you get
down there?"
"He was there all
the time," some one said.
"There was no need
to ask him whether he had understood; you could see that by his face.
"Well, are you
going to tell about it?" I asked.
"I?" He
thought a while. "I will tell the whole thing."
"I will tell it at
home."
"So will I."
"And I."
"Is that
all?"
"Yes."
All flew down under the
staircase, some promising to give it to the Frenchmen, others scolding the
German, and others repeating how Kutuzov had made him "rear".
"Sie haben ganz
Russisch erzachlt," the German who had been hooted said to me in the
evening. "You ought to hear how they tell the story in our country! You
said nothing about the German struggle for freedom."
I fully agreed with him
that my narrative was not history but a fanciful tale to rouse the national
sentiment. Consequently, as a study of history, this attempt was even less
successful than the first.
* * * * * * * *
To give a full picture
of Tolstoy as a schoolmaster, we must add his views on the teaching of music.
He gives a concise summary of his conclusions in four short paragraphs.
[Tolstoy writes] From
the small experience which I have had in teaching music, I have become
convinced:
(1) That the method
which consists in writing the sounds down in figures is the most convenient.
(2) That teaching time
independently of sound is again the most convenient method.
(3) That, in order that
musical instruction should produce permanent effect and be cheerfully received,
it is necessary from the very outset to teach the art and not the skill of
singing and playing. Young ladies may be made to play Burgmuner’s exercises,
but the children of the people it is better not to teach at all than to teach
mechanically.
(4) That the aim of
musical instruction must consist in giving the pupils that knowledge of the
common laws of music which we possess, but by no means in transmitting that
false taste which is developed in us.
Drawing occupied a conspicuous
place in the school course, but Tolstoy did not teach it himself, as he did not
think he was competent, and this task was undertaken by a fellow teacher.
In the spring of 1862,
Tolstoy was very tired after his work as Peace Mediator, and at the school, and
having some fear of consumption, he resolved to try the Koumiss treatment.
Accompanied by his
man-servant Aleksey and two schoolboys, he went to the province of Samara in
the middle of May [1862].
He wrote from Moscow to
his aunt Tatyana, informing her that he and his companions were all well and
giving her certain advice and messages in connection with the school.
They went by rail to
Tver and then on by a steamer, which was to take them down the river Volga to
Samara.
On the voyage, Tolstoy probably
was in that very happy mood which is so often enjoyed by all travellers upon
the Volga. The great river in its spring overflow, the soft murmur of the
steamer as it moved, the fascinating spring nights with their starlit skies,
the mirror-like river, the lights of the shore and the vessel, the pilgrims,
monks, Tartars, and other passengers, who, in spite of the great variety of
types, conditions, nationalities, and religions, bear on them a distinctive
Great Russian cachet; possibly thoughts of the great historic past of the river
and its banks -- all these make an incomparably gladdening and softening
impression and bring with them many thoughts and dreams.
Tolstoy probably had
some similar sensations, for on May 20th [1862] he wrote in his diary:
[Tolstoy writes] On
board steamer. It seems as if I were again awakening to life and to the
understanding of it. The thought as to the absurdity of progress pursues me.
With the intelligent and the silly, with old men and with children, I keep
discussing this one thing.
On his way, Tolstoy
stopped with his relation Vladimir Ivanovich Yuskhov in Kazan.
Then, from Samara
itself, he wrote to his aunt:
[Tolstoy writes] May
27, 1862...I have had a splendid journey; I like the locality very much; my
health is better, i.e., I cough less. Aleksey and the boys are alive and well,
as you may tell their parents..."
He next wrote from the
place where he was undergoing his treatment:
[Tolstoy writes] June
28, 1862...Aleksey and myself have become stouter, especially aleksey, but we
cough a little, and again especially Aleksey. We are living in a Kibitka [a
Tartar tent]. I found my friend Stolipin was an Ataman [Cossack commander] at
Uralsk, where I visited him. I brought from there a clerk, but I do not dictate
or write much. Laziness quite overpowers one when taking koumiss. In a
fortnight I intend returning home. I am troubled by want of news in these
wilds, and also by the consciousness that I am dreadfully behindhand with the
publication of the journal. I kiss your hands. Please write in detail about
Seryozha, Masha, the student, whom I greet.
Enclosed are letters
from the boys to their teachers.
While he was spending a
peaceful time in the Bashkir Steppes, an unexpected event took place in the
school at Yasnaya Polyana.
There can be no doubt
that the powerful preaching of freedom of speech and action at the school could
not but attract the attention of the authorities, and Yasnaya Polyana was
denounced to those whom it concerned as a center of criminal revolutionary
propaganda. In the summer of 1862, the police appeared in the school and made a
perquisition.
A full description of
this is to be found in the reminiscences of E. Markov in his article printed in
"The European Messenger."
[E. Markov writes] I
cannot help mentioning a characteristic episode, known only to a very few
persons, but which had been the cause of Tolstoy’s giving up educational work.
As a peace mediator of the first elected group, Tolstoy warmly sympathized with
the liberation of the serfs, and he naturally acted in a direction which
provoked a large majority of landowners against him. He has received a number
of threatening letters; they threatened to knock him down or shoot him in a
duel; and he has been denounced to the authorities. It so happened that just at
the very time when the magazine "Yasnaya Polyana" was started by
Tolstoy, proclamations of different revolutionary parties made their appearance
in St. Petersburg, and the police were actively engaged searching for the
hidden printing press. Some one of Tolstoy’s political enemies craftily
insinuated that certain secret leaflets containing appeals for cooperation
could be printed only in the printing office of a magazine published --
horrible dictu! -- not in a town, as all respectable people would have it done,
but in the country. In fabricating this, they only omitted to give a glance at
the title-page, where it was stated in big type that the review was published
in the most respectable printing office of M. N. Katkov in Moscow. The
denunciation, nevertheless, created a real storm.
In the absence of
Tolstoy, his house was being kept by his elderly aunt, and his sister, also
married to a Tolstoy, was staying there with her children on a visit. Our
common friend, G. A. Auerbach, and myself were spending the summer with our
families at a distance of about five versts from Yasnaya Polyana, in a house
let to us by a landowner in the same Raspberry Abattis where Yasnaya Polyana
was. One early morning a messenger from Yasnaya Polyana arrived. We were
requested to come as soon as possible on important business. Auerbach and I
jumped into a wagonette and hurried on as hard as we could. On our entering the
courtyard, we were faced with a real invasion; there were post chaises drawn by
teams of three horses with their bells, conveyances of local inhabitants, the
head of the police district, the commissary of rural police, local policemen,
witnesses, and in addition to all this -- gendarmes. The colonel of the
gendarmes arrived with jingling and bustle at the head of this fearful
expedition into Tolstoy’s peaceful abode, to the great consternation of the
village people. After some difficulty, we succeeded in entering the house. The
poor ladies were almost fainting. Everywhere there were watchmen, everything
was opened, shifted about, and turned upside down -- tables, drawers,
wardrobes, chests of drawers, boxes, caskets, etc. Crowbars were used in the
stables to lift the floors; the ponds in the park were searched by means of
nets in order to catch the criminal printing press, instead of which only
innocent carp and crabs made their appearance.
It need hardly be said
that in the first place, the unfortunate school had been turned upside down;
but, finding nothing there, the searchers went in the same noisy, bustling
procession, with sounding bells, to pay a visit apparently to all the seventeen
schools of the peace districts, everywhere turning over tables and ransacking
cupboards, carrying off exercise books and school manuals, putting teachers
under arrest, and creating the wildest conjectures in the heads of the
peasants, who were generally unfavorable to schools. [E. Makarov, "The
Living Soul in School: Thoughts and Reminiscences of An Old
Educationalist," "Messenger of Europe," p. 584, February 1900.]
Prince D. D. Obolenskiy
speaks of the same incident in his reminiscences, with the addition of some
interesting details:
[Prince D. D.
Obolenskiy writes] The school of Yasnaya Polyana was getting on splendidly. But
as most of the school teachers were students, the authorities did not very much
favor the institution and suspected that there must be something politically
unsound in Yasnaya Polyana. Even an officer of the gendarmes called, but of
course could not find anything, for there was nothing to find. Only in one room
in the house of Yasnaya Polyana, which was converted into a schoolroom, the
attention of the officer was attracted by a photographic apparatus. In 1862
this was still a novelty, especially in the provinces and villages. "What
is that?" sternly inquired the officer. "Whose photos are taken
here?" The students, of course, did not like his visit, and one of them
said for fun, "Kergen’s, from nature." "How Kergen?"
inquired the officer. But the laughter explained to him that it was a joke, and
he left the place biting his lips. ["Sketches and Reminiscences by Prince
D. D. Obolenskiy," "The Russian Archive, Book X, 1894.]
Zakharyin Yakunin Tells
the following in his "Reminiscences of the Countess A. A. Tolstaya:
[Zakharyin Yakunin
writes] Relating to her this humiliating incident, Tolstoy added: "I often
say to myself, what a very lucky thing it is that I was not at home! If I had
been, I should by this time have been tried for murder." It is easy to
explain these strong words used by Tolstoy forty-two years ago, if one
remembers the great shock suffered by his dearest friends at the time -- his
aunt and his sister. It is enough to say that the Police Commissioner of Tula,
Kobelyatskiy, gave permission to Tolstoy’s sister to leave the study for the
drawing room and then to go to bed only after he had read before her, and in
the presence of two gendarmes, all those intimate letters which we mentioned in
their place, as well as Tolstoy’s diary, and everything Tolstoy had written and
kept hidden from all since the age of sixteen...
The owner of Yasnaya
Polyana did not wish to leave such unnecessary harshness unpunished, so he cut
short his medical treatment and went home. He wrote to Countess A. A. Tolstaya
immediately upon receiving news of the police invasion and asked her to
communicate all the details of the affair to those in power who knew him well
and on whose protection he could rely, i.e., to Count B. A. Perovskiy, Countess
H. D. Bludova, and others. What Tolstoy requested was not the punishment of
those who committed the outrage, but the restoration of his good name in the
eyes of the peasants around him and security against similar incidents in the
future.
This affair I
positively do not wish to and cannot leave alone," he wrote; "all the
employment in which I had found happiness and peace is spoiled. Auntie is so
ill from fright that she will probably not recover. The people look upon me no
longer as an honest man -- an opinion, on their part, which I have earned
during many years -- but as a criminal, an incendiary, or a coiner, who has escaped
merely owing to his slyness...."
"Ah, friend! you
have been caught...you needn’t talk to us any more about honesty and justice --
you have almost been handcuffed yourself."
"As to the
landowners, it goes without saying there is one outburst of delight. Please
tell me at once, after consulting Perovskiy or Aleksey Tolstoy, or whom you
like, how I am to write and to transmit my letter to the Emperor. I have no
other choice than either to receive a satisfaction as public as the insult (it
is too late for any redress), or else to expatriate myself, upon which I have
firmly decided. To Herzen I will not go; Herzen has his own way, and I have
mine. Nor will conceal matters, but will loudly proclaim that I am selling my
estate in order to leave Russia, where it is impossible to know for one minute
what have to expect."
It is a long letter
written on eight large pages. In forming her at the end that the colonel of
gendarmes on leaving had threatened Yasnaya Polyana with a new search till he
should find out "what was hidden," Tolstoy added:
"Loaded pistols
are in my room, and I am waiting to see how all this will end."
I remember Tolstoy
telling me that he felt extremely hurt by this meddling of the police in his
affairs, the more so as the visit and the search of the police were made during
his absence. He made up his mind to complain of it to the Emperor Aleksandr II,
and at the latter’s visit to Moscow, when he met him in the Aleksandrovsk
Garden, he personally handed him a petition. The Emperor received his petition,
and I believe sent one of his adjutants to apologize.
But the authorities
were far from pacified, and a correspondence between the Ministers of the
Interior and of Instruction ensued on the subject of the review "Yasnaya
Polyana." We quote extracts from this correspondence printed in the
reminiscences of Usov:
[Usov writes] The
Minister of Interior informed the Minister of Instruction on October 3, 1862:
The careful reading of
the educational review "Yasnaya Polyana, edited by Count Tolstoy, leads to
the conclusion that this review, in preaching new methods of tuition and
principles of popular schools, frequently spreads ideas which, besides being
incorrect, are injurious in their teaching. Without entering into a full
examination of the doctrines of the review, and without pointing out any
particular articles or expressions -- which, however, could be easily done -- I
consider it necessary to draw the attention of your Excellency to the general
tendency and spirit of the review, which very often attacks the fundamental
rules of religion and morality. The continuation of the review in the same
spirit must, in my opinion, be considered the more dangerous as its editor is a
man of remarkable and one may say even a fascinating talent, who cannot be
suspected to be a criminal or an unprincipled man. The evil lies in the
sophistry and eccentricity of his convictions, which, being expounded with
extraordinary eloquence, amy carry away inexperienced teachers in this
direction, and thus give a wrong turn to popular education. I have the honor to
inform you of this, hoping that you may consider it useful to draw the special
attention of the censor to this publication.
Having received this
report, the Minister of Instruction issued an order for the examination of all
the printed books of the review "Yasnaya Polyana, and, on October 24th of
the same year [1862], informed the Minister of the Interior that in accordance
with the examination made by his subordinates, and the report presented to him,
he saw nothing dangerous or contrary to religion in the review "Yasnaya
Polyana." One only came at times across extreme views upon the subject of
education, which might very well be criticized in scientific educational
reviews, but not forbidden by the censor.
[Minister of Public
Instruction writes, 1862] On the whole, I must say that Count Tolstoy’s work as
an educationist deserves full respect, and the Minister of Public Instruction
is bound to help him and give him encouragement, even though not sharing all his
views, which, after maturer consideration, he will probably give up himself.
[E. Solovev, "Leo tolstoy: His Life and Literary Activity," p. 73.
Published by Pavlenkov, St. Petersburg, 1897.]
The liberal Ministry of
Public Instruction was mistaken. Tolstoy did not give up his ideas; but all
those attacks had prevented the further development of his school work in
Yasnaya Polyana.
Notwithstanding the
apparent success of his educational work, Tolstoy could not be entirely
satisfied with it; however grand the building which he had so cleverly planned,
he was not sure of the firmness of its foundation. For him, this foundation was
non- existent. His analytical brain prevented him from resting on unstable
foundations, and a really firm one he had not found.
This dissatisfaction
was expressed in his "Confession" in the following words in reference
to this period:
[Tolstoy writes] I
believed that I had found a solution aborad, and armed with that conviction, I
returned to Russia the same year in which the peasants were freed from serfdom,
and accepting the office of a country magistrate or arbitrator, I began to
teach the uneducated people in the schools, and the educated classes by means
of the journals which I published. Things seemed to be going on well, but I
felt that my mind was not in a normal state, and that a change was near. I
might then perhaps have come to that state of absolute despair to which I
brought fifteen years later, if it had not been for a new experience in life which
promised me safety -- the home life of a family man. For a year I occupied
myself with my duties as a arbitrator, with the schools, and with my newspaper,
and my work became so involved that I was harassed to death; my arbitration was
one continual struggle; what to do in the schools became less and less clear,
and my newspaper shuffling more and more repugnant to me. It was always the
same thing, trying to teach without knowing how or what. So that I fell ill,
more with mental than physical sickness, gave up everything, and started for
the steppes to breathe a fresher air, to drink mare’s milk and live a mere
animal life.
Soon after my return, I
married.
The following incident
in the life of Tolstoy took place about the same time:
Still a passionate
gambler, he often fell victim to his own excesses. thus in the beginning of
1862, tolstoy lost 1,000 rubles in a game of billiards to Katkov, the
well-known publicist and editor of "Moscow News."
He was unable to meet
this debt and in lieu of payment gave his unfinished novel "The
Cossacks" to be printed in the magazine, the "Russian
Messenger", published by Katkov himself. It appeared in January 1863 in
its unfinished shape, and in consequence of disagreeable recollections
connected with it, Tolstoy gave it up and never finished the story.
Being informed of this
incident by Botkin, Turgenev wrote about it to Fet:
[Turgenev writes]
Tolstoy has written to Botkin that he played against luck in Moscow and got
from Katkov 1,000 rubles as a deposit for his Caucasian novel. May God grant he
returns to his true work, if even in this manner. His "Childhood" and
"Youth" have appeared in an English translation, and it seems they
are popular. I asked a friend of mine to write an article on it in the
"Revue des Deux Mondes". One ought to have intercourse with the
people, but to long for it like a woman who is enceinte is ridiculous.
At that time Tolstoy
used very often to visit the house of Dr. Bers, with whom he was to be more
closely connected by family ties.
We were still little
girls [said the Countess Tolstaya to the biographer Loewenfeld] when Tolstoy
first visited our house. He was then already a well-known writer and lived in
Moscow in a gay, noisy style. One day Tolstoy rushed into our room and joyfully
informed us that he had just sold his "Cossacks" to Katkov for a
thousand rubles. We thought the price very low. Then he explained that he had
to do it; that he had lost that sum of money at a game of "China
billiards," and that it was for him a matter of honor to settle the debt
immediately. He intended to write the second part of "The Cossacks,"
he has never done it. His news so much upset us little girls that we cried,
walking up and down the room.
About this time,
Tolstoy again became friendly with Fet, the estrangement from whom had been the
result of the quarrel with Turgenev. Of this renewal of their friendly
relations, Fet speak thus:
[Fet writes] If my
memory -- which keeps correctly not only events of importance in my life, but
even the precise words used on any odd occasion -- did not retain the
circumstances of our reconciliation with Tolstoy after his ill-tempered
postscript, it only proves that his anger against me was like a hailstorm in
July, which was bound to melt by itself. Yet I suppose it did not occur without
Borisov’s help. However this may be, Tolstoy again appeared on our horizon and
with the enthusiasm peculiar to him began to speak of his friendship with the
family of Dr. Bers.
Having accepted the
offer of the Count to introduce me to the Bers family, I met the doctor, a
polite and well-mannered old man, and a beautiful, distinguished looking
brunette, his wife, who was evidently the ruler of the household. I refrain
from describing the three young ladies, the youngest of whom possessed a
beautiful contralto voice. Notwithstanding the careful supervision of their
mother and their perfect modesty, they all possessed the charm which the French
call du chien. The dinner table and the dinner of the domineering hostess were
irreproachable." [A. Fet, My Reminiscences", Vol. I]
Of the attitude of
Tolstoy to the bers family and his gradual preparation for the marriage we
learn from a private letter of Tolstoy’s sister-in-law:
[Tatyana Bers writes]
His relations with our house are of long standing: our grandfather Islenev and
Tolstoy’s father were neighboring landowners as well as friends. Their families
had been in constant communication, and it is through this that my mother and
Tolstoy were like sister and brother in their childhood. He used to call on us
when he was an officer. My mother was then already married and on very friendly
terms with Tolstoy’s sister, and at her house as a child I often met Tolstoy.
He used to get up all sorts of games with his nieces and myself. I was about
ten at that time, and I have but little recollection of him. When he returned
from abroad in the year of his marriage, he had not seen us for several years,
and coming to Pokrovskoye (near Moscow), he found my two elder sisters already
grown up. He brought with him a teacher, Keller, from aborad, and engaged a few
more teachers in Moscow for his school, which occupied his attention very much.
He almost always came
on foot to Pokrovskoye (12 versts). We went out with him for long walks. He
took great interest in our life and became very intimate with us. Once we -- my
mother and we three sisters -- went for a fortnight to grandfather’s country
place in the province of Tula, of course driving, and he joined our company. On
the way we called at Yasnaya Polyana. He lived with his aunt Tatyana
Aleksandrovna Yergolskaya and his sister Marie, who were the ladies that my
mother stopped with. The next day a picnic was arranged at Yasnaya Polyana, in
the coppice, with the families of Auerbach and Markov. Haymaking was going on
in the abatis, and we all climbed up a haystack. After this, Tolstoy followed
us to "Tvitzi," my grandfather’s property, and there, at the
card-table, occurred the declaration in "primary letters," as
described in "Anna Karenina." In September we moved to Moscow, where
he too followed, and on the 17th of the month the intended wedding was made
known in Moscow. During the whole of his stay in Moscow he was everywhere and
always lively, gay, and witty -- he was like a volcano throwing out sacred
sparks and fire. I remember him often at the piano; he would bring music,
rehearsed the cherubic song of Bornianskiy with us, and many other songs. He
accompanied me every day and called me Mme. Viardot, urging me to be always
singing.
This is how Countess
Tolstaya herself tells about her wedding, in a conversation with Loewenfeld. We
amplify and correct the narrative which we heard from the Countess:
[Sonya Tolstaya says]
The Count visited our house constantly at that time. We thought he was courting
our elder sister, and my father was perfectly sure of it down to the last
minute, when Tolstoy asked him for my hand. This was in 1862. We went with our
mother in August to visit our grandfather via Yasnaya Polyana. My mother wanted
to call on tolstoy’s sister, and we, the three sisters and our younger brother,
therefore remained for a few days there. Nobody was astonished at the Count’s
attention to us, our acquaintance being, as I have told you, of long standing,
and the Count had always been very kind to us. "Tvitzi," our
grandfather’s property, or rather that of his wife, nee Isleneva -- for his own
land he lost by card-playing -- was fifty versts from Yasnaya Polyana. A few
days later Tolstoy arrived and, in a word, here took place a scene similar to
that described in "Anna Karenina," when Levin made his love
declaration in "primary letters," and Kitty guessed it at once. Up to
the present, said the Countess with a smile, proving that the mere recollection
of it caused her pleasure, I cannot understand how I made out the meaning of
the letters then. It must be true that souls attuned to one another give out
the same sound even as do equally tuned chords."
The sentence exchanged
by Tolstoy and the lady who became his wife, which had been written only in
primary letters, were the following:
I. y. f. e. a. f. i. a.
t. m. a. y. s. L. Y. a. T. m. d. i. This meant: "In your family exists a
false idea as to me and your sister Liza. You and Tanichka must destroy it."
The Countess guessed
the sentence and nodded affirmatively. Then he wrote:
Y. y. a. d. f. h. r. m
. t. v. o. m. a. a. a. t. i. o. h., which meant: "Your youth and desire
for happiness remind me too vividly of my advanced age and the impossibility of
happiness."
Nothing more was said
between them, but they understood and were sure of one another.
They went to Moscow,
whither Tolstoy followed them. He lived in town, and the family of bers were
generally in Pokrovskoye- Glebovo, twelve versts from Moscow, where they had
lived every summer for twenty years. Tolstoy was their daily visitor. All in
the house were perfectly sure that he was going to propose to the elder
daughter. But on September 17th [1862], the Saint’s Day of Sofya Andreyevna,
Tolstoy handed her a letter in which he made her a proposal of marriage. Of
course this was joyfully accepted by her; but her father was displeased; he did
not like to give the younger daughter in marriage before the elder one, as it
was against old customs, and he at first refused his consent. But the
persistence of Tolstoy and the firmness of Sofya Andreyevna induced him to
yield.
In Tolstoy’s diary we
find the following vivid reflections of these events. After one of the visits
to the family Bers, he wrote down on August 23rd [1862]:
[Tolstoy writes] I am
afraid of myself. What if it is only the desire to love, but not love? I try to
look only at her weak side, and yet I love.
At the same time he
felt the loneliness of his public life.
[Tolstoy writes] I got
up in good health, with an especially clear head; my writing came easily, but
the subject matter is poor. Then I felt so sad as I have not for long. I have
no friends, none. I am alone. There were friends when I served Mammon, and
there are none when I serve the truth."
At last, on August 26th
[1862] he wrote:
[Tolstoy writes] I went
to the Bers’s at Pokrovskoye on foot. I felt at peace, comfortable. Sonya gave
me a story to read. What energy of truth and simplicity! She is troubled with
its indefiniteness. I read it all without agitation, without any symptoms of
jealousy or envy, but the words "of excessively unattractive appearance
and inconstancy of views" hit me splendidly. I consoled myself by the
thought that it was not about me.
Unfortunately this story
was never given to the world; it was destroyed by the author.
On August 28th [1862],
his birthday, when he was thirty-four years old, we once more see in his diary
marks of hesitation, self- accusation, and a struggle.
[Tolstoy writes] I got
up in the usual sadness. I have planned a society for apprentices. A sweet,
quieting night. You ugly face, don’t think of marriage; your calling is of
another kind, and much has been given for it.
But want of family
happiness got the upper hand, and the desire of love turned at last into real
passionate love, which knew no bars whatever. And yet notwithstanding the power
of this passion, Tolstoy here too displayed his honesty and love of truth.
After having already made his proposal and been accepted, he handed to his
betrothed all the diaries of his bachelor days, with all his expressions of
self-reproach and his perfectly sincere description of his youthful escapades,
and the excesses and moral conflicts which he had gone through.
The reading of the
diary was blow which caused deep suffering to the young girl, who had seen in
her hero the ideal of all virtues. The suffering was so great and the struggle
she went through so hard that at times she hesitated and wondered whether she
should not sever the link. But love swept away all hesitation, and after nights
of weeping she returned him his diary with a look in which he read forgiveness
and a stronger and still more courageous love than before.
The wedding was fixed
for a very early date, the end of the week following the formal proposal --
September 23rd [1862].
The marriage took place
at the Kremlin in the Court church, and immediately after it the newly married
couple drove away in a dormeuse to Yasnaya Polyana, where they were met by
Tolstoy’s brother and his aunt tatyana Aleksandrovna.
The brother of Countess
Tolstaya, S. A. bers, in his reminiscences thus describes his sister.
[S. A. Bers (Sonya’s
brother) writes] My late father did not approve of schools for girls, so that
Tolstoy’s wife was brought up at home, but she went through an examination and
received the diploma of a teacher. While a girl she kept her diary, tried to
write stories, and showed some talent for painting. [S. A. Bers,
"Reminiscences of Count L. N. Tolstoy", p13]
Soon after his marriage,
Tolstoy wrote to Fet:
[Tolstoy writes]
Fetoushka, Dear Old Fellow -- I have been married for two weeks and am happy
and a new, quite new man. I wished to come to see you, but I cannot manage it.
When shall I see you? Having come to myself, I value you very much indeed, and
there is between us too much in common and unforgettable -- Nikolenka and much
besides. Come to make my acquaintance. I kiss Marya Petrovna’s hands. Goodby
dear friend. I embrace you with all my heart. [A. Fet, "My
Reminiscences"]
With his marriage,
Tolstoy entered upon a new phase of life, the family phase, "yet unknown
to him, but promising salvation," as he says in his
"Confession". We shall see in our further narrative how far these
expectations of Tolstoy were justified. The spirit of analysis did not spare
even this harbor of salvation and destroyed this allusion also. But
all-powerful reason lifted him a step higher. In the next volume we hope to
peep into this mysterious process so far as is possible.
During this period
Tolstoy wrote, besides those already mentioned, the following books: The
Snowstorm; The Recollections of a billiard-Marker; Two Hussars; Family
Happiness; and Polikushka; and he also began a new story entitled The Cloth-
Measurer.
"The
Snowstorm" presents a winter landscape. While reading it, you not only see
before you the storm, the snowbound road and the wandering drivers with their
vehicles, but you hear all the sounds of the storm, and feel in the elements a
kind of soft, evanescent life.
In the
"Recollections of a Billiard-Marker" is presented a pure, sweet,
human soul gradually lost in the midst of town debauchery.
In "Two
Hussars" are pictured two generations: the old, which indulged in all
kinds of excesses but which at the same time was unsophisticated and sincere,
and therefore lived in harmony with nature; and beside it the young generation
-- viciously cautious, calculating, and hypocritical. The harmony of nature is
broken, and the harmony of consciousness not yet found, and the soul, depraved
by vice, sounds with horrible discord.
"Family
Happiness" is a quiet, touching story of family affection and the author’s
experience.
"Polikushka"
-- a tragedy of serfdom, the trifling of the sentimental gentry with the
peasant’s soul, which possesses hidden under its coarse appearance the finest
moral traits that break at the mere touch of the perverted and decadent
nobility.
The critics of the
1860s paid very little attention to these remarkable works.
They looked for a
certain public standard and had not enough sensibility to perceive the higher
moral beauty with which these works were imbued.
The silence of the
critics induced one of them to write an article entitled "The Phenomena of
Contemporary Literature Passed Over By Our Critics. Count Tolstoy and His
Works."
We consider it out of
place to enter into detailed criticism of these works, and we mention them only
as facts, proving the unceasing inner creative work of Tolstoy.
IN this cursory review
almost half of Leo Tolstoy’s life lies before us.
Fearing to distort his
original thoughts and the facts of his life by unskilled handling, I have tried
wherever possible to let Tolstoy himself, or those nearest to him, his
relatives and friends, his acquaintances and comrades, expound those thoughts
and facts, reducing my part of the work to the presentation of a series of
interesting pictures.
Notwithstanding the
rawness of material, I believe that the nature of Tolstoy’s personality during
this half of his life must stand out clearly before the reader. To this end
certain striking traits may be pointed out which impress one, and which appear
as leading on to his further development.
One of these is his
extraordinary capacity for being passionately carried away by anything brought
within his sphere. Whether that happened to be hunting or card- playing, music
or reading, school-teaching or farming, he exhausted to the very utmost each
set of new impressions, transformed it in his artistic laboratory, and
presented it to the world in lovely shapes, penetrated with high moral and
philosophic meaning.
The same passionate
ardor he carried into his search for truth, for the meaning of human life, and
with the same power of genius he transformed and gave to the world the results
of his work.
The other striking trait
of his character is its truthful- ness; a sincerity which feared nothing, which
often caused disagreeable encounters, but more often, and finally, brought him
to the God of Truth, whom he always served, however unconsciously overshadowed
by varying temporary attractions.
The third and final
trait of his character is the love of goodness; the enjoyment of it, and the
incessant labor upon himself in view of widening the domain of goodness, the
winning others over to the path of goodness, the striving to show to others all
its beauty.
It is evident that
these three traits, combined with his natural gifts, were sufficient to win for
him the world-wide influence he now possesses.
But glancing at the
first half of his life we notice yet one more remarkable trait-his constant
dissatisfaction with himself, with his social activity, with his literary work.
This dissatisfaction has been maintained in him by constant self-analysis,
which never allowed him to find rest in any of the beautiful illusions floating
before him.
This dissatisfaction
was not a sickly, causeless complaining. Deep and real causes lay at the bottom
of it. With all the great resources of his spiritual development, he was devoid
of a substantial foundation-of the synthesis of all the ideas in which he was
interested. He often ap- proached the solution of the great problem, but could
not get hold of it, passed on, and again suffered intensely and deeply.
These waverings round
the one, the only possible, necessary, and satisfactory solution, explain all
his apparent contradictions, his reasonings and self-accusations.
In the next volume we
hope to narrate that current of events in Tolstoy’s life which brought him to
the moment when the thirst for truth, and the suffering occasioned by not finding
it, culminated, and eventually led him to the only solution, the only
foundation of life, and the only guide in his further exertions-to religion.