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+The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Kreutzer Sonata and Other Stories, by Leo Tolstoy
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
+most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
+whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
+of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
+www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you
+will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before
+using this eBook.
+
+Title: The Kreutzer Sonata and Other Stories
+
+Author: Leo Tolstoy
+
+Release Date: October, 1996 [eBook #689]
+[Most recently updated: September 21, 2022]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+Produced by: Judith Boss
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE KREUTZER SONATA ***
+
+cover 
+
+
+
+
+The Kreutzer Sonata
+and Other Stories
+
+by Leo Tolstoy
+
+Translated by Benj. R. Tucker
+
+
+
+
+Contents
+
+
+ TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE.
+
+ THE KREUTZER SONATA.
+ CHAPTER I.
+ CHAPTER II.
+ CHAPTER III.
+ CHAPTER IV.
+ CHAPTER V.
+ CHAPTER VI.
+ CHAPTER VII.
+ CHAPTER VIII.
+ CHAPTER IX.
+ CHAPTER X.
+ CHAPTER XI.
+ CHAPTER XII.
+ CHAPTER XIII.
+ CHAPTER XIV.
+ CHAPTER XV.
+ CHAPTER XVI.
+ CHAPTER XVII.
+ CHAPTER XVIII.
+ CHAPTER XIX.
+ CHAPTER XX.
+ CHAPTER XXI.
+ CHAPTER XXII.
+ CHAPTER XXIII.
+ CHAPTER XXIV.
+ CHAPTER XXV.
+ CHAPTER XXVI.
+ CHAPTER XXVII.
+ CHAPTER XXVIII.
+
+ LESSON OF “THE KREUTZER SONATA.”
+
+ IVAN THE FOOL.
+ CHAPTER I.
+ CHAPTER II.
+ CHAPTER III.
+ CHAPTER IV.
+ CHAPTER V.
+ CHAPTER VI.
+ CHAPTER VII.
+ CHAPTER VIII.
+ CHAPTER IX.
+ CHAPTER X.
+ CHAPTER XI.
+ CHAPTER XII.
+
+ A LOST OPPORTUNITY.
+
+ “POLIKUSHKA.”
+ CHAPTER I.
+ CHAPTER II.
+ CHAPTER III.
+ CHAPTER IV.
+ CHAPTER V.
+ CHAPTER VI.
+
+ THE CANDLE.
+
+
+
+
+TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE.
+
+
+On comparing with the original Russian some English translations of
+Count Tolstoy’s works, published both in this country and in England, I
+concluded that they were far from being accurate. The majority of them
+were retranslations from the French, and I found that the respective
+transitions through which they had passed tended to obliterate many of
+the beauties of the Russian language and of the peculiar
+characteristics of Russian life. A satisfactory translation can be made
+only by one who understands the language and _spirit_ of the Russian
+people. As Tolstoy’s writings contain so many idioms it is not an easy
+task to render them into intelligible English, and the one who
+successfully accomplishes this must be a native of Russia, commanding
+the English and Russian languages with equal fluency.
+
+The story of “Ivan the Fool” portrays Tolstoy’s communistic ideas,
+involving the abolition of military forces, middlemen, despotism, and
+money. Instead of these he would establish on earth a kingdom in which
+each and every person would become a worker and producer. The author
+describes the various struggles through which three brothers passed,
+beset as they were by devils large and small, until they reached the
+ideal state of existence which he believes to be the only happy one
+attainable in this world.
+
+On reading this little story one is surprised that the Russian censor
+passed it, as it is devoted to a narration of ideas quite at variance
+with the present policy of the government of that country.
+
+“A Lost Opportunity” is a singularly true picture of peasant life,
+which evinces a deep study of the subject on the part of the writer.
+Tolstoy has drawn many of the peculiar customs of the Russian peasant
+in a masterly manner, and I doubt if he has given a more comprehensive
+description of this feature of Russian life in any of his other works.
+In this story also he has presented many traits which are common to
+human nature throughout the world, and this gives an added interest to
+the book. The language is simple and picturesque, and the characters
+are drawn with remarkable fidelity to nature. The moral of this tale
+points out how the hero Ivan might have avoided the terrible
+consequences of a quarrel with his neighbor (which grew out of nothing)
+if he had lived in accordance with the scriptural injunction to forgive
+his brother’s sins and seek not for revenge.
+
+The story of “Polikushka” is a very graphic description of the life led
+by a servant of the court household of a certain nobleman, in which the
+author portrays the different conditions and surroundings enjoyed by
+these servants from those of the ordinary or common peasants. It is a
+true and powerful reproduction of an element in Russian life but little
+written about heretofore. Like the other stories of this great writer,
+“Polikushka” has a moral to which we all might profitably give heed. He
+illustrates the awful consequences of intemperance, and concludes that
+only kind treatment can reform the victims of alcohol.
+
+For much valuable assistance in the work of these translations, I am
+deeply indebted to the bright English scholarship of my devoted wife.
+
+
+
+
+THE KREUTZER SONATA.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+
+Travellers left and entered our car at every stopping of the train.
+Three persons, however, remained, bound, like myself, for the farthest
+station: a lady neither young nor pretty, smoking cigarettes, with a
+thin face, a cap on her head, and wearing a semi-masculine outer
+garment; then her companion, a very loquacious gentleman of about forty
+years, with baggage entirely new and arranged in an orderly manner;
+then a gentleman who held himself entirely aloof, short in stature,
+very nervous, of uncertain age, with bright eyes, not pronounced in
+color, but extremely attractive,—eyes that darted with rapidity from
+one object to another.
+
+This gentleman, during almost all the journey thus far, had entered
+into conversation with no fellow-traveller, as if he carefully avoided
+all acquaintance. When spoken to, he answered curtly and decisively,
+and began to look out of the car window obstinately.
+
+Yet it seemed to me that the solitude weighed upon him. He seemed to
+perceive that I understood this, and when our eyes met, as happened
+frequently, since we were sitting almost opposite each other, he turned
+away his head, and avoided conversation with me as much as with the
+others. At nightfall, during a stop at a large station, the gentleman
+with the fine baggage—a lawyer, as I have since learned—got out with
+his companion to drink some tea at the restaurant. During their absence
+several new travellers entered the car, among whom was a tall old man,
+shaven and wrinkled, evidently a merchant, wearing a large
+heavily-lined cloak and a big cap. This merchant sat down opposite the
+empty seats of the lawyer and his companion, and straightway entered
+into conversation with a young man who seemed like an employee in some
+commercial house, and who had likewise just boarded the train. At first
+the clerk had remarked that the seat opposite was occupied, and the old
+man had answered that he should get out at the first station. Thus
+their conversation started.
+
+I was sitting not far from these two travellers, and, as the train was
+not in motion, I could catch bits of their conversation when others
+were not talking.
+
+They talked first of the prices of goods and the condition of business;
+they referred to a person whom they both knew; then they plunged into
+the fair at Nijni Novgorod. The clerk boasted of knowing people who
+were leading a gay life there, but the old man did not allow him to
+continue, and, interrupting him, began to describe the festivities of
+the previous year at Kounavino, in which he had taken part. He was
+evidently proud of these recollections, and, probably thinking that
+this would detract nothing from the gravity which his face and manners
+expressed, he related with pride how, when drunk, he had fired, at
+Kounavino, such a broadside that he could describe it only in the
+other’s ear.
+
+The clerk began to laugh noisily. The old man laughed too, showing two
+long yellow teeth. Their conversation not interesting me, I left the
+car to stretch my legs. At the door I met the lawyer and his lady.
+
+“You have no more time,” the lawyer said to me. “The second bell is
+about to ring.”
+
+Indeed I had scarcely reached the rear of the train when the bell
+sounded. As I entered the car again, the lawyer was talking with his
+companion in an animated fashion. The merchant, sitting opposite them,
+was taciturn.
+
+“And then she squarely declared to her husband,” said the lawyer with a
+smile, as I passed by them, “that she neither could nor would live with
+him, because” . . .
+
+And he continued, but I did not hear the rest of the sentence, my
+attention being distracted by the passing of the conductor and a new
+traveller. When silence was restored, I again heard the lawyer’s voice.
+The conversation had passed from a special case to general
+considerations.
+
+“And afterward comes discord, financial difficulties, disputes between
+the two parties, and the couple separate. In the good old days that
+seldom happened. Is it not so?” asked the lawyer of the two merchants,
+evidently trying to drag them into the conversation.
+
+Just then the train started, and the old man, without answering, took
+off his cap, and crossed himself three times while muttering a prayer.
+When he had finished, he clapped his cap far down on his head, and
+said:
+
+“Yes, sir, that happened in former times also, but not as often. In the
+present day it is bound to happen more frequently. People have become
+too learned.”
+
+The lawyer made some reply to the old man, but the train, ever
+increasing its speed, made such a clatter upon the rails that I could
+no longer hear distinctly. As I was interested in what the old man was
+saying, I drew nearer. My neighbor, the nervous gentleman, was
+evidently interested also, and, without changing his seat, he lent an
+ear.
+
+“But what harm is there in education?” asked the lady, with a smile
+that was scarcely perceptible. “Would it be better to marry as in the
+old days, when the bride and bridegroom did not even see each other
+before marriage?” she continued, answering, as is the habit of our
+ladies, not the words that her interlocutor had spoken, but the words
+she believed he was going to speak. “Women did not know whether they
+would love or would be loved, and they were married to the first comer,
+and suffered all their lives. Then you think it was better so?” she
+continued, evidently addressing the lawyer and myself, and not at all
+the old man.
+
+“People have become too learned,” repeated the last, looking at the
+lady with contempt, and leaving her question unanswered.
+
+“I should be curious to know how you explain the correlation between
+education and conjugal differences,” said the lawyer, with a slight
+smile.
+
+The merchant wanted to make some reply, but the lady interrupted him.
+
+“No, those days are past.”
+
+The lawyer cut short her words:—
+
+“Let him express his thought.”
+
+“Because there is no more fear,” replied the old man.
+
+“But how will you marry people who do not love each other? Only animals
+can be coupled at the will of a proprietor. But people have
+inclinations, attachments,” the lady hastened to say, casting a glance
+at the lawyer, at me, and even at the clerk, who, standing up and
+leaning his elbow on the back of a seat, was listening to the
+conversation with a smile.
+
+“You are wrong to say that, madam,” said the old man. “The animals are
+beasts, but man has received the law.”
+
+“But, nevertheless, how is one to live with a man when there is no
+love?” said the lady, evidently excited by the general sympathy and
+attention.
+
+“Formerly no such distinctions were made,” said the old man, gravely.
+“Only now have they become a part of our habits. As soon as the least
+thing happens, the wife says: ‘I release you. I am going to leave your
+house.’ Even among the moujiks this fashion has become acclimated.
+‘There,’ she says, ‘here are your shirts and drawers. I am going off
+with Vanka. His hair is curlier than yours.’ Just go talk with them.
+And yet the first rule for the wife should be fear.”
+
+The clerk looked at the lawyer, the lady, and myself, evidently
+repressing a smile, and all ready to deride or approve the merchant’s
+words, according to the attitude of the others.
+
+“What fear?” said the lady.
+
+“This fear,—the wife must fear her husband; that is what fear.”
+
+“Oh, that, my little father, that is ended.”
+
+“No, madam, that cannot end. As she, Eve, the woman, was taken from
+man’s ribs, so she will remain unto the end of the world,” said the old
+man, shaking his head so triumphantly and so severely that the clerk,
+deciding that the victory was on his side, burst into a loud laugh.
+
+“Yes, you men think so,” replied the lady, without surrendering, and
+turning toward us. “You have given yourself liberty. As for woman, you
+wish to keep her in the seraglio. To you, everything is permissible. Is
+it not so?”
+
+“Oh, man,—that’s another affair.”
+
+“Then, according to you, to man everything is permissible?”
+
+“No one gives him this permission; only, if the man behaves badly
+outside, the family is not increased thereby; but the woman, the wife,
+is a fragile vessel,” continued the merchant, severely.
+
+His tone of authority evidently subjugated his hearers. Even the lady
+felt crushed, but she did not surrender.
+
+“Yes, but you will admit, I think, that woman is a human being, and has
+feelings like her husband. What should she do if she does not love her
+husband?”
+
+“If she does not love him!” repeated the old man, stormily, and
+knitting his brows; “why, she will be made to love him.”
+
+This unexpected argument pleased the clerk, and he uttered a murmur of
+approbation.
+
+“Oh, no, she will not be forced,” said the lady. “Where there is no
+love, one cannot be obliged to love in spite of herself.”
+
+“And if the wife deceives her husband, what is to be done?” said the
+lawyer.
+
+“That should not happen,” said the old man. “He must have his eyes
+about him.”
+
+“And if it does happen, all the same? You will admit that it does
+happen?”
+
+“It happens among the upper classes, not among us,” answered the old
+man. “And if any husband is found who is such a fool as not to rule his
+wife, he will not have robbed her. But no scandal, nevertheless. Love
+or not, but do not disturb the household. Every husband can govern his
+wife. He has the necessary power. It is only the imbecile who does not
+succeed in doing so.”
+
+Everybody was silent. The clerk moved, advanced, and, not wishing to
+lag behind the others in the conversation, began with his eternal
+smile:
+
+“Yes, in the house of our employer, a scandal has arisen, and it is
+very difficult to view the matter clearly. The wife loved to amuse
+herself, and began to go astray. He is a capable and serious man.
+First, it was with the book-keeper. The husband tried to bring her back
+to reason through kindness. She did not change her conduct. She plunged
+into all sorts of beastliness. She began to steal his money. He beat
+her, but she grew worse and worse. To an unbaptized, to a pagan, to a
+Jew (saving your permission), she went in succession for her caresses.
+What could the employer do? He has dropped her entirely, and now he
+lives as a bachelor. As for her, she is dragging in the depths.”
+
+“He is an imbecile,” said the old man. “If from the first he had not
+allowed her to go in her own fashion, and had kept a firm hand upon
+her, she would be living honestly, no danger. Liberty must be taken
+away from the beginning. Do not trust yourself to your horse upon the
+highway. Do not trust yourself to your wife at home.”
+
+At that moment the conductor passed, asking for the tickets for the
+next station. The old man gave up his.
+
+“Yes, the feminine sex must be dominated in season, else all will
+perish.”
+
+“And you yourselves, at Kounavino, did you not lead a gay life with the
+pretty girls?” asked the lawyer with a smile.
+
+“Oh, that’s another matter,” said the merchant, severely. “Good-by,” he
+added, rising. He wrapped himself in his cloak, lifted his cap, and,
+taking his bag, left the car.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+
+Scarcely had the old man gone when a general conversation began.
+
+“There’s a little Old Testament father for you,” said the clerk.
+
+“He is a Domostroy,”[*] said the lady. “What savage ideas about a woman
+and marriage!”
+
+[*] The Domostroy is a matrimonial code of the days of Ivan the
+Terrible.
+
+
+“Yes, gentlemen,” said the lawyer, “we are still a long way from the
+European ideas upon marriage. First, the rights of woman, then free
+marriage, then divorce, as a question not yet solved.” . . .
+
+“The main thing, and the thing which such people as he do not
+understand,” rejoined the lady, “is that only love consecrates
+marriage, and that the real marriage is that which is consecrated by
+love.”
+
+The clerk listened and smiled, with the air of one accustomed to store
+in his memory all intelligent conversation that he hears, in order to
+make use of it afterwards.
+
+“But what is this love that consecrates marriage?” said, suddenly, the
+voice of the nervous and taciturn gentleman, who, unnoticed by us, had
+approached.
+
+He was standing with his hand on the seat, and evidently agitated. His
+face was red, a vein in his forehead was swollen, and the muscles of
+his cheeks quivered.
+
+“What is this love that consecrates marriage?” he repeated.
+
+“What love?” said the lady. “The ordinary love of husband and wife.”
+
+“And how, then, can ordinary love consecrate marriage?” continued the
+nervous gentleman, still excited, and with a displeased air. He seemed
+to wish to say something disagreeable to the lady. She felt it, and
+began to grow agitated.
+
+“How? Why, very simply,” said she.
+
+The nervous gentleman seized the word as it left her lips.
+
+“No, not simply.”
+
+“Madam says,” interceded the lawyer indicating his companion, “that
+marriage should be first the result of an attachment, of a love, if you
+will, and that, when love exists, and in that case only, marriage
+represents something sacred. But every marriage which is not based on a
+natural attachment, on love, has in it nothing that is morally
+obligatory. Is not that the idea that you intended to convey?” he asked
+the lady.
+
+The lady, with a nod of her head, expressed her approval of this
+translation of her thoughts.
+
+“Then,” resumed the lawyer, continuing his remarks.
+
+But the nervous gentleman, evidently scarcely able to contain himself,
+without allowing the lawyer to finish, asked:
+
+“Yes, sir. But what are we to understand by this love that alone
+consecrates marriage?”
+
+“Everybody knows what love is,” said the lady.
+
+“But I don’t know, and I should like to know how you define it.”
+
+“How? It is very simple,” said the lady.
+
+And she seemed thoughtful, and then said:
+
+“Love . . . love . . . is a preference for one man or one woman to the
+exclusion of all others. . . .”
+
+“A preference for how long? . . . For a month, two days, or half an
+hour?” said the nervous gentleman, with special irritation.
+
+“No, permit me, you evidently are not talking of the same thing.”
+
+“Yes, I am talking absolutely of the same thing. Of the preference for
+one man or one woman to the exclusion of all others. But I ask: a
+preference for how long?”
+
+“For how long? For a long time, for a life-time sometimes.”
+
+“But that happens only in novels. In life, never. In life this
+preference for one to the exclusion of all others lasts in rare cases
+several years, oftener several months, or even weeks, days, hours. . .
+.”
+
+“Oh, sir. Oh, no, no, permit me,” said all three of us at the same
+time.
+
+The clerk himself uttered a monosyllable of disapproval.
+
+“Yes, I know,” he said, shouting louder than all of us; “you are
+talking of what is believed to exist, and I am talking of what is.
+Every man feels what you call love toward each pretty woman he sees,
+and very little toward his wife. That is the origin of the proverb,—and
+it is a true one,—‘Another’s wife is a white swan, and ours is bitter
+wormwood.’”
+
+“Ah, but what you say is terrible! There certainly exists among human
+beings this feeling which is called love, and which lasts, not for
+months and years, but for life.”
+
+“No, that does not exist. Even if it should be admitted that Menelaus
+had preferred Helen all his life, Helen would have preferred Paris; and
+so it has been, is, and will be eternally. And it cannot be otherwise,
+just as it cannot happen that, in a load of chick-peas, two peas marked
+with a special sign should fall side by side. Further, this is not only
+an improbability, but it is certain that a feeling of satiety will come
+to Helen or to Menelaus. The whole difference is that to one it comes
+sooner, to the other later. It is only in stupid novels that it is
+written that ‘they loved each other all their lives.’ And none but
+children can believe it. To talk of loving a man or woman for life is
+like saying that a candle can burn forever.”
+
+“But you are talking of physical love. Do you not admit a love based
+upon a conformity of ideals, on a spiritual affinity?”
+
+“Why not? But in that case it is not necessary to procreate together
+(excuse my brutality). The point is that this conformity of ideals is
+not met among old people, but among young and pretty persons,” said he,
+and he began to laugh disagreeably.
+
+“Yes, I affirm that love, real love, does not consecrate marriage, as
+we are in the habit of believing, but that, on the contrary, it ruins
+it.”
+
+“Permit me,” said the lawyer. “The facts contradict your words. We see
+that marriage exists, that all humanity—at least the larger
+portion—lives conjugally, and that many husbands and wives honestly end
+a long life together.”
+
+The nervous gentleman smiled ill-naturedly.
+
+“And what then? You say that marriage is based upon love, and when I
+give voice to a doubt as to the existence of any other love than
+sensual love, you prove to me the existence of love by marriage. But in
+our day marriage is only a violence and falsehood.”
+
+“No, pardon me,” said the lawyer. “I say only that marriages have
+existed and do exist.”
+
+“But how and why do they exist? They have existed, and they do exist,
+for people who have seen, and do see, in marriage something
+sacramental, a sacrament that is binding before God. For such people
+marriages exist, but to us they are only hypocrisy and violence. We
+feel it, and, to clear ourselves, we preach free love; but, really, to
+preach free love is only a call backward to the promiscuity of the
+sexes (excuse me, he said to the lady), the haphazard sin of certain
+_raskolniks_. The old foundation is shattered; we must build a new one,
+but we must not preach debauchery.”
+
+He grew so warm that all became silent, looking at him in astonishment.
+
+“And yet the transition state is terrible. People feel that haphazard
+sin is inadmissible. It is necessary in some way or other to regulate
+the sexual relations; but there exists no other foundation than the old
+one, in which nobody longer believes? People marry in the old fashion,
+without believing in what they do, and the result is falsehood,
+violence. When it is falsehood alone, it is easily endured. The husband
+and wife simply deceive the world by professing to live monogamically.
+If they really are polygamous and polyandrous, it is bad, but
+acceptable. But when, as often happens, the husband and the wife have
+taken upon themselves the obligation to live together all their lives
+(they themselves do not know why), and from the second month have
+already a desire to separate, but continue to live together just the
+same, then comes that infernal existence in which they resort to drink,
+in which they fire revolvers, in which they assassinate each other, in
+which they poison each other.”
+
+All were silent, but we felt ill at ease.
+
+“Yes, these critical episodes happen in marital life. For instance,
+there is the Posdnicheff affair,” said the lawyer, wishing to stop the
+conversation on this embarrassing and too exciting ground. “Have you
+read how he killed his wife through jealousy?”
+
+The lady said that she had not read it. The nervous gentleman said
+nothing, and changed color.
+
+“I see that you have divined who I am,” said he, suddenly, after a
+pause.
+
+“No, I have not had that pleasure.”
+
+“It is no great pleasure. I am Posdnicheff.”
+
+New silence. He blushed, then turned pale again.
+
+“What matters it, however?” said he. “Excuse me, I do not wish to
+embarrass you.”
+
+And he resumed his old seat.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+
+I resumed mine, also. The lawyer and the lady whispered together. I was
+sitting beside Posdnicheff, and I maintained silence. I desired to talk
+to him, but I did not know how to begin, and thus an hour passed until
+we reached the next station.
+
+There the lawyer and the lady went out, as well as the clerk. We were
+left alone, Posdnicheff and I.
+
+“They say it, and they lie, or they do not understand,” said
+Posdnicheff.
+
+“Of what are you talking?”
+
+“Why, still the same thing.”
+
+He leaned his elbows upon his knees, and pressed his hands against his
+temples.
+
+“Love, marriage, family,—all lies, lies, lies.”
+
+He rose, lowered the lamp-shade, lay down with his elbows on the
+cushion, and closed his eyes. He remained thus for a minute.
+
+“Is it disagreeable to you to remain with me, now that you know who I
+am?”
+
+“Oh, no.”
+
+“You have no desire to sleep?”
+
+“Not at all.”
+
+“Then do you want me to tell you the story of my life?”
+
+Just then the conductor passed. He followed him with an ill-natured
+look, and did not begin until he had gone again. Then during all the
+rest of the story he did not stop once. Even the new travellers as they
+entered did not stop him.
+
+His face, while he was talking, changed several times so completely
+that it bore positively no resemblance to itself as it had appeared
+just before. His eyes, his mouth, his moustache, and even his beard,
+all were new. Each time it was a beautiful and touching physiognomy,
+and these transformations were produced suddenly in the penumbra; and
+for five minutes it was the same face, that could not be compared to
+that of five minutes before. And then, I know not how, it changed
+again, and became unrecognizable.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+
+“Well, I am going then to tell you my life, and my whole frightful
+history,—yes, frightful. And the story itself is more frightful than
+the outcome.”
+
+He became silent for a moment, passed his hands over his eyes, and
+began:—
+
+“To be understood clearly, the whole must be told from the beginning.
+It must be told how and why I married, and what I was before my
+marriage. First, I will tell you who I am. The son of a rich gentleman
+of the steppes, an old marshal of the nobility, I was a University
+pupil, a graduate of the law school. I married in my thirtieth year.
+But before talking to you of my marriage, I must tell you how I lived
+formerly, and what ideas I had of conjugal life. I led the life of so
+many other so-called respectable people,—that is, in debauchery. And
+like the majority, while leading the life of a _débauché_, I was
+convinced that I was a man of irreproachable morality.
+
+“The idea that I had of my morality arose from the fact that in my
+family there was no knowledge of those special debaucheries, so common
+in the surroundings of land-owners, and also from the fact that my
+father and my mother did not deceive each other. In consequence of
+this, I had built from childhood a dream of high and poetical conjugal
+life. My wife was to be perfection itself, our mutual love was to be
+incomparable, the purity of our conjugal life stainless. I thought
+thus, and all the time I marvelled at the nobility of my projects.
+
+“At the same time, I passed ten years of my adult life without hurrying
+toward marriage, and I led what I called the well-regulated and
+reasonable life of a bachelor. I was proud of it before my friends, and
+before all men of my age who abandoned themselves to all sorts of
+special refinements. I was not a seducer, I had no unnatural tastes, I
+did not make debauchery the principal object of my life; but I found
+pleasure within the limits of society’s rules, and innocently believed
+myself a profoundly moral being. The women with whom I had relations
+did not belong to me alone, and I asked of them nothing but the
+pleasure of the moment.
+
+“In all this I saw nothing abnormal. On the contrary, from the fact
+that I did not engage my heart, but paid in cash, I supposed that I was
+honest. I avoided those women who, by attaching themselves to me, or
+presenting me with a child, could bind my future. Moreover, perhaps
+there may have been children or attachments; but I so arranged matters
+that I could not become aware of them.
+
+“And living thus, I considered myself a perfectly honest man. I did not
+understand that debauchery does not consist simply in physical acts,
+that no matter what physical ignominy does not yet constitute
+debauchery, and that real debauchery consists in freedom from the moral
+bonds toward a woman with whom one enters into carnal relations, and I
+regarded _this freedom_ as a merit. I remember that I once tortured
+myself exceedingly for having forgotten to pay a woman who probably had
+given herself to me through love. I only became tranquil again when,
+having sent her the money, I had thus shown her that I did not consider
+myself as in any way bound to her. Oh, do not shake your head as if you
+were in agreement with me (he cried suddenly with vehemence). I know
+these tricks. All of you, and you especially, if you are not a rare
+exception, have the same ideas that I had then. If you are in agreement
+with me, it is now only. Formerly you did not think so. No more did I;
+and, if I had been told what I have just told you, that which has
+happened would not have happened. However, it is all the same. Excuse
+me (he continued): the truth is that it is frightful, frightful,
+frightful, this abyss of errors and debaucheries in which we live face
+to face with the real question of the rights of woman.” . . .
+
+“What do you mean by the ‘real’ question of the rights of woman?”
+
+“The question of the nature of this special being, organized otherwise
+than man, and how this being and man ought to view the wife. . . .”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+
+“Yes: for ten years I lived the most revolting existence, while
+dreaming of the noblest love, and even in the name of that love. Yes, I
+want to tell you how I killed my wife, and for that I must tell you how
+I debauched myself. I killed her before I knew her.
+
+“I killed _the_ wife when I first tasted sensual joys without love, and
+then it was that I killed _my_ wife. Yes, sir: it is only after having
+suffered, after having tortured myself, that I have come to understand
+the root of things, that I have come to understand my crimes. Thus you
+will see where and how began the drama that has led me to misfortune.
+
+“It is necessary to go back to my sixteenth year, when I was still at
+school, and my elder brother a first-year student. I had not yet known
+women but, like all the unfortunate children of our society, I was
+already no longer innocent. I was tortured, as you were, I am sure, and
+as are tortured ninety-nine one-hundredths of our boys. I lived in a
+frightful dread, I prayed to God, and I prostrated myself.
+
+“I was already perverted in imagination, but the last steps remained to
+be taken. I could still escape, when a friend of my brother, a very gay
+student, one of those who are called good fellows,—that is, the
+greatest of scamps,—and who had taught us to drink and play cards, took
+advantage of a night of intoxication to drag us THERE. We started. My
+brother, as innocent as I, fell that night, and I, a mere lad of
+sixteen, polluted myself and helped to pollute a sister-woman, without
+understanding what I did. Never had I heard from my elders that what I
+thus did was bad. It is true that there are the ten commandments of the
+Bible; but the commandments are made only to be recited before the
+priests at examinations, and even then are not as exacting as the
+commandments in regard to the use of _ut_ in conditional propositions.
+
+“Thus, from my elders, whose opinion I esteemed, I had never heard that
+this was reprehensible. On the contrary, I had heard people whom I
+respected say that it was good. I had heard that my struggles and my
+sufferings would be appeased after this act. I had heard it and read
+it. I had heard from my elders that it was excellent for the health,
+and my friends have always seemed to believe that it contained I know
+not what merit and valor. So nothing is seen in it but what is
+praiseworthy. As for the danger of disease, it is a foreseen danger.
+Does not the government guard against it? And even science corrupts
+us.”
+
+“How so, science?” I asked.
+
+“Why, the doctors, the pontiffs of science. Who pervert young people by
+laying down such rules of hygiene? Who pervert women by devising and
+teaching them ways by which not to have children?
+
+“Yes: if only a hundredth of the efforts spent in curing diseases were
+spent in curing debauchery, disease would long ago have ceased to
+exist, whereas now all efforts are employed, not in extirpating
+debauchery, but in favoring it, by assuring the harmlessness of the
+consequences. Besides, it is not a question of that. It is a question
+of this frightful thing that has happened to me, as it happens to
+nine-tenths, if not more, not only of the men of our society, but of
+all societies, even peasants,—this frightful thing that I had fallen,
+and not because I was subjected to the natural seduction of a certain
+woman. No, no woman seduced me. I fell because the surroundings in
+which I found myself saw in this degrading thing only a legitimate
+function, useful to the health; because others saw in it simply a
+natural amusement, not only excusable, but even innocent in a young
+man. I did not understand that it was a fall, and I began to give
+myself to those pleasures (partly from desire and partly from
+necessity) which I was led to believe were characteristic of my age,
+just as I had begun to drink and smoke.
+
+“And yet there was in this first fall something peculiar and touching.
+I remember that straightway I was filled with such a profound sadness
+that I had a desire to weep, to weep over the loss forever of my
+relations with woman. Yes, my relations with woman were lost forever.
+Pure relations with women, from that time forward, I could no longer
+have. I had become what is called a voluptuary; and to be a voluptuary
+is a physical condition like the condition of a victim of the morphine
+habit, of a drunkard, and of a smoker.
+
+“Just as the victim of the morphine habit, the drunkard, the smoker, is
+no longer a normal man, so the man who has known several women for his
+pleasure is no longer normal? He is abnormal forever. He is a
+voluptuary. Just as the drunkard and the victim of the morphine habit
+may be recognized by their face and manner, so we may recognize a
+voluptuary. He may repress himself and struggle, but nevermore will he
+enjoy simple, pure, and fraternal relations toward woman. By his way of
+glancing at a young woman one may at once recognize a voluptuary; and I
+became a voluptuary, and I have remained one.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+
+“Yes, so it is; and that went farther and farther with all sorts of
+variations. My God! when I remember all my cowardly acts and bad deeds,
+I am frightened. And I remember that ‘me’ who, during that period, was
+still the butt of his comrades’ ridicule on account of his innocence.
+
+“And when I hear people talk of the gilded youth, of the officers, of
+the Parisians, and all these gentlemen, and myself, living wild lives
+at the age of thirty, and who have on our consciences hundreds of
+crimes toward women, terrible and varied, when we enter a parlor or a
+ball-room, washed, shaven, and perfumed, with very white linen, in
+dress coats or in uniform, as emblems of purity, oh, the disgust! There
+will surely come a time, an epoch, when all these lives and all this
+cowardice will be unveiled!
+
+“So, nevertheless, I lived, until the age of thirty, without abandoning
+for a minute my intention of marrying, and building an elevated
+conjugal life; and with this in view I watched all young girls who
+might suit me. I was buried in rottenness, and at the same time I
+looked for virgins, whose purity was worthy of me! Many of them were
+rejected: they did not seem to me pure enough!
+
+“Finally I found one that I considered on a level with myself. She was
+one of two daughters of a landed proprietor of Penza, formerly very
+rich and since ruined. To tell the truth, without false modesty, they
+pursued me and finally captured me. The mother (the father was away)
+laid all sorts of traps, and one of these, a trip in a boat, decided my
+future.
+
+“I made up my mind at the end of the aforesaid trip one night, by
+moonlight, on our way home, while I was sitting beside her. I admired
+her slender body, whose charming shape was moulded by a jersey, and her
+curling hair, and I suddenly concluded that _this was she_. It seemed
+to me on that beautiful evening that she understood all that I thought
+and felt, and I thought and felt the most elevating things.
+
+“Really, it was only the jersey that was so becoming to her, and her
+curly hair, and also the fact that I had spent the day beside her, and
+that I desired a more intimate relation.
+
+“I returned home enthusiastic, and I persuaded myself that she realized
+the highest perfection, and that for that reason she was worthy to be
+my wife, and the next day I made to her a proposal of marriage.
+
+“No, say what you will, we live in such an abyss of falsehood, that,
+unless some event strikes us a blow on the head, as in my case, we
+cannot awaken. What confusion! Out of the thousands of men who marry,
+not only among us, but also among the people, scarcely will you find a
+single one who has not previously married at least ten times. (It is
+true that there now exist, at least so I have heard, pure young people
+who feel and know that this is not a joke, but a serious matter. May
+God come to their aid! But in my time there was not to be found one
+such in a thousand.)
+
+“And all know it, and pretend not to know it. In all the novels are
+described down to the smallest details the feelings of the characters,
+the lakes and brambles around which they walk; but, when it comes to
+describing their _great_ love, not a word is breathed of what _He_, the
+interesting character, has previously done, not a word about his
+frequenting of disreputable houses, or his association with
+nursery-maids, cooks, and the wives of others.
+
+“And if anything is said of these things, such _improper_ novels are
+not allowed in the hands of young girls. All men have the air of
+believing, in presence of maidens, that these corrupt pleasures, in
+which _everybody_ takes part, do not exist, or exist only to a very
+small extent. They pretend it so carefully that they succeed in
+convincing themselves of it. As for the poor young girls, they believe
+it quite seriously, just as my poor wife believed it.
+
+“I remember that, being already engaged, I showed her my ‘memoirs,’
+from which she could learn more or less of my past, and especially my
+last _liaison_ which she might perhaps have discovered through the
+gossip of some third party. It was for this last reason, for that
+matter, that I felt the necessity of communicating these memoirs to
+her. I can still see her fright, her despair, her bewilderment, when
+she had learned and understood it. She was on the point of breaking the
+engagement. What a lucky thing it would have been for both of us!”
+
+Posdnicheff was silent for a moment, and then resumed:—
+
+“After all, no! It is better that things happened as they did, better!”
+he cried. “It was a good thing for me. Besides, it makes no difference.
+I was saying that in these cases it is the poor young girls who are
+deceived. As for the mothers, the mothers especially, informed by their
+husbands, they know all, and, while pretending to believe in the purity
+of the young man, they act as if they did not believe in it.
+
+“They know what bait must be held out to people for themselves and
+their daughters. We men sin through ignorance, and a determination not
+to learn. As for the women, they know very well that the noblest and
+most poetic love, as we call it, depends, not on moral qualities, but
+on the physical intimacy, and also on the manner of doing the hair, and
+the color and shape.
+
+“Ask an experienced coquette, who has undertaken to seduce a man, which
+she would prefer,—to be convicted, in presence of the man whom she is
+engaged in conquering, of falsehood, perversity, cruelty, or to appear
+before him in an ill-fitting dress, or a dress of an unbecoming color.
+She will prefer the first alternative. She knows very well that we
+simply lie when we talk of our elevated sentiments, that we seek only
+the possession of her body, and that because of that we will forgive
+her every sort of baseness, but will not forgive her a costume of an
+ugly shade, without taste or fit.
+
+“And these things she knows by reason, where as the maiden knows them
+only by instinct, like the animal. Hence these abominable jerseys,
+these artificial humps on the back, these bare shoulders, arms, and
+throats.
+
+“Women, especially those who have passed through the school of
+marriage, know very well that conversations upon elevated subjects are
+only conversations, and that man seeks and desires the body and all
+that ornaments the body. Consequently, they act accordingly? If we
+reject conventional explanations, and view the life of our upper and
+lower classes as it is, with all its shamelessness, it is only a vast
+perversity. You do not share this opinion? Permit me, I am going to
+prove it to you (said he, interrupting me).
+
+“You say that the women of our society live for a different interest
+from that which actuates fallen women. And I say no, and I am going to
+prove it to you. If beings differ from one another according to the
+purpose of their life, according to their _inner life_, this will
+necessarily be reflected also in their _outer life_, and their exterior
+will be very different. Well, then, compare the wretched, the despised,
+with the women of the highest society: the same dresses, the same
+fashions, the same perfumeries, the same passion for jewelry, for
+brilliant and very expensive articles, the same amusements, dances,
+music, and songs. The former attract by all possible means; so do the
+latter. No difference, none whatever!
+
+“Yes, and I, too, was captivated by jerseys, bustles, and curly hair.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+
+“And it was very easy to capture me, since I was brought up under
+artificial conditions, like cucumbers in a hothouse. Our too abundant
+nourishment, together with complete physical idleness, is nothing but
+systematic excitement of the imagination. The men of our society are
+fed and kept like reproductive stallions. It is sufficient to close the
+valve,—that is, for a young man to live a quiet life for some time,—to
+produce as an immediate result a restlessness, which, becoming
+exaggerated by reflection through the prism of our unnatural life,
+provokes the illusion of love.
+
+“All our idyls and marriage, all, are the result for the most part of
+our eating. Does that astonish you? For my part, I am astonished that
+we do not see it. Not far from my estate this spring some moujiks were
+working on a railway embankment. You know what a peasant’s food
+is,—bread, _kvass_,[*] onions. With this frugal nourishment he lives,
+he is alert, he makes light work in the fields. But on the railway this
+bill of fare becomes _cacha_ and a pound of meat. Only he restores this
+meat by sixteen hours of labor pushing loads weighing twelve hundred
+pounds.
+
+[*] _Kvass_, a sort of cider.
+
+
+“And we, who eat two pounds of meat and game, we who absorb all sorts
+of heating drinks and food, how do we expend it? In sensual excesses.
+If the valve is open, all goes well; but close it, as I had closed it
+temporarily before my marriage, and immediately there will result an
+excitement which, deformed by novels, verses, music, by our idle and
+luxurious life, will give a love of the finest water. I, too, fell in
+love, as everybody does, and there were transports, emotions, poesy;
+but really all this passion was prepared by mamma and the dressmakers.
+If there had been no trips in boats, no well-fitted garments, etc., if
+my wife had worn some shapeless blouse, and I had seen her thus at her
+home, I should not have been seduced.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+
+“And note, also, this falsehood, of which all are guilty; the way in
+which marriages are made. What could there be more natural? The young
+girl is marriageable, she should marry. What simpler, provided the
+young person is not a monster, and men can be found with a desire to
+marry? Well, no, here begins a new hypocrisy.
+
+“Formerly, when the maiden arrived at a favorable age, her marriage was
+arranged by her parents. That was done, that is done still, throughout
+humanity, among the Chinese, the Hindoos, the Mussulmans, and among our
+common people also. Things are so managed in at least ninety-nine per
+cent. of the families of the entire human race.
+
+“Only we riotous livers have imagined that this way was bad, and have
+invented another. And this other,—what is it? It is this. The young
+girls are seated, and the gentlemen walk up and down before them, as in
+a bazaar, and make their choice. The maidens wait and think, but do not
+dare to say: ‘Take me, young man, me and not her. Look at these
+shoulders and the rest.’ We males walk up and down, and estimate the
+merchandise, and then we discourse upon the rights of woman, upon the
+liberty that she acquires, I know not how, in the theatrical halls.”
+
+“But what is to be done?” said I to him. “Shall the woman make the
+advances?”
+
+“I do not know. But, if it is a question of equality, let the equality
+be complete. Though it has been found that to contract marriages
+through the agency of match-makers is humiliating, it is nevertheless a
+thousand times preferable to our system. There the rights and the
+chances are equal; here the woman is a slave, exhibited in the market.
+But as she cannot bend to her condition, or make advances herself,
+there begins that other and more abominable lie which is sometimes
+called _going into society_, sometimes _amusing one’s self_, and which
+is really nothing but the hunt for a husband.
+
+“But say to a mother or to her daughter that they are engaged only in a
+hunt for a husband. God! What an offence! Yet they can do nothing else,
+and have nothing else to do; and the terrible feature of it all is to
+see sometimes very young, poor, and innocent maidens haunted solely by
+such ideas. If only, I repeat, it were done frankly; but it is always
+accompanied with lies and babble of this sort:—
+
+“‘Ah, the descent of species! How interesting it is!’
+
+“‘Oh, Lily is much interested in painting.’
+
+“‘Shall you go to the Exposition? How charming it is!’
+
+“‘And the troika, and the plays, and the symphony. Ah, how adorable!’
+
+“‘My Lise is passionately fond of music.’
+
+“‘And you, why do you not share these convictions?’
+
+“And through all this verbiage, all have but one single idea: ‘Take me,
+take my Lise. No, me! Only try!’”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+
+“Do you know,” suddenly continued Posdnicheff, “that this power of
+women from which the world suffers arises solely from what I have just
+spoken of?”
+
+“What do you mean by the power of women?” I said. “Everybody, on the
+contrary, complains that women have not sufficient rights, that they
+are in subjection.”
+
+“That’s it; that’s it exactly,” said he, vivaciously. “That is just
+what I mean, and that is the explanation of this extraordinary
+phenomenon, that on the one hand woman is reduced to the lowest degree
+of humiliation and on the other hand she reigns over everything. See
+the Jews: with their power of money, they avenge their subjection, just
+as the women do. ‘Ah! you wish us to be only merchants? All right;
+remaining merchants, we will get possession of you,’ say the Jews. ‘Ah!
+you wish us to be only objects of sensuality? All right; by the aid of
+sensuality we will bend you beneath our yoke,’ say the women.
+
+“The absence of the rights of woman does not consist in the fact that
+she has not the right to vote, or the right to sit on the bench, but in
+the fact that in her affectional relations she is not the equal of man,
+she has not the right to abstain, to choose instead of being chosen.
+You say that that would be abnormal. Very well! But then do not let man
+enjoy these rights, while his companion is deprived of them, and finds
+herself obliged to make use of the coquetry by which she governs, so
+that the result is that man chooses ‘formally,’ whereas really it is
+woman who chooses. As soon as she is in possession of her means, she
+abuses them, and acquires a terrible supremacy.”
+
+“But where do you see this exceptional power?”
+
+“Where? Why, everywhere, in everything. Go see the stores in the large
+cities. There are millions there, millions. It is impossible to
+estimate the enormous quantity of labor that is expended there. In
+nine-tenths of these stores is there anything whatever for the use of
+men? All the luxury of life is demanded and sustained by woman. Count
+the factories; the greater part of them are engaged in making feminine
+ornaments. Millions of men, generations of slaves, die toiling like
+convicts simply to satisfy the whims of our companions.
+
+“Women, like queens, keep nine-tenths of the human race as prisoners of
+war, or as prisoners at hard labor. And all this because they have been
+humiliated, because they have been deprived of rights equal to those
+which men enjoy. They take revenge for our sensuality; they catch us in
+their nets.
+
+“Yes, the whole thing is there. Women have made of themselves such a
+weapon to act upon the senses that a young man, and even an old man,
+cannot remain tranquil in their presence. Watch a popular festival, or
+our receptions or ball-rooms. Woman well knows her influence there. You
+will see it in her triumphant smiles.
+
+“As soon as a young man advances toward a woman, directly he falls
+under the influence of this opium, and loses his head. Long ago I felt
+ill at ease when I saw a woman too well adorned,—whether a woman of the
+people with her red neckerchief and her looped skirt, or a woman of our
+own society in her ball-room dress. But now it simply terrifies me. I
+see in it a danger to men, something contrary to the laws; and I feel a
+desire to call a policeman, to appeal for defence from some quarter, to
+demand that this dangerous object be removed.
+
+“And this is not a joke, by any means. I am convinced, I am sure, that
+the time will come—and perhaps it is not far distant—when the world
+will understand this, and will be astonished that a society could exist
+in which actions as harmful as those which appeal to sensuality by
+adorning the body as our companions do were allowed. As well set traps
+along our public streets, or worse than that.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+
+“That, then, was the way in which I was captured. I was in love, as it
+is called; not only did _she_ appear to me a perfect being, but I
+considered myself a white blackbird. It is a commonplace fact that
+there is no one so low in the world that he cannot find some one viler
+than himself, and consequently puff with pride and self-contentment. I
+was in that situation. I did not marry for money. Interest was foreign
+to the affair, unlike the marriages of most of my acquaintances, who
+married either for money or for relations. First, I was rich, she was
+poor. Second, I was especially proud of the fact that, while others
+married with an intention of continuing their polygamic life as
+bachelors, it was my firm intention to live monogamically after my
+engagement and the wedding, and my pride swelled immeasurably.
+
+“Yes, I was a wretch, convinced that I was an angel. The period of my
+engagement did not last long. I cannot remember those days without
+shame. What an abomination!
+
+“It is generally agreed that love is a moral sentiment, a community of
+thought rather than of sense. If that is the case, this community of
+thought ought to find expression in words and conversation. Nothing of
+the sort. It was extremely difficult for us to talk with each other.
+What a toil of Sisyphus was our conversation! Scarcely had we thought
+of something to say, and said it, when we had to resume our silence and
+try to discover new subjects. Literally, we did not know what to say to
+each other. All that we could think of concerning the life that was
+before us and our home was said.
+
+“And then what? If we had been animals, we should have known that we
+had not to talk. But here, on the contrary, it was necessary to talk,
+and there were no resources! For that which occupied our minds was not
+a thing to be expressed in words.
+
+“And then that silly custom of eating bon-bons, that brutal gluttony
+for sweetmeats, those abominable preparations for the wedding, those
+discussions with mamma upon the apartments, upon the sleeping-rooms,
+upon the bedding, upon the morning-gowns, upon the wrappers, the linen,
+the costumes! Understand that if people married according to the old
+fashion, as this old man said just now, then these eiderdown coverlets
+and this bedding would all be sacred details; but with us, out of ten
+married people there is scarcely to be found one who, I do not say
+believes in sacraments (whether he believes or not is a matter of
+indifference to us), but believes in what he promises. Out of a hundred
+men, there is scarcely one who has not married before, and out of fifty
+scarcely one who has not made up his mind to deceive his wife.
+
+“The great majority look upon this journey to the church as a condition
+necessary to the possession of a certain woman. Think then of the
+supreme significance which material details must take on. Is it not a
+sort of sale, in which a maiden is given over to a _débauché_, the sale
+being surrounded with the most agreeable details?”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+
+“All marry in this way. And I did like the rest. If the young people
+who dream of the honeymoon only knew what a disillusion it is, and
+always a disillusion! I really do not know why all think it necessary
+to conceal it.
+
+“One day I was walking among the shows in Paris, when, attracted by a
+sign, I entered an establishment to see a bearded woman and a
+water-dog. The woman was a man in disguise, and the dog was an ordinary
+dog, covered with a sealskin, and swimming in a bath. It was not in the
+least interesting, but the Barnum accompanied me to the exit very
+courteously, and, in addressing the people who were coming in, made an
+appeal to my testimony. ‘Ask the gentleman if it is not worth seeing!
+Come in, come in! It only costs a franc!’ And in my confusion I did not
+dare to answer that there was nothing curious to be seen, and it was
+upon my false shame that the Barnum must have counted.
+
+“It must be the same with the persons who have passed through the
+abominations of the honeymoon. They do not dare to undeceive their
+neighbor. And I did the same.
+
+“The felicities of the honeymoon do not exist. On the contrary, it is a
+period of uneasiness, of shame, of pity, and, above all, of _ennui_,—of
+ferocious _ennui_. It is something like the feeling of a youth when he
+is beginning to smoke. He desires to vomit; he drivels, and swallows
+his drivel, pretending to enjoy this little amusement. The vice of
+marriage . . .”
+
+“What! _Vice?_” I said. “But you are talking of one of the most natural
+things.”
+
+“Natural!” said he. “Natural! No, I consider on the contrary that it is
+against nature, and it is I, a perverted man, who have reached this
+conviction. What would it be, then, if I had not known corruption? To a
+young girl, to every unperverted young girl, it is an act extremely
+unnatural, just as it is to children. My sister married, when very
+young, a man twice her own age, and who was utterly corrupt. I remember
+how astonished we were the night of her wedding, when, pale and covered
+with tears, she fled from her husband, her whole body trembling, saying
+that for nothing in the world would she tell what he wanted of her.
+
+“You say natural? It is natural to eat; that is a pleasant, agreeable
+function, which no one is ashamed to perform from the time of his
+birth. No, it is not natural. A pure young girl wants one
+thing,—children. Children, yes, not a lover.” . . .
+
+“But,” said I, with astonishment, “how would the human race continue?”
+
+“But what is the use of its continuing?” he rejoined, vehemently.
+
+“What! What is the use? But then we should not exist.”
+
+“And why is it necessary that we should exist?”
+
+“Why, to live, to be sure.”
+
+“And why live? The Schopenhauers, the Hartmanns, and all the Buddhists,
+say that the greatest happiness is Nirvana, Non-Life; and they are
+right in this sense,—that human happiness is coincident with the
+annihilation of ‘Self.’ Only they do not express themselves well. They
+say that Humanity should annihilate itself to avoid its sufferings,
+that its object should be to destroy itself. Now the object of Humanity
+cannot be to avoid sufferings by annihilation, since suffering is the
+result of activity. The object of activity cannot consist in
+suppressing its consequences. The object of Man, as of Humanity, is
+happiness, and, to attain it, Humanity has a law which it must carry
+out. This law consists in the union of beings. This union is thwarted
+by the passions. And that is why, if the passions disappear, the union
+will be accomplished. Humanity then will have carried out the law, and
+will have no further reason to exist.”
+
+“And before Humanity carries out the law?”
+
+“In the meantime it will have the sign of the unfulfilled law, and the
+existence of physical love. As long as this love shall exist, and
+because of it, generations will be born, one of which will finally
+fulfil the law. When at last the law shall be fulfilled, the Human Race
+will be annihilated. At least it is impossible for us to conceive of
+Life in the perfect union of people.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+
+“Strange theory!” cried I.
+
+“Strange in what? According to all the doctrines of the Church, the
+world will have an end. Science teaches the same fatal conclusions.
+Why, then, is it strange that the same thing should result from moral
+Doctrine? ‘Let those who can, contain,’ said Christ. And I take this
+passage literally, as it is written. That morality may exist between
+people in their worldly relations, they must make complete chastity
+their object. In tending toward this end, man humiliates himself. When
+he shall reach the last degree of humiliation, we shall have moral
+marriage.
+
+“But if man, as in our society, tends only toward physical love, though
+he may clothe it with pretexts and the false forms of marriage, he will
+have only permissible debauchery, he will know only the same immoral
+life in which I fell and caused my wife to fall, a life which we call
+the honest life of the family. Think what a perversion of ideas must
+arise when the happiest situation of man, liberty, chastity, is looked
+upon as something wretched and ridiculous. The highest ideal, the best
+situation of woman, to be pure, to be a vestal, a virgin, excites fear
+and laughter in our society. How many, how many young girls sacrifice
+their purity to this Moloch of opinion by marrying rascals that they
+may not remain virgins,—that is, superiors! Through fear of finding
+themselves in that ideal state, they ruin themselves.
+
+“But I did not understand formerly, I did not understand that the words
+of the Gospel, that ‘he who looks upon a woman to lust after her has
+already committed adultery,’ do not apply to the wives of others, but
+notably and especially to our own wives. I did not understand this, and
+I thought that the honeymoon and all of my acts during that period were
+virtuous, and that to satisfy one’s desires with his wife is an
+eminently chaste thing. Know, then, that I consider these departures,
+these isolations, which young married couples arrange with the
+permission of their parents, as nothing else than a license to engage
+in debauchery.
+
+“I saw, then, in this nothing bad or shameful, and, hoping for great
+joys, I began to live the honeymoon. And very certainly none of these
+joys followed. But I had faith, and was determined to have them, cost
+what they might. But the more I tried to secure them, the less I
+succeeded. All this time I felt anxious, ashamed, and weary. Soon I
+began to suffer. I believe that on the third or fourth day I found my
+wife sad and asked her the reason. I began to embrace her, which in my
+opinion was all that she could desire. She put me away with her hand,
+and began to weep.
+
+“At what? She could not tell me. She was filled with sorrow, with
+anguish. Probably her tortured nerves had suggested to her the truth
+about the baseness of our relations, but she found no words in which to
+say it. I began to question her; she answered that she missed her
+absent mother. It seemed to me that she was not telling the truth. I
+sought to console her by maintaining silence in regard to her parents.
+I did not imagine that she felt herself simply overwhelmed, and that
+her parents had nothing to do with her sorrow. She did not listen to
+me, and I accused her of caprice. I began to laugh at her gently. She
+dried her tears, and began to reproach me, in hard and wounding terms,
+for my selfishness and cruelty.
+
+“I looked at her. Her whole face expressed hatred, and hatred of me. I
+cannot describe to you the fright which this sight gave me. ‘How?
+What?’ thought I, ‘love is the unity of souls, and here she hates me?
+Me? Why? But it is impossible! It is no longer she!’
+
+“I tried to calm her. I came in conflict with an immovable and cold
+hostility, so that, having no time to reflect, I was seized with keen
+irritation. We exchanged disagreeable remarks. The impression of this
+first quarrel was terrible. I say quarrel, but the term is inexact. It
+was the sudden discovery of the abyss that had been dug between us.
+Love was exhausted with the satisfaction of sensuality. We stood face
+to face in our true light, like two egoists trying to procure the
+greatest possible enjoyment, like two individuals trying to mutually
+exploit each other.
+
+“So what I called our quarrel was our actual situation as it appeared
+after the satisfaction of sensual desire. I did not realize that this
+cold hostility was our normal state, and that this first quarrel would
+soon be drowned under a new flood of the intensest sensuality. I
+thought that we had disputed with each other, and had become
+reconciled, and that it would not happen again. But in this same
+honeymoon there came a period of satiety, in which we ceased to be
+necessary to each other, and a new quarrel broke out.
+
+“It became evident that the first was not a matter of chance. ‘It was
+inevitable,’ I thought. This second quarrel stupefied me the more,
+because it was based on an extremely unjust cause. It was something
+like a question of money,—and never had I haggled on that score; it was
+even impossible that I should do so in relation to her. I only remember
+that, in answer to some remark that I made, she insinuated that it was
+my intention to rule her by means of money, and that it was upon money
+that I based my sole right over her. In short, something
+extraordinarily stupid and base, which was neither in my character nor
+in hers.
+
+“I was beside myself. I accused her of indelicacy. She made the same
+accusation against me, and the dispute broke out. In her words, in the
+expression of her face, of her eyes, I noticed again the hatred that
+had so astonished me before. With a brother, friends, my father, I had
+occasionally quarrelled, but never had there been between us this
+fierce spite. Some time passed. Our mutual hatred was again concealed
+beneath an access of sensual desire, and I again consoled myself with
+the reflection that these scenes were reparable faults.
+
+“But when they were repeated a third and a fourth time, I understood
+that they were not simply faults, but a fatality that must happen
+again. I was no longer frightened, I was simply astonished that I
+should be precisely the one to live so uncomfortably with my wife, and
+that the same thing did not happen in other households. I did not know
+that in all households the same sudden changes take place, but that
+all, like myself, imagine that it is a misfortune exclusively reserved
+for themselves alone, which they carefully conceal as shameful, not
+only to others, but to themselves, like a bad disease.
+
+“That was what happened to me. Begun in the early days, it continued
+and increased with characteristics of fury that were ever more
+pronounced. At the bottom of my soul, from the first weeks, I felt that
+I was in a trap, that I had what I did not expect, and that marriage is
+not a joy, but a painful trial. Like everybody else, I refused to
+confess it (I should not have confessed it even now but for the
+outcome). Now I am astonished to think that I did not see my real
+situation. It was so easy to perceive it, in view of those quarrels,
+begun for reasons so trivial that afterwards one could not recall them.
+
+“Just as it often happens among gay young people that, in the absence
+of jokes, they laugh at their own laughter, so we found no reasons for
+our hatred, and we hated each other because hatred was naturally
+boiling up in us. More extraordinary still was the absence of causes
+for reconciliation.
+
+“Sometimes words, explanations, or even tears, but sometimes, I
+remember, after insulting words, there tacitly followed embraces and
+declarations. Abomination! Why is it that I did not then perceive this
+baseness?”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+
+“All of us, men and women, are brought up in these aberrations of
+feeling that we call love. I from childhood had prepared myself for
+this thing, and I loved, and I loved during all my youth, and I was
+joyous in loving. It had been put into my head that it was the noblest
+and highest occupation in the world. But when this expected feeling
+came at last, and I, a man, abandoned myself to it, the lie was pierced
+through and through. Theoretically a lofty love is conceivable;
+practically it is an ignoble and degrading thing, which it is equally
+disgusting to talk about and to remember. It is not in vain that nature
+has made ceremonies, but people pretend that the ignoble and the
+shameful is beautiful and lofty.
+
+“I will tell you brutally and briefly what were the first signs of my
+love. I abandoned myself to beastly excesses, not only not ashamed of
+them, but proud of them, giving no thought to the intellectual life of
+my wife. And not only did I not think of her intellectual life, I did
+not even consider her physical life.
+
+“I was astonished at the origin of our hostility, and yet how clear it
+was! This hostility is nothing but a protest of human nature against
+the beast that enslaves it. It could not be otherwise. This hatred was
+the hatred of accomplices in a crime. Was it not a crime that, this
+poor woman having become pregnant in the first month, our _liaison_
+should have continued just the same?
+
+“You imagine that I am wandering from my story. Not at all. I am always
+giving you an account of the events that led to the murder of my wife.
+The imbeciles! They think that I killed my wife on the 5th of October.
+It was long before that that I immolated her, just as they all kill
+now. Understand well that in our society there is an idea shared by all
+that woman procures man pleasure (and _vice versa_, probably, but I
+know nothing of that, I only know my own case). _Wein, Weiber und
+Gesang_. So say the poets in their verses: Wine, women, and song!
+
+“If it were only that! Take all the poetry, the painting, the
+sculpture, beginning with Pouschkine’s ‘Little Feet,’ with ‘Venus and
+Phryne,’ and you will see that woman is only a means of enjoyment. That
+is what she is at Trouba,[*] at Gratchevka, and in a court ball-room.
+And think of this diabolical trick: if she were a thing without moral
+value, it might be said that woman is a fine morsel; but, in the first
+place, these knights assure us that they adore woman (they adore her
+and look upon her, however, as a means of enjoyment), then all assure
+us that they esteem woman. Some give up their seats to her, pick up her
+handkerchief; others recognize in her a right to fill all offices,
+participate in government, etc., but, in spite of all that, the
+essential point remains the same. She is, she remains, an object of
+sensual desire, and she knows it. It is slavery, for slavery is nothing
+else than the utilization of the labor of some for the enjoyment of
+others. That slavery may not exist people must refuse to enjoy the
+labor of others, and look upon it as a shameful act and as a sin.
+
+[*] A suburb of Moscow.
+
+
+“Actually, this is what happens. They abolish the external form, they
+suppress the formal sales of slaves, and then they imagine and assure
+others that slavery is abolished. They are unwilling to see that it
+still exists, since people, as before, like to profit by the labor of
+others, and think it good and just. This being given, there will always
+be found beings stronger or more cunning than others to profit thereby.
+The same thing happens in the emancipation of woman. At bottom feminine
+servitude consists entirely in her assimilation with a means of
+pleasure. They excite woman, they give her all sorts of rights equal to
+those of men, but they continue to look upon her as an object of
+sensual desire, and thus they bring her up from infancy and in public
+opinion.
+
+“She is always the humiliated and corrupt serf, and man remains always
+the debauched Master. Yes, to abolish slavery, public opinion must
+admit that it is shameful to exploit one’s neighbor, and, to make woman
+free, public opinion must admit that it is shameful to consider woman
+as an instrument of pleasure.
+
+“The emancipation of woman is not to be effected in the public courts
+or in the chamber of deputies, but in the sleeping chamber.
+Prostitution is to be combated, not in the houses of ill-fame, but in
+the family. They free woman in the public courts and in the chamber of
+deputies, but she remains an instrument. Teach her, as she is taught
+among us, to look upon herself as such, and she will always remain an
+inferior being. Either, with the aid of the rascally doctors, she will
+try to prevent conception, and descend, not to the level of an animal,
+but to the level of a thing; or she will be what she is in the great
+majority of cases,—sick, hysterical, wretched, without hope of
+spiritual progress.” . . .
+
+“But why that?” I asked.
+
+“Oh! the most astonishing thing is that no one is willing to see this
+thing, evident as it is, which the doctors must understand, but which
+they take good care not to do. Man does not wish to know the law of
+nature,—children. But children are born and become an embarrassment.
+Then man devises means of avoiding this embarrassment. We have not yet
+reached the low level of Europe, nor Paris, nor the ‘system of two
+children,’ nor Mahomet. We have discovered nothing, because we have
+given it no thought. We feel that there is something bad in the two
+first means; but we wish to preserve the family, and our view of woman
+is still worse.
+
+“With us woman must be at the same time mistress and nurse, and her
+strength is not sufficient. That is why we have hysteria, nervous
+attacks, and, among the peasants, witchcraft. Note that among the young
+girls of the peasantry this state of things does not exist, but only
+among the wives, and the wives who live with their husbands. The reason
+is clear, and this is the cause of the intellectual and moral decline
+of woman, and of her abasement.
+
+“If they would only reflect what a grand work for the wife is the
+period of gestation! In her is forming the being who continues us, and
+this holy work is thwarted and rendered painful . . . by what? It is
+frightful to think of it! And after that they talk of the liberties and
+the rights of woman! It is like the cannibals fattening their prisoners
+in order to devour them, and assuring these unfortunates at the same
+time that their rights and their liberties are guarded!”
+
+All this was new to me, and astonished me very much.
+
+“But if this is so,” said I, “it follows that one may love his wife
+only once every two years; and as man” . . .
+
+“And as man has need of her, you are going to say. At least, so the
+priests of science assure us. I would force these priests to fulfil the
+function of these women, who, in their opinion, are necessary to man. I
+wonder what song they would sing then. Assure man that he needs brandy,
+tobacco, opium, and he will believe those poisons necessary. It follows
+that God did not know how to arrange matters properly, since, without
+asking the opinions of the priests, he has combined things as they are.
+Man needs, so they have decided, to satisfy his sensual desire, and
+here this function is disturbed by the birth and the nursing of
+children.
+
+“What, then, is to be done? Why, apply to the priests; they will
+arrange everything, and they have really discovered a way. When, then,
+will these rascals with their lies be uncrowned! It is high time. We
+have had enough of them. People go mad, and shoot each other with
+revolvers, and always because of that! And how could it be otherwise?
+
+“One would say that the animals know that descent continues their race,
+and that they follow a certain law in regard thereto. Only man does not
+know this, and is unwilling to know it. He cares only to have as much
+sensual enjoyment as possible. The king of nature,—man! In the name of
+his love he kills half the human race. Of woman, who ought to be his
+aid in the movement of humanity toward liberty, he makes, in the name
+of his pleasures, not an aid, but an enemy. Who is it that everywhere
+puts a check upon the progressive movement of humanity? Woman. Why is
+it so?
+
+“For the reason that I have given, and for that reason only.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+
+“Yes, much worse than the animal is man when he does not live as a man.
+Thus was I. The horrible part is that I believed, inasmuch as I did not
+allow myself to be seduced by other women that I was leading an honest
+family life, that I was a very moral being, and that if we had
+quarrels, the fault was in my wife, and in her character.
+
+“But it is evident that the fault was not in her. She was like
+everybody else, like the majority. She was brought up according to the
+principles exacted by the situation of our society,—that is, as all the
+young girls of our wealthy classes, without exception, are brought up,
+and as they cannot fail to be brought up. How many times we hear or
+read of reflections upon the abnormal condition of women, and upon what
+they ought to be. But these are only vain words. The education of women
+results from the real and not imaginary view which the world entertains
+of women’s vocation. According to this view, the condition of women
+consists in procuring pleasure and it is to that end that her education
+is directed. From her infancy she is taught only those things that are
+calculated to increase her charm. Every young girl is accustomed to
+think only of that.
+
+“As the serfs were brought up solely to please their masters, so woman
+is brought up to attract men. It cannot be otherwise. But you will say,
+perhaps, that that applies only to young girls who are badly brought
+up, but that there is another education, an education that is serious,
+in the schools, an education in the dead languages, an education in the
+institutions of midwifery, an education in medical courses, and in
+other courses. It is false.
+
+“Every sort of feminine education has for its sole object the
+attraction of men.
+
+“Some attract by music or curly hair, others by science or by civic
+virtue. The object is the same, and cannot be otherwise (since no other
+object exists),—to seduce man in order to possess him. Imagine courses
+of instruction for women and feminine science without men,—that is,
+learned women, and men not _knowing_ them as learned. Oh, no! No
+education, no instruction can change woman as long as her highest ideal
+shall be marriage and not virginity, freedom from sensuality. Until
+that time she will remain a serf. One need only imagine, forgetting the
+universality of the case, the conditions in which our young girls are
+brought up, to avoid astonishment at the debauchery of the women of our
+upper classes. It is the opposite that would cause astonishment.
+
+“Follow my reasoning. From infancy garments, ornaments, cleanliness,
+grace, dances, music, reading of poetry, novels, singing, the theatre,
+the concert, for use within and without, according as women listen, or
+practice themselves. With that, complete physical idleness, an
+excessive care of the body, a vast consumption of sweetmeats; and God
+knows how the poor maidens suffer from their own sensuality, excited by
+all these things. Nine out of ten are tortured intolerably during the
+first period of maturity, and afterward provided they do not marry at
+the age of twenty. That is what we are unwilling to see, but those who
+have eyes see it all the same. And even the majority of these
+unfortunate creatures are so excited by a hidden sensuality (and it is
+lucky if it is hidden) that they are fit for nothing. They become
+animated only in the presence of men. Their whole life is spent in
+preparations for coquetry, or in coquetry itself. In the presence of
+men they become too animated; they begin to live by sensual energy. But
+the moment the man goes away, the life stops.
+
+“And that, not in the presence of a certain man, but in the presence of
+any man, provided he is not utterly hideous. You will say that this is
+an exception. No, it is a rule. Only in some it is made very evident,
+in others less so. But no one lives by her own life; they are all
+dependent upon man. They cannot be otherwise, since to them the
+attraction of the greatest number of men is the ideal of life (young
+girls and married women), and it is for this reason that they have no
+feeling stronger than that of the animal need of every female who tries
+to attract the largest number of males in order to increase the
+opportunities for choice. So it is in the life of young girls, and so
+it continues during marriage. In the life of young girls it is
+necessary in order to selection, and in marriage it is necessary in
+order to rule the husband. Only one thing suppresses or interrupts
+these tendencies for a time,—namely, children,—and then only when the
+woman is not a monster,—that is, when she nurses her own children. Here
+again the doctor interferes.
+
+“With my wife, who desired to nurse her own children, and who did nurse
+six of them, it happened that the first child was sickly. The doctors,
+who cynically undressed her and felt of her everywhere, and whom I had
+to thank and pay for these acts,—these dear doctors decided that she
+ought not to nurse her child, and she was temporarily deprived of the
+only remedy for coquetry. A nurse finished the nursing of this
+first-born,—that is to say, we profited by the poverty and ignorance of
+a woman to steal her from her own little one in favor of ours, and for
+that purpose we dressed her in a _kakoschnik_ trimmed with gold lace.
+Nevertheless, that is not the question; but there was again awakened in
+my wife that coquetry which had been sleeping during the nursing
+period. Thanks to that, she reawakened in me the torments of jealousy
+which I had formerly known, though in a much slighter degree.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+
+“Yes, jealousy, that is another of the secrets of marriage known to all
+and concealed by all. Besides the general cause of the mutual hatred of
+husbands and wives resulting from complicity in the pollution of a
+human being, and also from other causes, the inexhaustible source of
+marital wounds is jealousy. But by tacit consent it is determined to
+conceal them from all, and we conceal them. Knowing them, each one
+supposes in himself that it is an unfortunate peculiarity, and not a
+common destiny. So it was with me, and it had to be so. There cannot
+fail to be jealousy between husbands and wives who live immorally. If
+they cannot sacrifice their pleasures for the welfare of their child,
+they conclude therefrom, and truly, that they will not sacrifice their
+pleasures for, I will not say happiness and tranquillity (since one may
+sin in secret), but even for the sake of conscience. Each one knows
+very well that neither admits any high moral reasons for not betraying
+the other, since in their mutual relations they fail in the
+requirements of morality, and from that time distrust and watch each
+other.
+
+“Oh, what a frightful feeling of jealousy! I do not speak of that real
+jealousy which has foundations (it is tormenting, but it promises an
+issue), but of that unconscious jealousy which inevitably accompanies
+every immoral marriage, and which, having no cause, has no end. This
+jealousy is frightful. Frightful, that is the word.
+
+“And this is it. A young man speaks to my wife. He looks at her with a
+smile, and, as it seems to me, he surveys her body. How does he dare to
+think of her, to think of the possibility of a romance with her? And
+how can she, seeing this, tolerate him? Not only does she tolerate him,
+but she seems pleased. I even see that she puts herself to trouble on
+his account. And in my soul there rises such a hatred for her that each
+of her words, each gesture, disgusts me. She notices it, she knows not
+what to do, and how assume an air of indifferent animation? Ah! I
+suffer! That makes her gay, she is content. And my hatred increases
+tenfold, but I do not dare to give it free force, because at the bottom
+of my soul I know that there are no real reasons for it, and I remain
+in my seat, feigning indifference, and exaggerating my attention and
+courtesy to _him_.
+
+“Then I get angry with myself. I desire to leave the room, to leave
+them alone, and I do, in fact, go out; but scarcely am I outside when I
+am invaded by a fear of what is taking place within my absence. I go in
+again, inventing some pretext. Or sometimes I do not go in; I remain
+near the door, and listen. How can she humiliate herself and humiliate
+me by placing me in this cowardly situation of suspicion and espionage?
+Oh, abomination! Oh, the wicked animal! And he too, what does he think
+of you? But he is like all men. He is what I was before my marriage. It
+gives him pleasure. He even smiles when he looks at me, as much as to
+say: ‘What have you to do with this? It is my turn now.’
+
+“This feeling is horrible. Its burn is unendurable. To entertain this
+feeling toward any one, to once suspect a man of lusting after my wife,
+was enough to spoil this man forever in my eyes, as if he had been
+sprinkled with vitriol. Let me once become jealous of a being, and
+nevermore could I re-establish with him simple human relations, and my
+eyes flashed when I looked at him.
+
+“As for my wife, so many times had I enveloped her with this moral
+vitriol, with this jealous hatred, that she was degraded thereby. In
+the periods of this causeless hatred I gradually uncrowned her. I
+covered her with shame in my imagination.
+
+“I invented impossible knaveries. I suspected, I am ashamed to say,
+that she, this queen of ‘The Thousand and One Nights,’ deceived me with
+my serf, under my very eyes, and laughing at me.
+
+“Thus, with each new access of jealousy (I speak always of causeless
+jealousy), I entered into the furrow dug formerly by my filthy
+suspicions, and I continually deepened it. She did the same thing. If I
+have reasons to be jealous, she who knew my past had a thousand times
+more. And she was more ill-natured in her jealousy than I. And the
+sufferings that I felt from her jealousy were different, and likewise
+very painful.
+
+“The situation may be described thus. We are living more or less
+tranquilly. I am even gay and contented. Suddenly we start a
+conversation on some most commonplace subject, and directly she finds
+herself disagreeing with me upon matters concerning which we have been
+generally in accord. And furthermore I see that, without any necessity
+therefor, she is becoming irritated. I think that she has a nervous
+attack, or else that the subject of conversation is really disagreeable
+to her. We talk of something else, and that begins again. Again she
+torments me, and becomes irritated. I am astonished and look for a
+reason. Why? For what? She keeps silence, answers me with
+monosyllables, evidently making allusions to something. I begin to
+divine that the reason of all this is that I have taken a few walks in
+the garden with her cousin, to whom I did not give even a thought. I
+begin to divine, but I cannot say so. If I say so, I confirm her
+suspicions. I interrogate her, I question her. She does not answer, but
+she sees that I understand, and that confirms her suspicions.
+
+“‘What is the matter with you?’ I ask.
+
+“‘Nothing, I am as well as usual,’ she answers.
+
+“And at the same time, like a crazy woman, she gives utterance to the
+silliest remarks, to the most inexplicable explosions of spite.
+
+“Sometimes I am patient, but at other times I break out with anger.
+Then her own irritation is launched forth in a flood of insults, in
+charges of imaginary crimes and all carried to the highest degree by
+sobs, tears, and retreats through the house to the most improbable
+spots. I go to look for her. I am ashamed before people, before the
+children, but there is nothing to be done. She is in a condition where
+I feel that she is ready for anything. I run, and finally find her.
+Nights of torture follow, in which both of us, with exhausted nerves,
+appease each other, after the most cruel words and accusations.
+
+“Yes, jealousy, causeless jealousy, is the condition of our debauched
+conjugal life. And throughout my marriage never did I cease to feel it
+and to suffer from it. There were two periods in which I suffered most
+intensely. The first time was after the birth of our first child, when
+the doctors had forbidden my wife to nurse it. I was particularly
+jealous, in the first place, because my wife felt that restlessness
+peculiar to animal matter when the regular course of life is
+interrupted without occasion. But especially was I jealous because,
+having seen with what facility she had thrown off her moral duties as a
+mother, I concluded rightly, though unconsciously, that she would throw
+off as easily her conjugal duties, feeling all the surer of this
+because she was in perfect health, as was shown by the fact that, in
+spite of the prohibition of the dear doctors, she nursed her following
+children, and even very well.”
+
+“I see that you have no love for the doctors,” said I, having noticed
+Posdnicheff’s extraordinarily spiteful expression of face and tone of
+voice whenever he spoke of them.
+
+“It is not a question of loving them or of not loving them. They have
+ruined my life, as they have ruined the lives of thousands of beings
+before me, and I cannot help connecting the consequence with the cause.
+I conceive that they desire, like the lawyers and the rest, to make
+money. I would willingly have given them half of my income—and any one
+would have done it in my place, understanding what they do—if they had
+consented not to meddle in my conjugal life, and to keep themselves at
+a distance. I have compiled no statistics, but I know scores of
+cases—in reality, they are innumerable—where they have killed, now a
+child in its mother’s womb, asserting positively that the mother could
+not give birth to it (when the mother could give birth to it very
+well), now mothers, under the pretext of a so-called operation. No one
+has counted these murders, just as no one counted the murders of the
+Inquisition, because it was supposed that they were committed for the
+benefit of humanity. Innumerable are the crimes of the doctors! But all
+these crimes are nothing compared with the materialistic demoralization
+which they introduce into the world through women. I say nothing of the
+fact that, if it were to follow their advice,—thanks to the microbe
+which they see everywhere,—humanity, instead of tending to union, would
+proceed straight to complete disunion. Everybody, according to their
+doctrine, should isolate himself, and never remove from his mouth a
+syringe filled with phenic acid (moreover, they have found out now that
+it does no good). But I would pass over all these things. The supreme
+poison is the perversion of people, especially of women. One can no
+longer say now: ‘You live badly, live better.’ One can no longer say it
+either to himself or to others, for, if you live badly (say the
+doctors), the cause is in the nervous system or in something similar,
+and it is necessary to go to consult them, and they will prescribe for
+you thirty-five copecks’ worth of remedies to be bought at the
+drug-store, and you must swallow them. Your condition grows worse?
+Again to the doctors, and more remedies! An excellent business!
+
+“But to return to our subject. I was saying that my wife nursed her
+children well, that the nursing and the gestation of the children, and
+the children in general, quieted my tortures of jealousy, but that, on
+the other hand, they provoked torments of a different sort.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+
+“The children came rapidly, one after another, and there happened what
+happens in our society with children and doctors. Yes, children,
+maternal love, it is a painful thing. Children, to a woman of our
+society, are not a joy, a pride, nor a fulfilment of her vocation, but
+a cause of fear, anxiety, and interminable suffering, torture. Women
+say it, they think it, and they feel it too. Children to them are
+really a torture, not because they do not wish to give birth to them,
+nurse them, and care for them (women with a strong maternal
+instinct—and such was my wife—are ready to do that), but because the
+children may fall sick and die. They do not wish to give birth to them,
+and then not love them; and when they love, they do not wish to feel
+fear for the child’s health and life. That is why they do not wish to
+nurse them. ‘If I nurse it,’ they say, ‘I shall become too fond of it.’
+One would think that they preferred india-rubber children, which could
+neither be sick nor die, and could always be repaired. What an
+entanglement in the brains of these poor women! Why such abominations
+to avoid pregnancy, and to avoid the love of the little ones?
+
+“Love, the most joyous condition of the soul, is represented as a
+danger. And why? Because, when a man does not live as a man, he is
+worse than a beast. A woman cannot look upon a child otherwise than as
+a pleasure. It is true that it is painful to give birth to it, but what
+little hands! . . . Oh, the little hands! Oh, the little feet! Oh, its
+smile! Oh, its little body! Oh, its prattle! Oh, its hiccough! In a
+word, it is a feeling of animal, sensual maternity. But as for any idea
+as to the mysterious significance of the appearance of a new human
+being to replace us, there is scarcely a sign of it.
+
+“Nothing of it appears in all that is said and done. No one has any
+faith now in a baptism of the child, and yet that was nothing but a
+reminder of the human significance of the newborn babe.
+
+“They have rejected all that, but they have not replaced it, and there
+remain only the dresses, the laces, the little hands, the little feet,
+and whatever exists in the animal. But the animal has neither
+imagination, nor foresight, nor reason, nor a doctor.
+
+“No! not even a doctor! The chicken droops its head, overwhelmed, or
+the calf dies; the hen clucks and the cow lows for a time, and then
+these beasts continue to live, forgetting what has happened.
+
+“With us, if the child falls sick, what is to be done, how to care for
+it, what doctor to call, where to go? If it dies, there will be no more
+little hands or little feet, and then what is the use of the sufferings
+endured? The cow does not ask all that, and this is why children are a
+source of misery. The cow has no imagination, and for that reason
+cannot think how it might have saved the child if it had done this or
+that, and its grief, founded in its physical being, lasts but a very
+short time. It is only a condition, and not that sorrow which becomes
+exaggerated to the point of despair, thanks to idleness and satiety.
+The cow has not that reasoning faculty which would enable it to ask the
+why. Why endure all these tortures? What was the use of so much love,
+if the little ones were to die? The cow has no logic which tells it to
+have no more children, and, if any come accidentally, to neither love
+nor nurse them, that it may not suffer. But our wives reason, and
+reason in this way, and that is why I said that, when a man does not
+live as a man, he is beneath the animal.”
+
+“But then, how is it necessary to act, in your opinion, in order to
+treat children humanly?” I asked.
+
+“How? Why, love them humanly.”
+
+“Well, do not mothers love their children?”
+
+“They do not love them humanly, or very seldom do, and that is why they
+do not love them even as dogs. Mark this, a hen, a goose, a wolf, will
+always remain to woman inaccessible ideals of animal love. It is a rare
+thing for a woman to throw herself, at the peril of her life, upon an
+elephant to snatch her child away, whereas a hen or a sparrow will not
+fail to fly at a dog and sacrifice itself utterly for its children.
+Observe this, also. Woman has the power to limit her physical love for
+her children, which an animal cannot do. Does that mean that, because
+of this, woman is inferior to the animal? No. She is superior (and even
+to say superior is unjust, she is not superior, she is different), but
+she has other duties, human duties. She can restrain herself in the
+matter of animal love, and transfer her love to the soul of the child.
+That is what woman’s _rôle_ should be, and that is precisely what we do
+not see in our society. We read of the heroic acts of mothers who
+sacrifice their children in the name of a superior idea, and these
+things seem to us like tales of the ancient world, which do not concern
+us. And yet I believe that, if the mother has not some ideal, in the
+name of which she can sacrifice the animal feeling, and if this force
+finds no employment, she will transfer it to chimerical attempts to
+physically preserve her child, aided in this task by the doctor, and
+she will suffer as she does suffer.
+
+“So it was with my wife. Whether there was one child or five, the
+feeling remained the same. In fact, it was a little better when there
+had been five. Life was always poisoned with fear for the children, not
+only from their real or imaginary diseases, but even by their simple
+presence. For my part, at least, throughout my conjugal life, all my
+interests and all my happiness depended upon the health of my children,
+their condition, their studies. Children, it is needless to say, are a
+serious consideration; but all ought to live, and in our days parents
+can no longer live. Regular life does not exist for them. The whole
+life of the family hangs by a hair. What a terrible thing it is to
+suddenly receive the news that little Basile is vomiting, or that Lise
+has a cramp in the stomach! Immediately you abandon everything, you
+forget everything, everything becomes nothing. The essential thing is
+the doctor, the enema, the temperature. You cannot begin a conversation
+but little Pierre comes running in with an anxious air to ask if he may
+eat an apple, or what jacket he shall put on, or else it is the servant
+who enters with a screaming baby.
+
+“Regular, steady family life does not exist. Where you live, and
+consequently what you do, depends upon the health of the little ones,
+the health of the little ones depends upon nobody, and, thanks to the
+doctors, who pretend to aid health, your entire life is disturbed. It
+is a perpetual peril. Scarcely do we believe ourselves out of it when a
+new danger comes: more attempts to save. Always the situation of
+sailors on a foundering vessel. Sometimes it seemed to me that this was
+done on purpose, that my wife feigned anxiety in order to conquer me,
+since that solved the question so simply for her benefit. It seemed to
+me that all that she did at those times was done for its effect upon
+me, but now I see that she herself, my wife, suffered and was tortured
+on account of the little ones, their health, and their diseases.
+
+“A torture to both of us, but to her the children were also a means of
+forgetting herself, like an intoxication. I often noticed, when she was
+very sad, that she was relieved, when a child fell sick, at being able
+to take refuge in this intoxication. It was involuntary intoxication,
+because as yet there was nothing else. On every side we heard that Mrs.
+So-and-so had lost children, that Dr. So-and-so had saved the child of
+Mrs. So-and-so, and that in a certain family all had moved from the
+house in which they were living, and thereby saved the little ones. And
+the doctors, with a serious air, confirmed this, sustaining my wife in
+her opinions. She was not prone to fear, but the doctor dropped some
+word, like corruption of the blood, scarlatina, or else—heaven help
+us—diphtheria, and off she went.
+
+“It was impossible for it to be otherwise. Women in the old days had
+the belief that ‘God has given, God has taken away,’ that the soul of
+the little angel is going to heaven, and that it is better to die
+innocent than to die in sin. If the women of to-day had something like
+this faith, they could endure more peacefully the sickness of their
+children. But of all that there does not remain even a trace. And yet
+it is necessary to believe in something; consequently they stupidly
+believe in medicine, and not even in medicine, but in the doctor. One
+believes in X, another in Z, and, like all believers, they do not see
+the idiocy of their beliefs. They believe _quia absurdum_, because, in
+reality, if they did not believe in a stupid way, they would see the
+vanity of all that these brigands prescribe for them. Scarlatina is a
+contagious disease; so, when one lives in a large city, half the family
+has to move away from its residence (we did it twice), and yet every
+man in the city is a centre through which pass innumerable diameters,
+carrying threads of all sorts of contagions. There is no obstacle: the
+baker, the tailor, the coachman, the laundresses.
+
+“And I would undertake, for every man who moves on account of
+contagion, to find in his new dwelling-place another contagion similar,
+if not the same.
+
+“But that is not all. Every one knows rich people who, after a case of
+diphtheria, destroy everything in their residences, and then fall sick
+in houses newly built and furnished. Every one knows, likewise, numbers
+of men who come in contact with sick people and do not get infected.
+Our anxieties are due to the people who circulate tall stories. One
+woman says that she has an excellent doctor. ‘Pardon me,’ answers the
+other, ‘he killed such a one,’ or such a one. And _vice versa_. Bring
+her another, who knows no more, who learned from the same books, who
+treats according to the same formulas, but who goes about in a
+carriage, and asks a hundred roubles a visit, and she will have faith
+in him.
+
+“It all lies in the fact that our women are savages. They have no
+belief in God, but some of them believe in the evil eye, and the others
+in doctors who charge high fees. If they had faith they would know that
+scarlatina, diphtheria, etc., are not so terrible, since they cannot
+disturb that which man can and should love,—the soul. There can result
+from them only that which none of us can avoid,—disease and death.
+Without faith in God, they love only physically, and all their energy
+is concentrated upon the preservation of life, which cannot be
+preserved, and which the doctors promise the fools of both sexes to
+save. And from that time there is nothing to be done; the doctors must
+be summoned.
+
+“Thus the presence of the children not only did not improve our
+relations as husband and wife, but, on the contrary, disunited us. The
+children became an additional cause of dispute, and the larger they
+grew, the more they became an instrument of struggle.
+
+“One would have said that we used them as weapons with which to combat
+each other. Each of us had his favorite. I made use of little Basile
+(the eldest), she of Lise. Further, when the children reached an age
+where their characters began to be defined, they became allies, which
+we drew each in his or her own direction. They suffered horribly from
+this, the poor things, but we, in our perpetual hubbub, were not
+clear-headed enough to think of them. The little girl was devoted to
+me, but the eldest boy, who resembled my wife, his favorite, often
+inspired me with dislike.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+
+“We lived at first in the country, then in the city, and, if the final
+misfortune had not happened, I should have lived thus until my old age
+and should then have believed that I had had a good life,—not too good,
+but, on the other hand, not bad,—an existence such as other people
+lead. I should not have understood the abyss of misfortune and ignoble
+falsehood in which I floundered about, feeling that something was not
+right. I felt, in the first place, that I, a man, who, according to my
+ideas, ought to be the master, wore the petticoats, and that I could
+not get rid of them. The principal cause of my subjection was the
+children. I should have liked to free myself, but I could not. Bringing
+up the children, and resting upon them, my wife ruled. I did not then
+realize that she could not help ruling, especially because, in
+marrying, she was morally superior to me, as every young girl is
+incomparably superior to the man, since she is incomparably purer.
+Strange thing! The ordinary wife in our society is a very commonplace
+person or worse, selfish, gossiping, whimsical, whereas the ordinary
+young girl, until the age of twenty, is a charming being, ready for
+everything that is beautiful and lofty. Why is this so? Evidently
+because husbands pervert them, and lower them to their own level.
+
+“In truth, if boys and girls are born equal, the little girls find
+themselves in a better situation. In the first place, the young girl is
+not subjected to the perverting conditions to which we are subjected.
+She has neither cigarettes, nor wine, nor cards, nor comrades, nor
+public houses, nor public functions. And then the chief thing is that
+she is physically pure, and that is why, in marrying, she is superior
+to her husband. She is superior to man as a young girl, and when she
+becomes a wife in our society, where there is no need to work in order
+to live, she becomes superior, also, by the gravity of the acts of
+generation, birth, and nursing.
+
+“Woman, in bringing a child into the world, and giving it her bosom,
+sees clearly that her affair is more serious than the affair of man,
+who sits in the Zemstvo, in the court. She knows that in these
+functions the main thing is money, and money can be made in different
+ways, and for that very reason money is not inevitably necessary, like
+nursing a child. Consequently woman is necessarily superior to man, and
+must rule. But man, in our society, not only does not recognize this,
+but, on the contrary, always looks upon her from the height of his
+grandeur, despising what she does.
+
+“Thus my wife despised me for my work at the Zemstvo, because she gave
+birth to children and nursed them. I, in turn, thought that woman’s
+labor was most contemptible, which one might and should laugh at.
+
+“Apart from the other motives, we were also separated by a mutual
+contempt. Our relations grew ever more hostile, and we arrived at that
+period when, not only did dissent provoke hostility, but hostility
+provoked dissent. Whatever she might say, I was sure in advance to hold
+a contrary opinion; and she the same. Toward the fourth year of our
+marriage it was tacitly decided between us that no intellectual
+community was possible, and we made no further attempts at it. As to
+the simplest objects, we each held obstinately to our own opinions.
+With strangers we talked upon the most varied and most intimate
+matters, but not with each other. Sometimes, in listening to my wife
+talk with others in my presence, I said to myself: ‘What a woman!
+Everything that she says is a lie!’ And I was astonished that the
+person with whom she was conversing did not see that she was lying.
+When we were together; we were condemned to silence, or to
+conversations which, I am sure, might have been carried on by animals.
+
+“‘What time is it? It is bed-time. What is there for dinner to-day?
+Where shall we go? What is there in the newspaper? The doctor must be
+sent for, Lise has a sore throat.’
+
+“Unless we kept within the extremely narrow limits of such
+conversation, irritation was sure to ensue. The presence of a third
+person relieved us, for through an intermediary we could still
+communicate. She probably believed that she was always right. As for
+me, in my own eyes, I was a saint beside her.
+
+“The periods of what we call love arrived as often as formerly. They
+were more brutal, without refinement, without ornament; but they were
+short, and generally followed by periods of irritation without cause,
+irritation fed by the most trivial pretexts. We had spats about the
+coffee, the table-cloth, the carriage, games of cards,—trifles, in
+short, which could not be of the least importance to either of us. As
+for me, a terrible execration was continually boiling up within me. I
+watched her pour the tea, swing her foot, lift her spoon to her mouth,
+and blow upon hot liquids or sip them, and I detested her as if these
+had been so many crimes.
+
+“I did not notice that these periods of irritation depended very
+regularly upon the periods of love. Each of the latter was followed by
+one of the former. A period of intense love was followed by a long
+period of anger; a period of mild love induced a mild irritation. We
+did not understand that this love and this hatred were two opposite
+faces of the same animal feeling. To live thus would be terrible, if
+one understood the philosophy of it. But we did not perceive this, we
+did not analyze it. It is at once the torture and the relief of man
+that, when he lives irregularly, he can cherish illusions as to the
+miseries of his situation. So did we. She tried to forget herself in
+sudden and absorbing occupations, in household duties, the care of the
+furniture, her dress and that of her children, in the education of the
+latter, and in looking after their health. These were occupations that
+did not arise from any immediate necessity, but she accomplished them
+as if her life and that of her children depended on whether the pastry
+was allowed to burn, whether a curtain was hanging properly, whether a
+dress was a success, whether a lesson was well learned, or whether a
+medicine was swallowed.
+
+“I saw clearly that to her all this was, more than anything else, a
+means of forgetting, an intoxication, just as hunting, card-playing,
+and my functions at the Zemstvo served the same purpose for me. It is
+true that in addition I had an intoxication literally
+speaking,—tobacco, which I smoked in large quantities, and wine, upon
+which I did not get drunk, but of which I took too much. Vodka before
+meals, and during meals two glasses of wine, so that a perpetual mist
+concealed the turmoil of existence.
+
+“These new theories of hypnotism, of mental maladies, of hysteria are
+not simple stupidities, but dangerous or evil stupidities. Charcot, I
+am sure, would have said that my wife was hysterical, and of me he
+would have said that I was an abnormal being, and he would have wanted
+to treat me. But in us there was nothing requiring treatment. All this
+mental malady was the simple result of the fact that we were living
+immorally. Thanks to this immoral life, we suffered, and, to stifle our
+sufferings, we tried abnormal means, which the doctors call the
+‘symptoms’ of a mental malady,—_hysteria_.
+
+“There was no occasion in all this to apply for treatment to Charcot or
+to anybody else. Neither suggestion nor bromide would have been
+effective in working our cure. The needful thing was an examination of
+the origin of the evil. It is as when one is sitting on a nail; if you
+see the nail, you see that which is irregular in your life, and you
+avoid it. Then the pain stops, without any necessity of stifling it.
+Our pain arose from the irregularity of our life, and also my jealousy,
+my irritability, and the necessity of keeping myself in a state of
+perpetual semi-intoxication by hunting, card-playing, and, above all,
+the use of wine and tobacco. It was because of this irregularity that
+my wife so passionately pursued her occupations. The sudden changes of
+her disposition, from extreme sadness to extreme gayety, and her
+babble, arose from the need of forgetting herself, of forgetting her
+life, in the continual intoxication of varied and very brief
+occupations.
+
+“Thus we lived in a perpetual fog, in which we did not distinguish our
+condition. We were like two galley-slaves fastened to the same ball,
+cursing each other, poisoning each other’s existence, and trying to
+shake each other off. I was still unaware that ninety-nine families out
+of every hundred live in the same hell, and that it cannot be
+otherwise. I had not learned this fact from others or from myself. The
+coincidences that are met in regular, and even in irregular life, are
+surprising. At the very period when the life of parents becomes
+impossible, it becomes indispensable that they go to the city to live,
+in order to educate their children. That is what we did.”
+
+Posdnicheff became silent, and twice there escaped him, in the
+half-darkness, sighs, which at that moment seemed to me like suppressed
+sobs. Then he continued.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+
+“So we lived in the city. In the city the wretched feel less sad. One
+can live there a hundred years without being noticed, and be dead a
+long time before anybody will notice it. People have no time to inquire
+into your life. All are absorbed. Business, social relations, art, the
+health of children, their education. And there are visits that must be
+received and made; it is necessary to see this one, it is necessary to
+hear that one or the other one. In the city there are always one, two,
+or three celebrities that it is indispensable that one should visit.
+
+“Now one must care for himself, or care for such or such a little one,
+now it is the professor, the private tutor, the governesses, . . . and
+life is absolutely empty. In this activity we were less conscious of
+the sufferings of our cohabitation. Moreover, in the first of it, we
+had a superb occupation,—the arrangement of the new dwelling, and then,
+too, the moving from the city to the country, and from the country to
+the city.
+
+“Thus we spent a winter. The following winter an incident happened to
+us which passed unnoticed, but which was the fundamental cause of all
+that happened later. My wife was suffering, and the rascals (the
+doctors) would not permit her to conceive a child, and taught her how
+to avoid it. I was profoundly disgusted. I struggled vainly against it,
+but she insisted frivolously and obstinately, and I surrendered. The
+last justification of our life as wretches was thereby suppressed, and
+life became baser than ever.
+
+“The peasant and the workingman need children, and hence their conjugal
+relations have a justification. But we, when we have a few children,
+have no need of any more. They make a superfluous confusion of expenses
+and joint heirs, and are an embarrassment. Consequently we have no
+excuses for our existence as wretches, but we are so deeply degraded
+that we do not see the necessity of a justification. The majority of
+people in contemporary society give themselves up to this debauchery
+without the slightest remorse. We have no conscience left, except, so
+to speak, the conscience of public opinion and of the criminal code.
+But in this matter neither of these consciences is struck. There is not
+a being in society who blushes at it. Each one practices it,—X, Y, Z,
+etc. What is the use of multiplying beggars, and depriving ourselves of
+the joys of social life? There is no necessity of having conscience
+before the criminal code, or of fearing it: low girls, soldiers’ wives
+who throw their children into ponds or wells, these certainly must be
+put in prison. But with us the suppression is effected opportunely and
+properly.
+
+“Thus we passed two years more. The method prescribed by the rascals
+had evidently succeeded. My wife had grown stouter and handsomer. It
+was the beauty of the end of summer. She felt it, and paid much
+attention to her person. She had acquired that provoking beauty that
+stirs men. She was in all the brilliancy of the wife of thirty years,
+who conceives no children, eats heartily, and is excited. The very
+sight of her was enough to frighten one. She was like a spirited
+carriage-horse that has long been idle, and suddenly finds itself
+without a bridle. As for my wife, she had no bridle, as for that
+matter, ninety-nine hundredths of our women have none.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+
+Posdnicheff’s face had become transformed; his eyes were pitiable;
+their expression seemed strange, like that of another being than
+himself; his moustache and beard turned up toward the top of his face;
+his nose was diminished, and his mouth enlarged, immense, frightful.
+
+“Yes,” he resumed “she had grown stouter since ceasing to conceive, and
+her anxieties about her children began to disappear. Not even to
+disappear. One would have said that she was waking from a long
+intoxication, that on coming to herself she had perceived the entire
+universe with its joys, a whole world in which she had not learned to
+live, and which she did not understand.
+
+“‘If only this world shall not vanish! When time is past, when old age
+comes, one cannot recover it.’ Thus, I believe, she thought, or rather
+felt. Moreover, she could neither think nor feel otherwise. She had
+been brought up in this idea that there is in the world but one thing
+worthy of attention,—love. In marrying, she had known something of this
+love, but very far from everything that she had understood as promised
+her, everything that she expected. How many disillusions! How much
+suffering! And an unexpected torture,—the children! This torture had
+told upon her, and then, thanks to the obliging doctor, she had learned
+that it is possible to avoid having children. That had made her glad.
+She had tried, and she was now revived for the only thing that she
+knew,—for love. But love with a husband polluted by jealousy and
+ill-nature was no longer her ideal. She began to think of some other
+tenderness; at least, that is what I thought. She looked about her as
+if expecting some event or some being. I noticed it, and I could not
+help being anxious.
+
+“Always, now, it happened that, in talking with me through a third
+party (that is, in talking with others, but with the intention that I
+should hear), she boldly expressed,—not thinking that an hour before
+she had said the opposite,—half joking, half seriously, this idea that
+maternal anxieties are a delusion; that it is not worth while to
+sacrifice one’s life to children. When one is young, it is necessary to
+enjoy life. So she occupied herself less with the children, not with
+the same intensity as formerly, and paid more and more attention to
+herself, to her face,—although she concealed it,—to her pleasures, and
+even to her perfection from the worldly point of view. She began to
+devote herself passionately to the piano, which had formerly stood
+forgotten in the corner. There, at the piano, began the adventure.
+
+“The _man_ appeared.”
+
+Posdnicheff seemed embarrassed, and twice again there escaped him that
+nasal sound of which I spoke above. I thought that it gave him pain to
+refer to the _man_, and to remember him. He made an effort, as if to
+break down the obstacle that embarrassed him, and continued with
+determination.
+
+“He was a bad man in my eyes, and not because he has played such an
+important _rôle_ in my life, but because he was really such. For the
+rest, from the fact that he was bad, we must conclude that he was
+irresponsible. He was a musician, a violinist. Not a professional
+musician, but half man of the world, half artist. His father, a country
+proprietor, was a neighbor of my father’s. The father had become
+ruined, and the children, three boys, were all sent away. Our man, the
+youngest, was sent to his godmother at Paris. There they placed him in
+the Conservatory, for he showed a taste for music. He came out a
+violinist, and played in concerts.”
+
+On the point of speaking evil of the other, Posdnicheff checked
+himself, stopped, and said suddenly:
+
+“In truth, I know not how he lived. I only know that that year he came
+to Russia, and came to see me. Moist eyes of almond shape, smiling red
+lips, a little moustache well waxed, hair brushed in the latest
+fashion, a vulgarly pretty face,—what the women call ‘not bad,’—feebly
+built physically, but with no deformity; with hips as broad as a
+woman’s; correct, and insinuating himself into the familiarity of
+people as far as possible, but having that keen sense that quickly
+detects a false step and retires in reason,—a man, in short, observant
+of the external rules of dignity, with that special Parisianism that is
+revealed in buttoned boots, a gaudy cravat, and that something which
+foreigners pick up in Paris, and which, in its peculiarity and novelty,
+always has an influence on our women. In his manners an external and
+artificial gayety, a way, you know, of referring to everything by
+hints, by unfinished fragments, as if everything that one says you knew
+already, recalled it, and could supply the omissions. Well, he, with
+his music, was the cause of all.
+
+“At the trial the affair was so represented that everything seemed
+attributable to jealousy. It is false,—that is, not quite false, but
+there was something else. The verdict was rendered that I was a
+deceived husband, that I had killed in defence of my sullied honor
+(that is the way they put it in their language), and thus I was
+acquitted. I tried to explain the affair from my own point of view, but
+they concluded that I simply wanted to rehabilitate the memory of my
+wife. Her relations with the musician, whatever they may have been, are
+now of no importance to me or to her. The important part is what I have
+told you. The whole tragedy was due to the fact that this man came into
+our house at a time when an immense abyss had already been dug between
+us, that frightful tension of mutual hatred, in which the slightest
+motive sufficed to precipitate the crisis. Our quarrels in the last
+days were something terrible, and the more astonishing because they
+were followed by a brutal passion extremely strained. If it had not
+been he, some other would have come. If the pretext had not been
+jealousy, I should have discovered another. I insist upon this
+point,—that all husbands who live the married life that I lived must
+either resort to outside debauchery, or separate from their wives, or
+kill themselves, or kill their wives as I did. If there is any one in
+my case to whom this does not happen, he is a very rare exception, for,
+before ending as I ended, I was several times on the point of suicide,
+and my wife made several attempts to poison herself.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+
+“In order that you may understand me, I must tell you how this
+happened. We were living along, and all seemed well. Suddenly we began
+to talk of the children’s education. I do not remember what words
+either of us uttered, but a discussion began, reproaches, leaps from
+one subject to another. ‘Yes, I know it. It has been so for a long
+time.’ . . . ‘You said that.’ . . . ‘No, I did not say that.’ . . .
+‘Then I lie?’ etc.
+
+“And I felt that the frightful crisis was approaching when I should
+desire to kill her or else myself. I knew that it was approaching; I
+was afraid of it as of fire; I wanted to restrain myself. But rage took
+possession of my whole being. My wife found herself in the same
+condition, perhaps worse. She knew that she intentionally distorted
+each of my words, and each of her words was saturated with venom. All
+that was dear to me she disparaged and profaned. The farther the
+quarrel went, the more furious it became. I cried, ‘Be silent,’ or
+something like that.
+
+“She bounded out of the room and ran toward the children. I tried to
+hold her back to finish my insults. I grasped her by the arm, and hurt
+her. She cried: ‘Children, your father is beating me.’ I cried: ‘Don’t
+lie.’ She continued to utter falsehoods for the simple purpose of
+irritating me further. ‘Ah, it is not the first time,’ or something of
+that sort. The children rushed toward her and tried to quiet her. I
+said: ‘Don’t sham.’ She said: ‘You look upon everything as a sham. You
+would kill a person and say he was shamming. Now I understand you. That
+is what you want to do.’ ‘Oh, if you were only dead!’ I cried.
+
+“I remember how that terrible phrase frightened me. Never had I thought
+that I could utter words so brutal, so frightful, and I was stupefied
+at what had just escaped my lips. I fled into my private apartment. I
+sat down and began to smoke. I heard her go into the hall and prepare
+to go out. I asked her: ‘Where are you going? She did not answer.
+‘Well, may the devil take you!’ said I to myself, going back into my
+private room, where I lay down again and began smoking afresh.
+Thousands of plans of vengeance, of ways of getting rid of her, and how
+to arrange this, and act as if nothing had happened,—all this passed
+through my head. I thought of these things, and I smoked, and smoked,
+and smoked. I thought of running away, of making my escape, of going to
+America. I went so far as to dream how beautiful it would be, after
+getting rid of her, to love another woman, entirely different from her.
+I should be rid of her if she should die or if I should get a divorce,
+and I tried to think how that could be managed. I saw that I was
+getting confused, but, in order not to see that I was not thinking
+rightly, I kept on smoking.
+
+“And the life of the house went on as usual. The children’s teacher
+came and asked: ‘Where is Madame? When will she return?’
+
+“The servants asked if they should serve the tea. I entered the
+dining-room. The children, Lise, the eldest girl, looked at me with
+fright, as if to question me, and she did not come. The whole evening
+passed, and still she did not come. Two sentiments kept succeeding each
+other in my soul,—hatred of her, since she tortured myself and the
+children by her absence, but would finally return just the same, and
+fear lest she might return and make some attempt upon herself. But
+where should I look for her? At her sister’s? It seemed so stupid to go
+to ask where one’s wife is. Moreover, may God forbid, I hoped, that she
+should be at her sister’s! If she wishes to torment any one, let her
+torment herself first. And suppose she were not at her sister’s.
+
+“Suppose she were to do, or had already done, something.
+
+“Eleven o’clock, midnight, one o’clock. . . . I did not sleep. I did
+not go to my chamber. It is stupid to lie stretched out all alone, and
+to wait. But in my study I did not rest. I tried to busy myself, to
+write letters, to read. Impossible! I was alone, tortured, wicked, and
+I listened. Toward daylight I went to sleep. I awoke. She had not
+returned. Everything in the house went on as usual, and all looked at
+me in astonishment, questioningly. The children’s eyes were full of
+reproach for me.
+
+“And always the same feeling of anxiety about her, and of hatred
+because of this anxiety.
+
+“Toward eleven o’clock in the morning came her sister, her
+ambassadress. Then began the usual phrases: ‘She is in a terrible
+state. What is the matter?’ ‘Why, nothing has happened.’ I spoke of her
+asperity of character, and I added that I had done nothing, and that I
+would not take the first step. If she wants a divorce, so much the
+better! My sister-in-law would not listen to this idea, and went away
+without having gained anything. I was obstinate, and I said boldly and
+determinedly, in talking to her, that I would not take the first step.
+Immediately she had gone I went into the other room, and saw the
+children in a frightened and pitiful state, and there I found myself
+already inclined to take this first step. But I was bound by my word.
+Again I walked up and down, always smoking. At breakfast I drank brandy
+and wine, and I reached the point which I unconsciously desired, the
+point where I no longer saw the stupidity and baseness of my situation.
+
+“Toward three o’clock she came. I thought that she was appeased, or
+admitted her defeat. I began to tell her that I was provoked by her
+reproaches. She answered me, with the same severe and terribly downcast
+face, that she had not come for explanations, but to take the children,
+that we could not live together. I answered that it was not my fault,
+that she had put me beside myself. She looked at me with a severe and
+solemn air, and said: ‘Say no more. You will repent it.’ I said that I
+could not tolerate comedies. Then she cried out something that I did
+not understand, and rushed toward her room. The key turned in the lock,
+and she shut herself up. I pushed at the door. There was no response.
+Furious, I went away.
+
+“A half hour later Lise came running all in tears. ‘What! Has anything
+happened? We cannot hear Mamma!’ We went toward my wife’s room. I
+pushed the door with all my might. The bolt was scarcely drawn, and the
+door opened. In a skirt, with high boots, my wife lay awkwardly on the
+bed. On the table an empty opium phial. We restored her to life. Tears
+and then reconciliation! Not reconciliation; internally each kept the
+hatred for the other, but it was absolutely necessary for the moment to
+end the scene in some way, and life began again as before. These
+scenes, and even worse, came now once a week, now every month, now
+every day. And invariably the same incidents. Once I was absolutely
+resolved to fly, but through some inconceivable weakness I remained.
+
+“Such were the circumstances in which we were living when the _man_
+came. The man was bad, it is true. But what! No worse than we were.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+
+“When we moved to Moscow, this gentleman—his name was
+Troukhatchevsky—came to my house. It was in the morning. I received
+him. In former times we had been very familiar. He tried, by various
+advances, to re-establish the familiarity, but I was determined to keep
+him at a distance, and soon he gave it up. He displeased me extremely.
+At the first glance I saw that he was a filthy _débauché_. I was
+jealous of him, even before he had seen my wife. But, strange thing!
+some occult fatal power kept me from repulsing him and sending him
+away, and, on the contrary, induced me to suffer this approach. What
+could have been simpler than to talk with him a few minutes, and then
+dismiss him coldly without introducing him to my wife? But no, as if on
+purpose, I turned the conversation upon his skill as a violinist, and
+he answered that, contrary to what I had heard, he now played the
+violin more than formerly. He remembered that I used to play. I
+answered that I had abandoned music, but that my wife played very well.
+
+“Singular thing! Why, in the important events of our life, in those in
+which a man’s fate is decided,—as mine was decided in that moment,—why
+in these events is there neither a past nor a future? My relations with
+Troukhatchevsky the first day, at the first hour, were such as they
+might still have been after all that has happened. I was conscious that
+some frightful misfortune must result from the presence of this man,
+and, in spite of that, I could not help being amiable to him. I
+introduced him to my wife. She was pleased with him. In the beginning,
+I suppose, because of the pleasure of the violin playing, which she
+adored. She had even hired for that purpose a violinist from the
+theatre. But when she cast a glance at me, she understood my feelings,
+and concealed her impression. Then began the mutual trickery and
+deceit. I smiled agreeably, pretending that all this pleased me
+extremely. He, looking at my wife, as all _débauchés_ look at beautiful
+women, with an air of being interested solely in the subject of
+conversation,—that is, in that which did not interest him at all.
+
+“She tried to seem indifferent. But my expression, my jealous or false
+smile, which she knew so well, and the voluptuous glances of the
+musician, evidently excited her. I saw that, after the first interview,
+her eyes were already glittering, glittering strangely, and that,
+thanks to my jealousy, between him and her had been immediately
+established that sort of electric current which is provoked by an
+identity of expression in the smile and in the eyes.
+
+“We talked, at the first interview, of music, of Paris, and of all
+sorts of trivialities. He rose to go. Pressing his hat against his
+swaying hip, he stood erect, looking now at her and now at me, as if
+waiting to see what she would do. I remember that minute, precisely
+because it was in my power not to invite him. I need not have invited
+him, and then nothing would have happened. But I cast a glance first at
+him, then at her. ‘Don’t flatter yourself that I can be jealous of
+you,’ I thought, addressing myself to her mentally, and I invited the
+other to bring his violin that very evening, and to play with my wife.
+She raised her eyes toward me with astonishment, and her face turned
+purple, as if she were seized with a sudden fear. She began to excuse
+herself, saying that she did not play well enough. This refusal only
+excited me the more. I remember the strange feeling with which I looked
+at his neck, his white neck, in contrast with his black hair, separated
+by a parting, when, with his skipping gait, like that of a bird, he
+left my house. I could not help confessing to myself that this man’s
+presence caused me suffering. ‘It is in my power,’ thought I, ‘to so
+arrange things that I shall never see him again. But can it be that I,
+_I_, fear him? No, I do not fear him. It would be too humiliating!’
+
+“And there in the hall, knowing that my wife heard me, I insisted that
+he should come that very evening with his violin. He promised me, and
+went away. In the evening he arrived with his violin, and they played
+together. But for a long time things did not go well; we had not the
+necessary music, and that which we had my wife could not play at sight.
+I amused myself with their difficulties. I aided them, I made
+proposals, and they finally executed a few pieces,—songs without words,
+and a little sonata by Mozart. He played in a marvellous manner. He had
+what is called the energetic and tender tone. As for difficulties,
+there were none for him. Scarcely had he begun to play, when his face
+changed. He became serious, and much more sympathetic. He was, it is
+needless to say, much stronger than my wife. He helped her, he advised
+her simply and naturally, and at the same time played his game with
+courtesy. My wife seemed interested only in the music. She was very
+simple and agreeable. Throughout the evening I feigned, not only for
+the others, but for myself, an interest solely in the music. Really, I
+was continually tortured by jealousy. From the first minute that the
+musician’s eyes met those of my wife, I saw that he did not regard her
+as a disagreeable woman, with whom on occasion it would be unpleasant
+to enter into intimate relations.
+
+“If I had been pure, I should not have dreamed of what he might think
+of her. But I looked at women, and that is why I understood him and was
+in torture. I was in torture, especially because I was sure that toward
+me she had no other feeling than of perpetual irritation, sometimes
+interrupted by the customary sensuality, and that this man,—thanks to
+his external elegance and his novelty, and, above all, thanks to his
+unquestionably remarkable talent, thanks to the attraction exercised
+under the influence of music, thanks to the impression that music
+produces upon nervous natures,—this man would not only please, but
+would inevitably, and without difficulty, subjugate and conquer her,
+and do with her as he liked.
+
+“I could not help seeing this. I could not help suffering, or keep from
+being jealous. And I was jealous, and I suffered, and in spite of that,
+and perhaps even because of that, an unknown force, in spite of my
+will, impelled me to be not only polite, but more than polite, amiable.
+I cannot say whether I did it for my wife, or to show him that I did
+not fear _him_, or to deceive myself; but from my first relations with
+him I could not be at my ease. I was obliged, that I might not give way
+to a desire to kill him immediately, to ‘caress’ him. I filled his
+glass at the table, I grew enthusiastic over his playing, I talked to
+him with an extremely amiable smile, and I invited him to dinner the
+following Sunday, and to play again. I told him that I would invite
+some of my acquaintances, lovers of his art, to hear him.
+
+“Two or three days later I was entering my house, in conversation with
+a friend, when in the hall I suddenly felt something as heavy as a
+stone weighing on my heart, and I could not account for it. And it was
+this, it was this: in passing through the hall, I had noticed something
+which reminded me of _him_. Not until I reached my study did I realize
+what it was, and I returned to the hall to verify my conjecture. Yes, I
+was not mistaken. It was his overcoat (everything that belonged to him,
+I, without realizing it, had observed with extraordinary attention). I
+questioned the servant. That was it. He had come. “I passed near the
+parlor, through my children’s study-room. Lise, my daughter, was
+sitting before a book, and the old nurse, with my youngest child, was
+beside the table, turning the cover of something or other. In the
+parlor I heard a slow _arpeggio_, and his voice, deadened, and a denial
+from her. She said: ‘No, no! There is something else!’ And it seemed to
+me that some one was purposely deadening the words by the aid of the
+piano.
+
+“My God! How my heart leaped! What were my imaginations! When I
+remember the beast that lived in me at that moment, I am seized with
+fright. My heart was first compressed, then stopped, and then began to
+beat like a hammer. The principal feeling, as in every bad feeling, was
+pity for myself. ‘Before the children, before the old nurse,’ thought
+I, ‘she dishonors me. I will go away. I can endure it no longer. God
+knows what I should do if. . . . But I must go in.’
+
+“The old nurse raised her eyes to mine, as if she understood, and
+advised me to keep a sharp watch. ‘I must go in,’ I said to myself,
+and, without knowing what I did, I opened the door. He was sitting at
+the piano and making _arpeggios_ with his long, white, curved fingers.
+She was standing in the angle of the grand piano, before the open
+score. She saw or heard me first, and raised her eyes to mine. Was she
+stunned, was she pretending not to be frightened, or was she really not
+frightened at all? In any case, she did not tremble, she did not stir.
+She blushed, but only a little later.
+
+“‘How glad I am that you have come! We have not decided what we will
+play Sunday,’ said she, in a tone that she would not have had if she
+had been alone with me.
+
+“This tone, and the way in which she said ‘we’ in speaking of herself
+and of him, revolted me. I saluted him silently. He shook hands with me
+directly, with a smile that seemed to me full of mockery. He explained
+to me that he had brought some scores, in order to prepare for the
+Sunday concert, and that they were not in accord as to the piece to
+choose,—whether difficult, classic things, notably a sonata by
+Beethoven, or lighter pieces.
+
+“And as he spoke, he looked at me. It was all so natural, so simple,
+that there was absolutely nothing to be said against it. And at the
+same time I saw, I was sure, that it was false, that they were in a
+conspiracy to deceive me.
+
+“One of the most torturing situations for the jealous (and in our
+social life everybody is jealous) are those social conditions which
+allow a very great and dangerous intimacy between a man and a woman
+under certain pretexts. One must make himself the laughing stock of
+everybody, if he desires to prevent associations in the ball-room, the
+intimacy of doctors with their patients, the familiarity of art
+occupations, and especially of music. In order that people may occupy
+themselves together with the noblest art, music, a certain intimacy is
+necessary, in which there is nothing blameworthy. Only a jealous fool
+of a husband can have anything to say against it. A husband should not
+have such thoughts, and especially should not thrust his nose into
+these affairs, or prevent them. And yet, everybody knows that precisely
+in these occupations, especially in music, many adulteries originate in
+our society.
+
+“I had evidently embarrassed them, because for some time I was unable
+to say anything. I was like a bottle suddenly turned upside down, from
+which the water does not run because it is too full. I wanted to insult
+the man, and to drive him away, but I could do nothing of the kind. On
+the contrary, I felt that I was disturbing them, and that it was my
+fault. I made a presence of approving everything, this time also,
+thanks to that strange feeling that forced me to treat him the more
+amiably in proportion as his presence was more painful to me. I said
+that I trusted to his taste, and I advised my wife to do the same. He
+remained just as long as it was necessary in order to efface the
+unpleasant impression of my abrupt entrance with a frightened face. He
+went away with an air of satisfaction at the conclusions arrived at. As
+for me, I was perfectly sure that, in comparison with that which
+preoccupied them, the question of music was indifferent to them. I
+accompanied him with especial courtesy to the hall (how can one help
+accompanying a man who has come to disturb your tranquillity and ruin
+the happiness of the entire family?), and I shook his white, soft hand
+with fervent amiability.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+
+“All that day I did not speak to my wife. I could not. Her proximity
+excited such hatred that I feared myself. At the table she asked me, in
+presence of the children, when I was to start upon a journey. I was to
+go the following week to an assembly of the Zemstvo, in a neighboring
+locality. I named the date. She asked me if I would need anything for
+the journey. I did not answer. I sat silent at the table, and silently
+I retired to my study. In those last days she never entered my study,
+especially at that hour. Suddenly I heard her steps, her walk, and then
+a terribly base idea entered my head that, like the wife of Uri, she
+wished to conceal a fault already committed, and that it was for this
+reason that she came to see me at this unseasonable hour. ‘Is it
+possible,’ thought I, ‘that she is coming to see me?’ On hearing her
+step as it approached: ‘If it is to see me that she is coming, then I
+am right.’
+
+“An inexpressible hatred invaded my soul. The steps drew nearer, and
+nearer, and nearer yet. Would she pass by and go on to the other room?
+No, the hinges creaked, and at the door her tall, graceful, languid
+figure appeared. In her face, in her eyes, a timidity, an insinuating
+expression, which she tried to hide, but which I saw, and of which I
+understood the meaning. I came near suffocating, such were my efforts
+to hold my breath, and, continuing to look at her, I took my cigarette,
+and lighted it.
+
+“‘What does this mean? One comes to talk with you, and you go to
+smoking.’
+
+“And she sat down beside me on the sofa, resting against my shoulder. I
+recoiled, that I might not touch her.
+
+“‘I see that you are displeased with what I wish to play on Sunday,’
+said she.
+
+“‘I am not at all displeased,’ said I.
+
+“‘Can I not see?’
+
+“‘Well, I congratulate you on your clairvoyance. Only to you every
+baseness is agreeable, and I abhor it.’
+
+“‘If you are going to swear like a trooper, I am going away.’
+
+“‘Then go away. Only know that, if the honor of the family is nothing
+to you, to me it is dear. As for you, the devil take you!’
+
+“‘What! What is the matter?’
+
+“‘Go away, in the name of God.’
+
+“But she did not go away. Was she pretending not to understand, or did
+she really not understand what I meant? But she was offended and became
+angry.
+
+“‘You have become absolutely impossible,’ she began, or some such
+phrase as that regarding my character, trying, as usual, to give me as
+much pain as possible. ‘After what you have done to my sister (she
+referred to an incident with her sister, in which, beside myself, I had
+uttered brutalities; she knew that that tortured me, and tried to touch
+me in that tender spot) nothing will astonish me.’
+
+“‘Yes, offended, humiliated, and dishonored, and after that to hold me
+still responsible,’ thought I, and suddenly a rage, such a hatred
+invaded me as I do not remember to have ever felt before. For the first
+time I desired to express this hatred physically. I leaped upon her,
+but at the same moment I understood my condition, and I asked myself
+whether it would be well for me to abandon myself to my fury. And I
+answered myself that it would be well, that it would frighten her, and,
+instead of resisting, I lashed and spurred myself on, and was glad to
+feel my anger boiling more and more fiercely.
+
+“‘Go away, or I will kill you!’ I cried, purposely, with a frightful
+voice, and I grasped her by the arm. She did not go away. Then I
+twisted her arm, and pushed her away violently.
+
+“‘What is the matter with you? Come to your senses!’ she shrieked.
+
+“‘Go away,’ roared I, louder than ever, rolling my eyes wildly. ‘It
+takes you to put me in such a fury. I do not answer for myself! Go
+away!’
+
+“In abandoning myself to my anger, I became steeped in it, and I wanted
+to commit some violent act to show the force of my fury. I felt a
+terrible desire to beat her, to kill her, but I realized that that
+could not be, and I restrained myself. I drew back from her, rushed to
+the table, grasped the paper-weight, and threw it on the floor by her
+side. I took care to aim a little to one side, and, before she
+disappeared (I did it so that she could see it), I grasped a
+candlestick, which I also hurled, and then took down the barometer,
+continuing to shout:
+
+“‘Go away! I do not answer for myself!’
+
+“She disappeared, and I immediately ceased my demonstrations. An hour
+later the old servant came to me and said that my wife was in a fit of
+hysterics. I went to see her. She sobbed and laughed, incapable of
+expressing anything, her whole body in a tremble. She was not shamming,
+she was really sick. We sent for the doctor, and all night long I cared
+for her. Toward daylight she grew calmer, and we became reconciled
+under the influence of that feeling which we called ‘love.’ The next
+morning, when, after the reconciliation, I confessed to her that I was
+jealous of Troukhatchevsky, she was not at all embarrassed, and began
+to laugh in the most natural way, so strange did the possibility of
+being led astray by such a man appear to her.
+
+“‘With such a man can an honest woman entertain any feeling beyond the
+pleasure of enjoying music with him? But if you like, I am ready to
+never see him again, even on Sunday, although everybody has been
+invited. Write him that I am indisposed, and that will end the matter.
+Only one thing annoys me,—that any one could have thought him
+dangerous. I am too proud not to detest such thoughts.’
+
+“And she did not lie. She believed what she said. She hoped by her
+words to provoke in herself a contempt for him, and thereby to defend
+herself. But she did not succeed. Everything was directed against her,
+especially that abominable music. So ended the quarrel, and on Sunday
+our guests came, and Troukhatchevsky and my wife again played
+together.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+
+
+“I think that it is superfluous to say that I was very vain. If one has
+no vanity in this life of ours, there is no sufficient reason for
+living. So for that Sunday I had busied myself in tastefully arranging
+things for the dinner and the musical _soirée_. I had purchased myself
+numerous things for the dinner, and had chosen the guests. Toward six
+o’clock they arrived, and after them Troukhatchevsky, in his
+dress-coat, with diamond shirt-studs, in bad taste. He bore himself
+with ease. To all questions he responded promptly, with a smile of
+contentment and understanding, and that peculiar expression which was
+intended to mean: ‘All that you may do and say will be exactly what I
+expected.’ Everything about him that was not correct I now noticed with
+especial pleasure, for it all tended to tranquillize me, and prove to
+me that to my wife he stood in such a degree of inferiority that, as
+she had told me, she could not stoop to his level. Less because of my
+wife’s assurances than because of the atrocious sufferings which I felt
+in jealousy, I no longer allowed myself to be jealous.
+
+“In spite of that, I was not at ease with the musician or with her
+during dinner-time and the time that elapsed before the beginning of
+the music. Involuntarily I followed each of their gestures and looks.
+The dinner, like all dinners, was tiresome and conventional. Not long
+afterward the music began. He went to get his violin; my wife advanced
+to the piano, and rummaged among the scores. Oh, how well I remember
+all the details of that evening! I remember how he brought the violin,
+how he opened the box, took off the serge embroidered by a lady’s hand,
+and began to tune the instrument. I can still see my wife sit down,
+with a false air of indifference, under which it was plain that she hid
+a great timidity, a timidity that was especially due to her comparative
+lack of musical knowledge. She sat down with that false air in front of
+the piano, and then began the usual preliminaries,—the _pizzicati_ of
+the violin and the arrangement of the scores. I remember then how they
+looked at each other, and cast a glance at their auditors who were
+taking their seats. They said a few words to each other, and the music
+began. They played Beethoven’s ‘Kreutzer Sonata.’ Do you know the first
+_presto?_ Do you know it? Ah!” . . .
+
+Posdnicheff heaved a sigh, and was silent for a long time.
+
+“A terrible thing is that sonata, especially the _presto!_ And a
+terrible thing is music in general. What is it? Why does it do what it
+does? They say that music stirs the soul. Stupidity! A lie! It acts, it
+acts frightfully (I speak for myself), but not in an ennobling way. It
+acts neither in an ennobling nor a debasing way, but in an irritating
+way. How shall I say it? Music makes me forget my real situation. It
+transports me into a state which is not my own. Under the influence of
+music I really seem to feel what I do not feel, to understand what I do
+not understand, to have powers which I cannot have. Music seems to me
+to act like yawning or laughter; I have no desire to sleep, but I yawn
+when I see others yawn; with no reason to laugh, I laugh when I hear
+others laugh. And music transports me immediately into the condition of
+soul in which he who wrote the music found himself at that time. I
+become confounded with his soul, and with him I pass from one condition
+to another. But why that? I know nothing about it? But he who wrote
+Beethoven’s ‘Kreutzer Sonata’ knew well why he found himself in a
+certain condition. That condition led him to certain actions, and for
+that reason to him had a meaning, but to me none, none whatever. And
+that is why music provokes an excitement which it does not bring to a
+conclusion. For instance, a military march is played; the soldier
+passes to the sound of this march, and the music is finished. A dance
+is played; I have finished dancing, and the music is finished. A mass
+is sung; I receive the sacrament, and again the music is finished. But
+any other music provokes an excitement, and this excitement is not
+accompanied by the thing that needs properly to be done, and that is
+why music is so dangerous, and sometimes acts so frightfully.
+
+“In China music is under the control of the State, and that is the way
+it ought to be. Is it admissible that the first comer should hypnotize
+one or more persons, and then do with them as he likes? And especially
+that the hypnotizer should be the first immoral individual who happens
+to come along? It is a frightful power in the hands of any one, no
+matter whom. For instance, should they be allowed to play this
+‘Kreutzer Sonata,’ the first _presto_,—and there are many like it,—in
+parlors, among ladies wearing low necked dresses, or in concerts, then
+finish the piece, receive the applause, and then begin another piece?
+These things should be played under certain circumstances, only in
+cases where it is necessary to incite certain actions corresponding to
+the music. But to incite an energy of feeling which corresponds to
+neither the time nor the place, and is expended in nothing, cannot fail
+to act dangerously. On me in particular this piece acted in a frightful
+manner. One would have said that new sentiments, new virtualities, of
+which I was formerly ignorant, had developed in me. ‘Ah, yes, that’s
+it! Not at all as I lived and thought before! This is the right way to
+live!’
+
+“Thus I spoke to my soul as I listened to that music. What was this new
+thing that I thus learned? That I did not realize, but the
+consciousness of this indefinite state filled me with joy. In that
+state there was no room for jealousy. The same faces, and among them
+_he_ and my wife, I saw in a different light. This music transported me
+into an unknown world, where there was no room for jealousy. Jealousy
+and the feelings that provoke it seemed to me trivialities, nor worth
+thinking of.
+
+“After the _presto_ followed the _andante_, not very new, with
+commonplace variations, and the feeble _finale_. Then they played more,
+at the request of the guests,—first an elegy by Ernst, and then various
+other pieces. They were all very well, but did not produce upon me a
+tenth part of the impression that the opening piece did. I felt light
+and gay throughout the evening. As for my wife, never had I seen her as
+she was that night. Those brilliant eyes, that severity and majestic
+expression while she was playing, and then that utter languor, that
+weak, pitiable, and happy smile after she had finished,—I saw them all
+and attached no importance to them, believing that she felt as I did,
+that to her, as to me, new sentiments had been revealed, as through a
+fog. During almost the whole evening I was not jealous.
+
+“Two days later I was to start for the assembly of the Zemstvo, and for
+that reason, on taking leave of me and carrying all his scores with
+him, Troukhatchevsky asked me when I should return. I inferred from
+that that he believed it impossible to come to my house during my
+absence, and that was agreeable to me. Now I was not to return before
+his departure from the city. So we bade each other a definite farewell.
+For the first time I shook his hand with pleasure, and thanked him for
+the satisfaction that he had given me. He likewise took leave of my
+wife, and their parting seemed to me very natural and proper. All went
+marvellously. My wife and I retired, well satisfied with the evening.
+We talked of our impressions in a general way, and we were nearer
+together and more friendly than we had been for a long time.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV.
+
+
+“Two days later I started for the assembly, having bid farewell to my
+wife in an excellent and tranquil state of mind. In the district there
+was always much to be done. It was a world and a life apart. During two
+days I spent ten hours at the sessions. The evening of the second day,
+on returning to my district lodgings, I found a letter from my wife,
+telling me of the children, of their uncle, of the servants, and, among
+other things, as if it were perfectly natural, that Troukhatchevsky had
+been at the house, and had brought her the promised scores. He had also
+proposed that they play again, but she had refused.
+
+“For my part, I did not remember at all that he had promised any score.
+It had seemed to me on Sunday evening that he took a definite leave,
+and for this reason the news gave me a disagreeable surprise. I read
+the letter again. There was something tender and timid about it. It
+produced an extremely painful impression upon me. My heart swelled, and
+the mad beast of jealousy began to roar in his lair, and seemed to want
+to leap upon his prey. But I was afraid of this beast, and I imposed
+silence upon it.
+
+“What an abominable sentiment is jealousy! ‘What could be more natural
+than what she has written?’ said I to myself. I went to bed, thinking
+myself tranquil again. I thought of the business that remained to be
+done, and I went to sleep without thinking of her.
+
+“During these assemblies of the Zemstvo I always slept badly in my
+strange quarters. That night I went to sleep directly, but, as
+sometimes happens, a sort of sudden shock awoke me. I thought
+immediately of her, of my physical love for her, of Troukhatchevsky,
+and that between them everything had happened. And a feeling of rage
+compressed my heart, and I tried to quiet myself.
+
+“‘How stupid!’ said I to myself; ‘there is no reason, none at all. And
+why humiliate ourselves, herself and myself, and especially myself, by
+supposing such horrors? This mercenary violinist, known as a bad
+man,—shall I think of him in connection with a respectable woman, the
+mother of a family, _my_ wife? How silly!’ But on the other hand, I
+said to myself: ‘Why should it not happen?’
+
+“Why? Was it not the same simple and intelligible feeling in the name
+of which I married, in the name of which I was living with her, the
+only thing I wanted of her, and that which, consequently, others
+desired, this musician among the rest? He was not married, was in good
+health (I remember how his teeth ground the gristle of the cutlets, and
+how eagerly he emptied the glass of wine with his red lips), was
+careful of his person, well fed, and not only without principles, but
+evidently with the principle that one should take advantage of the
+pleasure that offers itself. There was a bond between them, music,—the
+most refined form of sensual voluptuousness. What was there to restrain
+them? Nothing. Everything, on the contrary, attracted them. And she,
+she had been and had remained a mystery. I did not know her. I knew her
+only as an animal, and an animal nothing can or should restrain. And
+now I remember their faces on Sunday evening, when, after the ‘Kreutzer
+Sonata,’ they played a passionate piece, written I know not by whom,
+but a piece passionate to the point of obscenity.
+
+“‘How could I have gone away?’ said I to myself, as I recalled their
+faces. ‘Was it not clear that between them everything was done that
+evening? Was it not clear that between them not only there were no more
+obstacles, but that both—especially she—felt a certain shame after what
+had happened at the piano? How weakly, pitiably, happily she smiled, as
+she wiped the perspiration from her reddened face! They already avoided
+each other’s eyes, and only at the supper, when she poured some water
+for him, did they look at each other and smile imperceptibly.’
+
+“Now I remember with fright that look and that scarcely perceptible
+smile. ‘Yes, everything has happened,’ a voice said to me, and directly
+another said the opposite. ‘Are you mad? It is impossible!’ said the
+second voice.
+
+“It was too painful to me to remain thus stretched in the darkness. I
+struck a match, and the little yellow-papered room frightened me. I
+lighted a cigarette, and, as always happens, when one turns in a circle
+of inextricable contradiction, I began to smoke. I smoked cigarette
+after cigarette to dull my senses, that I might not see my
+contradictions. All night I did not sleep, and at five o’clock, when it
+was not yet light, I decided that I could stand this strain no longer,
+and that I would leave directly. There was a train at eight o’clock. I
+awakened the keeper who was acting as my servant, and sent him to look
+for horses. To the assembly of Zemstvo I sent a message that I was
+called back to Moscow by pressing business, and that I begged them to
+substitute for me a member of the Committee. At eight o’clock I got
+into a _tarantass_ and started off.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV.
+
+
+“I had to go twenty-five versts by carriage and eight hours by train.
+By carriage it was a very pleasant journey. The coolness of autumn was
+accompanied by a brilliant sun. You know the weather when the wheels
+imprint themselves upon the dirty road. The road was level, and the
+light strong, and the air strengthening. The _tarantass_ was
+comfortable. As I looked at the horses, the fields, and the people whom
+we passed, I forgot where I was going. Sometimes it seemed to me that I
+was travelling without an object,—simply promenading,—and that I should
+go on thus to the end of the world. And I was happy when I so forgot
+myself. But when I remembered where I was going, I said to myself: ‘I
+shall see later. Don’t think about it.’
+
+“When half way, an incident happened to distract me still further. The
+_tarantass_, though new, broke down, and had to be repaired. The delays
+in looking for a _télègue_, the repairs, the payment, the tea in the
+inn, the conversation with the _dvornik_, all served to amuse me.
+Toward nightfall all was ready, and I started off again. By night the
+journey was still pleasanter than by day. The moon in its first
+quarter, a slight frost, the road still in good condition, the horses,
+the sprightly coachman, all served to put me in good spirits. I
+scarcely thought of what awaited me, and was gay perhaps because of the
+very thing that awaited me, and because I was about to say farewell to
+the joys of life.
+
+“But this tranquil state, the power of conquering my preoccupation, all
+ended with the carriage drive. Scarcely had I entered the cars, when
+the other thing began. Those eight hours on the rail were so terrible
+to me that I shall never forget them in my life. Was it because on
+entering the car I had a vivid imagination of having already arrived,
+or because the railway acts upon people in such an exciting fashion? At
+any rate, after boarding the train I could no longer control my
+imagination, which incessantly, with extraordinary vivacity, drew
+pictures before my eyes, each more cynical than its predecessor, which
+kindled my jealousy. And always the same things about what was
+happening at home during my absence. I burned with indignation, with
+rage, and with a peculiar feeling which steeped me in humiliation, as I
+contemplated these pictures. And I could not tear myself out of this
+condition. I could not help looking at them, I could not efface them, I
+could not keep from evoking them.
+
+“The more I looked at these imaginary pictures, the more I believed in
+their reality, forgetting that they had no serious foundation. The
+vivacity of these images seemed to prove to me that my imaginations
+were a reality. One would have said that a demon, against my will, was
+inventing and breathing into me the most terrible fictions. A
+conversation which dated a long time back, with the brother of
+Troukhatchevsky, I remembered at that moment, in a sort of ecstasy, and
+it tore my heart as I connected it with the musician and my wife. Yes,
+it was very long ago. The brother of Troukhatchevsky, answering my
+questions as to whether he frequented disreputable houses, said that a
+respectable man does not go where he may contract a disease, in a low
+and unclean spot, when one can find an honest woman. And here he, his
+brother, the musician, had found the honest woman. ‘It is true that she
+is no longer in her early youth. She has lost a tooth on one side, and
+her face is slightly bloated,’ thought I for Troukhatchevsky. ‘But what
+is to be done? One must profit by what one has.’
+
+“‘Yes, he is bound to take her for his mistress,’ said I to myself
+again; ‘and besides, she is not dangerous.’
+
+“‘No, it is not possible’ I rejoined in fright. ‘Nothing, nothing of
+the kind has happened, and there is no reason to suppose there has. Did
+she not tell me that the very idea that I could be jealous of her
+because of him was humiliating to her?’ ‘Yes, but she lied,’ I cried,
+and all began over again.
+
+“There were only two travellers in my compartment: an old woman with
+her husband, neither of them very talkative; and even they got out at
+one of the stations, leaving me all alone. I was like a beast in a
+cage. Now I jumped up and approached the window, now I began to walk
+back and forth, staggering as if I hoped to make the train go faster by
+my efforts, and the car with its seats and its windows trembled
+continually, as ours does now.”
+
+And Posdnicheff rose abruptly, took a few steps, and sat down again.
+
+“Oh, I am afraid, I am afraid of railway carriages. Fear seizes me. I
+sat down again, and I said to myself: ‘I must think of something else.
+For instance, of the inn keeper at whose house I took tea.’ And then,
+in my imagination arose the _dvornik_, with his long beard, and his
+grandson, a little fellow of the same age as my little Basile. My
+little Basile! My little Basile! He will see the musician kiss his
+mother! What thoughts will pass through his poor soul! But what does
+that matter to her! She loves.
+
+“And again it all began, the circle of the same thoughts. I suffered so
+much that at last I did not know what to do with myself, and an idea
+passed through my head that pleased me much,—to get out upon the rails,
+throw myself under the cars, and thus finish everything. One thing
+prevented me from doing so. It was pity! It was pity for myself,
+evoking at the same time a hatred for her, for him, but not so much for
+him. Toward him I felt a strange sentiment of my humiliation and his
+victory, but toward her a terrible hatred.
+
+“‘But I cannot kill myself and leave her free. She must suffer, she
+must understand at least that I have suffered,’ said I to myself.
+
+“At a station I saw people drinking at the lunch counter, and directly
+I went to swallow a glass of vodka. Beside me stood a Jew, drinking
+also. He began to talk to me, and I, in order not to be left alone in
+my compartment, went with him into his third-class, dirty, full of
+smoke, and covered with peelings and sunflower seeds. There I sat down
+beside the Jew, and, as it seemed, he told many anecdotes.
+
+“First I listened to him, but I did not understand what he said. He
+noticed it, and exacted my attention to his person. Then I rose and
+entered my own compartment.
+
+“‘I must consider,’ said I to myself, ‘whether what I think is true,
+whether there is any reason to torment myself.’ I sat down, wishing to
+reflect quietly; but directly, instead of the peaceful reflections, the
+same thing began again. Instead of the reasoning, the pictures.
+
+“‘How many times have I tormented myself in this way,’ I thought (I
+recalled previous and similar fits of jealousy), ‘and then seen it end
+in nothing at all? It is the same now. Perhaps, yes, surely, I shall
+find her quietly sleeping. She will awaken, she will be glad, and in
+her words and looks I shall see that nothing has happened, that all
+this is vain. Ah, if it would only so turn out!’ ‘But no, that has
+happened too often! Now the end has come,’ a voice said to me.
+
+“And again it all began. Ah, what torture! It is not to a hospital
+filled with syphilitic patients that I would take a young man to
+deprive him of the desire for women, but into my soul, to show him the
+demon which tore it. The frightful part was that I recognized in myself
+an indisputable right to the body of my wife, as if her body were
+entirely mine. And at the same time I felt that I could not possess
+this body, that it was not mine, that she could do with it as she
+liked, and that she liked to do with it as I did not like. And I was
+powerless against him and against her. He, like the Vanka of the song,
+would sing, before mounting the gallows, how he would kiss her sweet
+lips, etc., and he would even have the best of it before death. With
+her it was still worse. If she _had not done it_, she had the desire,
+she wished to do it, and I knew that she did. That was worse yet. It
+would be better if she had already done it, to relieve me of my
+uncertainty.
+
+“In short, I could not say what I desired. I desired that she might not
+want what she _must_ want. It was complete madness.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI.
+
+
+“At the station before the last, when the conductor came to take the
+tickets, I took my baggage and went out on the car platform, and the
+consciousness that the climax was near at hand only added to my
+agitation. I was cold, my jaw trembled so that my teeth chattered.
+Mechanically I left the station with the crowd, I took a _tchik_, and I
+started. I looked at the few people passing in the streets and at the
+_dvorniks_. I read the signs, without thinking of anything. After going
+half a verst my feet began to feel cold, and I remembered that in the
+car I had taken off my woollen socks, and had put them in my travelling
+bag. Where had I put the bag? Was it with me? Yes, and the basket?
+
+“I bethought myself that I had totally forgotten my baggage. I took out
+my check, and then decided it was not worth while to return. I
+continued on my way. In spite of all my efforts to remember, I cannot
+at this moment make out why I was in such a hurry. I know only that I
+was conscious that a serious and menacing event was approaching in my
+life. It was a case of real auto-suggestion. Was it so serious because
+I thought it so? Or had I a presentiment? I do not know. Perhaps, too,
+after what has happened, all previous events have taken on a lugubrious
+tint in my memory.
+
+“I arrived at the steps. It was an hour past midnight. A few
+_isvotchiks_ were before the door, awaiting customers, attracted by the
+lighted windows (the lighted windows were those of our parlor and
+reception room). Without trying to account for this late illumination,
+I went up the steps, always with the same expectation of something
+terrible, and I rang. The servant, a good, industrious, and very stupid
+being, named Gregor, opened the door. The first thing that leaped to my
+eyes in the hall, on the hat-stand, among other garments, was an
+overcoat. I ought to have been astonished, but I was not astonished. I
+expected it. ‘That’s it!’ I said to myself.
+
+“When I had asked Gregor who was there, and he had named
+Troukhatchevsky, I inquired whether there were other visitors. He
+answered: ‘Nobody.’ I remember the air with which he said that, with a
+tone that was intended to give me pleasure, and dissipate my doubts.
+‘That’s it! that’s it!’ I had the air of saying to myself. ‘And the
+children?’
+
+“‘Thank God, they are very well. They went to sleep long ago.’
+
+“I scarcely breathed, and I could not keep my jaw from trembling.
+
+“Then it was not as I thought. I had often before returned home with
+the thought that a misfortune had awaited me, but had been mistaken,
+and everything was going on as usual. But now things were not going on
+as usual. All that I had imagined, all that I believed to be chimeras,
+all really existed. Here was the truth.
+
+“I was on the point of sobbing, but straightway the demon whispered in
+my ear: ‘Weep and be sentimental, and they will separate quietly, and
+there will be no proofs, and all your life you will doubt and suffer.’
+And pity for myself vanished, and there remained only the bestial need
+of some adroit, cunning, and energetic action. I became a beast, an
+intelligent beast.
+
+“‘No, no,’ said I to Gregor, who was about to announce my arrival. ‘Do
+this, take a carriage, and go at once for my baggage. Here is the
+check. Start.’
+
+“He went along the hall to get his overcoat. Fearing lest he might
+frighten them, I accompanied him to his little room, and waited for him
+to put on his things. In the dining-room could be heard the sound of
+conversation and the rattling of knives and plates. They were eating.
+They had not heard the ring. ‘Now if they only do not go out,’ I
+thought.
+
+“Gregor put on his fur-collared coat and went out. I closed the door
+after him. I felt anxious when I was alone, thinking that directly I
+should have to act. How? I did not yet know. I knew only that all was
+ended, that there could be no doubt of _his_ innocence, and that in an
+instant my relations with her were going to be terminated. Before, I
+had still doubts. I said to myself: ‘Perhaps this is not true. Perhaps
+I am mistaken.’ Now all doubt had disappeared. All was decided
+irrevocably. Secretly, all alone with him, at night! It is a violation
+of all duties! Or, worse yet, she may make a show of that audacity, of
+that insolence in crime, which, by its excess, tends to prove
+innocence. All is clear. No doubt. I feared but one thing,—that they
+might run in different directions, that they might invent some new lie,
+and thus deprive me of material proof, and of the sorrowful joy of
+punishing, yes, of executing them.
+
+“And to surprise them more quickly, I started on tiptoe for the
+dining-room, not through the parlor, but through the hall and the
+children’s rooms. In the first room slept the little boy. In the
+second, the old nurse moved in her bed, and seemed on the point of
+waking, and I wondered what she would think when she knew all. And pity
+for myself gave me such a pang that I could not keep the tears back.
+Not to wake the children, I ran lightly through the hall into my study.
+I dropped upon the sofa, and sobbed. ‘I, an honest man, I, the son of
+my parents, who all my life long have dreamed of family happiness, I
+who have never betrayed! . . . And here my five children, and she
+embracing a musician because he has red lips! No, she is not a woman!
+She is a bitch, a dirty bitch! Beside the chamber of the children, whom
+she had pretended to love all her life! And then to think of what she
+wrote me! And how do I know? Perhaps it has always been thus. Perhaps
+all these children, supposed to be mine, are the children of my
+servants. And if I had arrived to-morrow, she would have come to meet
+me with her _coiffure_, with her _corsage_, her indolent and graceful
+movements (and I see her attractive and ignoble features), and this
+jealous animal would have remained forever in my heart, tearing it.
+What will the old nurse say? And Gregor? And the poor little Lise? She
+already understands things. And this impudence, this falsehood, this
+bestial sensuality, that I know so well,’ I said to myself.
+
+“I tried to rise. I could not. My heart was beating so violently that I
+could not hold myself upon my legs. ‘Yes, I shall die of a rush of
+blood. She will kill me. That is what she wants. What is it to her to
+kill? But that would be too agreeable to him, and I will not allow him
+to have this pleasure.
+
+“Yes, here I am, and there they are. They are laughing, they. . . .
+Yes, in spite of the fact that she is no longer in her early youth, he
+has not disdained her. At any rate, she is by no means ugly, and above
+all, not dangerous to his dear health, to him. Why did I not stifle her
+then?’ said I to myself, as I remembered that other scene of the
+previous week, when I drove her from my study, and broke the furniture.
+
+“And I recalled the state in which I was then. Not only did I recall
+it, but I again entered into the same bestial state. And suddenly there
+came to me a desire to act, and all reasoning, except such as was
+necessary to action, vanished from my brain, and I was in the condition
+of a beast, and of a man under the influence of physical excitement
+pending a danger, who acts imperturbably, without haste, and yet
+without losing a minute, pursuing a definite object.
+
+“The first thing that I did was to take off my boots, and now, having
+only stockings on, I advanced toward the wall, over the sofa, where
+firearms and daggers were hanging, and I took down a curved Damascus
+blade, which I had never used, and which was very sharp. I took it from
+its sheath. I remember that the sheath fell upon the sofa, and that I
+said to myself: ‘I must look for it later; it must not be lost.’
+
+“Then I took off my overcoat, which I had kept on all the time, and
+with wolf-like tread started for _the room_. I do not remember how I
+proceeded, whether I ran or went slowly, through what chambers I
+passed, how I approached the dining-room, how I opened the door, how I
+entered. I remember nothing about it.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII.
+
+
+“I remember only the expression of their faces when I opened the door.
+I remember that, because it awakened in me a feeling of sorrowful joy.
+It was an expression of terror, such as I desired. Never shall I forget
+that desperate and sudden fright that appeared on their faces when they
+saw me. He, I believe, was at the table, and, when he saw or heard me,
+he started, jumped to his feet, and retreated to the sideboard. Fear
+was the only sentiment that could be read with certainty in his face.
+In hers, too, fear was to be read, but accompanied by other
+impressions. And yet, if her face had expressed only fear, perhaps that
+which happened would not have happened. But in the expression of her
+face there was at the first moment—at least, I thought I saw it—a
+feeling of _ennui_, of discontent, at this disturbance of her love and
+happiness. One would have said that her sole desire was not to be
+disturbed _in the moment of her happiness_. But these expressions
+appeared upon their faces only for a moment. Terror almost immediately
+gave place to interrogation. Would they lie or not? If yes, they must
+begin. If not, something else was going to happen. But what?
+
+“He gave her a questioning glance. On her face the expression of
+anguish and _ennui_ changed, it seemed to me, when she looked at him,
+into an expression of anxiety for _him_. For a moment I stood in the
+doorway, holding the dagger hidden behind my back. Suddenly he smiled,
+and in a voice that was indifferent almost to the point of ridicule, he
+said:
+
+“‘We were having some music.’
+
+“‘I did not expect—,’ she began at the same time, chiming in with the
+tone of the other.
+
+“But neither he nor she finished their remarks. The same rage that I
+had felt the previous week took possession of me. I felt the need of
+giving free course to my violence and ‘the joy of wrath.’
+
+“No, they did not finish. That other thing was going to begin, of which
+he was afraid, and was going to annihilate what they wanted to say. I
+threw myself upon her, still hiding the dagger, that he might not
+prevent me from striking where I desired, in her bosom, under the
+breast. At that moment he saw . . . and, what I did not expect on his
+part, he quickly seized my hand, and cried:
+
+“‘Come to your senses! What are you doing? Help! Help!’
+
+“I tore my hands from his grasp, and leaped upon him. I must have been
+very terrible, for he turned as white as a sheet, to his lips. His eyes
+scintillated singularly, and—again what I did not expect of him—he
+scrambled under the piano, toward the other room. I tried to follow
+him, but a very heavy weight fell upon my left arm. It was she.
+
+“I made an effort to clear myself. She clung more heavily than ever,
+refusing to let go. This unexpected obstacle, this burden, and this
+repugnant touch only irritated me the more. I perceived that I was
+completely mad, that I must be frightful, and I was glad of it. With a
+sudden impulse, and with all my strength, I dealt her, with my left
+elbow, a blow squarely in the face.
+
+“She uttered a cry and let go my arm. I wanted to follow the other, but
+I felt that it would be ridiculous to pursue in my stockings the lover
+of my wife, and I did not wish to be grotesque, I wished to be
+terrible. In spite of my extreme rage, I was all the time conscious of
+the impression that I was making upon others, and even this impression
+partially guided me.
+
+“I turned toward her. She had fallen on the long easy chair, and,
+covering her face at the spot where I had struck her, she looked at me.
+Her features exhibited fear and hatred toward me, her enemy, such as
+the rat exhibits when one lifts the rat-trap. At least, I saw nothing
+in her but that fear and hatred, the fear and hatred which love for
+another had provoked. Perhaps I still should have restrained myself,
+and should not have gone to the last extremity, if she had maintained
+silence. But suddenly she began to speak; she grasped my hand that held
+the dagger.
+
+“‘Come to your senses! What are you doing? What is the matter with you?
+Nothing has happened, nothing, nothing! I swear it to you!’
+
+“I might have delayed longer, but these last words, from which I
+inferred the contrary of what they affirmed,—that is, that _everything_
+had happened,—these words called for a reply. And the reply must
+correspond to the condition into which I had lashed myself, and which
+was increasing and must continue to increase. Rage has its laws.
+
+“‘Do not lie, wretch. Do not lie!’ I roared.
+
+“With my left hand I seized her hands. She disengaged herself. Then,
+without dropping my dagger, I seized her by the throat, forced her to
+the floor, and began to strangle her. With her two hands she clutched
+mine, tearing them from her throat, stifling. Then I struck her a blow
+with the dagger, in the left side, between the lower ribs.
+
+“When people say that they do not remember what they do in a fit of
+fury, they talk nonsense. It is false. I remember everything.
+
+“I did not lose my consciousness for a single moment. The more I lashed
+myself to fury, the clearer my mind became, and I could not help seeing
+what I did. I cannot say that I knew in advance what I would do, but at
+the moment when I acted, and it seems to me even a little before, I
+knew what I was doing, as if to make it possible to repent, and to be
+able to say later that I could have stopped.
+
+“I knew that I struck the blow between the ribs, and that the dagger
+entered.
+
+“At the second when I did it, I knew that I was performing a horrible
+act, such as I had never performed,—an act that would have frightful
+consequences. My thought was as quick as lightning, and the deed
+followed immediately. The act, to my inner sense, had an extraordinary
+clearness. I perceived the resistance of the corset and then something
+else, and then the sinking of the knife into a soft substance. She
+clutched at the dagger with her hands, and cut herself with it, but
+could not restrain the blow.
+
+“Long afterward, in prison when the moral revolution had been effected
+within me, I thought of that minute, I remembered it as far as I could,
+and I co-ordinated all the sudden changes. I remembered the terrible
+consciousness which I felt,—that I was killing a wife, _my_ wife.
+
+“I well remember the horror of that consciousness and I know vaguely
+that, having plunged in the dagger, I drew it out again immediately,
+wishing to repair and arrest my action. She straightened up and cried:
+
+“‘Nurse, he has killed me!’
+
+“The old nurse, who had heard the noise, was standing in the doorway. I
+was still erect, waiting, and not believing myself in what had
+happened. But at that moment, from under her corset, the blood gushed
+forth. Then only did I understand that all reparation was impossible,
+and promptly I decided that it was not even necessary, that all had
+happened in accordance with my wish, and that I had fulfilled my
+desire. I waited until she fell, and until the nurse, exclaiming, ‘Oh,
+my God!’ ran to her; then only I threw away the dagger and went out of
+the room.
+
+“‘I must not be agitated. I must be conscious of what I am doing,’ I
+said to myself, looking neither at her nor at the old nurse. The latter
+cried and called the maid. I passed through the hall, and, after having
+sent the maid, started for my study.
+
+“‘What shall I do now?’ I asked myself.
+
+“And immediately I understood what I should do. Directly after entering
+the study, I went straight to the wall, took down the revolver, and
+examined it attentively. It was loaded. Then I placed it on the table.
+Next I picked up the sheath of the dagger, which had dropped down
+behind the sofa, and then I sat down. I remained thus for a long time.
+I thought of nothing, I did not try to remember anything. I heard a
+stifled noise of steps, a movement of objects and of tapestries, then
+the arrival of a person, and then the arrival of another person. Then I
+saw Gregor bring into my room the baggage from the railway; as if any
+one needed it!
+
+“‘Have you heard what has happened?’ I asked him. ‘Have you told the
+_dvornik_ to inform the police?’
+
+“He made no answer, and went out. I rose, closed the door, took the
+cigarettes and the matches, and began to smoke. I had not finished one
+cigarette, when a drowsy feeling came over me and sent me into a deep
+sleep. I surely slept two hours. I remember having dreamed that I was
+on good terms with her, that after a quarrel we were in the act of
+making up, that something prevented us, but that we were friends all
+the same.
+
+“A knock at the door awoke me.
+
+“‘It is the police,’ thought I, as I opened my eyes. ‘I have killed, I
+believe. But perhaps it is _she;_ perhaps nothing has happened.’
+
+“Another knock. I did not answer. I was solving the question: ‘Has it
+happened or not? Yes, it has happened.’
+
+“I remembered the resistance of the corset, and then. . . . ‘Yes, it
+has happened. Yes, it has happened. Yes, now I must execute myself,’
+said I to myself.
+
+“I said it, but I knew well that I should not kill myself.
+Nevertheless, I rose and took the revolver, but, strange thing, I
+remembered that formerly I had very often had suicidal ideas, that that
+very night, on the cars, it had seemed to me easy, especially easy
+because I thought how it would stupefy her. Now I not only could not
+kill myself, but I could not even think of it.
+
+“‘Why do it?’ I asked myself, without answering.
+
+“Another knock at the door.
+
+“‘Yes, but I must first know who is knocking. I have time enough.’
+
+“I put the revolver back on the table, and hid it under my newspaper. I
+went to the door and drew back the bolt.
+
+“It was my wife’s sister,—a good and stupid widow.
+
+“‘Basile, what does this mean?’ said she, and her tears, always ready,
+began to flow.
+
+“‘What do you want?’ I asked roughly.
+
+“I saw clearly that there was no necessity of being rough with her, but
+I could not speak in any other tone.
+
+“‘Basile, she is dying. Ivan Fedorowitch says so.’
+
+“Ivan Fedorowitch was the doctor, _her_ doctor, her counsellor.
+
+“‘Is he here?’ I inquired.
+
+“And all my hatred of her arose anew.
+
+“Well, what?
+
+“‘Basile, go to her! Ah! how terrible it is!’ said she.
+
+“‘Go to her?’ I asked myself; and immediately I made answer to myself
+that I ought to go, that probably that was the thing that is usually
+done when a husband like myself kills his wife, that it was absolutely
+necessary that I should go and see her.
+
+“‘If that is the proper thing, I must go,’ I repeated to myself. ‘Yes,
+if it is necessary, I shall still have time,’ said I to myself,
+thinking of my intention of blowing my brains out.
+
+“And I followed my sister-in-law. ‘Now there are going to be phrases
+and grimaces, but I will not yield,’ I declared to myself.
+
+“‘Wait,’ said I to my sister-in-law, ‘it is stupid to be without boots.
+Let me at least put on my slippers.’”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII.
+
+
+“Strange thing! Again, when I had left my study, and was passing
+through the familiar rooms, again the hope came to me that nothing had
+happened. But the odor of the drugs, iodoform and phenic acid, brought
+me back to a sense of reality.
+
+“‘No, everything has happened.’
+
+“In passing through the hall, beside the children’s chamber, I saw
+little Lise. She was looking at me, with eyes that were full of fear. I
+even thought that all the children were looking at me. As I approached
+the door of our sleeping-room, a servant opened it from within, and
+came out. The first thing that I noticed was _her_ light gray dress
+upon a chair, all dark with blood. On our common bed she was stretched,
+with knees drawn up.
+
+“She lay very high, upon pillows, with her chemise half open. Linen had
+been placed upon the wound. A heavy smell of iodoform filled the room.
+Before, and more than anything else, I was astonished at her face,
+which was swollen and bruised under the eyes and over a part of the
+nose. This was the result of the blow that I had struck her with my
+elbow, when she had tried to hold me back. Of beauty there was no trace
+left. I saw something hideous in her. I stopped upon the threshold.
+
+“‘Approach, approach her,’ said her sister.
+
+“‘Yes, probably she repents,’ thought I; ‘shall I forgive her? Yes, she
+is dying, I must forgive her,’ I added, trying to be generous.
+
+“I approached the bedside. With difficulty she raised her eyes, one of
+which was swollen, and uttered these words haltingly:
+
+“‘You have accomplished what you desired. You have killed me.’
+
+“And in her face, through the physical sufferings, in spite of the
+approach of death, was expressed the same old hatred, so familiar to
+me.
+
+“‘The children . . . I will not give them to you . . . all the same. .
+. . She (her sister) shall take them.’ . . .
+
+“But of that which I considered essential, of her fault, of her
+treason, one would have said that she did not think it necessary to say
+even a word.
+
+“‘Yes, revel in what you have done.’
+
+“And she sobbed.
+
+“At the door stood her sister with the children.
+
+“‘Yes, see what you have done!’
+
+“I cast a glance at the children, and then at her bruised and swollen
+face, and for the first time I forgot myself (my rights, my pride), and
+for the first time I saw in her a human being, a sister.
+
+“And all that which a moment before had been so offensive to me now
+seemed to me so petty,—all this jealousy,—and, on the contrary, what I
+had done seemed to me so important that I felt like bending over,
+approaching my face to her hand, and saying:
+
+“‘Forgive me!’
+
+“But I did not dare. She was silent, with eyelids lowered, evidently
+having no strength to speak further. Then her deformed face began to
+tremble and shrivel, and she feebly pushed me back.
+
+“‘Why has all this happened? Why?’
+
+“‘Forgive me,’ said I.
+
+“‘Yes, if you had not killed me,’ she cried suddenly, and her eyes
+shone feverishly. ‘Forgiveness—that is nothing. . . . If I only do not
+die! Ah, you have accomplished what you desired! I hate you!’
+
+“Then she grew delirious. She was frightened, and cried:
+
+“‘Fire, I do not fear . . . but strike them all . . . He has gone. . .
+. He has gone.’ . . .
+
+“The delirium continued. She no longer recognized the children, not
+even little Lise, who had approached. Toward noon she died. As for me,
+I was arrested before her death, at eight o’clock in the morning. They
+took me to the police station, and then to prison, and there, during
+eleven months, awaiting the verdict, I reflected upon myself, and upon
+my past, and I understood it. Yes, I began to understand from the third
+day. The third day they took me to the house.” . . .
+
+Posdnicheff seemed to wish to add something, but, no longer having the
+strength to repress his sobs, he stopped. After a few minutes, having
+recovered his calmness, he resumed:
+
+“I began to understand only when I saw her in the coffin.” . . .
+
+He uttered a sob, and then immediately continued, with haste:
+
+“Then only, when I saw her dead face, did I understand all that I had
+done. I understood that it was I, I, who had killed her. I understood
+that I was the cause of the fact that she, who had been a moving,
+living, palpitating being, had now become motionless and cold, and that
+there was no way of repairing this thing. He who has not lived through
+that cannot understand it.”
+
+
+We remained silent a long time. Posdnicheff sobbed and trembled before
+me. His face had become delicate and long, and his mouth had grown
+larger.
+
+“Yes,” said he suddenly, “if I had known what I now know, I should
+never have married her, never, not for anything.”
+
+Again we remained silent for a long time.
+
+“Yes, that is what I have done, that is my experience, We must
+understand the real meaning of the words of the Gospel,—Matthew, v.
+28,—‘that whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed
+adultery’; and these words relate to the wife, to the sister, and not
+only to the wife of another, but especially to one’s own wife.”
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+LESSON OF “THE KREUTZER SONATA.”
+
+
+I have received, and still continue to receive, numbers of letters from
+persons who are perfect strangers to me, asking me to state in plain
+and simple language my own views on the subject handled in the story
+entitled “The Kreutzer Sonata.” With this request I shall now endeavor
+to comply.
+
+My views on the question may be succinctly stated as follows: Without
+entering into details, it will be generally admitted that I am accurate
+in saying that many people condone in young men a course of conduct
+with regard to the other sex which is incompatible with strict
+morality, and that this dissoluteness is pardoned generally. Both
+parents and the government, in consequence of this view, may be said to
+wink at profligacy, and even in the last resource to encourage its
+practice. I am of opinion that this is not right.
+
+It is not possible that the health of one class should necessitate the
+ruin of another, and, in consequence, it is our first duty to turn a
+deaf ear to such an essential immoral doctrine, no matter how strongly
+society may have established or law protected it. Moreover, it needs to
+be fully recognized that men are rightly to be held responsible for the
+consequences of their own acts, and that these are no longer to be
+visited on the woman alone. It follows from this that it is the duty of
+men who do not wish to lead a life of infamy to practice such
+continence in respect to all woman as they would were the female
+society in which they move made up exclusively of their own mothers and
+sisters.
+
+A more rational mode of life should be adopted which would include
+abstinence from all alcoholic drinks, from excess in eating and from
+flesh meat, on the one hand, and recourse to physical labor on the
+other. I am not speaking of gymnastics, or of any of those occupations
+which may be fitly described as playing at work; I mean the genuine
+toil that fatigues. No one need go far in search of proofs that this
+kind of abstemious living is not merely possible, but far less hurtful
+to health than excess. Hundreds of instances are known to every one.
+This is my first contention.
+
+In the second place, I think that of late years, through various
+reasons which I need not enter, but among which the above-mentioned
+laxity of opinion in society and the frequent idealization of the
+subject in current literature and painting may be mentioned, conjugal
+infidelity has become more common and is considered less reprehensible.
+I am of opinion that this is not right. The origin of the evil is
+twofold. It is due, in the first place, to a natural instinct, and, in
+the second, to the elevation of this instinct to a place to which it
+does not rightly belong. This being so, the evil can only be remedied
+by effecting a change in the views now in vogue about “falling in love”
+and all that this term implies, by educating men and women at home
+through family influence and example, and abroad by means of healthy
+public opinion, to practice that abstinence which morality and
+Christianity alike enjoin. This is my second contention.
+
+In the third place I am of opinion that another consequence of the
+false light in which “falling in love,” and what it leads to, are
+viewed in our society, is that the birth of children has lost its
+pristine significance, and that modern marriages are conceived less and
+less from the point of view of the family. I am of opinion that this is
+not right. This is my third contention.
+
+In the fourth place, I am of opinion that the children (who in our
+society are considered an obstacle to enjoyment—an unlucky accident, as
+it were) are educated not with a view to the problem which they will be
+one day called on to face and to solve, but solely with an eye to the
+pleasure which they may be made to yield to their parents. The
+consequence is, that the children of human beings are brought up for
+all the world like the young of animals, the chief care of their
+parents being not to train them to such work as is worthy of men and
+women, but to increase their weight, or add a cubit to their stature,
+to make them spruce, sleek, well-fed, and comely. They rig them out in
+all manner of fantastic costumes, wash them, over-feed them, and refuse
+to make them work. If the children of the lower orders differ in this
+last respect from those of the well-to-do classes, the difference is
+merely formal; they work from sheer necessity, and not because their
+parents recognize work as a duty. And in over-fed children, as in
+over-fed animals, sensuality is engendered unnaturally early.
+
+Fashionable dress to-day, the course of reading, plays, music, dances,
+luscious food, all the elements of our modern life, in a word, from the
+pictures on the little boxes of sweetmeats up to the novel, the tale,
+and the poem, contribute to fan this sensuality into a strong,
+consuming flame, with the result that sexual vices and diseases have
+come to be the normal conditions of the period of tender youth, and
+often continue into the riper age of full-blown manhood. And I am of
+opinion that this is not right.
+
+It is high time it ceased. The children of human beings should not be
+brought up as if they were animals; and we should set up as the object
+and strive to maintain as the result of our labors something better and
+nobler than a well-dressed body. This is my fourth contention.
+
+In the fifth place, I am of opinion that, owing to the exaggerated and
+erroneous significance attributed by our society to love and to the
+idealized states that accompany and succeed it, the best energies of
+our men and women are drawn forth and exhausted during the most
+promising period of life; those of the men in the work of looking for,
+choosing, and winning the most desirable objects of love, for which
+purpose lying and fraud are held to be quite excusable; those of the
+women and girls in alluring men and decoying them into liaisons or
+marriage by the most questionable means conceivable, as an instance of
+which the present fashions in evening dress may be cited. I am of
+opinion that this is not right.
+
+The truth is, that the whole affair has been exalted by poets and
+romancers to an undue importance, and that love in its various
+developments is not a fitting object to consume the best energies of
+men. People set it before them and strive after it, because their view
+of life is as vulgar and brutish as is that other conception frequently
+met with in the lower stages of development, which sees in luscious and
+abundant food an end worthy of man’s best efforts. Now, this is not
+right and should not be done. And, in order to avoid doing it, it is
+only needful to realize the fact that whatever truly deserves to be
+held up as a worthy object of man’s striving and working, whether it be
+the service of humanity, of one’s country, of science, of art, not to
+speak of the service of God, is far above and beyond the sphere of
+personal enjoyment. Hence, it follows that not only to form a liaison,
+but even to contract marriage, is, from a Christian point of view, not
+a progress, but a fall. Love, and all the states that accompany and
+follow it, however we may try in prose and verse to prove the contrary,
+never do and never can facilitate the attainment of an aim worthy of
+men, but always make it more difficult. This is my fifth contention.
+
+How about the human race? If we admit that celibacy is better and
+nobler than marriage, evidently the human race will come to an end.
+But, if the logical conclusion of the argument is that the human race
+will become extinct, the whole reasoning is wrong.
+
+To that I reply that the argument is not mine; I did not invent it.
+That it is incumbent on mankind so to strive, and that celibacy is
+preferable to marriage, are truths revealed by Christ 1,900 years ago,
+set forth in our catechisms, and professed by us as followers of
+Christ.
+
+Chastity and celibacy, it is urged, cannot constitute the ideal of
+humanity, because chastity would annihilate the race which strove to
+realize it, and humanity cannot set up as its ideal its own
+annihilation. It may be pointed out in reply that only that is a true
+ideal, which, being unattainable, admits of infinite gradation in
+degrees of proximity. Such is the Christian ideal of the founding of
+God’s kingdom, the union of all living creatures by the bonds of love.
+The conception of its attainment is incompatible with the conception of
+the movement of life. What kind of life could subsist if all living
+creatures were joined together by the bonds of love? None. Our
+conception of life is inseparably bound up with the conception of a
+continual striving after an unattainable ideal.
+
+But even if we suppose the Christian ideal of perfect chastity
+realized, what then? We should merely find ourselves face to face on
+the one hand with the familiar teaching of religion, one of whose
+dogmas is that the world will have an end; and on the other of
+so-called science, which informs us that the sun is gradually losing
+its heat, the result of which will in time be the extinction of the
+human race.
+
+Now there is not and cannot be such an institution as Christian
+marriage, just as there cannot be such a thing as a Christian liturgy
+(Matt. vi. 5-12; John iv. 21), nor Christian teachers, nor church
+fathers (Matt. xxiii. 8-10), nor Christian armies, Christian law
+courts, nor Christian States. This is what was always taught and
+believed by true Christians of the first and following centuries. A
+Christian’s ideal is not marriage, but love for God and for his
+neighbor. Consequently in the eyes of a Christian relations in marriage
+not only do not constitute a lawful, right, and happy state, as our
+society and our churches maintain, but, on the contrary, are always a
+fall.
+
+Such a thing as Christian marriage never was and never could be. Christ
+did not marry, nor did he establish marriage; neither did his disciples
+marry. But if Christian marriage cannot exist, there is such a thing as
+a Christian view of marriage. And this is how it may be formulated: A
+Christian (and by this term I understand not those who call themselves
+Christians merely because they were baptized and still receive the
+sacrament once a year, but those whose lives are shaped and regulated
+by the teachings of Christ), I say, cannot view the marriage relation
+otherwise than as a deviation from the doctrine of Christ,—as a sin.
+This is clearly laid down in Matt. v. 28, and the ceremony called
+Christian marriage does not alter its character one jot. A Christian
+will never, therefore, desire marriage, but will always avoid it.
+
+If the light of truth dawns upon a Christian when he is already
+married, or if, being a Christian, from weakness he enters into marital
+relations with the ceremonies of the church, or without them, he has no
+other alternative than to abide with his wife (and the wife with her
+husband, if it is she who is a Christian) and to aspire together with
+her to free themselves of their sin. This is the Christian view of
+marriage; and there cannot be any other for a man who honestly
+endeavors to shape his life in accordance with the teachings of Christ.
+
+To very many persons the thoughts I have uttered here and in “The
+Kreutzer Sonata” will seem strange, vague, even contradictory. They
+certainly do contradict, not each other, but the whole tenor of our
+lives, and involuntarily a doubt arises, “on which side is truth,—on
+the side of the thoughts which seem true and well-founded, or on the
+side of the lives of others and myself?” I, too, was weighed down by
+that same doubt when writing “The Kreutzer Sonata.” I had not the
+faintest presentiment that the train of thought I had started would
+lead me whither it did. I was terrified by my own conclusion, and I was
+at first disposed to reject it, but it was impossible not to hearken to
+the voice of my reason and my conscience. And so, strange though they
+may appear to many, opposed as they undoubtedly are to the trend and
+tenor of our lives, and incompatible though they may prove with what I
+have heretofore thought and uttered, I have no choice but to accept
+them. “But man is weak,” people will object. “His task should be
+regulated by his strength.”
+
+This is tantamount to saying, “My hand is weak. I cannot draw a
+straight line,—that is, a line which will be the shortest line between
+two given points,—and so, in order to make it more easy for myself, I,
+intending to draw a straight, will choose for my model a crooked line.”
+
+The weaker my hand, the greater the need that my model should be
+perfect.
+
+_Leo Tolstoy._
+
+
+
+
+IVAN THE FOOL.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+
+In a certain kingdom there lived a rich peasant, who had three
+sons—Simeon (a soldier), Tarras-Briukhan (fat man), and Ivan (a
+fool)—and one daughter, Milania, born dumb. Simeon went to war, to
+serve the Czar; Tarras went to a city and became a merchant; and Ivan,
+with his sister, remained at home to work on the farm.
+
+For his valiant service in the army, Simeon received an estate with
+high rank, and married a noble’s daughter. Besides his large pay, he
+was in receipt of a handsome income from his estate; yet he was unable
+to make ends meet. What the husband saved, the wife wasted in
+extravagance. One day Simeon went to the estate to collect his income,
+when the steward informed him that there was no income, saying:
+
+“We have neither horses, cows, fishing-nets, nor implements; it is
+necessary first to buy everything, and then to look for income.”
+
+Simeon thereupon went to his father and said:
+
+“You are rich, _batiushka_ [little father], but you have given nothing
+to me. Give me one-third of what you possess as my share, and I will
+transfer it to my estate.”
+
+The old man replied: “You did not help to bring prosperity to our
+household. For what reason, then, should you now demand the third part
+of everything? It would be unjust to Ivan and his sister.”
+
+“Yes,” said Simeon; “but he is a fool, and she was born dumb. What need
+have they of anything?”
+
+“See what Ivan will say.”
+
+Ivan’s reply was: “Well, let him take his share.”
+
+Simeon took the portion allotted to him, and went again to serve in the
+army.
+
+Tarras also met with success. He became rich and married a merchant’s
+daughter, but even this failed to satisfy his desires, and he also went
+to his father and said, “Give me my share.”
+
+The old man, however, refused to comply with his request, saying: “You
+had no hand in the accumulation of our property, and what our household
+contains is the result of Ivan’s hard work. It would be unjust,” he
+repeated, “to Ivan and his sister.”
+
+Tarras replied: “But he does not need it. He is a fool, and cannot
+marry, for no one will have him; and sister does not require anything,
+for she was born dumb.” Turning then to Ivan he continued: “Give me
+half the grain you have, and I will not touch the implements or
+fishing-nets; and from the cattle I will take only the dark mare, as
+she is not fit to plow.”
+
+Ivan laughed and said: “Well, I will go and arrange matters so that
+Tarras may have his share,” whereupon Tarras took the brown mare with
+the grain to town, leaving Ivan with one old horse to work on as before
+and support his father, mother, and sister.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+
+It was disappointing to the _Stary Tchert_ (Old Devil) that the
+brothers did not quarrel over the division of the property, and that
+they separated peacefully; and he cried out, calling his three small
+devils (_Tchertionki_).
+
+“See here,” said he, “there are living three brothers—Simeon the
+soldier, Tarras-Briukhan, and Ivan the Fool. It is necessary that they
+should quarrel. Now they live peacefully, and enjoy each other’s
+hospitality. The Fool spoiled all my plans. Now you three go and work
+with them in such a manner that they will be ready to tear each other’s
+eyes out. Can you do this?”
+
+“We can,” they replied.
+
+“How will you accomplish it?”
+
+“In this way: We will first ruin them to such an extent that they will
+have nothing to eat, and we will then gather them together in one place
+where we are sure that they will fight.”
+
+“Very well; I see you understand your business. Go, and do not return
+to me until you have created a feud between the three brothers—or I
+will skin you alive.”
+
+The three small devils went to a swamp to consult as to the best means
+of accomplishing their mission. They disputed for a long time—each one
+wanting the easiest part of the work—and not being able to agree,
+concluded to draw lots; by which it was decided that the one who was
+first finished had to come and help the others. This agreement being
+entered into, they appointed a time when they were again to meet in the
+swamp—to find out who was through and who needed assistance.
+
+The time having arrived, the young devils met in the swamp as agreed,
+when each related his experience. The first, who went to Simeon, said:
+“I have succeeded in my undertaking, and to-morrow Simeon returns to
+his father.”
+
+His comrades, eager for particulars, inquired how he had done it.
+
+“Well,” he began, “the first thing I did was to blow some courage into
+his veins, and, on the strength of it, Simeon went to the Czar and
+offered to conquer the whole world for him. The Emperor made him
+commander-in-chief of the forces, and sent him with an army to fight
+the Viceroy of India. Having started on their mission of conquest, they
+were unaware that I, following in their wake, had wet all their powder.
+I also went to the Indian ruler and showed him how I could create
+numberless soldiers from straw.
+
+“Simeon’s army, seeing that they were surrounded by such a vast number
+of Indian warriors of my creation, became frightened, and Simeon
+commanded to fire from cannons and rifles, which of course they were
+unable to do. The soldiers, discouraged, retreated in great disorder.
+Thus Simeon brought upon himself the terrible disgrace of defeat. His
+estate was confiscated, and to-morrow he is to be executed. All that
+remains for me to do, therefore,” concluded the young devil, “is to
+release him to-morrow morning. Now, then, who wants my assistance?”
+
+The second small devil (from Tarras) then related his story.
+
+“I do not need any help,” he began. “My business is also all right. My
+work with Tarras will be finished in one week. In the first place I
+made him grow thin. He afterward became so covetous that he wanted to
+possess everything he saw, and he spent all the money he had in the
+purchase of immense quantities of goods. When his capital was gone he
+still continued to buy with borrowed money, and has become involved in
+such difficulties that he cannot free himself. At the end of one week
+the date for the payment of his notes will have expired, and, his goods
+being seized upon, he will become a bankrupt; and he also will return
+to his father.”
+
+At the conclusion of this narrative they inquired of the third devil
+how things had fared between him and Ivan.
+
+“Well,” said he, “my report is not so encouraging. The first thing I
+did was to spit into his jug of _quass_ [a sour drink made from rye],
+which made him sick at his stomach. He afterward went to plow his
+summer-fallow, but I made the soil so hard that the plow could scarcely
+penetrate it. I thought the Fool would not succeed, but he started to
+work nevertheless. Moaning with pain, he still continued to labor. I
+broke one plow, but he replaced it with another, fixing it securely,
+and resumed work. Going beneath the surface of the ground I took hold
+of the plowshares, but did not succeed in stopping Ivan. He pressed so
+hard, and the colter was so sharp, that my hands were cut; and despite
+my utmost efforts, he went over all but a small portion of the field.”
+
+He concluded with: “Come, brothers, and help me, for if we do not
+conquer him our whole enterprise will be a failure. If the Fool is
+permitted successfully to conduct his farming, they will have no need,
+for he will support his brothers.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+
+Ivan having succeeded in plowing all but a small portion of his land,
+he returned the next day to finish it. The pain in his stomach
+continued, but he felt that he must go on with his work. He tried to
+start his plow, but it would not move; it seemed to have struck a hard
+root. It was the small devil in the ground who had wound his feet
+around the plowshares and held them.
+
+“This is strange,” thought Ivan. “There were never any roots here
+before, and this is surely one.”
+
+Ivan put his hand in the ground, and, feeling something soft, grasped
+and pulled it out. It was like a root in appearance, but seemed to
+possess life. Holding it up he saw that it was a little devil.
+Disgusted, he exclaimed, “See the nasty thing,” and he proceeded to
+strike it a blow, intending to kill it, when the young devil cried out:
+
+“Do not kill me, and I will grant your every wish.”
+
+“What can you do for me?”
+
+“Tell me what it is you most wish for,” the little devil replied.
+
+Ivan, peasant-fashion, scratched the back of his head as he thought,
+and finally he said:
+
+“I am dreadfully sick at my stomach. Can you cure me?”
+
+“I can,” the little devil said.
+
+“Then do so.”
+
+The little devil bent toward the earth and began searching for roots,
+and when he found them he gave them to Ivan, saying: “If you will
+swallow some of these you will be immediately cured of whatsoever
+disease you are afflicted with.”
+
+Ivan did as directed, and obtained instant relief.
+
+“I beg of you to let me go now,” the little devil pleaded; “I will pass
+into the earth, never to return.”
+
+“Very well; you may go, and God bless you;” and as Ivan pronounced the
+name of God, the small devil disappeared into the earth like a flash,
+and only a slight opening in the ground remained.
+
+Ivan placed in his hat what roots he had left, and proceeded to plow.
+Soon finishing his work, he turned his plow over and returned home.
+
+When he reached the house he found his brother Simeon and his wife
+seated at the supper-table. His estate had been confiscated, and he
+himself had barely escaped execution by making his way out of prison,
+and having nothing to live upon had come back to his father for
+support.
+
+Turning to Ivan he said: “I came to ask you to care for us until I can
+find something to do.”
+
+“Very well,” Ivan replied; “you may remain with us.”
+
+Just as Ivan was about to sit down to the table Simeon’s wife made a
+wry face, indicating that she did not like the smell of Ivan’s
+sheep-skin coat; and turning to her husband she said, “I shall not sit
+at the table with a moujik [peasant] who smells like that.”
+
+Simeon the soldier turned to his brother and said: “My lady objects to
+the smell of your clothes. You may eat in the porch.”
+
+Ivan said: “Very well, it is all the same to me. I will soon have to go
+and feed my horse any way.”
+
+Ivan took some bread in one hand, and his _kaftan_ (coat) in the other,
+and left the room.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+
+The small devil finished with Simeon that night, and according to
+agreement went to the assistance of his comrade who had charge of Ivan,
+that he might help to conquer the Fool. He went to the field and
+searched everywhere, but could find nothing but the hole through which
+the small devil had disappeared.
+
+“Well, this is strange,” he said; “something must have happened to my
+companion, and I will have to take his place and continue the work he
+began. The Fool is through with his plowing, so I must look about me
+for some other means of compassing his destruction. I must overflow his
+meadow and prevent him from cutting the grass.”
+
+The little devil accordingly overflowed the meadow with muddy water,
+and, when Ivan went at dawn next morning with his scythe set and
+sharpened and tried to mow the grass, he found that it resisted all his
+efforts and would not yield to the implement as usual.
+
+Many times Ivan tried to cut the grass, but always without success. At
+last, becoming weary of the effort, he decided to return home and have
+his scythe again sharpened, and also to procure a quantity of bread,
+saying: “I will come back here and will not leave until I have mown all
+the meadow, even if it should take a whole week.”
+
+Hearing this, the little devil became thoughtful, saying: “That Ivan is
+a _koolak_ [hard case], and I must think of some other way of
+conquering him.”
+
+Ivan soon returned with his sharpened scythe and started to mow.
+
+The small devil hid himself in the grass, and as the point of the
+scythe came down he buried it in the earth and made it almost
+impossible for Ivan to move the implement. He, however, succeeded in
+mowing all but one small spot in the swamp, where again the small devil
+hid himself, saying: “Even if he should cut my hands I will prevent him
+from accomplishing his work.”
+
+When Ivan came to the swamp he found that the grass was not very thick.
+Still, the scythe would not work, which made him so angry that he
+worked with all his might, and one blow more powerful than the others
+cut off a portion of the small devil’s tail, who had hidden himself
+there.
+
+Despite the little devil’s efforts he succeeded in finishing his work,
+when he returned home and ordered his sister to gather up the grass
+while he went to another field to cut rye. But the devil preceded him
+there, and fixed the rye in such a manner that it was almost impossible
+for Ivan to cut it; however, after continuous hard labor he succeeded,
+and when he was through with the rye he said to himself: “Now I will
+start to mow oats.”
+
+On hearing this, the little devil thought to himself: “I could not
+prevent him from mowing the rye, but I will surely stop him from mowing
+the oats when the morning comes.”
+
+Early next day, when the devil came to the field, he found that the
+oats had been already mowed. Ivan did it during the night, so as to
+avoid the loss that might have resulted from the grain being too ripe
+and dry. Seeing that Ivan again had escaped him, the little devil
+became greatly enraged, saying:
+
+“He cut me all over and made me tired, that fool. I did not meet such
+misfortune even on the battle-field. He does not even sleep;” and the
+devil began to swear. “I cannot follow him,” he continued. “I will go
+now to the heaps and make everything rotten.”
+
+Accordingly he went to a heap of the new-mown grain and began his
+fiendish work. After wetting it he built a fire and warmed himself, and
+soon was fast asleep.
+
+Ivan harnessed his horse, and, with his sister, went to bring the rye
+home from the field.
+
+After lifting a couple of sheaves from the first heap his pitchfork
+came into contact with the little devil’s back, which caused the latter
+to howl with pain and to jump around in every direction. Ivan
+exclaimed:
+
+“See here! What nastiness! You again here?”
+
+“I am another one!” said the little devil. “That was my brother. I am
+the one who was sent to your brother Simeon.”
+
+“Well,” said Ivan, “it matters not who you are. I will fix you all the
+same.”
+
+As Ivan was about to strike the first blow the devil pleaded: “Let me
+go and I will do you no more harm. I will do whatever you wish.”
+
+“What can you do for me?” asked Ivan.
+
+“I can make soldiers from almost anything.”
+
+“And what will they be good for?”
+
+“Oh, they will do everything for you!”
+
+“Can they sing?”
+
+“They can.”
+
+“Well, make them.”
+
+“Take a bunch of straw and scatter it on the ground, and see if each
+straw will not turn into a soldier.”
+
+Ivan shook the straws on the ground, and, as he expected, each straw
+turned into a soldier, and they began marching with a band at their
+head.
+
+“_Ishty_ [look you], that was well done! How it will delight the
+village maidens!” he exclaimed.
+
+The small devil now said: “Let me go; you do not need me any longer.”
+
+But Ivan said: “No, I will not let you go just yet. You have converted
+the straw into soldiers, and now I want you to turn them again into
+straw, as I cannot afford to lose it, but I want it with the grain on.”
+
+The devil replied: “Say: ‘So many soldiers, so much straw.’”
+
+Ivan did as directed, and got back his rye with the straw.
+
+The small devil again begged for his release.
+
+Ivan, taking him from the pitchfork, said: “With God’s blessing you may
+depart”; and, as before at the mention of God’s name, the little devil
+was hurled into the earth like a flash, and nothing was left but the
+hole to show where he had gone.
+
+Soon afterward Ivan returned home, to find his brother Tarras and his
+wife there. Tarras-Briukhan could not pay his debts, and was forced to
+flee from his creditors and seek refuge under his father’s roof. Seeing
+Ivan, he said: “Well, Ivan, may we remain here until I start in some
+new business?”
+
+Ivan replied as he had before to Simeon: “Yes, you are perfectly
+welcome to remain here as long as it suits you.”
+
+With that announcement he removed his coat and seated himself at the
+supper-table with the others. But Tarras-Briukhan’s wife objected to
+the smell of his clothes, saying: “I cannot eat with a fool; neither
+can I stand the smell.”
+
+Then Tarras-Briukhan said: “Ivan, from your clothes there comes a bad
+smell; go and eat by yourself in the porch.”
+
+“Very well,” said Ivan; and he took some bread and went out as ordered,
+saying, “It is time for me to feed my mare.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+
+The small devil who had charge of Tarras finished with him that night,
+and according to agreement proceeded to the assistance of the other two
+to help them conquer Ivan. Arriving at the plowed field he looked
+around for his comrades, but found only the hole through which one had
+disappeared; and on going to the meadow he discovered the severed tail
+of the other, and in the rye-field he found yet another hole.
+
+“Well,” he thought, “it is quite clear that my comrades have met with
+some great misfortune, and that I will have to take their places and
+arrange the feud between the brothers.”
+
+The small devil then went in search of Ivan. But he, having finished
+with the field, was nowhere to be found. He had gone to the forest to
+cut logs to build homes for his brothers, as they found it inconvenient
+for so many to live under the same roof.
+
+The small devil at last discovered his whereabouts, and going to the
+forest climbed into the branches of the trees and began to interfere
+with Ivan’s work. Ivan cut down a tree, which failed, however, to fall
+to the ground, becoming entangled in the branches of other trees; yet
+he succeeded in getting it down after a hard struggle. In chopping down
+the next tree he met with the same difficulties, and also with the
+third. Ivan had supposed he could cut down fifty trees in a day, but he
+succeeded in chopping but ten before darkness put an end to his labors
+for a time. He was now exhausted, and, perspiring profusely, he sat
+down alone in the woods to rest. He soon after resumed his work,
+cutting down one more tree; but the effort gave him a pain in his back,
+and he was obliged to rest again. Seeing this, the small devil was full
+of joy.
+
+“Well,” he thought, “now he is exhausted and will stop work, and I will
+rest also.” He then seated himself on some branches and rejoiced.
+
+Ivan again arose, however, and, taking his axe, gave the tree a
+terrific blow from the opposite side, which felled it instantly to the
+ground, carrying the little devil with it; and Ivan, proceeding to cut
+the branches, found the devil alive. Very much astonished, Ivan
+exclaimed:
+
+“Look you! Such nastiness! Are you again here?”
+
+“I am another one,” replied the devil. “I was with your brother
+Tarras.”
+
+“Well,” said Ivan, “that makes no difference; I will fix you.” And he
+was about to strike him a blow with the axe when the devil pleaded:
+
+“Do not kill me, and whatever you wish you shall have.”
+
+Ivan asked, “What can you do?”
+
+“I can make for you all the money you wish.”
+
+Ivan then told the devil he might proceed, whereupon the latter began
+to explain to him how he might become rich.
+
+“Take,” said he to Ivan, “the leaves of this oak tree and rub them in
+your hands, and the gold will fall to the ground.”
+
+Ivan did as he was directed, and immediately the gold began to drop
+about his feet; and he remarked:
+
+“This will be a fine trick to amuse the village boys with.”
+
+“Can I now take my departure?” asked the devil, to which Ivan replied,
+“With God’s blessing you may go.”
+
+At the mention of the name of God, the devil disappeared into the
+earth.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+
+The brothers, having finished their houses, moved into them and lived
+apart from their father and brother. Ivan, when he had completed his
+plowing, made a great feast, to which he invited his brothers, telling
+them that he had plenty of beer for them to drink. The brothers,
+however, declined Ivan’s hospitality, saying, “We have seen the beer
+moujiks drink, and want none of it.”
+
+Ivan then gathered around him all the peasants in the village and with
+them drank beer until he became intoxicated, when he joined the
+_Khorovody_ (a street gathering of the village boys and girls, who sing
+songs), and told them they must sing his praises, saying that in return
+he would show them such sights as they had never before seen in their
+lives. The little girls laughed and began to sing songs praising Ivan,
+and when they had finished they said: “Very well; now give us what you
+said you would.”
+
+Ivan replied, “I will soon show you,” and, taking an empty bag in his
+hand, he started for the woods. The little girls laughed as they said,
+“What a fool he is!” and resuming their play they forgot all about him.
+
+Some time after Ivan suddenly appeared among them carrying in his hand
+the bag, which was now filled.
+
+“Shall I divide this with you?” he said.
+
+“Yes; divide!” they sang in chorus.
+
+So Ivan put his hand into the bag and drew it out full of gold coins,
+which he scattered among them.
+
+“Batiushka,” they cried as they ran to gather up the precious pieces.
+
+The moujiks then appeared on the scene and began to fight among
+themselves for the possession of the yellow objects. In the mêlée one
+old woman was nearly crushed to death.
+
+Ivan laughed and was greatly amused at the sight of so many persons
+quarrelling over a few pieces of gold.
+
+“Oh! you duratchki” (little fools), he said, “why did you almost crush
+the life out of the old grandmother? Be more gentle. I have plenty
+more, and I will give them to you;” whereupon he began throwing about
+more of the coins.
+
+The people gathered around him, and Ivan continued throwing until he
+emptied his bag. They clamored for more, but Ivan replied: “The gold is
+all gone. Another time I will give you more. Now we will resume our
+singing and dancing.”
+
+The little children sang, but Ivan said to them, “Your songs are no
+good.”
+
+The children said, “Then show us how to sing better.”
+
+To this Ivan replied, “I will show you people who can sing better than
+you.” With that remark Ivan went to the barn and, securing a bundle of
+straw, did as the little devil had directed him; and presently a
+regiment of soldiers appeared in the village street, and he ordered
+them to sing and dance.
+
+The people were astonished and could not understand how Ivan had
+produced the strangers.
+
+The soldiers sang for some time, to the great delight of the villagers;
+and when Ivan commanded them to stop they instantly ceased.
+
+Ivan then ordered them off to the barn, telling the astonished and
+mystified moujiks that they must not follow him. Reaching the barn, he
+turned the soldiers again into straw and went home to sleep off the
+effects of his debauch.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+
+The next morning Ivan’s exploits were the talk of the village, and news
+of the wonderful things he had done reached the ears of his brother
+Simeon, who immediately went to Ivan to learn all about it.
+
+“Explain to me,” he said; “from whence did you bring the soldiers, and
+where did you take them?”
+
+“And what do you wish to know for?” asked Ivan.
+
+“Why, with soldiers we can do almost anything we wish—whole kingdoms
+can be conquered,” replied Simeon.
+
+This information greatly surprised Ivan, who said: “Well, why did you
+not tell me about this before? I can make as many as you want.”
+
+Ivan then took his brother to the barn, but he said: “While I am
+willing to create the soldiers, you must take them away from here; for
+if it should become necessary to feed them, all the food in the village
+would last them only one day.”
+
+Simeon promised to do as Ivan wished, whereupon Ivan proceeded to
+convert the straw into soldiers. Out of one bundle of straw he made an
+entire regiment; in fact, so many soldiers appeared as if by magic that
+there was not a vacant spot in the field.
+
+Turning to Simeon Ivan said, “Well, is there a sufficient number?”
+
+Beaming with joy, Simeon replied: “Enough! enough! Thank you, Ivan!”
+
+“Glad you are satisfied,” said Ivan, “and if you wish more I will make
+them for you. I have plenty of straw now.”
+
+Simeon divided his soldiers into battalions and regiments, and after
+having drilled them he went forth to fight and to conquer.
+
+Simeon had just gotten safely out of the village with his soldiers when
+Tarras, the other brother, appeared before Ivan—he also having heard of
+the previous day’s performance and wanting to learn the secret of his
+power. He sought Ivan, saying: “Tell me the secret of your supply of
+gold, for if I had plenty of money I could with its assistance gather
+in all the wealth in the world.”
+
+Ivan was greatly surprised on hearing this statement, and said: “You
+might have told me this before, for I can obtain for you as much money
+as you wish.”
+
+Tarras was delighted, and he said, “You might get me about three
+bushels.”
+
+“Well,” said Ivan, “we will go to the woods, or, better still, we will
+harness the horse, as we could not possibly carry so much money
+ourselves.”
+
+The brothers went to the woods and Ivan proceeded to gather the oak
+leaves, which he rubbed between his hands, the dust falling to the
+ground and turning into gold pieces as quickly as it fell.
+
+When quite a pile had accumulated Ivan turned to Tarras and asked if he
+had rubbed enough leaves into money, whereupon Tarras replied: “Thank
+you, Ivan; that will be sufficient for this time.”
+
+Ivan then said: “If you wish more, come to me and I will rub as much as
+you want, for there are plenty of leaves.”
+
+Tarras, with his _tarantas_ (wagon) filled with gold, rode away to the
+city to engage in trade and increase his wealth; and thus both brothers
+went their way, Simeon to fight and Tarras to trade.
+
+Simeon’s soldiers conquered a kingdom for him and Tarras-Briukhan made
+plenty of money.
+
+Some time afterward the two brothers met and confessed to each other
+the source from whence sprang their prosperity, but they were not yet
+satisfied.
+
+Simeon said: “I have conquered a kingdom and enjoy a very pleasant
+life, but I have not sufficient money to procure food for my soldiers;”
+while Tarras confessed that he was the possessor of enormous wealth,
+but the care of it caused him much uneasiness.
+
+“Let us go again to our brother,” said Simeon; “I will order him to
+make more soldiers and will give them to you, and you may then tell him
+that he must make more money so that we can buy food for them.”
+
+They went again to Ivan, and Simeon said: “I have not sufficient
+soldiers; I want you to make me at least two divisions more.” But Ivan
+shook his head as he said: “I will not create soldiers for nothing; you
+must pay me for doing it.”
+
+“Well, but you promised,” said Simeon.
+
+“I know I did,” replied Ivan; “but I have changed my mind since that
+time.”
+
+“But, fool, why will you not do as you promised?”
+
+“For the reason that your soldiers kill men, and I will not make any
+more for such a cruel purpose.” With this reply Ivan remained stubborn
+and would not create any more soldiers.
+
+Tarras-Briukhan next approached Ivan and ordered him to make more
+money; but, as in the case of Tarras, Ivan only shook his head, as he
+said: “I will not make you any money unless you pay me for doing it. I
+cannot work without pay.”
+
+Tarras then reminded him of his promise.
+
+“I know I promised,” replied Ivan; “but still I must refuse to do as
+you wish.”
+
+“But why, fool, will you not fulfill your promise?” asked Tarras.
+
+“For the reason that your gold was the means of depriving Mikhailovna
+of her cow.”
+
+“But how did that happen?” inquired Tarras.
+
+“It happened in this way,” said Ivan. “Mikhailovna always kept a cow,
+and her children had plenty of milk to drink; but some time ago one of
+her boys came to me to beg for some milk, and I asked, ‘Where is your
+cow?’ when he replied, ‘A clerk of Tarras-Briukhan came to our home and
+offered three gold pieces for her. Our mother could not resist the
+temptation, and now we have no milk to drink. I gave you the gold
+pieces for your pleasure, and you put them to such poor use that I will
+not give you any more.’”
+
+The brothers, on hearing this, took their departure to discuss as to
+the best plan to pursue in regard to a settlement of their troubles.
+
+Simeon said: “Let us arrange it in this way: I will give you the half
+of my kingdom, and soldiers to keep guard over your wealth; and you
+give me money to feed the soldiers in my half of the kingdom.”
+
+To this arrangement Tarras agreed, and both the brothers became rulers
+and very happy.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+
+Ivan remained on the farm and worked to support his father, mother, and
+dumb sister. Once it happened that the old dog, which had grown up on
+the farm, was taken sick, when Ivan thought he was dying, and, taking
+pity on the animal, placed some bread in his hat and carried it to him.
+It happened that when he turned out the bread the root which the little
+devil had given him fell out also. The old dog swallowed it with the
+bread and was almost instantly cured, when he jumped up and began to
+wag his tail as an expression of joy. Ivan’s father and mother, seeing
+the dog cured so quickly, asked by what means he had performed such a
+miracle.
+
+Ivan replied: “I had some roots which would cure any disease, and the
+dog swallowed one of them.”
+
+It happened about that time that the Czar’s daughter became ill, and
+her father had it announced in every city, town, and village that
+whosoever would cure her would be richly rewarded; and if the lucky
+person should prove to be a single man he would give her in marriage to
+him.
+
+This announcement, of course, appeared in Ivan’s village.
+
+Ivan’s father and mother called him and said: “If you have any of those
+wonderful roots, go and cure the Czar’s daughter. You will be much
+happier for having performed such a kind act—indeed, you will be made
+happy for all your after life.”
+
+“Very well,” said Ivan; and he immediately made ready for the journey.
+As he reached the porch on his way out he saw a poor woman standing
+directly in his path and holding a broken arm. The woman accosted him,
+saying:
+
+“I was told that you could cure me, and will you not please do so, as I
+am powerless to do anything for myself?”
+
+Ivan replied: “Very well, my poor woman; I will relieve you if I can.”
+
+He produced a root which he handed to the poor woman and told her to
+swallow it.
+
+She did as Ivan told her and was instantly cured, and went away
+rejoicing that she had recovered the use of her arm.
+
+Ivan’s father and mother came out to wish him good luck on his journey,
+and to them he told the story of the poor woman, saying that he had
+given her his last root. On hearing this his parents were much
+distressed, as they now believed him to be without the means of curing
+the Czar’s daughter, and began to scold him.
+
+“You had pity for a beggar and gave no thought to the Czar’s daughter,”
+they said.
+
+“I have pity for the Czar’s daughter also,” replied Ivan, after which
+he harnessed his horse to his wagon and took his seat ready for his
+departure; whereupon his parents said: “Where are you going, you
+fool—to cure the Czar’s daughter, and without anything to do it with?”
+
+“Very well,” replied Ivan, as he drove away.
+
+In due time he arrived at the palace, and the moment he appeared on the
+balcony the Czar’s daughter was cured. The Czar was overjoyed and
+ordered Ivan to be brought into his presence. He dressed him in the
+richest robes and addressed him as his son-in-law. Ivan was married to
+the Czarevna, and, the Czar dying soon after, Ivan became ruler. Thus
+the three brothers became rulers in different kingdoms.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+
+The brothers lived and reigned. Simeon, the eldest brother, with his
+straw soldiers took captive the genuine soldiers and trained all alike.
+He was feared by every one.
+
+Tarras-Briukhan, the other brother, did not squander the gold he
+obtained from Ivan, but instead greatly increased his wealth, and at
+the same time lived well. He kept his money in large trunks, and, while
+having more than he knew what to do with, still continued to collect
+money from his subjects. The people had to work for the money to pay
+the taxes which Tarras levied on them, and life was made burdensome to
+them.
+
+Ivan the Fool did not enjoy his wealth and power to the same extent as
+did his brothers. As soon as his father-in-law, the late Czar, was
+buried, he discarded the Imperial robes which had fallen to him and
+told his wife to put them away, as he had no further use for them.
+Having cast aside the insignia of his rank, he once more donned his
+peasant garb and started to work as of old.
+
+“I felt lonesome,” he said, “and began to grow enormously stout, and
+yet I had no appetite, and neither could I sleep.”
+
+Ivan sent for his father, mother, and dumb sister, and brought them to
+live with him, and they worked with him at whatever he chose to do.
+
+The people soon learned that Ivan was a fool. His wife one day said to
+him, “The people say you are a fool, Ivan.”
+
+“Well, let them think so if they wish,” he replied.
+
+His wife pondered this reply for some time, and at last decided that if
+Ivan was a fool she also was one, and that it would be useless to go
+contrary to her husband, thinking affectionately of the old proverb
+that “where the needle goes there goes the thread also.” She therefore
+cast aside her magnificent robes, and, putting them into the trunk with
+Ivan’s, dressed herself in cheap clothing and joined her dumb
+sister-in-law, with the intention of learning to work. She succeeded so
+well that she soon became a great help to Ivan.
+
+Seeing that Ivan was a fool, all the wise men left the kingdom and only
+the fools remained. They had no money, their wealth consisting only of
+the products of their labor. But they lived peacefully together,
+supported themselves in comfort, and had plenty to spare for the needy
+and afflicted.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+
+The old devil grew tired of waiting for the good news which he expected
+the little devils to bring him. He waited in vain to hear of the ruin
+of the brothers, so he went in search of the emissaries which he had
+sent to perform that work for him. After looking around for some time,
+and seeing nothing but the three holes in the ground, he decided that
+they had not succeeded in their work and that he would have to do it
+himself.
+
+The old devil next went in search of the brothers, but he could learn
+nothing of their whereabouts. After some time he found them in their
+different kingdoms, contented and happy. This greatly incensed the old
+devil, and he said, “I will now have to accomplish their mission
+myself.”
+
+He first visited Simeon the soldier, and appeared before him as a
+_voyevoda_ (general), saying: “You, Simeon, are a great warrior, and I
+also have had considerable experience in warfare, and am desirous of
+serving you.”
+
+Simeon questioned the disguised devil, and seeing that he was an
+intelligent man took him into his service.
+
+The new General taught Simeon how to strengthen his army until it
+became very powerful. New implements of warfare were introduced.
+
+Cannons capable of throwing one hundred balls a minute were also
+constructed, and these, it was expected, would be of deadly effect in
+battle.
+
+Simeon, on the advice of his new General, ordered all young men above a
+certain age to report for drill. On the same advice Simeon established
+gun-shops, where immense numbers of cannons and rifles were made.
+
+The next move of the new General was to have Simeon declare war against
+the neighboring kingdom. This he did, and with his immense army marched
+into the adjoining territory, which he pillaged and burned, destroying
+more than half the enemy’s soldiers. This so frightened the ruler of
+that country that he willingly gave up half of his kingdom to save the
+other half.
+
+Simeon, overjoyed at his success, declared his intention of marching
+into Indian territory and subduing the Viceroy of that country.
+
+But Simeon’s intentions reached the ears of the Indian ruler, who
+prepared to do battle with him. In addition to having secured all the
+latest implements of warfare, he added still others of his own
+invention. He ordered all boys over fourteen and all single women to be
+drafted into the army, until its proportions became much larger than
+Simeon’s. His cannons and rifles were of the same pattern as Simeon’s,
+and he invented a flying-machine from which bombs could be thrown into
+the enemy’s camp.
+
+Simeon went forth to conquer the Viceroy with full confidence in his
+own powers to succeed. This time luck forsook him, and instead of being
+the conqueror he was himself conquered.
+
+The Indian ruler had so arranged his army that Simeon could not even
+get within shooting distance, while the bombs from the flying-machine
+carried destruction and terror in their path, completely routing his
+army, so that Simeon was left alone.
+
+The Viceroy took possession of his kingdom and Simeon had to fly for
+his life.
+
+Having finished with Simeon, the old devil next approached Tarras. He
+appeared before him disguised as one of the merchants of his kingdom,
+and established factories and began to make money. The “merchant” paid
+the highest price for everything he purchased, and the people ran after
+him to sell their goods. Through this “merchant” they were enabled to
+make plenty of money, paying up all their arrears of taxes as well as
+the others when they came due.
+
+Tarras was overjoyed at this condition of affairs and said: “Thanks to
+this merchant, now I will have more money than before, and life will be
+much pleasanter for me.”
+
+He wished to erect new buildings, and advertised for workmen, offering
+the highest prices for all kinds of labor. Tarras thought the people
+would be as anxious to work as formerly, but instead he was much
+surprised to learn that they were working for the “merchant.” Thinking
+to induce them to leave the “merchant,” he increased his offers, but
+the former, equal to the emergency, also raised the wages of his
+workmen. Tarras, having plenty of money, increased the offers still
+more; but the “merchant” raised them still higher and got the better of
+him. Thus, defeated at every point, Tarras was compelled to abandon the
+idea of building.
+
+Tarras next announced that he intended laying out gardens and erecting
+fountains, and the work was to be commenced in the fall, but no one
+came to offer his services, and again he was obliged to forego his
+intentions. Winter set in, and Tarras wanted some sable fur with which
+to line his great-coat, and he sent his man to procure it for him; but
+the servant returned without it, saying: “There are no sables to be
+had. The ‘merchant’ has bought them all, paying a very high price for
+them.”
+
+Tarras needed horses and sent a messenger to purchase them, but he
+returned with the same story as on former occasions—that none were to
+be found, the “merchant” having bought them all to carry water for an
+artificial pond he was constructing. Tarras was at last compelled to
+suspend business, as he could not find any one willing to work for him.
+They had all gone over to the “merchant’s” side. The only dealings the
+people had with Tarras were when they went to pay their taxes. His
+money accumulated so fast that he could not find a place to put it, and
+his life became miserable. He abandoned all idea of entering upon the
+new venture, and only thought of how to exist peaceably. This he found
+it difficult to do, for, turn which way he would, fresh obstacles
+confronted him. Even his cooks, coachmen, and all his other servants
+forsook him and joined the “merchant.” With all his wealth he had
+nothing to eat, and when he went to market he found the “merchant” had
+been there before him and had bought up all the provisions. Still, the
+people continued to bring him money.
+
+Tarras at last became so indignant that he ordered the “merchant” out
+of his kingdom. He left, but settled just outside the boundary line,
+and continued his business with the same result as before, and Tarras
+was frequently forced to go without food for days. It was rumored that
+the “merchant” wanted to buy even Tarras himself. On hearing this the
+latter became very much alarmed and could not decide as to the best
+course to pursue.
+
+About this time his brother Simeon arrived in the kingdom, and said:
+“Help me, for I have been defeated and ruined by the Indian Viceroy.”
+
+Tarras replied: “How can I help you, when I have had no food myself for
+two days?”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+
+The old devil, having finished with the second brother, went to Ivan
+the Fool. This time he disguised himself as a General, the same as in
+the case of Simeon, and, appearing before Ivan, said: “Get an army
+together. It is disgraceful for the ruler of a kingdom to be without an
+army. You call your people to assemble, and I will form them into a
+fine large army.”
+
+Ivan took the supposed General’s advice, and said: “Well, you may form
+my people into an army, but you must also teach them to sing the songs
+I like.”
+
+The old devil then went through Ivan’s kingdom to secure recruits for
+the army, saying: “Come, shave your heads [the heads of recruits are
+always shaved in Russia] and I will give each of you a red hat and
+plenty of vodka” (whiskey).
+
+At this the fools only laughed, and said: “We can have all the vodka we
+want, for we distill it ourselves; and of hats, our little girls make
+all we want, of any color we please, and with handsome fringes.”
+
+Thus was the devil foiled in securing recruits for his army; so he
+returned to Ivan and said: “Your fools will not volunteer to be
+soldiers. It will therefore be necessary to force them.”
+
+“Very well,” replied Ivan, “you may use force if you want to.”
+
+The old devil then announced that all the fools must become soldiers,
+and those who refused, Ivan would punish with death.
+
+The fools went to the General; and said: “You tell us that Ivan will
+punish with death all those who refuse to become soldiers, but you have
+omitted to state what will be done with us soldiers. We have been told
+that we are only to be killed.”
+
+“Yes, that is true,” was the reply.
+
+The fools on hearing this became stubborn and refused to go.
+
+“Better kill us now if we cannot avoid death, but we will not become
+soldiers,” they declared.
+
+“Oh! you fools,” said the old devil, “soldiers may and may not be
+killed; but if you disobey Ivan’s orders you will find certain death at
+his hands.”
+
+The fools remained absorbed in thought for some time and finally went
+to Ivan to question him in regard to the matter.
+
+On arriving at his house they said: “A General came to us with an order
+from you that we were all to become soldiers, and if we refused you
+were to punish us with death. Is it true?”
+
+Ivan began to laugh heartily on hearing this, and said: “Well, how I
+alone can punish you with death is something I cannot understand. If I
+was not a fool myself I would be able to explain it to you, but as it
+is I cannot.”
+
+“Well, then, we will not go,” they said.
+
+“Very well,” replied Ivan, “you need not become soldiers unless you
+wish to.”
+
+The old devil, seeing his schemes about to prove failures, went to the
+ruler of Tarakania and became his friend, saying: “Let us go and
+conquer Ivan’s kingdom. He has no money, but he has plenty of cattle,
+provisions, and various other things that would be useful to us.”
+
+The Tarakanian ruler gathered his large army together, and equipping it
+with cannons and rifles, crossed the boundary line into Ivan’s kingdom.
+The people went to Ivan and said: “The ruler of Tarakania is here with
+a large army to fight us.”
+
+“Let them come,” replied Ivan.
+
+The Tarakanian ruler, after crossing the line into Ivan’s kingdom,
+looked in vain for soldiers to fight against; and waiting some time and
+none appearing, he sent his own warriors to attack the villages.
+
+They soon reached the first village, which they began to plunder.
+
+The fools of both sexes looked calmly on, offering not the least
+resistance when their cattle and provisions were being taken from them.
+On the contrary, they invited the soldiers to come and live with them,
+saying: “If you, dear friends, find it is difficult to earn a living in
+your own land, come and live with us, where everything is plentiful.”
+
+The soldiers decided to remain, finding the people happy and
+prosperous, with enough surplus food to supply many of their neighbors.
+They were surprised at the cordial greetings which they everywhere
+received, and, returning to the ruler of Tarakania, they said: “We
+cannot fight with these people—take us to another place. We would much
+prefer the dangers of actual warfare to this unsoldierly method of
+subduing the village.”
+
+The Tarakanian ruler, becoming enraged, ordered the soldiers to destroy
+the whole kingdom, plunder the villages, burn the houses and
+provisions, and slaughter the cattle.
+
+“Should you disobey my orders,” said he, “I will have every one of you
+executed.”
+
+The soldiers, becoming frightened, started to do as they were ordered,
+but the fools wept bitterly, offering no resistance, men, women, and
+children all joining in the general lamentation.
+
+“Why do you treat us so cruelly?” they cried to the invading soldiers.
+“Why do you wish to destroy everything we have? If you have more need
+of these things than we have, why not take them with you and leave us
+in peace?”
+
+The soldiers, becoming saddened with remorse, refused further to pursue
+their path of destruction—the entire army scattering in many
+directions.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+
+The old devil, failing to ruin Ivan’s kingdom with soldiers,
+transformed himself into a nobleman, dressed exquisitely, and became
+one of Ivan’s subjects, with the intention of compassing the downfall
+of his kingdom—as he had done with that of Tarras.
+
+The “nobleman” said to Ivan: “I desire to teach you wisdom and to
+render you other service. I will build you a palace and factories.”
+
+“Very well,” said Ivan; “you may live with us.”
+
+The next day the “nobleman” appeared on the Square with a sack of gold
+in his hand and a plan for building a house, saying to the people: “You
+are living like pigs, and I am going to teach you how to live decently.
+You are to build a house for me according to this plan. I will
+superintend the work myself, and will pay you for your services in
+gold,” showing them at the same time the contents of his sack.
+
+The fools were amused. They had never before seen any money. Their
+business was conducted entirely by exchange of farm products or by
+hiring themselves out to work by the day in return for whatever they
+most needed. They therefore glanced at the gold pieces with amazement,
+and said, “What nice toys they would be to play with!” In return for
+the gold they gave their services and brought the “nobleman” the
+produce of their farms.
+
+The old devil was overjoyed as he thought, “Now my enterprise is on a
+fair road and I will be able to ruin the Fool—as I did his brothers.”
+
+The fools obtained sufficient gold to distribute among the entire
+community, the women and young girls of the village wearing much of it
+as ornaments, while to the children they gave some pieces to play with
+on the streets.
+
+When they had secured all they wanted they stopped working and the
+“nobleman” did not get his house more than half finished. He had
+neither provisions nor cattle for the year, and ordered the people to
+bring him both. He directed them also to go on with the building of the
+palace and factories. He promised to pay them liberally in gold for
+everything they did. No one responded to his call—only once in awhile a
+little boy or girl would call to exchange eggs for his gold.
+
+Thus was the “nobleman” deserted, and, having nothing to eat, he went
+to the village to procure some provisions for his dinner. He went to
+one house and offered gold in return for a chicken, but was refused,
+the owner saying: “We have enough of that already and do not want any
+more.”
+
+He next went to a fish-woman to buy some herring, when she, too,
+refused to accept his gold in return for fish, saying: “I do not wish
+it, my dear man; I have no children to whom I can give it to play with.
+I have three pieces which I keep as curiosities only.”
+
+He then went to a peasant to buy bread, but he also refused to accept
+the gold. “I have no use for it,” said he, “unless you wish to give it
+for Christ’s sake; then it will be a different matter, and I will tell
+my _baba_ [old woman] to cut a piece of bread for you.”
+
+The old devil was so angry that he ran away from the peasant, spitting
+and cursing as he went.
+
+Not only did the offer to accept in the name of Christ anger him, but
+the very mention of the name was like the thrust of a knife in his
+throat.
+
+The old devil did not succeed in getting any bread, and in his efforts
+to secure other articles of food he met with the same failure. The
+people had all the gold they wanted and what pieces they had they
+regarded as curiosities. They said to the old devil: “If you bring us
+something else in exchange for food, or come to ask for Christ’s sake,
+we will give you all you want.”
+
+But the old devil had nothing but gold, and was too lazy to work; and
+being unable to accept anything for Christ’s sake, he was greatly
+enraged.
+
+“What else do you want?” he said. “I will give you gold with which you
+can buy everything you want, and you need labor no longer.”
+
+But the fools would not accept his gold, nor listen to him. Thus the
+old devil was obliged to go to sleep hungry.
+
+Tidings of this condition of affairs soon reached the ears of Ivan. The
+people went to him and said: “What shall we do? This nobleman appeared
+among us; he is well dressed; he wishes to eat and drink of the best,
+but is unwilling to work, and does not beg for food for Christ’s sake.
+He only offers every one gold pieces. At first we gave him everything
+he wanted, taking the gold pieces in exchange just as curiosities; but
+now we have enough of them and refuse to accept any more from him. What
+shall we do with him? he may die of hunger!”
+
+Ivan heard all they had to say, and told them to employ him as a
+shepherd, taking turns in doing so.
+
+The old devil saw no other way out of the difficulty and was obliged to
+submit.
+
+It soon came the old devil’s turn to go to Ivan’s house. He went there
+to dinner and found Ivan’s dumb sister preparing the meal. She was
+often cheated by the lazy people, who while they did not work, yet ate
+up all the gruel. But she learned to know the lazy people from the
+condition of their hands. Those with great welts on their hands she
+invited first to the table, and those having smooth white hands had to
+take what was left.
+
+The old devil took a seat at the table, but the dumb girl, taking his
+hands, looked at them, and seeing them white and clean, and with long
+nails, swore at him and put him from the table.
+
+Ivan’s wife said to the old devil: “You must excuse my sister-in-law;
+she will not allow any one to sit at the table whose hands have not
+been hardened by toil, so you will have to wait until the dinner is
+over and then you can have what is left. With it you must be
+satisfied.”
+
+The old devil was very much offended that he was made to eat with
+“pigs,” as he expressed it, and complained to Ivan, saying: “The
+foolish law you have in your kingdom, that all persons must work, is
+surely the invention of fools. People who work for a living are not
+always forced to labor with their hands. Do you think wise men labor
+so?”
+
+Ivan replied: “Well, what do fools know about it? We all work with our
+hands.”
+
+“And for that reason you are fools,” replied the devil. “I can teach
+you how to use your brains, and you will find such labor more
+beneficial.”
+
+Ivan was surprised at hearing this, and said: “Well, it is perhaps not
+without good reason that we are called fools.”
+
+“It is not so easy to work with the brain,” the old devil said. “You
+will not give me anything to eat because my hands have not the
+appearance of being toil-hardened, but you must understand that it is
+much harder to do brain-work, and sometimes the head feels like
+bursting with the effort it is forced to make.”
+
+“Then why do you not select some light work that you can perform with
+your hands?” Ivan asked.
+
+The devil said: “I torment myself with brain-work because I have pity
+for you fools, for, if I did not torture myself, people like you would
+remain fools for all eternity. I have exercised my brain a great deal
+during my life, and now I am able to teach you.”
+
+Ivan was greatly surprised and said: “Very well; teach us, so that when
+our hands are tired we can use our heads to replace them.”
+
+The devil promised to instruct the people, and Ivan announced the fact
+throughout his kingdom.
+
+The devil was willing to teach all those who came to him how to use the
+head instead of the hands, so as to produce more with the former than
+with the latter.
+
+In Ivan’s kingdom there was a high tower, which was reached by a long,
+narrow ladder leading up to the balcony, and Ivan told the old devil
+that from the top of the tower every one could see him.
+
+So the old devil went up to the balcony and addressed the people.
+
+The fools came in great crowds to hear what the old devil had to say,
+thinking that he really meant to tell them how to work with the head.
+But the old devil only told them in words what to do, and did not give
+them any practical instruction. He said that men working only with
+their hands could not make a living. The fools did not understand what
+he said to them and looked at him in amazement, and then departed for
+their daily work.
+
+The old devil addressed them for two days from the balcony, and at the
+end of that time, feeling hungry, he asked the people to bring him some
+bread. But they only laughed at him and told him if he could work
+better with his head than with his hands he could also find bread for
+himself. He addressed the people for yet another day, and they went to
+hear him from curiosity, but soon left him to return to their work.
+
+Ivan asked, “Well, did the nobleman work with his head?”
+
+“Not yet,” they said; “so far he has only talked.”
+
+One day, while the old devil was standing on the balcony, he became
+weak, and, falling down, hurt his head against a pole.
+
+Seeing this, one of the fools ran to Ivan’s wife and said, “The
+gentleman has at last commenced to work with his head.”
+
+She ran to the field to tell Ivan, who was much surprised, and said,
+“Let us go and see him.”
+
+He turned his horses’ heads in the direction of the tower, where the
+old devil remained weak from hunger and was still suspended from the
+pole, with his body swaying back and forth and his head striking the
+lower part of the pole each time it came in contact with it. While Ivan
+was looking, the old devil started down the steps head-first—as they
+supposed, to count them.
+
+“Well,” said Ivan, “he told the truth after all—that sometimes from
+this kind of work the head bursts. This is far worse than welts on the
+hands.”
+
+The old devil fell to the ground head-foremost. Ivan approached him,
+but at that instant the ground opened and the devil disappeared,
+leaving only a hole to show where he had gone.
+
+Ivan scratched his head and said: “See here; such nastiness! This is
+yet another devil. He looks like the father of the little ones.”
+
+Ivan still lives, and people flock to his kingdom. His brothers come to
+him and he feeds them.
+
+To every one who comes to him and says, “Give us food,” he replies:
+“Very well; you are welcome. We have plenty of everything.”
+
+There is only one unchangeable custom observed in Ivan’s kingdom: The
+man with toil-hardened hands is always given a seat at the table, while
+the possessor of soft white hands must be contented with what is left.
+
+
+
+
+A LOST OPPORTUNITY.
+
+
+“Then came Peter to Him, and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin
+against me, and I forgive him? till seven times?” . . . . “So likewise
+shall My heavenly Father do also unto you, if ye from your hearts
+forgive not every one his brother their trespasses.”—ST. MATTHEW
+xviii., 21-35.
+
+
+In a certain village there lived a peasant by the name of Ivan
+Scherbakoff. He was prosperous, strong, and vigorous, and was
+considered the hardest worker in the whole village. He had three sons,
+who supported themselves by their own labor. The eldest was married,
+the second about to be married, and the youngest took care of the
+horses and occasionally attended to the plowing.
+
+The peasant’s wife, Ivanovna, was intelligent and industrious, while
+her daughter-in-law was a simple, quiet soul, but a hard worker.
+
+There was only one idle person in the household, and that was Ivan’s
+father, a very old man who for seven years had suffered from asthma,
+and who spent the greater part of his time lying on the brick oven.
+
+Ivan had plenty of everything—three horses, with one colt, a cow with
+calf, and fifteen sheep. The women made the men’s clothes, and in
+addition to performing all the necessary household labor, also worked
+in the field; while the men’s industry was confined altogether to the
+farm.
+
+What was left of the previous year’s supply of provisions was ample for
+their needs, and they sold a quantity of oats sufficient to pay their
+taxes and other expenses.
+
+Thus life went smoothly for Ivan.
+
+The peasant’s next-door neighbor was a son of Gordey Ivanoff, called
+“Gavryl the Lame.” It once happened that Ivan had a quarrel with him;
+but while old man Gordey was yet alive, and Ivan’s father was the head
+of the household, the two peasants lived as good neighbors should. If
+the women of one house required the use of a sieve or pail, they
+borrowed it from the inmates of the other house. The same condition of
+affairs existed between the men. They lived more like one family, the
+one dividing his possessions with the other, and perfect harmony
+reigned between the two families.
+
+If a stray calf or cow invaded the garden of one of the farmers, the
+other willingly drove it away, saying: “Be careful, neighbor, that your
+stock does not again stray into my garden; we should put a fence up.”
+In the same way they had no secrets from each other. The doors of their
+houses and barns had neither bolts nor locks, so sure were they of each
+other’s honesty. Not a shadow of suspicion darkened their daily
+intercourse.
+
+Thus lived the old people.
+
+In time the younger members of the two households started farming. It
+soon became apparent that they would not get along as peacefully as the
+old people had done, for they began quarrelling without the slightest
+provocation.
+
+A hen belonging to Ivan’s daughter-in-law commenced laying eggs, which
+the young woman collected each morning, intending to keep them for the
+Easter holidays. She made daily visits to the barn, where, under an old
+wagon, she was sure to find the precious egg.
+
+One day the children frightened the hen and she flew over their
+neighbor’s fence and laid her egg in their garden.
+
+Ivan’s daughter-in-law heard the hen cackling, but said: “I am very
+busy just at present, for this is the eve of a holy day, and I must
+clean and arrange this room. I will go for the egg later on.”
+
+When evening came, and she had finished her task, she went to the barn,
+and as usual looked under the old wagon, expecting to find an egg. But,
+alas! no egg was visible in the accustomed place.
+
+Greatly disappointed, she returned to the house and inquired of her
+mother-in-law and the other members of the family if they had taken it.
+“No,” they said, “we know nothing of it.”
+
+Taraska, the youngest brother-in-law, coming in soon after, she also
+inquired of him if he knew anything about the missing egg. “Yes,” he
+replied; “your pretty, crested hen laid her egg in our neighbors’
+garden, and after she had finished cackling she flew back again over
+the fence.”
+
+The young woman, greatly surprised on hearing this, turned and looked
+long and seriously at the hen, which was sitting with closed eyes
+beside the rooster in the chimney-corner. She asked the hen where it
+laid the egg. At the sound of her voice it simply opened and closed its
+eyes, but could make no answer.
+
+She then went to the neighbors’ house, where she was met by an old
+woman, who said: “What do you want, young woman?”
+
+Ivan’s daughter-in-law replied: “You see, _babushka_ [grandmother], my
+hen flew into your yard this morning. Did she not lay an egg there?”
+
+“We did not see any,” the old woman replied; “we have our own hens—God
+be praised!—and they have been laying for this long time. We hunt only
+for the eggs our own hens lay, and have no use for the eggs other
+people’s hens lay. Another thing I want to tell you, young woman: we do
+not go into other people’s yards to look for eggs.”
+
+Now this speech greatly angered the young woman, and she replied in the
+same spirit in which she had been spoken to, only using much stronger
+language and speaking at greater length.
+
+The neighbor replied in the same angry manner, and finally the women
+began to abuse each other and call vile names. It happened that old
+Ivan’s wife, on her way to the well for water, heard the dispute, and
+joined the others, taking her daughter-in-law’s part.
+
+Gavryl’s housekeeper, hearing the noise, could not resist the
+temptation to join the rest and to make her voice heard. As soon as she
+appeared on the scene, she, too, began to abuse her neighbor, reminding
+her of many disagreeable things which had happened (and many which had
+not happened) between them. She became so infuriated during her
+denunciations that she lost all control of herself, and ran around like
+some mad creature.
+
+Then all the women began to shout at the same time, each trying to say
+two words to another’s one, and using the vilest language in the
+quarreller’s vocabulary.
+
+“You are such and such,” shouted one of the women. “You are a thief, a
+_schlukha_ [a mean, dirty, low creature]; your father-in-law is even
+now starving, and you have no shame. You beggar, you borrowed my sieve
+and broke it. You made a large hole in it, and did not buy me another.”
+
+“You have our scale-beam,” cried another woman, “and must give it back
+to me;” whereupon she seized the scale-beam and tried to remove it from
+the shoulders of Ivan’s wife.
+
+In the mêlée which followed they upset the pails of water. They tore
+the covering from each other’s head, and a general fight ensued.
+
+Gavryl’s wife had by this time joined in the fracas, and he, crossing
+the field and seeing the trouble, came to her rescue.
+
+Ivan and his son, seeing that their womenfolk were being badly used,
+jumped into the midst of the fray, and a fearful fight followed.
+
+Ivan was the most powerful peasant in all the country round, and it did
+not take him long to disperse the crowd, for they flew in all
+directions. During the progress of the fight Ivan tore out a large
+quantity of Gavryl’s beard.
+
+By this time a large crowd of peasants had collected, and it was with
+the greatest difficulty that they persuaded the two families to stop
+quarrelling.
+
+This was the beginning.
+
+Gavryl took the portion of his beard which Ivan had torn out, and,
+wrapping it in a paper, went to the _volostnoye_ (moujiks’ court) and
+entered a complaint against Ivan.
+
+Holding up the hair, he said, “I did not grow this for that bear Ivan
+to tear out!”
+
+Gavryl’s wife went round among the neighbors, telling them that they
+must not repeat what she told them, but that she and her husband were
+going to get the best of Ivan, and that he was to be sent to Siberia.
+
+And so the quarrelling went on.
+
+The poor old grandfather, sick with asthma and lying on the brick oven
+all the time, tried from the first to dissuade them from quarrelling,
+and begged of them to live in peace; but they would not listen to his
+good advice. He said to them: “You children are making a great fuss and
+much trouble about nothing. I beg of you to stop and think of what a
+little thing has caused all this trouble. It has arisen from only one
+egg. If our neighbors’ children picked it up, it is all right. God
+bless them! One egg is of but little value, and without it God will
+supply sufficient for all our needs.”
+
+Ivan’s daughter-in-law here interposed and said, “But they called us
+vile names.”
+
+The old grandfather again spoke, saying: “Well, even if they _did_ call
+you bad names, it would have been better to return good for evil, and
+by your example show them how to speak better. Such conduct on your
+part would have been best for all concerned.” He continued: “Well, you
+had a fight, you wicked people. Such things sometimes happen, but it
+would be better if you went afterward and asked forgiveness and buried
+your grievances out of sight. Scatter them to the four winds of heaven,
+for if you do not do so it will be the worse for you in the end.”
+
+The younger members of the family, still obstinate, refused to profit
+by the old man’s advice, and declared he was not right, and that he
+only liked to grumble in his old-fashioned way.
+
+Ivan refused to go to his neighbor, as the grandfather wished, saying:
+“I did not tear out Gavryl’s beard. He did it himself, and his son tore
+my shirt and trousers into shreds.”
+
+Ivan entered suit against Gavryl. He first went to the village justice,
+and not getting satisfaction from him he carried his case to the
+village court.
+
+While the neighbors were wrangling over the affair, each suing the
+other, it happened that a perch-bolt from Gavryl’s wagon was lost; and
+the women of Gavryl’s household accused Ivan’s son of stealing it.
+
+They said: “We saw him in the night-time pass by our window, on his way
+to where the wagon was standing.” “And my _kumushka_ [sponsor],” said
+one of them, “told me that Ivan’s son had offered it for sale at the
+_kabak_ [tavern].”
+
+This accusation caused them again to go into court for a settlement of
+their grievances.
+
+While the heads of the families were trying to have their troubles
+settled in court, their home quarrels were constant, and frequently
+resulted in hand-to-hand encounters. Even the little children followed
+the example of their elders and quarrelled incessantly.
+
+The women, when they met on the riverbank to do the family washing,
+instead of attending to their work passed the time in abusing each
+other, and not infrequently they came to blows.
+
+At first the male members of the families were content with accusing
+each other of various crimes, such as stealing and like meannesses. But
+the trouble in this mild form did not last long.
+
+They soon resorted to other measures. They began to appropriate one
+another’s things without asking permission, while various articles
+disappeared from both houses and could not be found. This was done out
+of revenge.
+
+This example being set by the men, the women and children also
+followed, and life soon became a burden to all who took part in the
+strife.
+
+Ivan Scherbakoff and “Gavryl the Lame” at last laid their trouble
+before the _mir_ (village meeting), in addition to having been in court
+and calling on the justice of the peace. Both of the latter had grown
+tired of them and their incessant wrangling. One time Gavryl would
+succeed in having Ivan fined, and if he was not able to pay it he would
+be locked up in the cold dreary prison for days. Then it would be
+Ivan’s turn to get Gavryl punished in like manner, and the greater the
+injury the one could do the other the more delight he took in it.
+
+The success of either in having the other punished only served to
+increase their rage against each other, until they were like mad dogs
+in their warfare.
+
+If anything went wrong with one of them he immediately accused his
+adversary of conspiring to ruin him, and sought revenge without
+stopping to inquire into the rights of the case.
+
+When the peasants went into court, and had each other fined and
+imprisoned, it did not soften their hearts in the least. They would
+only taunt one another on such occasions, saying: “Never mind; I will
+repay you for all this.”
+
+This state of affairs lasted for six years.
+
+Ivan’s father, the sick old man, constantly repeated his good advice.
+He would try to arouse their conscience by saying: “What are you doing,
+my children? Can you not throw off all these troubles, pay more
+attention to your business, and suppress your anger against your
+neighbors? There is no use in your continuing to live in this way, for
+the more enraged you become against each other the worse it is for
+you.”
+
+Again was the wise advice of the old man rejected.
+
+At the beginning of the seventh year of the existence of the feud it
+happened that a daughter-in-law of Ivan’s was present at a marriage. At
+the wedding feast she openly accused Gavryl of stealing a horse. Gavryl
+was intoxicated at the time and was in no mood to stand the insult, so
+in retaliation he struck the woman a terrific blow, which confined her
+to her bed for more than a week. The woman being in delicate health,
+the worst results were feared.
+
+Ivan, glad of a fresh opportunity to harass his neighbor, lodged a
+formal complaint before the district-attorney, hoping to rid himself
+forever of Gavryl by having him sent to Siberia.
+
+On examining the complaint the district-attorney would not consider it,
+as by that time the injured woman was walking about and as well as
+ever.
+
+Thus again Ivan was disappointed in obtaining his revenge, and, not
+being satisfied with the district-attorney’s decision, had the case
+transferred to the court, where he used all possible means to push his
+suit. To secure the favor of the _starshina_ (village mayor) he made
+him a present of half a gallon of sweet vodka; and to the mayor’s
+_pisar_ (secretary) also he gave presents. By this means he succeeded
+in securing a verdict against Gavryl. The sentence was that Gavryl was
+to receive twenty lashes on his bare back, and the punishment was to be
+administered in the yard which surrounded the court-house.
+
+When Ivan heard the sentence read he looked triumphantly at Gavryl to
+see what effect it would produce on him. Gavryl turned very white on
+hearing that he was to be treated with such indignity, and turning his
+back on the assembly left the room without uttering a word.
+
+Ivan followed him out, and as he reached his horse he heard Gavryl
+saying: “Very well; my spine will burn from the lashes, but something
+will burn with greater fierceness in Ivan’s household before long.”
+
+Ivan, on hearing these words, instantly returned to the court, and
+going up to the judges said: “Oh! just judges, he threatens to burn my
+house and all it contains.”
+
+A messenger was immediately sent in search of Gavryl, who was soon
+found and again brought into the presence of the judges.
+
+“Is it true,” they asked, “that you said you would burn Ivan’s house
+and all it contained?”
+
+Gavryl replied: “I did not say anything of the kind. You may give me as
+many lashes as you please—that is, if you have the power to do so. It
+seems to me that I alone have to suffer for the truth, while he,”
+pointing to Ivan, “is allowed to do and say what he pleases.” Gavryl
+wished to say something more, but his lips trembled, and the words
+refused to come; so in silence he turned his face toward the wall.
+
+The sight of so much suffering moved even the judges to pity, and,
+becoming alarmed at Gavryl’s continued silence, they said, “He may do
+both his neighbor and himself some frightful injury.”
+
+“See here, my brothers,” said one feeble old judge, looking at Ivan and
+Gavryl as he spoke, “I think you had better try to arrange this matter
+peaceably. You, brother Gavryl, did wrong to strike a woman who was in
+delicate health. It was a lucky thing for you that God had mercy on you
+and that the woman did not die, for if she had I know not what dire
+misfortune might have overtaken you! It will not do either of you any
+good to go on living as you are at present. Go, Gavryl, and make
+friends with Ivan; I am sure he will forgive you, and we will set aside
+the verdict just given.”
+
+The secretary on hearing this said: “It is impossible to do this on the
+present case. According to Article 117 this matter has gone too far to
+be settled peaceably now, as the verdict has been rendered and must be
+enforced.”
+
+But the judges would not listen to the secretary, saying to him: “You
+talk altogether too much. You must remember that the first thing is to
+fulfill God’s command to ‘Love thy neighbor as thyself,’ and all will
+be well with you.”
+
+Thus with kind words the judges tried to reconcile the two peasants.
+Their words fell on stony ground, however, for Gavryl would not listen
+to them.
+
+“I am fifty years old,” said Gavryl, “and have a son married, and never
+from my birth has the lash been applied to my back; but now this bear
+Ivan has secured a verdict against me which condemns me to receive
+twenty lashes, and I am forced to bow to this decision and suffer the
+shame of a public beating. Well, he will have cause to remember this.”
+
+At this Gavryl’s voice trembled and he stopped speaking, and turning
+his back on the judges took his departure.
+
+It was about ten versts’ distance from the court to the homes of the
+neighbors, and this Ivan travelled late. The women had already gone out
+for the cattle. He unharnessed his horse and put everything in its
+place, and then went into the _izba_ (room), but found no one there.
+
+The men had not yet returned from their work in the field and the women
+had gone to look for the cattle, so that all about the place was quiet.
+Going into the room, Ivan seated himself on a wooden bench and soon
+became lost in thought. He remembered how, when Gavryl first heard the
+sentence which had been passed upon him, he grew very pale, and turned
+his face to the wall, all the while remaining silent.
+
+Ivan’s heart ached when he thought of the disgrace which he had been
+the means of bringing upon Gavryl, and he wondered how he would feel if
+the same sentence had been passed upon him. His thoughts were
+interrupted by the coughing of his father, who was lying on the oven.
+
+The old man, on seeing Ivan, came down off the oven, and slowly
+approaching his son seated himself on the bench beside him, looking at
+him as though ashamed. He continued to cough as he leaned on the table
+and said, “Well, did they sentence him?”
+
+“Yes, they sentenced him to receive twenty lashes,” replied Ivan.
+
+On hearing this the old man sorrowfully shook his head, and said: “This
+is very bad, Ivan, and what is the meaning of it all? It is indeed very
+bad, but not so bad for Gavryl as for yourself. Well, suppose his
+sentence _is_ carried out, and he gets the twenty lashes, what will it
+benefit you?”
+
+“He will not again strike a woman,” Ivan replied.
+
+“What is it he will not do? He does not do anything worse than what you
+are constantly doing!”
+
+This conversation enraged Ivan, and he shouted: “Well, what did he do?
+He beat a woman nearly to death, and even now he threatens to burn my
+house! Must I bow to him for all this?”
+
+The old man sighed deeply as he said: “You, Ivan, are strong and free
+to go wherever you please, while I have been lying for years on the
+oven. You think that you know everything and that I do not know
+anything. No! you are still a child, and as such you cannot see that a
+kind of madness controls your actions and blinds your sight. The sins
+of others are ever before you, while you resolutely keep your own
+behind your back. I know that what Gavryl did was wrong, but if he
+alone should do wrong there would be no evil in the world. Do you think
+that all the evil in the world is the work of one man alone? No! it
+requires two persons to work much evil in the world. You see only the
+bad in Gavryl’s character, but you are blind to the evil that is in
+your own nature. If he alone were bad and you good, then there would be
+no wrong.”
+
+The old man, after a pause, continued: “Who tore Gavryl’s beard? Who
+destroyed his heaps of rye? Who dragged him into court?—and yet you try
+to put all the blame on his shoulders. You are behaving very badly
+yourself, and for that reason you are wrong. I did not act in such a
+manner, and certainly I never taught you to do so. I lived in peace
+with Gavryl’s father all the time we were neighbors. We were always the
+best of friends. If he was without flour his wife would come to me and
+say, ‘_Diadia Frol_ [Grandfather], we need flour.’ I would then say:
+‘My good woman, go to the warehouse and take as much as you want.’ If
+he had no one to care for his horses I would say, ‘Go, _Ivanushka_
+[diminutive of Ivan], and help him to care for them.’ If I required
+anything I would go to him and say, ‘Grandfather Gordey, I need this or
+that,’ and he would always reply, ‘Take just whatever you want.’ By
+this means we passed an easy and peaceful life. But what is your life
+compared with it? As the soldiers fought at Plevna, so are you and
+Gavryl fighting all the time, only that your battles are far more
+disgraceful than that fought at Plevna.”
+
+The old man went on: “And you call this living! and what a sin it all
+is! You are a peasant, and the head of the house; therefore, the
+responsibility of the trouble rests with you. What an example you set
+your wife and children by constantly quarrelling with your neighbor!
+Only a short time since your little boy, Taraska, was cursing his aunt
+Arina, and his mother only laughed at it, saying, ‘What a bright child
+he is!’ Is that right? You are to blame for all this. You should think
+of the salvation of your soul. Is that the way to do it? You say one
+unkind word to me and I will reply with two. You will give me one slap
+in the face, and I will retaliate with two slaps. No, my son; Christ
+did not teach us foolish people to act in such a way. If any one should
+say an unkind word to you it is better not to answer at all; but if you
+_do_ reply do it kindly, and his conscience will accuse him, and he
+will regret his unkindness to you. This is the way Christ taught us to
+live. He tells us that if a person smite us on the one cheek we should
+offer unto him the other. That is Christ’s command to us, and we should
+follow it. You should therefore subdue your pride. Am I not right?”
+
+Ivan remained silent, but his father’s words had sunk deep into his
+heart.
+
+The old man coughed and continued: “Do you think Christ thought us
+wicked? Did he not die that we might be saved? Now you think only of
+this earthly life. Are you better or worse for thinking alone of it?
+Are you better or worse for having begun that Plevna battle? Think of
+your expense at court and the time lost in going back and forth, and
+what have you gained? Your sons have reached manhood, and are able now
+to work for you. You are therefore at liberty to enjoy life and be
+happy. With the assistance of your children you could reach a high
+state of prosperity. But now your property instead of increasing is
+gradually growing less, and why? It is the result of your pride. When
+it becomes necessary for you and your boys to go to the field to work,
+your enemy instead summons you to appear at court or before some kind
+of judicial person. If you do not plow at the proper time and sow at
+the proper time mother earth will not yield up her products, and you
+and your children will be left destitute. Why did your oats fail this
+year? When did you sow them? Were you not quarrelling with your
+neighbor instead of attending to your work? You have just now returned
+from the town, where you have been the means of having your neighbor
+humiliated. You have succeeded in getting him sentenced, but in the end
+the punishment will fall on your own shoulders. Oh! my child, it would
+be better for you to attend to your work on the farm and train your
+boys to become good farmers and honest men. If any one offend you
+forgive him for Christ’s sake, and then prosperity will smile on your
+work and a light and happy feeling will fill your heart.”
+
+Ivan still remained silent.
+
+The old father in a pleading voice continued: “Take an old man’s
+advice. Go and harness your horse, drive back to the court, and
+withdraw all these complaints against your neighbor. To-morrow go to
+him, offer to make peace in Christ’s name, and invite him to your
+house. It will be a holy day (the birth of the Virgin Mary). Get out
+the samovar and have some vodka, and over both forgive and forget each
+other’s sins, promising not to transgress in the future, and advise
+your women and children to do the same.”
+
+Ivan heaved a deep sigh but felt easier in his heart, as he thought:
+“The old man speaks the truth;” yet he was in doubt as to how he would
+put his father’s advice into practice.
+
+The old man, surmising his uncertainty, said to Ivan: “Go, Ivanushka;
+do not delay. Extinguish the fire in the beginning, before it grows
+large, for then it may be impossible.”
+
+Ivan’s father wished to say more to him, but was prevented by the
+arrival of the women, who came into the room chattering like so many
+magpies. They had already heard of Gavryl’s sentence, and of how he
+threatened to set fire to Ivan’s house. They found out all about it,
+and in telling it to their neighbors added their own versions of the
+story, with the usual exaggeration. Meeting in the pasture-ground, they
+proceeded to quarrel with Gavryl’s women. They related how the latter’s
+daughter-in-law had threatened to secure the influence of the manager
+of a certain noble’s estate in behalf of his friend Gavryl; also that
+the school-teacher was writing a petition to the Czar himself against
+Ivan, explaining in detail his theft of the perchbolt and partial
+destruction of Gavryl’s garden—declaring that half of Ivan’s land was
+to be given to them.
+
+Ivan listened calmly to their stories, but his anger was soon aroused
+once more, when he abandoned his intention of making peace with Gavryl.
+
+As Ivan was always busy about the household, he did not stop to speak
+to the wrangling women, but immediately left the room, directing his
+steps toward the barn. Before getting through with his work the sun had
+set and the boys had returned from their plowing. Ivan met them and
+asked about their work, helping them to put things in order and leaving
+the broken horse-collar aside to be repaired. He intended to perform
+some other duties, but it became too dark and he was obliged to leave
+them till the next day. He fed the cattle, however, and opened the gate
+that Taraska might take his horses to pasture for the night, after
+which he closed it again and went into the house for his supper.
+
+By this time he had forgotten all about Gavryl and what his father had
+said to him. Yet, just as he touched the door-knob, he heard sounds of
+quarrelling proceeding from his neighbor’s house.
+
+“What do I want with that devil?” shouted Gavryl to some one. “He
+deserves to be killed!”
+
+Ivan stopped and listened for a moment, when he shook his head
+threateningly and entered the room. When he came in, the apartment was
+already lighted. His daughter-in-law was working with her loom, while
+the old woman was preparing the supper. The eldest son was twining
+strings for his _lapti_ (peasant’s shoes made of strips of bark from
+the linden-tree). The other son was sitting by the table reading a
+book. The room presented a pleasant appearance, everything being in
+order and the inmates apparently gay and happy—the only dark shadow
+being that cast over the household by Ivan’s trouble with his neighbor.
+
+Ivan came in very cross, and, angrily throwing aside a cat which lay
+sleeping on the bench, cursed the women for having misplaced a pail. He
+looked very sad and serious, and, seating himself in a corner of the
+room, proceeded to repair the horse-collar. He could not forget Gavryl,
+however—the threatening words he had used in the court-room and those
+which Ivan had just heard.
+
+Presently Taraska came in, and after having his supper, put on his
+sheepskin coat, and, taking some bread with him, returned to watch over
+his horses for the night. His eldest brother wished to accompany him,
+but Ivan himself arose and went with him as far as the porch. The night
+was dark and cloudy and a strong wind was blowing, which produced a
+peculiar whistling sound that was most unpleasant to the ear. Ivan
+helped his son to mount his horse, which, followed by a colt, started
+off on a gallop.
+
+Ivan stood for a few moments looking around him and listening to the
+clatter of the horse’s hoofs as Taraska rode down the village street.
+He heard him meet other boys on horseback, who rode quite as well as
+Taraska, and soon all were lost in the darkness.
+
+Ivan remained standing by the gate in a gloomy mood, as he was unable
+to banish from his mind the harassing thoughts of Gavryl, which the
+latter’s menacing words had inspired: “Something will burn with greater
+fierceness in Ivan’s household before long.”
+
+“He is so desperate,” thought Ivan, “that he may set fire to my house
+regardless of the danger to his own. At present everything is dry, and
+as the wind is so high he may sneak from the back of his own building,
+start a fire, and get away unseen by any of us.
+
+“He may burn and steal without being found out, and thus go unpunished.
+I wish I could catch him.”
+
+This thought so worried Ivan that he decided not to return to his
+house, but went out and stood on the street-corner.
+
+“I guess,” thought Ivan to himself, “I will take a walk around the
+premises and examine everything carefully, for who knows what he may be
+tempted to do?”
+
+Ivan moved very cautiously round to the back of his buildings, not
+making the slightest noise, and scarcely daring to breathe. Just as he
+reached a corner of the house he looked toward the fence, and it seemed
+to him that he saw something moving, and that it was slowly creeping
+toward the corner of the house opposite to where he was standing. He
+stepped back quickly and hid himself in the shadow of the building.
+Ivan stood and listened, but all was quiet. Not a sound could be heard
+but the moaning of the wind through the branches of the trees, and the
+rustling of the leaves as it caught them up and whirled them in all
+directions. So dense was the darkness that it was at first impossible
+for Ivan to see more than a few feet beyond where he stood.
+
+After a time, however, his sight becoming accustomed to the gloom, he
+was enabled to see for a considerable distance. The plow and his other
+farming implements stood just where he had placed them. He could see
+also the opposite corner of the house.
+
+He looked in every direction, but no one was in sight, and he thought
+to himself that his imagination must have played him some trick,
+leading him to believe that some one was moving when there really was
+no one there.
+
+Still, Ivan was not satisfied, and decided to make a further
+examination of the premises. As on the previous occasion, he moved so
+very cautiously that he could not hear even the sound of his own
+footsteps. He had taken the precaution to remove his shoes, that he
+might step the more noiselessly. When he reached the corner of the barn
+it again seemed to him that he saw something moving, this time near the
+plow; but it quickly disappeared. By this time Ivan’s heart was beating
+very fast, and he was standing in a listening attitude when a sudden
+flash of light illumined the spot, and he could distinctly see the
+figure of a man seated on his haunches with his back turned toward him,
+and in the act of lighting a bunch of straw which he held in his hand!
+Ivan’s heart began to beat yet faster, and he became terribly excited,
+walking up and down with rapid strides, but without making a noise.
+
+Ivan said: “Well, now, he cannot get away, for he will be caught in the
+very act.”
+
+Ivan had taken a few more steps when suddenly a bright light flamed up,
+but not in the same spot in which he had seen the figure of the man
+sitting. Gavryl had lighted the straw, and running to the barn held it
+under the edge of the roof, which began to burn fiercely; and by the
+light of the fire he could distinctly see his neighbor standing.
+
+As an eagle springs at a skylark, so sprang Ivan at Gavryl, saying: “I
+will tear you into pieces! You shall not get away from me this time!”
+
+But “Gavryl the Lame,” hearing footsteps, wrenched himself free from
+Ivan’s grasp and ran like a hare past the buildings.
+
+Ivan, now terribly excited, shouted, “You shall not escape me!” and
+started in pursuit; but just as he reached him and was about to grasp
+the collar of his coat, Gavryl succeeded in jumping to one side, and
+Ivan’s coat became entangled in something and he was thrown violently
+to the ground. Jumping quickly to his feet he shouted, “_Karaool!
+derji!_” (watch! catch!)
+
+While Ivan was regaining his feet Gavryl succeeded in reaching his
+house, but Ivan followed so quickly that he caught up with him before
+he could enter. Just as he was about to grasp him he was struck on the
+head with some hard substance. He had been hit on the temple as with a
+stone. The blow was struck by Gavryl, who had picked up an oaken stave,
+and with it gave Ivan a terrible blow on the head.
+
+Ivan was stunned, and bright sparks danced before his eyes, while he
+swayed from side to side like a drunken man, until finally all became
+dark and he sank to the ground unconscious.
+
+When he recovered his senses, Gavryl was nowhere to be seen, but all
+around him was as light as day. Strange sounds proceeded from the
+direction of his house, and turning his face that way he saw that his
+barns were on fire. The rear parts of both were already destroyed, and
+the flames were leaping toward the front. Fire, smoke, and bits of
+burning straw were being rapidly whirled by the high wind over to where
+his house stood, and he expected every moment to see it burst into
+flames.
+
+“What is this, brother?” Ivan cried out, as he beat his thighs with his
+hands. “I should have stopped to snatch the bunch of burning straw,
+and, throwing it on the ground, should have extinguished it with my
+feet!”
+
+Ivan tried to cry out and arouse his people, but his lips refused to
+utter a word. He next tried to run, but he could not move his feet, and
+his legs seemed to twist themselves around each other. After several
+attempts he succeeded in taking one or two steps, when he again began
+to stagger and gasp for breath. It was some moments before he made
+another attempt to move, but after considerable exertion he finally
+reached the barn, the rear of which was by this time entirely consumed;
+and the corner of his house had already caught fire. Dense volumes of
+smoke began to pour out of the room, which made it difficult to
+approach.
+
+A crowd of peasants had by this time gathered, but they found it
+impossible to save their homes, so they carried everything which they
+could to a place of safety. The cattle they drove into neighboring
+pastures and left some one to care for them.
+
+The wind carried the sparks from Ivan’s house to Gavryl’s, and it, too,
+took fire and was consumed. The wind continued to increase with great
+fury, and the flames spread to both sides of the street, until in a
+very short time more than half the village was burned.
+
+The members of Ivan’s household had great difficulty in getting out of
+the burning building, but the neighbors rescued the old man and carried
+him to a place of safety, while the women escaped in only their
+night-clothes. Everything was burned, including the cattle and all the
+farm implements. The women lost their trunks, which were filled with
+quantities of clothing, the accumulation of years. The storehouse and
+all the provisions perished in the flames, not even the chickens being
+saved.
+
+Gavryl, however, more fortunate than Ivan, saved his cattle and a few
+other things.
+
+The village was burning all night.
+
+Ivan stood near his home, gazing sadly at the burning building, and he
+kept constantly repeating to himself: “I should have taken away the
+bunch of burning straw, and have stamped out the fire with my feet.”
+
+But when he saw his home fall in a smouldering heap, in spite of the
+terrible heat he sprang into the midst of it and carried out a charred
+log. The women seeing him, and fearing that he would lose his life,
+called to him to come back, but he would not pay any attention to them
+and went a second time to get a log. Still weak from the terrible blow
+which Gavryl had given him, he was overcome by the heat, and fell into
+the midst of the burning mass. Fortunately, his eldest son saw him
+fall, and rushing into the fire succeeded in getting hold of him and
+carrying him out of it. Ivan’s hair, beard, and clothing were burned
+entirely off. His hands were also frightfully injured, but he seemed
+indifferent to pain.
+
+“Grief drove him crazy,” the people said.
+
+The fire was growing less, but Ivan still stood where he could see it,
+and kept repeating to himself, “I should have taken,” etc.
+
+The morning after the fire the _starosta_ (village elder) sent his son
+to Ivan to tell him that the old man, his father, was dying, and wanted
+to see him to bid him good-bye.
+
+In his grief Ivan had forgotten all about his father, and could not
+understand what was being said to him. In a dazed way he asked: “What
+father? Whom does he want?”
+
+The elder’s son again repeated his father’s message to Ivan. “Your aged
+parent is at our house dying, and he wants to see you and bid you
+good-bye. Won’t you go now, uncle Ivan?” the boy said.
+
+Finally Ivan understood, and followed the elder’s son.
+
+When Ivan’s father was carried from the oven, he was slightly injured
+by a big bunch of burning straw falling on him just as he reached the
+street. To insure his safety he was removed to the elder’s house, which
+stood a considerable distance from his late home, and where it was not
+likely that the fire would reach it.
+
+When Ivan arrived at the elder’s home he found only the latter’s wife
+and children, who were all seated on the brick oven. The old man was
+lying on a bench holding a lighted candle in his hand (a Russian custom
+when a person is dying). Hearing a noise, he turned his face toward the
+door, and when he saw it was his son he tried to move. He motioned for
+Ivan to come nearer, and when he did so he whispered in a trembling
+voice: “Well, Ivanushka, did I not tell you before what would be the
+result of this sad affair? Who set the village on fire?”
+
+“He, he, _batiushka_ [little father]; he did it. I caught him. He
+placed the bunch of burning straw to the barn in my presence. Instead
+of running after him, I should have snatched the bunch of burning straw
+and throwing it on the ground have stamped it out with my feet; and
+then there would have been no fire.”
+
+“Ivan,” said the old man, “death is fast approaching me, and remember
+that you also will have to die. Who did this dreadful thing? Whose is
+the sin?”
+
+Ivan gazed at the noble face of his dying father and was silent. His
+heart was too full for utterance.
+
+“In the presence of God,” the old man continued, “whose is the sin?”
+
+It was only now that the truth began to dawn upon Ivan’s mind, and that
+he realized how foolish he had acted. He sobbed bitterly, and fell on
+his knees before his father, and, crying like a child, said:
+
+“My dear father, forgive me, for Christ’s sake, for I am guilty before
+God and before you!”
+
+The old man transferred the lighted candle from his right hand to the
+left, and, raising the former to his forehead, tried to make the sign
+of the cross, but owing to weakness was unable to do so.
+
+“Glory to Thee, O Lord! Glory to Thee!” he exclaimed; and turning his
+dim eyes toward his son, he said: “See here, Ivanushka! Ivanushka, my
+dear son!”
+
+“What, my dear father?” Ivan asked.
+
+“What are you going to do,” replied the old man, “now that you have no
+home?”
+
+Ivan cried and said: “I do not know how we shall live now.”
+
+The old man closed his eyes and made a movement with his lips, as if
+gathering his feeble strength for a final effort. Slowly opening his
+eyes, he whispered:
+
+“Should you live according to God’s commands you will be happy and
+prosperous again.”
+
+The old man was now silent for awhile and then, smiling sadly, he
+continued:
+
+“See here, Ivanushka, keep silent concerning this trouble, and do not
+tell who set the village on fire. Forgive one sin of your neighbor’s,
+and God will forgive two of yours.”
+
+Grasping the candle with both hands, Ivan’s father heaved a deep sigh,
+and, stretching himself out on his back, yielded up the ghost.
+
+
+Ivan for once accepted his father’s advice. He did not betray Gavryl,
+and no one ever learned the origin of the fire.
+
+Ivan’s heart became more kindly disposed toward his old enemy, feeling
+that much of the fault in connection with this sad affair rested with
+himself.
+
+Gavryl was greatly surprised that Ivan did not denounce him before all
+the villagers, and at first he stood in much fear of him, but he soon
+afterward overcame this feeling.
+
+The two peasants ceased to quarrel, and their families followed their
+example. While they were building new houses, both families lived
+beneath the same roof, and when they moved into their respective homes,
+Ivan and Gavryl lived on as good terms as their fathers had done before
+them.
+
+Ivan remembered his dying father’s command, and took deeply to heart
+the evident warning of God that _a fire should be extinguished in the
+beginning_. If any one wronged him he did not seek revenge, but instead
+made every effort to settle the matter peaceably. If any one spoke to
+him unkindly, he did not answer in the same way, but replied softly,
+and tried to persuade the person not to speak evil. He taught the women
+and children of his household to do the same.
+
+Ivan Scherbakoff was now a reformed man.
+
+He lived well and peacefully, and again became prosperous.
+
+Let us, therefore, have peace, live in brotherly love and kindness, and
+we will be happy.
+
+
+
+
+“POLIKUSHKA;”
+or, _The Lot of a Wicked Court Servant_.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+
+Polikey was a court man—one of the staff of servants belonging to the
+court household of a _boyarinia_ (lady of the nobility).
+
+He held a very insignificant position on the estate, and lived in a
+rather poor, small house with his wife and children.
+
+The house was built by the deceased nobleman whose widow he still
+continued to serve, and may be described as follows: The four walls
+surrounding the one _izba_ (room) were built of stone, and the interior
+was ten yards square. A Russian stove stood in the centre, around which
+was a free passage. Each corner was fenced off as a separate inclosure
+to the extent of several feet, and the one nearest to the door (the
+smallest of all) was known as “Polikey’s corner.” Elsewhere in the room
+stood the bed (with quilt, sheet, and cotton pillows), the cradle (with
+a baby lying therein), and the three-legged table, on which the meals
+were prepared and the family washing was done. At the latter also
+Polikey was at work on the preparation of some materials for use in his
+profession—that of an amateur veterinary surgeon. A calf, some hens,
+the family clothes and household utensils, together with seven persons,
+filled the little home to the utmost of its capacity. It would indeed
+have been almost impossible for them to move around had it not been for
+the convenience of the stove, on which some of them slept at night, and
+which served as a table in the day-time.
+
+It seemed hard to realize how so many persons managed to live in such
+close quarters.
+
+Polikey’s wife, Akulina, did the washing, spun and wove, bleached her
+linen, cooked and baked, and found time also to quarrel and gossip with
+her neighbors.
+
+The monthly allowance of food which they received from the noblewoman’s
+house was amply sufficient for the whole family, and there was always
+enough meal left to make mash for the cow. Their fuel they got free,
+and likewise the food for the cattle. In addition they were given a
+small piece of land on which to raise vegetables. They had a cow, a
+calf, and a number of chickens to care for.
+
+Polikey was employed in the stables to take care of two stallions, and,
+when necessary, to bleed the horses and cattle and clean their hoofs.
+
+In his treatment of the animals he used syringes, plasters, and various
+other remedies and appliances of his own invention. For these services
+he received whatever provisions were required by his family, and a
+certain sum of money—all of which would have been sufficient to enable
+them to live comfortably and even happily, if their hearts had not been
+filled with the shadow of a great sorrow.
+
+This shadow darkened the lives of the entire family.
+
+Polikey, while young, was employed in a horse-breeding establishment in
+a neighboring village. The head stableman was a notorious horse-thief,
+known far and wide as a great rogue, who, for his many misdeeds, was
+finally exiled to Siberia. Under his instruction Polikey underwent a
+course of training, and, being but a boy, was easily induced to perform
+many evil deeds. He became so expert in the various kinds of wickedness
+practiced by his teacher that, though he many times would gladly have
+abandoned his evil ways, he could not, owing to the great hold these
+early-formed habits had upon him. His father and mother died when he
+was but a child, and he had no one to point out to him the paths of
+virtue.
+
+In addition to his other numerous shortcomings, Polikey was fond of
+strong drink. He also had a habit of appropriating other people’s
+property, when the opportunity offered of his doing so without being
+seen. Collar-straps, padlocks, perch-bolts, and things even of greater
+value belonging to others found their way with remarkable rapidity and
+in great quantities to Polikey’s home. He did not, however, keep such
+things for his own use, but sold them whenever he could find a
+purchaser. His payment consisted chiefly of whiskey, though sometimes
+he received cash.
+
+This sort of employment, as his neighbors said, was both light and
+profitable; it required neither education nor labor. It had one
+drawback, however, which was calculated to reconcile his victims to
+their losses: Though he could for a time have all his needs supplied
+without expending either labor or money, there was always the
+possibility of his methods being discovered; and this result was sure
+to be followed by a long term of imprisonment. This impending danger
+made life a burden for Polikey and his family.
+
+Such a setback indeed very nearly happened to Polikey early in his
+career. He married while still young, and God gave him much happiness.
+His wife, who was a shepherd’s daughter, was a strong, intelligent,
+hard-working woman. She bore him many children, each of whom was said
+to be better than the preceding one.
+
+Polikey still continued to steal, but once was caught with some small
+articles belonging to others in his possession. Among them was a pair
+of leather reins, the property of another peasant, who beat him
+severely and reported him to his mistress.
+
+From that time on Polikey was an object of suspicion, and he was twice
+again detected in similar escapades. By this time the people began to
+abuse him, and the clerk of the court threatened to recruit him into
+the army as a soldier (which is regarded by the peasants as a great
+punishment and disgrace). His noble mistress severely reprimanded him;
+his wife wept from grief for his downfall, and everything went from bad
+to worse.
+
+Polikey, notwithstanding his weakness, was a good-natured sort of man,
+but his love of strong drink had so overcome every moral instinct that
+at times he was scarcely responsible for his actions. This habit he
+vainly endeavored to overcome. It often happened that when he returned
+home intoxicated, his wife, losing all patience, roundly cursed him and
+cruelly beat him. At times he would cry like a child, and bemoan his
+fate, saying: “Unfortunate man that I am, what shall I do? _Let my eyes
+burst into pieces_ if I do not forever give up the vile habit! I will
+not again touch vodka.”
+
+In spite of all his promises of reform, but a short period (perhaps a
+month) would elapse when Polikey would again mysteriously disappear
+from his home and be lost for several days on a spree.
+
+“From what source does he get the money he spends so freely?” the
+neighbors inquired of each other, as they sadly shook their heads.
+
+One of his most unfortunate exploits in the matter of stealing was in
+connection with a clock which belonged to the estate of his mistress.
+The clock stood in the private office of the noblewoman, and was so old
+as to have outlived its usefulness, and was simply kept as an heirloom.
+It so happened that Polikey went into the office one day when no one
+was present but himself, and, seeing the old clock, it seemed to
+possess a peculiar fascination for him, and he speedily transferred it
+to his person. He carried it to a town not far from the village, where
+he very readily found a purchaser.
+
+As if purposely to secure his punishment, it happened that the
+storekeeper to whom he sold it proved to be a relative of one of the
+court servants, and who, when he visited his friend on the next
+holiday, related all about his purchase of the clock.
+
+An investigation was immediately instituted, and all the details of
+Polikey’s transaction were brought to light and reported to his noble
+mistress. He was called into her presence, and, when confronted with
+the story of the theft, broke down and confessed all. He fell on his
+knees before the noblewoman and plead with her for mercy. The
+kind-hearted lady lectured him about God, the salvation of his soul,
+and his future life. She talked to him also about the misery and
+disgrace he brought upon his family, and altogether so worked upon his
+feelings that he cried like a child. In conclusion his kind mistress
+said: “I will forgive you this time on the condition that you promise
+faithfully to reform, and never again to take what does not belong to
+you.”
+
+Polikey, still weeping, replied: “I will never steal again in all my
+life, and if I break my promise may the earth open and swallow me up,
+and let my body be burned with red-hot irons!”
+
+Polikey returned to his home, and throwing himself on the oven spent
+the entire day weeping and repeating the promise made to his mistress.
+
+From that time on he was not again caught stealing, but his life became
+extremely sad, for he was regarded with suspicion by every one and
+pointed to as a thief.
+
+When the time came round for securing recruits for the army, all the
+peasants singled out Polikey as the first to be taken. The
+superintendent was especially anxious to get rid of him, and went to
+his mistress to induce her to have him sent away. The kind-hearted and
+merciful woman, remembering the peasant’s repentance, refused to grant
+the superintendent’s request, and told him he must take some other man
+in his stead.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+
+One evening Polikey was sitting on his bed beside the table, preparing
+some medicine for the cattle, when suddenly the door was thrown wide
+open, and Aksiutka, a young girl from the court, rushed in. Almost out
+of breath, she said: “My mistress has ordered you, Polikey _Illitch_
+[son of Ilia], to come up to the court at once!”
+
+The girl was standing and still breathing heavily from her late
+exertion as she continued: “Egor Mikhailovitch, the superintendent, has
+been to see our lady about having you drafted into the army, and,
+Polikey Illitch, your name was mentioned among others. Our lady has
+sent me to tell you to come up to the court immediately.”
+
+As soon as Aksiutka had delivered her message she left the room in the
+same abrupt manner in which she had entered.
+
+Akulina, without saying a word, got up and brought her husband’s boots
+to him. They were poor, worn-out things which some soldier had given
+him, and his wife did not glance at him as she handed them to him.
+
+“Are you going to change your shirt, Illitch?” she asked, at last.
+
+“No,” replied Polikey.
+
+Akulina did not once look at him all the time he was putting on his
+boots and preparing to go to the court. Perhaps, after all, it was
+better that she did not do so. His face was very pale and his lips
+trembled. He slowly combed his hair and was about to depart without
+saying a word, when his wife stopped him to arrange the ribbon on his
+shirt, and, after toying a little with his coat, she put his hat on for
+him and he left the little home.
+
+Polikey’s next-door neighbors were a joiner and his wife. A thin
+partition only separated the two families, and each could hear what the
+other said and did. Soon after Polikey’s departure a woman was heard to
+say: “Well, Polikey Illitch, so your mistress has sent for you!”
+
+The voice was that of the joiner’s wife on the other side of the
+partition. Akulina and the woman had quarrelled that morning about some
+trifling thing done by one of Polikey’s children, and it afforded her
+the greatest pleasure to learn that her neighbor had been summoned into
+the presence of his noble mistress. She looked upon such a circumstance
+as a bad omen. She continued talking to herself and said: “Perhaps she
+wants to send him to the town to make some purchases for her household.
+I did not suppose she would select such a faithful man as you are to
+perform such a service for her. If it should prove that she _does_ want
+to send you to the next town, just buy me a quarter-pound of tea. Will
+you, Polikey Illitch?”
+
+Poor Akulina, on hearing the joiner’s wife talking so unkindly of her
+husband, could hardly suppress the tears, and, the tirade continuing,
+she at last became angry, and wished she could in some way punish her.
+
+Forgetting her neighbor’s unkindness, her thoughts soon turned in
+another direction, and glancing at her sleeping children she said to
+herself that they might soon be orphans and she herself a soldier’s
+widow. This thought greatly distressed her, and burying her face in her
+hands she seated herself on the bed, where several of her progeny were
+fast asleep. Presently a little voice interrupted her meditations by
+crying out, “_Mamushka_ [little mother], you are crushing me,” and the
+child pulled her nightdress from under her mother’s arms.
+
+Akulina, with her head still resting on her hands, said: “Perhaps it
+would be better if we all should die. I only seem to have brought you
+into the world to suffer sorrow and misery.”
+
+Unable longer to control her grief, she burst into violent weeping,
+which served to increase the amusement of the joiner’s wife, who had
+not forgotten the morning’s squabble, and she laughed loudly at her
+neighbor’s woe.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+
+About half an hour had passed when the youngest child began to cry and
+Akulina arose to feed it. She had by this time ceased to weep, and
+after feeding the infant she again fell into her old position, with her
+face buried in her hands. She was very pale, but this only increased
+her beauty. After a time she raised her head, and staring at the
+burning candle she began to question herself as to why she had married,
+and as to the reason that the Czar required so many soldiers.
+
+Presently she heard steps outside, and knew that her husband was
+returning. She hurriedly wiped away the last traces of her tears as she
+arose to let him pass into the centre of the room.
+
+Polikey made his appearance with a look of triumph on his face, threw
+his hat on the bed, and hastily removed his coat; but not a word did he
+utter.
+
+Akulina, unable to restrain her impatience, asked, “Well, what did she
+want with you?”
+
+“Pshaw!” he replied, “it is very well known that Polikushka is
+considered the worst man in the village; but when it comes to business
+of importance, who is selected then? Why, Polikushka, of course.”
+
+“What kind of business?” Akulina timidly inquired.
+
+But Polikey was in no hurry to answer her question. He lighted his pipe
+with a very imposing air, and spit several times on the floor before he
+replied.
+
+Still retaining his pompous manner, he said, “She has ordered me to go
+to a certain merchant in the town and collect a considerable sum of
+money.”
+
+“You to collect money?” questioned Akulina.
+
+Polikey only shook his head and smiled significantly, saying:
+
+“‘You,’ the mistress said to me, ‘are a man resting under a grave
+suspicion—a man who is considered unsafe to trust in any capacity; but
+I have faith in you, and will intrust you with this important business
+of mine in preference to any one else.’”
+
+Polikey related all this in a loud voice, so that his neighbor might
+hear what he had to say.
+
+“‘You promised me to reform,’ my noble mistress said to me, ‘and I will
+be the first to show you how much faith I have in your promise. I want
+you to ride into town, and, going to the principal merchant there,
+collect a sum of money from him and bring it to me.’ I said to my
+mistress: ‘Everything you order shall be done. I will only too gladly
+obey your slightest wish.’
+
+“Then my mistress said: ‘Do you understand, Polikey, that your future
+lot depends upon the faithful performance of this duty I impose upon
+you?’ I replied: ‘Yes, I understand everything, and feel that I will
+succeed in performing acceptably any task which you may impose upon me.
+I have been accused of every kind of evil deed that it is possible to
+charge a man with, but I have never done anything seriously wrong
+against you, your honor.’ In this way I talked to our mistress until I
+succeeded in convincing her that my repentance was sincere, and she
+became greatly softened toward me, saying, ‘If you are successful I
+will give you the first place at the court.’”
+
+“And how much money are you to collect?” inquired Akulina.
+
+“Fifteen hundred rubles,” carelessly answered Polikey.
+
+Akulina sadly shook her head as she asked, “When are you to start?”
+
+“She ordered me to leave here to-morrow,” Polikey replied. “‘Take any
+horse you please,’ she said. ‘Come to the office, and I will see you
+there and wish you God-speed on your journey.’”
+
+“Glory to Thee, O Lord!” said Akulina, as she arose and made the sign
+of the cross. “God, I am sure, will bless you, Illitch,” she added, in
+a whisper, so that the people on the other side of the partition could
+not hear what she said, all the while holding on to his sleeve.
+“Illitch,” she cried at last, excitedly, “for God’s sake promise me
+that you will not touch a drop of vodka. Take an oath before God, and
+kiss the cross, so that I may be sure that you will not break your
+promise!”
+
+Polikey replied in most contemptuous tones: “Do you think I will dare
+to touch vodka when I shall have such a large sum of money in my care?”
+
+“Akulina, have a clean shirt ready for the morning,” were his parting
+words for the night.
+
+So Polikey and his wife went to sleep in a happy frame of mind and full
+of bright dreams for the future.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+
+Very early the next morning, almost before the stars had hidden
+themselves from view, there was seen standing before Polikey’s home a
+low wagon, the same in which the superintendent himself used to ride;
+and harnessed to it was a large-boned, dark-brown mare, called for some
+unknown reason by the name of _Baraban_ (drum). Aniutka, Polikey’s
+eldest daughter, in spite of the heavy rain and the cold wind which was
+blowing, stood outside barefooted and held (not without some fear) the
+reins in one hand, while with the other she endeavored to keep her
+green and yellow overcoat wound around her body, and also to hold
+Polikey’s sheepskin coat.
+
+In the house there were the greatest noise and confusion. The morning
+was still so dark that the little daylight there was failed to
+penetrate through the broken panes of glass, the window being stuffed
+in many places with rags and paper to exclude the cold air.
+
+Akulina ceased from her cooking for a while and helped to get Polikey
+ready for the journey. Most of the children were still in bed, very
+likely as a protection against the cold, for Akulina had taken away the
+big overcoat which usually covered them and had substituted a shawl of
+her own. Polikey’s shirt was all ready, nice and clean, but his shoes
+badly needed repairing, and this fact caused his devoted wife much
+anxiety. She took from her own feet the thick woollen stockings she was
+wearing, and gave them to Polikey. She then began to repair his shoes,
+patching up the holes so as to protect his feet from dampness.
+
+While this was going on he was sitting on the side of the bed with his
+feet dangling over the edge, and trying to turn the sash which confined
+his coat at the waist. He was anxious to look as clean as possible, and
+he declared his sash looked like a dirty rope.
+
+One of his daughters, enveloped in a sheepskin coat, was sent to a
+neighbor’s house to borrow a hat.
+
+Within Polikey’s home the greatest confusion reigned, for the court
+servants were constantly arriving with innumerable small orders which
+they wished Polikey to execute for them in town. One wanted needles,
+another tea, another tobacco, and last came the joiner’s wife, who by
+this time had prepared her samovar, and, anxious to make up the quarrel
+of the previous day, brought the traveller a cup of tea.
+
+Neighbor Nikita refused the loan of the hat, so the old one had to be
+patched up for the occasion. This occupied some time, as there were
+many holes in it.
+
+Finally Polikey was all ready, and jumping on the wagon started on his
+journey, after first making the sign of the cross.
+
+At the last moment his little boy, Mishka, ran to the door, begging to
+be given a short ride; and then his little daughter, Mashka, appeared
+on the scene and pleaded that she, too, might have a ride, declaring
+that she would be quite warm enough without furs.
+
+Polikey stopped the horse on hearing the children, and Akulina placed
+them in the wagon, together with two others belonging to a neighbor—all
+anxious to have a short ride.
+
+As Akulina helped the little ones into the wagon she took occasion to
+remind Polikey of the solemn promise he had made her not to touch a
+drop of vodka during the journey.
+
+Polikey drove the children as far as the blacksmith’s place, where he
+let them out of the wagon, telling them they must return home. He then
+arranged his clothing, and, setting his hat firmly on his head, started
+his horse on a trot.
+
+The two children, Mishka and Mashka, both barefooted, started running
+at such a rapid pace that a strange dog from another village, seeing
+them flying over the road, dropped his tail between his legs and ran
+home squealing.
+
+The weather was very cold, a sharp cutting wind blowing continuously;
+but this did not disturb Polikey, whose mind was engrossed with
+pleasant thoughts. As he rode through the wintry blasts he kept
+repeating to himself: “So I am the man they wanted to send to Siberia,
+and whom they threatened to enroll as a soldier—the same man whom every
+one abused, and said he was lazy, and who was pointed out as a thief
+and given the meanest work on the estate to do! Now I am going to
+receive a large sum of money, for which my mistress is sending me
+because she trusts me. I am also riding in the same wagon that the
+superintendent himself uses when he is riding as a representative of
+the court. I have the same harness, leather horse-collar, reins, and
+all the other gear.”
+
+Polikey, filled with pride at thought of the mission with which he had
+been intrusted, drew himself up with an air of pride, and, fixing his
+old hat more firmly on his head, buttoned his coat tightly about him
+and urged his horse to greater speed.
+
+“Just to think,” he continued; “I shall have in my possession three
+thousand half-rubles [the peasant manner of speaking of money so as to
+make it appear a larger sum than it really is], and will carry them in
+my bosom. If I wished to I might run away to Odessa instead of taking
+the money to my mistress. But no; I will not do that. I will surely
+carry the money straight to the one who has been kind enough to trust
+me.”
+
+When Polikey reached the first _kabak_ (tavern) he found that from long
+habit the mare was naturally turning her head toward it; but he would
+not allow her to stop, though money had been given him to purchase both
+food and drink. Striking the animal a sharp blow with the whip, he
+passed by the tavern. The performance was repeated when he reached the
+next kabak, which looked very inviting; but he resolutely set his face
+against entering, and passed on.
+
+About noon he arrived at his destination, and getting down from the
+wagon approached the gate of the merchant’s house where the servants of
+the court always stopped. Opening it he led the mare through, and
+(after unharnessing her) fed her. This done, he next entered the house
+and had dinner with the merchant’s workingman, and to them he related
+what an important mission he had been sent on, making himself very
+amusing by the pompous air which he assumed. Dinner over, he carried a
+letter to the merchant which the noblewoman had given him to deliver.
+
+The merchant, knowing thoroughly the reputation which Polikey bore,
+felt doubtful of trusting him with so much money, and somewhat
+anxiously inquired if he really had received orders to carry so many
+rubles.
+
+Polikey tried to appear offended at this question, but did not succeed,
+and he only smiled.
+
+The merchant, after reading the letter a second time and being
+convinced that all was right, gave Polikey the money, which he put in
+his bosom for safe-keeping.
+
+On his way to the house he did not once stop at any of the shops he
+passed. The clothing establishments possessed no attractions for him,
+and after he had safely passed them all he stood for a moment, feeling
+very pleased that he had been able to withstand temptation, and then
+went on his way.
+
+“I have money enough to buy up everything,” he said; “but I will not do
+so.”
+
+The numerous commissions which he had received compelled him to go to
+the bazaar. There he bought only what had been ordered, but he could
+not resist the temptation to ask the price of a very handsome
+sheep-skin coat which attracted his attention. The merchant to whom he
+spoke looked at Polikey and smiled, not believing that he had
+sufficient money to purchase such an expensive coat. But Polikey,
+pointing to his breast, said that he could buy out the whole shop if he
+wished to. He thereupon ordered the shop-keeper to take his measure. He
+tried the coat on and looked himself over carefully, testing the
+quality and blowing upon the hair to see that none of it came out.
+Finally, heaving a deep sigh, he took it off.
+
+“The price is too high,” he said. “If you could let me have it for
+fifteen rubles—”
+
+But the merchant cut him short by snatching the coat from him and
+throwing it angrily to one side.
+
+Polikey left the bazaar and returned to the merchant’s house in high
+spirits.
+
+After supper he went out and fed the mare, and prepared everything for
+the night. Returning to the house he got up on the stove to rest, and
+while there he took out the envelope which contained the money and
+looked long and earnestly at it. He could not read, but asked one of
+those present to tell him what the writing on the envelope meant. It
+was simply the address and the announcement that it contained fifteen
+hundred rubles.
+
+The envelope was made of common paper and was sealed with dark-brown
+sealing wax. There was one large seal in the centre and four smaller
+ones at the corners. Polikey continued to examine it carefully, even
+inserting his finger till he touched the crisp notes. He appeared to
+take a childish delight in having so much money in his possession.
+
+Having finished his examination, he put the envelope inside the lining
+of his old battered hat, and placing both under his head he went to
+sleep; but during the night he frequently awoke and always felt to know
+if the money was safe. Each time that he found that it was safe he
+rejoiced at the thought that he, Polikey, abused and regarded by every
+one as a thief, was intrusted with the care of such a large sum of
+money, and also that he was about to return with it quite as safely as
+the superintendent himself could have done.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+
+Before dawn the next morning Polikey was up, and after harnessing the
+mare and looking in his hat to see that the money was all right, he
+started on his return journey.
+
+Many times on the way Polikey took off his hat to see that the money
+was safe. Once he said to himself, “I think that perhaps it would be
+better if I should put it in my bosom.” This would necessitate the
+untying of his sash, so he decided to keep it still in his hat, or
+until he should have made half the journey, when he would be compelled
+to stop to feed his horse and to rest.
+
+He said to himself: “The lining is not sewn in very strongly and the
+envelope might fall out, so I think I had better not take off my hat
+until I reach home.”
+
+The money was safe—at least, so it seemed to him—and he began to think
+how grateful his mistress would be to him, and in his excited
+imagination he saw the five rubles he was so sure of receiving.
+
+Once more he examined the hat to see that the money was safe, and
+finding everything all right he put on his hat and pulled it well down
+over his ears, smiling all the while at his own thoughts.
+
+Akulina had carefully sewed all the holes in the hat, but it burst out
+in other places owing to Polikey’s removing it so often.
+
+In the darkness he did not notice the new rents, and tried to push the
+envelope further under the lining, and in doing so pushed one corner of
+it through the plush.
+
+The sun was getting high in the heavens, and Polikey having slept but
+little the previous night and feeling its warm rays fell fast asleep,
+after first pressing his hat more firmly on his head. By this action he
+forced the envelope still further through the plush, and as he rode
+along his head bobbed up and down.
+
+Polikey did not awake till he arrived near his own house, and his first
+act was to put his hand to his head to learn if his hat was all right.
+Finding that it was in its place, he did not think it necessary to
+examine it and see that the money was safe. Touching the mare gently
+with the whip she started into a trot, and as he rode along he arranged
+in his own mind how much he was to receive. With the air of a man
+already holding a high position at the court, he looked around him with
+an expression of lofty scorn on his face.
+
+As he neared his house he could see before him the one room which
+constituted their humble home, and the joiner’s wife next door carrying
+her rolls of linen. He saw also the office of the court and his
+mistress’s house, where he hoped he would be able presently to prove
+that he was an honest, trustworthy man.
+
+He reasoned with himself that any person can be abused by lying
+tongues, but when his mistress would see him she would say: “Well done,
+Polikey; you have shown that you can be honest. Here are three—it may
+be five—perhaps ten—rubles for you;” and also she would order tea for
+him, and might treat him to vodka—who knows?
+
+The latter thought gave him great pleasure, as he was feeling very
+cold.
+
+Speaking aloud he said: “What a happy holy-day we can have with ten
+rubles! Having so much money, I could pay Nikita the four rubles fifty
+kopecks which I owe him, and yet have some left to buy shoes for the
+children.”
+
+When near the house Polikey began to arrange his clothes, smoothing
+down his fur collar, re-tying his sash, and stroking his hair. To do
+the latter he had to take off his hat, and when doing so felt in the
+lining for the envelope. Quicker and quicker he ran his hand around the
+lining, and not finding the money used both hands, first one and then
+the other. But the envelope was not to be found.
+
+Polikey was by this time greatly distressed, and his face was white
+with fear as he passed his hand through the crown of his old hat.
+Polikey stopped the mare and began a diligent search through the wagon
+and its contents. Not finding the precious envelope, he felt in all his
+pockets—_but the money could not be found!_
+
+Wildly clutching at his hair, he exclaimed: “_Batiushka!_ What will I
+do now? What will become of me?” At the same time he realized that he
+was near his neighbors’ house and could be seen by them; so he turned
+the mare around, and, pulling his hat down securely upon his head, he
+rode quickly back in search of his lost treasure.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+
+The whole day passed without any one in the village of Pokrovski having
+seen anything of Polikey. During the afternoon his mistress inquired
+many times as to his whereabouts, and sent Aksiutka frequently to
+Akulina, who each time sent back word that Polikey had not yet
+returned, saying also that perhaps the merchant had kept him, or that
+something had happened to the mare.
+
+His poor wife felt a heavy load upon her heart, and was scarcely able
+to do her housework and put everything in order for the next day (which
+was to be a holy-day). The children also anxiously awaited their
+father’s appearance, and, though for different reasons, could hardly
+restrain their impatience. The noblewoman and Akulina were concerned
+only in regard to Polikey himself, while the children were interested
+most in what he would bring them from the town.
+
+The only news received by the villagers during the day concerning
+Polikey was to the effect that neighboring peasants had seen him
+running up and down the road and asking every one he met if he or she
+had found an envelope.
+
+One of them had seen him also walking by the side of his tired-out
+horse. “I thought,” said he, “that the man was drunk, and had not fed
+his horse for two days—the animal looked so exhausted.”
+
+Unable to sleep, and with her heart palpitating at every sound, Akulina
+lay awake all night vainly awaiting Polikey’s return. When the cock
+crowed the third time she was obliged to get up to attend to the fire.
+Day was just dawning and the church-bells had begun to ring. Soon all
+the children were also up, but there was still no tidings of the
+missing husband and father.
+
+In the morning the chill blasts of winter entered their humble home,
+and on looking out they saw that the houses, fields, and roads were
+thickly covered with snow. The day was clear and cold, as if befitting
+the holy-day they were about to celebrate. They were able to see a long
+distance from the house, but no one was in sight.
+
+Akulina was busy baking cakes, and had it not been for the joyous
+shouts of the children she would not have known that Polikey was coming
+up the road, for a few minutes later he came in with a bundle in his
+hand and walked quietly to his corner. Akulina noticed that he was very
+pale and that his face bore an expression of suffering—as if he would
+like to have cried but could not do so. But she did not stop to study
+it, but excitedly inquired: “What! Illitch, is everything all right
+with you?”
+
+He slowly muttered something, but his wife could not understand what he
+said.
+
+“What!” she cried out, “have you been to see our mistress?”
+
+Polikey still sat on the bed in his corner, glaring wildly about him,
+and smiling bitterly. He did not reply for a long time, and Akulina
+again cried:
+
+“Eh? Illitch! Why don’t you answer me? Why don’t you speak?”
+
+Finally he said: “Akulina, I delivered the money to our mistress; and
+oh, how she thanked me!” Then he suddenly looked about him, with an
+anxious, startled air, and with a sad smile on his lips. Two things in
+the room seemed to engross the most of his attention: the baby in the
+cradle, and the rope which was attached to the ladder. Approaching the
+cradle, he began with his thin fingers quickly to untie the knot in the
+rope by which the two were connected. After untying it he stood for a
+few moments looking silently at the baby.
+
+Akulina did not notice this proceeding, and with her cakes on the board
+went to place them in a corner.
+
+Polikey quickly hid the rope beneath his coat, and again seated himself
+on the bed.
+
+“What is it that troubles you, Illitch?” inquired Akulina. “You are not
+yourself.”
+
+“I have not slept,” he answered.
+
+Suddenly a dark shadow crossed the window, and a minute later the girl
+Aksiutka quickly entered the room, exclaiming:
+
+“The _boyarinia_ commands you, Polikey Illitch, to come to her this
+moment!”
+
+Polikey looked first at Akulina and then at the girl.
+
+“This moment!” he cried. “What more is wanted?”
+
+He spoke the last sentence so softly that Akulina became quieted in her
+mind, thinking that perhaps their mistress intended to reward her
+husband.
+
+“Say that I will come immediately,” he said.
+
+But Polikey failed to follow the girl, and went instead to another
+place.
+
+From the porch of his house there was a ladder reaching to the attic.
+Arriving at the foot of the ladder Polikey looked around him, and
+seeing no one about, he quickly ascended to the garret.
+
+
+Meanwhile the girl had reached her mistress’s house.
+
+“What does it mean that Polikey does not come?” said the noblewoman
+impatiently. “Where can he be? Why does he not come at once?”
+
+Aksiutka flew again to his house and demanded to see Polikey.
+
+“He went a long time ago,” answered Akulina, and looking around with an
+expression of fear on her face, she added, “He may have fallen asleep
+somewhere on the way.”
+
+About this time the joiner’s wife, with hair unkempt and clothes
+bedraggled, went up to the loft to gather the linen which she had
+previously put there to dry. Suddenly a cry of horror was heard, and
+the woman, with her eyes closed, and crazed by fear, ran down the
+ladder like a cat.
+
+“Illitch,” she cried, “has hanged himself!”
+
+Poor Akulina ran up the ladder before any of the people, who had
+gathered from the surrounding houses, could prevent her. With a loud
+shriek she fell back as if dead, and would surely have been killed had
+not one of the spectators succeeded in catching her in his arms.
+
+Before dark the same day a peasant of the village, while returning from
+the town, found the envelope containing Polikey’s money on the
+roadside, and soon after delivered it to the _boyarinia_.
+
+
+
+
+THE CANDLE.
+
+
+“Ye have heard that it hath been said, an eye for an eye and a tooth
+for a tooth: but I say unto you, That ye resist not evil.”—ST. MATTHEW
+v. 38, 39.
+
+
+It was in the time of serfdom—many years before Alexander II.’s
+liberation of the sixty million serfs in 1862. In those days the people
+were ruled by different kinds of lords. There were not a few who,
+remembering God, treated their slaves in a humane manner, and not as
+beasts of burden, while there were others who were seldom known to
+perform a kind or generous action; but the most barbarous and
+tyrannical of all were those former serfs who arose from the dirt and
+became princes.
+
+It was this latter class who made life literally a burden to those who
+were unfortunate enough to come under their rule. Many of them had
+arisen from the ranks of the peasantry to become superintendents of
+noblemen’s estates.
+
+The peasants were obliged to work for their master a certain number of
+days each week. There was plenty of land and water and the soil was
+rich and fertile, while the meadows and forests were sufficient to
+supply the needs of both the peasants and their lord.
+
+There was a certain nobleman who had chosen a superintendent from the
+peasantry on one of his other estates. No sooner had the power to
+govern been vested in this newly-made official than he began to
+practice the most outrageous cruelties upon the poor serfs who had been
+placed under his control. Although this man had a wife and two married
+daughters, and was making so much money that he could have lived
+happily without transgressing in any way against either God or man, yet
+he was filled with envy and jealousy and deeply sunk in sin.
+
+Michael Simeonovitch began his persecutions by compelling the peasants
+to perform more days of service on the estate every week than the laws
+obliged them to work. He established a brick-yard, in which he forced
+the men and women to do excessive labor, selling the bricks for his own
+profit.
+
+On one occasion the overworked serfs sent a delegation to Moscow to
+complain of their treatment to their lord, but they obtained no
+satisfaction. When the poor peasants returned disconsolate from the
+nobleman their superintendent determined to have revenge for their
+boldness in going above him for redress, and their life and that of
+their fellow-victims became worse than before.
+
+It happened that among the serfs there were some very treacherous
+people who would falsely accuse their fellows of wrong-doing and sow
+seeds of discord among the peasantry, whereupon Michael would become
+greatly enraged, while his poor subjects began to live in fear of their
+lives. When the superintendent passed through the village the people
+would run and hide themselves as from a wild beast. Seeing thus the
+terror which he had struck to the hearts of the moujiks, Michael’s
+treatment of them became still more vindictive, so that from over-work
+and ill-usage the lot of the poor serfs was indeed a hard one.
+
+There was a time when it was possible for the peasants, when driven to
+despair, to devise means whereby they could rid themselves of an
+inhuman monster such as Simeonovitch, and so these unfortunate people
+began to consider whether something could not be done to relieve _them_
+of their intolerable yoke. They would hold little meetings in secret
+places to bewail their misery and to confer with one another as to
+which would be the best way to act. Now and then the boldest of the
+gathering would rise and address his companions in this strain: “How
+much longer can we tolerate such a villain to rule over us? Let us make
+an end of it at once, for it were better for us to perish than to
+suffer. It is surely not a sin to kill such a devil in human form.”
+
+It happened once, before the Easter holidays, that one of these
+meetings was held in the woods, where Michael had sent the serfs to
+make a clearance for their master. At noon they assembled to eat their
+dinner and to hold a consultation. “Why can’t we leave now?” said one.
+“Very soon we shall be reduced to nothing. Already we are almost worked
+to death—there being no rest, night or day, either for us or our poor
+women. If anything should be done in a way not exactly to please him he
+will find fault and perhaps flog some of us to death—as was the case
+with poor Simeon, whom he killed not long ago. Only recently Anisim was
+tortured in irons till he died. We certainly cannot stand this much
+longer.” “Yes,” said another, “what is the use of waiting? Let us act
+at once. Michael will be here this evening, and will be certain to
+abuse us shamefully. Let us, then, thrust him from his horse and with
+one blow of an axe give him what he deserves, and thus end our misery.
+We can then dig a big hole and bury him like a dog, and no one will
+know what became of him. Now let us come to an agreement—to stand
+together as one man and not to betray one another.”
+
+The last speaker was Vasili Minayeff, who, if possible, had more cause
+to complain of Michael’s cruelty than any of his fellow-serfs. The
+superintendent was in the habit of flogging him severely every week,
+and he took also Vasili’s wife to serve him as cook.
+
+Accordingly, during the evening that followed this meeting in the woods
+Michael arrived on the scene on horseback. He began at once to find
+fault with the manner in which the work had been done, and to complain
+because some lime-trees had been cut down.
+
+“I told you not to cut down any lime-trees!” shouted the enraged
+superintendent. “Who did this thing? Tell me at once, or I shall flog
+every one of you!”
+
+On investigation, a peasant named Sidor was pointed out as the guilty
+one, and his face was roundly slapped. Michael also severely punished
+Vasili, because he had not done sufficient work, after which the master
+rode safely home.
+
+In the evening the serfs again assembled, and poor Vasili said: “Oh,
+what kind of people _are_ we, anyway? We are only sparrows, and not men
+at all! We agree to stand by each other, but as soon as the time for
+action comes we all run and hide. Once a lot of sparrows conspired
+against a hawk, but no sooner did the bird of prey appear than they
+sneaked off in the grass. Selecting one of the choicest sparrows, the
+hawk took it away to eat, after which the others came out crying,
+‘Twee-twee!’ and found that one was missing. ‘Who is killed?’ they
+asked. ‘Vanka! Well, he deserved it.’ You, my friends, are acting in
+just the same manner. When Michael attacked Sidor you should have stood
+by your promise. Why didn’t you arise, and with one stroke put an end
+to him and to our misery?”
+
+The effect of this speech was to make the peasants more firm in their
+determination to kill their superintendent. The latter had already
+given orders that they should be ready to plough during the Easter
+holidays, and to sow the field with oats, whereupon the serfs became
+stricken with grief, and gathered in Vasili’s house to hold another
+indignation meeting. “If he has really forgotten God,” they said, “and
+shall continue to commit such crimes against us, it is truly necessary
+that we should kill him. If not, let us perish, for it can make no
+difference to us now.”
+
+This despairing programme, however, met with considerable opposition
+from a peaceably-inclined man named Peter Mikhayeff. “Brethren,” said
+he, “you are contemplating a grievous sin. The taking of human life is
+a very serious matter. Of course it is easy to end the mortal existence
+of a man, but what will become of the souls of those who commit the
+deed? If Michael continues to act toward us unjustly God will surely
+punish him. But, my friends, we must have patience.”
+
+This pacific utterance only served to intensify the anger of Vasili.
+Said he: “Peter is forever repeating the same old story, ‘It is a sin
+to kill any one.’ Certainly it is sinful to murder; but we should
+consider the kind of man we are dealing with. We all know it is wrong
+to kill a good man, but even God would take away the life of such a dog
+as he is. It is our duty, if we have any love for mankind, to shoot a
+dog that is mad. It is a sin to let him live. If, therefore, we are to
+suffer at all, let it be in the interests of the people—and they will
+thank us for it. If we remain quiet any longer a flogging will be our
+only reward. You are talking nonsense, Mikhayeff. Why don’t you think
+of the sin we shall be committing if we work during the Easter
+holidays—for you will refuse to work then yourself?”
+
+“Well, then,” replied Peter, “if they shall send me to plough, I will
+go. But I shall not be going of my own free will, and God will know
+whose sin it is, and shall punish the offender accordingly. Yet we must
+not forget him. Brethren, I am not giving you my own views only. The
+law of God is not to return evil for evil; indeed, if you try in this
+way to stamp out wickedness it will come upon you all the stronger. It
+is not difficult for you to kill the man, but his blood will surely
+stain your own soul. You may think you have killed a bad man—that you
+have gotten rid of evil—but you will soon find out that the seeds of
+still greater wickedness have been planted within you. If you yield to
+misfortune it will surely come to you.”
+
+As Peter was not without sympathizers among the peasants, the poor
+serfs were consequently divided into two groups: the followers of
+Vasili and those who held the views of Mikhayeff.
+
+On Easter Sunday no work was done. Toward the evening an elder came to
+the peasants from the nobleman’s court and said: “Our superintendent,
+Michael Simeonovitch, orders you to go to-morrow to plough the field
+for the oats.” Thus the official went through the village and directed
+the men to prepare for work the next day—some by the river and others
+by the roadway. The poor people were almost overcome with grief, many
+of them shedding tears, but none dared to disobey the orders of their
+master.
+
+On the morning of Easter Monday, while the church bells were calling
+the inhabitants to religious services, and while every one else was
+about to enjoy a holiday, the unfortunate serfs started for the field
+to plough. Michael arose rather late and took a walk about the farm.
+The domestic servants were through with their work and had dressed
+themselves for the day, while Michael’s wife and their widowed daughter
+(who was visiting them, as was her custom on holidays) had been to
+church and returned. A steaming samovar awaited them, and they began to
+drink tea with Michael, who, after lighting his pipe, called the elder
+to him.
+
+“Well,” said the superintendent, “have you ordered the moujiks to
+plough to-day?”
+
+“Yes, sir, I did,” was the reply.
+
+“Have they all gone to the field?”
+
+“Yes, sir; all of them. I directed them myself where to begin.”
+
+“That is all very well. You gave the orders, but are they ploughing? Go
+at once and see, and you may tell them that I shall be there after
+dinner. I shall expect to find one and a half acres done for every two
+ploughs, and the work must be well done; otherwise they shall be
+severely punished, notwithstanding the holiday.”
+
+“I hear, sir, and obey.”
+
+The elder started to go, but Michael called him back. After hesitating
+for some time, as if he felt very uneasy, he said:
+
+“By the way, listen to what those scoundrels say about me. Doubtless
+some of them will curse me, and I want you to report the exact words. I
+know what villains they are. They don’t find work at all pleasant. They
+would rather lie down all day and do nothing. They would like to eat
+and drink and make merry on holidays, but they forget that if the
+ploughing is not done it will soon be too late. So you go and listen to
+what is said, and tell it to me in detail. Go at once.”
+
+“I hear, sir, and obey.”
+
+Turning his back and mounting his horse, the elder was soon at the
+field where the serfs were hard at work.
+
+It happened that Michael’s wife, a very good-hearted woman, overheard
+the conversation which her husband had just been holding with the
+elder. Approaching him, she said:
+
+“My good friend, Mishinka [diminutive of Michael], I beg of you to
+consider the importance and solemnity of this holy-day. Do not sin, for
+Christ’s sake. Let the poor moujiks go home.”
+
+Michael laughed, but made no reply to his wife’s humane request.
+Finally he said to her:
+
+“You’ve not been whipped for a very long time, and now you have become
+bold enough to interfere in affairs that are not your own.”
+
+“Mishinka,” she persisted, “I have had a frightful dream concerning
+you. You had better let the moujiks go.”
+
+“Yes,” said he; “I perceive that you have gained so much flesh of late
+that you think you would not feel the whip. Lookout!”
+
+Rudely thrusting his hot pipe against her cheek, Michael chased his
+wife from the room, after which he ordered his dinner. After eating a
+hearty meal consisting of cabbage-soup, roast pig, meat-cake, pastry
+with milk, jelly, sweet cakes, and vodka, he called his woman cook to
+him and ordered her to be seated and sing songs, Simeonovitch
+accompanying her on the guitar.
+
+While the superintendent was thus enjoying himself to the fullest
+satisfaction in the musical society of his cook the elder returned,
+and, making a low bow to his superior, proceeded to give the desired
+information concerning the serfs.
+
+“Well,” asked Michael, “did they plough?”
+
+“Yes,” replied the elder; “they have accomplished about half the
+field.”
+
+“Is there no fault to be found?”
+
+“Not that I could discover. The work seems to be well done. They are
+evidently afraid of you.”
+
+“How is the soil?”
+
+“Very good. It appears to be quite soft.”
+
+“Well,” said Simeonovitch, after a pause, “what did they say about me?
+Cursed me, I suppose?”
+
+As the elder hesitated somewhat, Michael commanded him to speak and
+tell him the whole truth. “Tell me all,” said he; “I want to know their
+exact words. If you tell me the truth I shall reward you; but if you
+conceal anything from me you will be punished. See here, Catherine,
+pour out a glass of vodka to give him courage!”
+
+After drinking to the health of his superior, the elder said to
+himself: “It is not my fault if they do not praise him. I shall tell
+him the truth.” Then turning suddenly to the superintendent he said:
+
+“They complain, Michael Simeonovitch! They complain bitterly.”
+
+“But what did they say?” demanded Michael. “Tell me!”
+
+“Well, one thing they said was, ‘He does not believe in God.’”
+
+Michael laughed. “Who said that?” he asked.
+
+“It seemed to be their unanimous opinion. ‘He has been overcome by the
+Evil One,’ they said.”
+
+“Very good,” laughed the superintendent; “but tell me what each of them
+said. What did Vasili say?”
+
+The elder did not wish to betray his people, but he had a certain
+grudge against Vasili, and he said:
+
+“He cursed you more than did any of the others.”
+
+“But what did he say?”
+
+“It is awful to repeat it, sir. Vasili said, ‘He shall die like a dog,
+having no chance to repent!’”
+
+“Oh, the villain!” exclaimed Michael. “He would kill me if he were not
+afraid. All right, Vasili; we shall have an accounting with you. And
+Tishka—he called me a dog, I suppose?”
+
+“Well,” said the elder, “they all spoke of you in anything but
+complimentary terms; but it is mean in me to repeat what they said.”
+
+“Mean or not you must tell me, I say!”
+
+“Some of them declared that your back should be broken.”
+
+Simeonovitch appeared to enjoy this immensely, for he laughed outright.
+“We shall see whose back will be the first to be broken,” said he. “Was
+that Tishka’s opinion? While I did not suppose they would say anything
+good about me, I did not expect such curses and threats. And Peter
+Mikhayeff—was that fool cursing me too?”
+
+“No; he did not curse you at all. He appeared to be the only silent one
+among them. Mikhayeff is a very wise moujik, and he surprises me very
+much. At his actions all the other peasants seemed amazed.”
+
+“What did he do?”
+
+“He did something remarkable. He was diligently ploughing, and as I
+approached him I heard some one singing very sweetly. Looking between
+the ploughshares, I observed a bright object shining.”
+
+“Well, what was it? Hurry up!”
+
+“It was a small, five-kopeck wax candle, burning brightly, and the wind
+was unable to blow it out. Peter, wearing a new shirt, sang beautiful
+hymns as he ploughed, and no matter how he handled the implement the
+candle continued to burn. In my presence he fixed the plough, shaking
+it violently, but the bright little object between the colters remained
+undisturbed.”
+
+“And what did Mikhayeff say?”
+
+“He said nothing—except when, on seeing me, he gave me the holy-day
+salutation, after which he went on his way singing and ploughing as
+before. I did not say anything to him, but, on approaching the other
+moujiks, I found that they were laughing and making sport of their
+silent companion. ‘It is a great sin to plough on Easter Monday,’ they
+said. ‘You could not get absolution from your sin if you were to pray
+all your life.’”
+
+“And did Mikhayeff make no reply?”
+
+“He stood long enough to say: ‘There should be peace on earth and
+good-will to men,’ after which he resumed his ploughing and singing,
+the candle burning even more brightly than before.”
+
+Simeonovitch had now ceased to ridicule, and, putting aside his guitar,
+his head dropped on his breast and he became lost in thought. Presently
+he ordered the elder and cook to depart, after which Michael went
+behind a screen and threw himself upon the bed. He was sighing and
+moaning, as if in great distress, when his wife came in and spoke
+kindly to him. He refused to listen to her, exclaiming:
+
+“He has conquered me, and my end is near!”
+
+“Mishinka,” said the woman, “arise and go to the moujiks in the field.
+Let them go home, and everything will be all right. Heretofore you have
+run far greater risks without any fear, but now you appear to be very
+much alarmed.”
+
+“He has conquered me!” he repeated. “I am lost!”
+
+“What do you mean?” demanded his wife, angrily. “If you will go and do
+as I tell you there will be no danger. Come, Mishinka,” she added,
+tenderly; “I shall have the saddle-horse brought for you at once.”
+
+When the horse arrived the woman persuaded her husband to mount the
+animal, and to fulfil her request concerning the serfs. When he reached
+the village a woman opened the gate for him to enter, and as he did so
+the inhabitants, seeing the brutal superintendent whom everybody
+feared, ran to hide themselves in their houses, gardens, and other
+secluded places.
+
+At length Michael reached the other gate, which he found closed also,
+and, being unable to open it himself while seated on his horse, he
+called loudly for assistance. As no one responded to his shouts he
+dismounted and opened the gate, but as he was about to remount, and had
+one foot in the stirrup, the horse became frightened at some pigs and
+sprang suddenly to one side. The superintendent fell across the fence
+and a very sharp picket pierced his stomach, when Michael fell
+unconscious to the ground.
+
+Toward the evening, when the serfs arrived at the village gate, their
+horses refused to enter. On looking around, the peasants discovered the
+dead body of their superintendent lying face downward in a pool of
+blood, where he had fallen from the fence. Peter Mikhayeff alone had
+sufficient courage to dismount and approach the prostrate form, his
+companions riding around the village and entering by way of the back
+yards. Peter closed the dead man’s eyes, after which he put the body in
+a wagon and took it home.
+
+When the nobleman learned of the fatal accident which had befallen his
+superintendent, and of the brutal treatment which he had meted out to
+those under him, he freed the serfs, exacting a small rent for the use
+of his land and the other agricultural opportunities.
+
+And thus the peasants clearly understood that the power of God is
+manifested not in evil, but in goodness.
+
+
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE KREUTZER SONATA ***
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