Chapter XX: Epilogue

On re-reading the chapter about Ketscher I cannot help reflecting on the original, eccentric characters who live or have lived in Russia. What whimsical personalities occur again and again in the history of our culture! In what countries, under what degrees of latitude and longitude could a figure be found as angular, as rugged, as captious and erratic, as good-natured and ill-natured, as noisy and unmanageable as Ketscher’s except in Moscow?

And how many of these original figures have I watched ‘in all their varied kinds,’ from my father to Turgenev’s ‘Children.’ ‘This is how the Russian oven turns them out,’ Pogodin said to me. And indeed, what marvels it does turn out, especially when the head is made on the German pattern ... from Russian buns and bread-rings to Orthodox loaves flavoured with Hegel, and French rolls _à la quatre-vingt-treize_! It would be a pity if all these original products should be lost and leave no trace. We usually dwell only upon the leading figures.

But in them the effect of the Russian oven is less obvious; in them its peculiarities are corrected and redeemed; they are examples of the Russian type of intelligence rather than of the influence of their environment. These are followed by all sorts of unattached individuals who have lost their way; the eccentric figures among them are beyond all reckoning. The tiny connecting links that make up the chain of historical movements, the particles of yeast which are lost in the dough, they have raised it, not for their own benefit. Men who awoke early in the dark night and groped feeling their way to work, stumbling against everything in their road, they awakened others to quite different labours.

... I will try some day to save two or three more profiles from complete oblivion. They are almost lost already in the grey fog from which only the mountain tops and high crags stand out.

II

BASIL AND ARMANCE

(_An episode of the year 1844._)

A very characteristic episode is connected with our second _villeggiatura_; it would really be a pity not to put it in, although Natalie and I had very little to do with it. This episode might be called: ‘Armance and Basil, or the philosopher from civility, the Christian from courtesy, and George Sand’s “Jacques” turned into the Jacques of Destiny.’ It began at a French fancy dress ball.

In the winter of 1843 I went to a fancy dress ball. There were a mass of people there, five thousand if I remember right, and scarcely any one I knew. Basil was whirling round with a masked lady, he had no thoughts to spare for me. He was slightly shaking his head and screwing up his eyelashes, as connoisseurs do when they find the wine excellent and the grouse marvellous.

The ball took place in the hall of a reputable society. I walked about and sat down a little, looking at Russian aristocrats dressed up as pierrots of all sorts, zealously doing their best to look like Parisian shopmen and desperate dancers of the _cancan_, and went upstairs to supper; there Basil sought me out. He was in an utterly abnormal state, and in the first glow of the acute period of love; it was more acute as Basil was about that time forty and his hair was beginning to be thin on his lofty brow. He talked to me incoherently of some French ‘Mignon,’ with all the simplicity of a Klärchen and all the playful charm of a Parisian _grisette_.

At first I imagined that this was one of those romances in one chapter in which there is a conquest on the first page and a bill to pay on the last. But I became convinced that this was not the case. Basil saw his Parisian girl a second or third time and followed circumvolutionary tactics without making a direct attack. He introduced me to her. Armance really was a lively, charming child of Paris, who took after her parent. From her language to her manners and the special shade of independence and boldness—everything about her was characteristic of the respectable working-class of the great city, she was still a work-girl not a petty-bourgeoise. This type has never existed among us. The careless gaiety, the easy manners, freedom, mischief, were all combined with the instinct of self-preservation, the instinctive feeling of danger and honour. Flung as children sometimes from ten years old into the battle of poverty and temptation, defenceless, surrounded by the pestilential infection of Paris and snares of all sorts, they become their own providence and protection. Such girls may readily give themselves, but it is hard to take them by surprise, unawares. Those of them who might be bought never get into this class of working girls; they are bought before they reach that stage, are whirled off and engulfed in another type, sometimes for ever, sometimes to reappear six or seven years later in their carriage in Longchamps or in the box at the opera—_mit Perlen und Diamanten_.

Basil was over head and ears in love. A theorist in music and a philosopher in painting, he was one of the most complete representatives of the ultra-Hegelians. He spent his whole life soaring in an aesthetic heavens among philosophical and critical niceties. He looked upon life as he did upon Shakespeare, reducing everything in life to its philosophical significance, making everything lively boring and everything fresh stale; in fact, leaving no emotion of the heart in its directness and simplicity. This attitude, however, was characteristic in varying degrees of almost every circle of that period; some broke loose from it by talent, others from liveliness, but traces of it persisted for a long time with all—some kept the jargon, others the philosophy itself.

‘Let us go’ Bakunin said to T—— in Berlin at the beginning of the ’forties, ‘and plunge into the gulf of real life, let us fling ourselves into the waves’; and they went to ask Varnhagen von Ense to dip them like a dexterous bathing man into the gulf of practical life and to present them to a pretty actress. It will be readily understood that with such preparations there is no reaching a plunge into the passions that ‘devour the secret sources of our spirit,’ nor indeed to any action whatever. The Germans too do not get to action; but then Germans do not seek action, but simply tranquillity. Our temperament on the other hand cannot endure this attitude—_des theoretischen Schweigens_—gets entangled, stumbles, and trips up more funnily than seriously. And so our philosopher in love at forty began, screwing up his eyes, to collate all the speculative theories on the demonic power of love which drew Hercules and the frail youth alike to the feet of Omphale, began to explain to himself and others the moral idea of the family, the foundations of marriage (Hegel’s _Philosophy of Law_, Chapter _Sittlichkeit_). There was no impediment on the side of Hegel. But the phenomenal world of fortuity and appearances—the world of the spirit not yet freed from tradition—was not so accommodating. Basil had a father, Pyotr Konytch, a wealthy man who had himself been married three times in succession and had had three children by each marriage. On learning that his son, and the eldest one too, wanted to marry a Catholic, a poor girl, and a French one, coming moreover from Kuznetsky Bridge, he resolutely refused his blessing. Basil, who had adopted the _chic_ and manners of scepticism, might have perhaps dispensed with the parental blessing; but the old man associated with the blessing not only consequences _jenseits_ (in the other world), but also _diesseits_ (in this world), to wit, his inheritance.

The old man’s opposition hurried things on, as is always the case, and Basil began to think of hastening the _dénouement_. The only thing left to do was to get married without wasting words, and later on to make the old man accept _un fait accompli_, or to conceal the marriage from him in the expectation that before long he would neither bless nor curse nor dispose of his fortune.

But the unenlightened world of tradition had to be reckoned with even then. To be married on the quiet in Moscow was not easy and was extremely expensive, and the wedding would have reached his father’s ears at once through deacons, sacristans, church servitors, match-makers, clerks, shopboys, and gossips of all sorts. It was proposed to sound our Father Ioann in the village of Pokrovskoe, known to my readers from the scandal of his stealing when inebriated a silver watch and box from the sacristan.

Father Ioann, on learning that the disobedient son was about forty, that the bride was not Russian and that her parents were not here, that, besides me, a university professor would sign as a witness, began thanking me for this kind service, probably supposing that I was trying to marry Basil in order to secure him a two-hundred rouble note. He was so touched that he shouted to the next room: ‘Wife, wife, bring out two or three eggs,’ and a bottle wrapt in paper out of the cupboard, in order to regale me.

Everything went well.

The day of the wedding and other details were not fixed: Armance was to come to Pokrovskoe to stay with us. Basil who meant to accompany her was to return to Moscow and, after making the final arrangements, to come from his father’s curse to receive the drunken blessing of Father Ioann.

In expectation of _i promessi sposi_ we ordered supper to be got ready and sat down to wait for them. We waited and waited: it struck twelve o’clock at night. No one came.... One o’clock—still no one. The ladies went to bed. A—— and Ketscher and I set to upon the supper. _Le ore suonan al quadriano, e una e due e tre_ ... but ... still no sign of them.

At last the tinkle of a bell came nearer and nearer, there was the rumble of wheels over the bridge. We rushed into the porch. A coach drawn by three horses drove rapidly into the yard and stopped, Basil came out. I went up to give my hand to Armance; she seized my hand at once, but with such force that I almost cried out—and then flung herself on my neck repeating with a giggle, ‘Monsieur Herstin’ ... it was no other than Vissarion Grigoryevitch Byelinsky in _propria persona_.

There was no one in the coach but Byelinsky who was laughing till he coughed and Basil who was crying till he had a cold in his nose. We looked at one another in amazement. I must observe that, to add to the effect, there had been no trace of Byelinsky in Moscow till two days before. ‘Give me something to eat,’ Byelinsky said at last, ‘I’ll tell you then what marvels have been happening among us; I must defend poor Basil, who is more afraid of you than of Armance.’

This is what had happened. Seeing that things were moving rapidly to a climax Basil took fright; he began to reflect and was utterly overwhelmed as he pondered on the mercilessly fatal character of marriage, its indissolubility according to the code of Russian law and the code of Hegel; he locked himself up, a victim to the spirit of agonising investigation and ruthless analysis. His terror grew from hour to hour, the more so as the way of retreat was not easy either, and to decide to take it needed almost as much character as the marriage itself. This terror grew till Byelinsky, who on arriving from Petersburg went straight to see him, knocked at his door. Basil described to him all the horror with which he was going to meet his happiness, and all the aversion with which he was entering upon marriage with love—and asked his advice and help.

Byelinsky answered that he must be mad after this—consciously and knowing beforehand what it would be—to take such fetters upon himself. ‘Herzen now,’ he said, ‘got married and eloped with his wife, and came from exile to get her; but ask him: he never once reflected whether he ought to do so or not and what the consequence would be. I am sure it seemed to him that he could do nothing else. Well! But you want to do the same, analysing and reflecting.’

This was all Basil wanted; he wrote to Armance that very night, a dissertation upon marriage, upon his luckless theorisings, upon the impossibility of simple happiness, from an analytic spirit, he laid before her all the disadvantages and dangers of their union and asked her advice—what they should do now.

He brought her answer with him.

In Byelinsky’s account and in Armance’s letter their two natures, hers and Basil’s, came out vividly. A marriage between persons of such opposite temperaments would certainly have been strange. Armance wrote sorrowfully: she was surprised, wounded, did not understand his reflections, and saw in them a pretext and a sign of cooling love. She said that, since it was so, there must be no talk of marriage, gave him back his promise, and concluded by saying that after what had happened they had better not meet. ‘I shall remember you with gratitude,’ she wrote, ‘and do not blame you in the least. I know that you are exceedingly good, but even more exceedingly weak! Good-bye, and may you be happy.’

Such a letter could not have been altogether agreeable to receive. In every word there was strength, vigour, and haughtiness. The child of splendid plebeian stock, Armance was worthy of her origin. Had she been an Englishwoman, what a tight hold she would have kept of Basil’s letter, how by the lips of her virtuous solicitor she would have described with indignation and shamefaced modesty his first pressure of her hand, his first kiss, and how her lawyer with tears in his eyes and chalk on his wig would have exhorted the jury to compensate injured innocence with a couple of thousand pounds.

The French woman, the poor sewing girl never thought of that.

The two or three days they spent at Pokrovskoe were depressing for the ex-bridegroom. He was like a school-boy who has disgraced himself in class, and is afraid both of the teacher and his comrades. He wrote me a letter which showed confusion and dissatisfaction with himself and asked me to come and say good-bye. At the beginning of August I went from Pokrovskoe to Moscow; while I was away Natalie received at Pokrovskoe a new dissertation from him. I went to Basil’s and came straight in upon a farewell banquet. They were drinking champagne, and in the toasts and good wishes there were strange hints. ‘Of course you don’t know,’ Basil murmured into my ear: ‘You see I ... er ...’ and he added in a whisper: ‘you see Armance is going with me. What a girl; only now I have learned to know her,’ and he shook his head.

This was as great a surprise as Byelinsky’s unexpected appearance.

In the letter to Natalie he explained to her at great length that thought and reflection upon marriage had brought him to hesitation and despair; he doubted both of his love for Armance and his suitability for family life; that in that way he had come to the agonising feeling that he ought to break off everything and flee to Paris, that in that state of mind he had come, pitiful and ridiculous, to Pokrovskoe. After he had reached this decision he had read the letter of Armance over again and made a fresh discovery, to wit, that he loved Armance very much, and he had therefore asked her to see him and had again offered her his hand. He had thought again of the priest at Pokrovskoe, but the proximity of Mamonov’s factory frightened him. He was intending to be married in Petersburg and at once to set off for France. ‘Armance is as happy as a child!’

In Petersburg Basil thought fit to be married in the Kazan cathedral. That philosophy and learning might not be forgotten, he asked the chief priest Sidonsky, the learned author of the _Introduction to the Study of Philosophy_, to perform the ceremony. Sidonsky had long known Basil from his learned articles as a free and worldly thinker and a disciple of the German philosophy. After all the strange things that had happened to Armance, she had the honour rarely vouchsafed to any of serving as the occasion for one of the most comic meetings of two sworn foes, learning and religion.

To show off his worldly culture Sidonsky began before the wedding talking of the latest philosophic _brochures_, and when everything was ready and the sacristan held up the epitrahil which, stooping, he began to put on, he said to Basil, dropping his eyes: ‘Pardon me, it is a ceremony; I know very well that the Christian ritual has outlived its time, that....’

‘Oh, no, no,’ Basil interrupted in a voice full of sympathy and compassion: ‘Christianity is eternal; its essence, its substance, cannot pass away.’

Sidonsky, with a chaste glance, thanked his ‘chivalrous’ antagonist, turned to the choir and chanted: ‘Blessed be the name of the Lord, now and for ever and ever!’ ‘Amen,’ boomed the choir, and the ceremony went on in due order, and Sidonsky led Basil in a crown and Armance in a crown round the lectern ... making Isaiah rejoice.

From the cathedral Basil took Armance home and leaving her there spent a literary soirée at Krayevsky’s. Ten days later Byelinsky saw the happy pair into the steamer. At this point it will be supposed that the story is certainly ended.

Not a bit of it.

Things went very well as far as the Cattegat; but at that point George Sand’s accursed novel _Jacques_ turned up.

‘What do you think of _Jacques_?’ Basil asked Armance as she was finishing the novel.

Armance told him her opinion of it, Basil informed her that it was quite mistaken, that her criticism wounded his spirit on its deepest side, and that his philosophy of life had nothing in common with hers.

The sanguine Armance was unwilling to change her philosophy of life, so they both crossed the Belt.

When they came out into the German Ocean Basil felt more at home, and made another attempt to persuade Armance to take a different view of _Jacques_ and to change her philosophy of life.

Almost dying of sea-sickness, Armance with a last effort declared that she would not change her opinion of _Jacques_.

‘What have we in common after that?’ observed Basil, flying into a rage.

‘Nothing,’ answered Armance, ‘and _si vous me cherchez, querelle_, then let us simply part as soon as we touch land.’

‘You have decided,’ said Basil, very high and mighty; ‘you prefer....’

‘Anything in the world to living with you; you are an insufferable man, weak and tyrannical.’

‘Madame!’

‘Monsieur!’

She went to the cabin, he remained on deck. Armance kept her word. From Havre she went to her father, and a year later returned to Russia and indeed went on to Siberia.

This time I believe the story of this intermittent marriage is ended.

Though indeed Barère[137] has said:

‘Only the dead do not return.’

_Written 1857_,
LAUREL HOUSE, PUTNEY.

FOOTNOTES

[1] Kaunitz (1711-1794) was for over forty years the leading statesman of Austria under Maria Theresa and Joseph II., and one of the most prominent figures in European politics.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[2] Among my papers are several letters of Sasha’s written between 1835 and 1836. Sasha was left behind in Moscow while her friend was in the country with the princess. I cannot read this simple and passionate whisper of the heart without deep feeling. ‘Can it be true,’ she writes, ‘that you are coming? Ah, if you really did come, I don’t know what would happen to me. You would not believe how often I am thinking of you, almost all my desires, all my thoughts, all, all, all are with you.... Ah, Natalya Alexandrovna, how splendid you are, how sweet, how noble!—but I cannot express it. Truly, these are not studied words, they are straight from the heart....’

In another letter she thanks Natalie for writing so often. ‘It is really too good, but there, that’s you, you,’ and she ends the letter with the words: ‘They keep interrupting me, I embrace you, my angel, with true immeasurable love. Give me your blessing!’

[3] Skalozub, a character in Griboyedov’s celebrated play, ‘Woe from Wit’ (or perhaps better, ‘Sorrow comes from having Sense’), is the typical coarse, ignorant, blustering military bully.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[4] I know very well how affected the French translation of names sounds, but a name is a traditional thing and how is one to change it? Besides, all unslavonic names are with us, as it were, shortened and less musical; we, educated to some extent, ‘not in the law of our fathers,’ in our youth ‘romanticised’ names, while the powers in authority ‘Slavonised’ them. As a man is promoted and attains to influence at court, the letters in his name are changed—thus, for instance, Count Strogonov remained to the end of his days Sergeyey Grigoryevitch, but Prince Golitsyn was always called Sergiey Mihailovitch. The last example of such a transformation we saw in General Rostovtsov, celebrated in connection with the Fourteenth of December; throughout the reign of Nicholas he was Yakov, as was Yakov Dolgoruky, but with the accession of Alexander II. he became Iakov, the same as the brother of our Lord!

[5] Xavier Saintine (1798-1865), a French writer of whose many plays and stories only _Picciola, or the Prisoner’s Flower_ is still well known.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[6] From Pushkin’s _Yevgeny Onyegin_.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[7] The reference is probably to Bulgarin, a journalist in close relations with Benckendorf (Chief of the Secret Police). This Bulgarin made many petty personal attacks on Pushkin, who in a well-known poem addresses him by the name Vidok-Figlyarin.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[8] Shemyaka was a prince of ancient Russia, whose injustice is still remembered in the proverbial expression, a ‘Shemyaka’s judgment.’—(_Translator’s Note._)

[9] The difference between the style of Natalie’s letters and mine is very great, especially in the early part of our correspondence; afterwards it was less unequal and in the end becomes similar. In my letters, together with genuine feeling there are affected expressions, far-fetched high-flown phrases, the influence of the school of Hugo and the new French novelists is apparent. There is nothing of the sort in her letters, her language is simple, poetic, and sincere, the only influence that can be discerned in it is the influence of the Gospel. At that time I was still trying to write in the grand style and wrote badly, because it was not my own language. A life in spheres cut off from practical experience, and too much reading prevents a young man for years from speaking and writing naturally and simply. Intellectual maturity only begins when the style is established and has taken its final form.

[10] On the other hand, the enlightened government appointed as French master in the same Vyatka high school the celebrated Orientalist Vernikovsky, who was a colleague of Kovalevsky’s and Mickiewicz’s, and was exiled in connection with the Philarets’ case.[11]

[11] The Philarets or ‘lovers of virtue’ were a students’ society of the Vilna University in the first quarter of the nineteenth century. Their object was to promote learning, to help the poor, and to preach ideals of goodness and justice. Tovjanski and Mickiewicz were members of it.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[12] A fragment of this chapter was published in the _Polar Star_, vol. i. page 79, together with the following note:

Who is entitled to write his reminiscences?

Every one.

Because no one is obliged to read them.

In order to write one’s reminiscences it is not at all necessary to be a great man, nor a notorious criminal, nor a celebrated artist, nor a statesman—it is quite enough to be simply a human being, to have something to tell, and not merely to desire to tell it but at least some little ability to do so.

Every life is interesting; if not the personality, then the environment, the country are interesting, life itself is interesting. Man likes to enter into another existence, he likes to touch the subtlest fibres of another’s heart, and to listen to its beating ... he compares, he checks it by his own, he seeks in himself confirmation, justification, sympathy....

But may not memoirs be tedious, may not the life described be colourless and commonplace?

Then we shall not read it—there is no worse punishment for a book than that.

Moreover, that is no drawback to the writing of memoirs. Benvenuto Cellini’s _Diary_ is not interesting because he was an excellent worker in gold but because it is in itself as interesting as any novel.

The fact is that the very word ‘entitled’ to this or that form of composition does not belong to our epoch, but dates from an era of intellectual immaturity, from an era of poet-laureates, doctors’ caps, peddling savants, certificated philosophers, diplomaed metaphysicians and other Pharisees of the Christian world. Then the act of writing was regarded as something sacred, a man writing for the public used a high-flown unnatural choice language, he ‘expounded’ or ‘sang.’

We simply talk; for us writing is the same sort of secular pursuit, the same sort of work or amusement as any other. In this connection it is difficult to dispute ‘the right to work.’ Whether the work will win recognition and approval is quite a different matter.

A year ago I published in Russia part of my memoirs under the title of _Prison and Exile_. I published it in London at the beginning of the war. I did not reckon upon readers nor upon any attention outside Russia. The success of that book exceeded all expectations: the _Revue des Deux Mondes_, the most chaste and rigid of journals, published half the book in a French translation; the clever and learned _Athenaeum_ printed extracts in English; the whole book has appeared in German and is being published in England.

That is why I have ventured to print extracts from other parts.

In another place I speak of the immense importance my memoirs have for me personally, and the object with which I began writing them. I confine myself now to the general remark that the publication of contemporary memoirs is particularly useful for us Russians. Thanks to the censorship, we are not accustomed to anything being made public, and the slightest publicity frightens, checks, and surprises us. In England any man who appears on any public stage, whether as a huckster of letters or a guardian of the press, is liable to the same hisses and applause as the actor in the lowest theatre in Islington or Paddington. Neither the Queen nor her husband are excluded. It is a mighty curb!

Let our Imperial Actors of the secret and open police, who have been so well protected from publicity by the censorship and paternal punishments, know that sooner or later their deeds will come into the light of day.

[13] Jeanne Deroin was a disciple of Saint Simon who published an _Almanach des Femmes_ in 1851.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[14] These little notes were kept by Natalie, and on many of them she wrote a few words in pencil. I could not preserve any of the letters she wrote to me in prison. I was obliged to destroy them all at once.

[15] I omit it.

[16] English in the original.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[17] Arnold Ruge (1802-1880) began his political career with six years’ imprisonment in connection with the _Burschenschaft_ movement, founded the _Deutsche Jahrbücher_, the journal of the Young Hegelian School, and some ten years later _Die Reform_, a more definitely political paper. From 1849 he lived in England, advocated a universal democratic state, and wrote many books, of which his autobiography is now of most interest.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[18] Tovjanski was a Pole, and at one time a member of the Society of Philarets. He held that there were many Messiahs, of whom Napoleon was one and himself another.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[19] His real name was Gaunot, and he was an adventurer well known in Paris between 1830 and 1850. He went in for being a god and called his religion _evadisme_ (from Eve and Adam), and himself Mapah from _mater_ and _pater_. He suggested to Dumas that the latter should become his chief disciple.

[20] Théroigne de Méricourt, called ‘l’Amazone de la liberté,’ assisted at the taking of the Bastille and became a popular heroine. Later on she was publicly whipped by a crowd of women, and lost her reason in consequence of this outrage.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[21] Carus, K. G. (1789-1869), a distinguished German physiologist, author of numerous works on anatomy, physiology, and allied subjects.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[22] Stefan Yavorsky was a famous monk and theologian of the eighteenth century.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[23] ‘The Tarantass,’ a story by Count Sologub, author of various comedies and novels satirising the official class.

[24] Parasha, an early poem of Turgenev’s.

[25] Motchalov, the great Russian actor, was particularly famous for his playing of Hamlet.

[26] _Murmolka_, a peasant cap, and _zipun_ a long homespun peasant coat.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[27] Saharov, Ivan Petrovitch (1807-1863), a well-known archaeologist and ethnographist, was a doctor of medicine and lecturer on palaeology. His discoveries are now regarded somewhat sceptically, but he did much for Russian antiquarian study.

[28] Meiendorf, Alexander Kazimirovitch (1788-1865), a writer on historical and geographical subjects.

[29] Ioakinth Bitchurin (1777-1853), a monk and at one time an archimandrite, head of the Orthodox Mission to Pekin, and later on a translator from the Chinese in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, was an authority on Chinese language and history.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[30] The reference is to the open letter in which Byelinsky expressed his passionate indignation at the _Correspondence with Friends_, published by Gogol.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[31] Klyutchnikov vividly expressed this in the following image: ‘Stankevitch is a silver rouble that envies the size of a copper piece.’—Annenkov, _Biography of Stankevitch_, p. 133.

[32] Botkin, Vassily Petrovitch (1810-1865), the self-taught son of a merchant, was a fine critic and authority on art and literature. His criticism was greatly valued by his friends, and his writings (chiefly articles in magazines) give no idea of his real importance in the history of Russian culture. His brother was the great physician.

[33] Krassov, Vassily Ivanovitch (1810-1855), a poet, at one time professor of literature in Kiev. His brother Ivan was a teacher of history in the Petersburg secondary schools.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[34] Victor Hugo, after reading _My Past and Thoughts_, in the French translation, wrote me a letter in defence of the youth of France at the period of the Restoration.

[35] Translated by Juliet M. Soskice.

[36] Date of Peter the Great’s death.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[37] Timofeyev, a sixth-rate writer of forgotten poems.

[38] Kukolnik, Nestor (1805-1868), was a schoolfellow of Gogol’s, and a very popular writer of stories and dramas in the most extreme romantic style—fearfully bombastic and unreal, and hyper-patriotic.

[39] The Moravian Brethren, called _Herrnhuter_ from the little town of Herrnhut in Saxony, where they settled in 1722, are a Protestant sect who abjure military service, the taking of oaths, and all distinctions of rank.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[40] I declare, on my word of honour, that the word ‘scoundrel’ was used by this worthy old person.

[41] Paul Louis Courier (1772-1825), a learned and brilliant writer of political pamphlets and letters, who discovered a complete manuscript of Longus’s _Daphnis and Chloe_, of which he published a French translation.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[42] Miss Wilmot’s words.

[43] The Comte d’Artois—afterwards Charles X.

[44] The Comte de Ségur (1753-1830) was French ambassador in Petersburg and a favourite of Catherine II. He was a man of action as well as a spirited writer, served in the American War of Independence, welcomed every movement on the side of liberty, and wrote a charming account of his times in his _Galerie Morale et Politique_, and his _Mémoires_.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[45] The Grand Duke, brother of Nicholas I., is meant.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[46] Perun was the God of sky and of thunder, the chief God of the ancient Slavs.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[47] This is so true that a German who has abused me a dozen times in the _Morning Advertiser_ adduced as proof that I had never been exiled the fact that I had the post of councillor in the provincial government.

[48] I am not certain whether these dissenters were Duhobors.

[49] The landowner in ‘The Agent,’ one of Turgenev’s ‘Sportsman’s Sketches.’

[50] Saltytchiha was a lady notorious in the reign of Catherine for her cruelty to her serfs. She was eventually brought to justice.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[51] _Property in Serfs._

[52] Araktcheyev left, I believe, a hundred thousand roubles to be paid a hundred years later, together with the accumulated interest, to the man who should write the best history of the reign of Alexander I.

[53] Araktcheyev was a pitiful coward, as Count Toll tells us in his memoirs, and the Secretary of State Martchenko in a little story of the Fourteenth of December published in the _Polar Star_. I have heard that he was in hiding during the Staraya Russa rising, and was in deadly terror of Reihel the general of Engineers.

[54] I am extremely sorry that I have forgotten the Christian name of the worthy gentleman. I remember his surname was Zherebtsov.

[55] These extracts are inserted here by the author in a slightly altered form.—_Note to Russian edition._

[56] Here Herzen describes how, returning late one evening after a festive supper party with his friends, he was tempted by a maidservant, who, half undressed, opened the door to him. This transgression came to the knowledge of Natalya Alexandrovna.—_Note to Russian edition._

[57] Written in England.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[58] Zurbaran, a Spanish painter of religious subjects. A well-known picture of his is of a monk castigating himself before an effigy of the Madonna.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[59] Puchta, a German professor and authority on Roman law.

[60] Savigny, a German university teacher, of French origin, and an authority on modern jurisprudence.

[61] Roteck, a German university teacher and authority on Roman law.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[62] Buchez, Philippe (1796-1865), a French philosopher and political writer; at first a follower of Saint Simon, afterwards an advocate of what he called Christian Socialism.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[63] Cabet, Étienne (1788-1856), was a French communist, one of the leaders of the Carbonari, and author of a philosophical and social romance _Voyage en Icarie_, describing a Communist Utopia. In 1848 a band of French workmen went out to found an ‘Icarian colony’ in Texas.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[64] Readers of _The Possessed_ may be interested to know that Dostoevsky is supposed (I cannot say whether on sufficient evidence) to have modelled the character of Stepan Trofimovitch in the earlier chapters of that novel on Granovsky.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[65] Ciceruacchio, a popular leader (his real name was Angelo Brunetti) in Rome, who had great influence from 1847, supporting the reforms of Pius IX., and active in bringing about the proclamation of a republic in February 1849. He was captured and shot with his sons the following July.

[66] The late Emperor of Austria, Francis Joseph.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[67] Translated by Juliet M. Soskice.

[68] The _Domostroy_ was a sixteenth-century book of moral precepts and practical advice written by the priest Sylvester, the adviser of Ivan the Terrible.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[69] Deutschthum was the nationalist movement in Germany. It was considered more patriotic to spell it Teutschthum.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[70] Barclay de Tolly was one of the ablest of the Russian generals of 1812. He was, as a matter of fact, of Scottish not of German descent.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[71] Shishkov, born 1754, began his career as a naval officer and attained the rank of vice-admiral, but, disapproving of the reforms of the early years of Alexander’s reign, left the navy. From 1812 he became prominent as a writer and president of the Academy, and from 1824 to 1828 was Minister of Public Instruction. Intensely conservative and patriotic, he bitterly opposed every new movement in literature and politics.

[72] Shebuev (1776-1855) was a well-known painter of historical pictures in the pseudo-classical style.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[73] At first the national hymn was very naïvely sung to the tune of ‘God save the King,’ and indeed it was scarcely ever sung. It was among the innovations of Nicholas. From the time of the Polish War the national hymn composed by Colonel Lvov of the _Corps of gendarmes_ was, by Imperial command, sung at all the royal festivities and at large concerts.

The Emperor Alexander was too well educated to like crude flattery; he listened with disgust in Paris to the Academicians’ despicable speeches grovelling at the feet of the Conqueror. On one occasion meeting Chateaubriand in his vestibule he showed him the last number of the _Journal des Débats_, and added: ‘I assure you I have never once seen such dull abjectness in any Russian paper.’ But in the time of Nicholas there were literary men who fully justified his Imperial confidence, and outdid all the journalists of 1814 and even some of the prefects of 1852. Bulgarin wrote in the _Northern Bee_ that among the other advantages of the railway between Moscow and Petersburg, he could not think without emotion that the same man would be able to hear a service for the health of his Imperial Majesty in the morning in the Kazan Cathedral, and in the evening in the Kremlin! One would have thought it difficult to excel this awful absurdity, but there was found a literary man in Moscow who surpassed its author. On one of Nicholas’s visits to Moscow a learned professor wrote an article in which, speaking of the immense mass of the people crowding before the palace, he added that the Tsar had but to express the faintest desire—and those thousands rushing to carry it out would gladly fling themselves into the river Moskva. The sentence was erased by S. G. Strogonov, who told me this charming anecdote.

[74] Lyapunov, a national hero who fought the Poles in the ‘Time of Trouble.’ Several plays were written about him—one by Gedeonov, on which Turgenev wrote a criticism. Kukolnik’s play is meant here.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[75] I was at the first performance of Lyapunov in Moscow and saw the hero tuck up his sleeves and say something like, ‘I’ll wash my hands in Polish blood.’ A hollow moan of repulsion broke from the whole body of the theatre; even the gendarmes, policemen, and people in stalls, the numbers on whose seats had somehow been rubbed off, could not summon up the pluck to applaud.

[76] The Uniats are members of the Greek Church who accept the supremacy of the Pope.

[77] ‘The Hand of the Most High saved the Fatherland’ is the title of a play by Kukolnik.

[78] Baron Joseph Jellachich, an Austrian general, who was also a poet and politician. In 1848 he was appointed Ban of Croatia, and took part in suppressing the revolt of the Hungarians.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[79] Tchaadayev was often at the English Club. On one occasion Menshikov, Minister of Naval Affairs, went up to him with the words: ‘How is it, Pyotr Yakovlevitch, you don’t recognise your old acquaintances?’ ‘Oh, it is you,’ answered Tchaadayev, who really had not recognised him, ‘but how is it you are wearing a black collar? I fancy that you used to wear a red one.’ ‘Why, don’t you know I am Minister of Naval Affairs?’ ‘You! why, I imagine you have never steered a boat.’ ‘You don’t need much wit to bake a pot, you know,’ answered Menshikov, a little bit displeased. ‘Oh well, if it is on that principle ...’ answered Tchaadayev.

A Senator was making great complaints of being very busy. ‘With what?’ asked Tchaadayev. ‘Upon my soul, the mere reading of the notes and papers!’ and the Senator made a gesture indicating a pile a yard from the floor. ‘But you don’t read them?’ ‘Oh yes, sometimes I do, and besides, it is often necessary to give my opinion on them.’ ‘Well, I don’t see the necessity,’ answered Tchaadayev.

[80] We now know for certain from Yakushkin’s _Diary_ that Tchaadayev was a member of the Decembrist society.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[81] Charles François Chevé (1813-1875) was a political writer, at one time a follower of Proudhon, but afterwards a Catholic.

[82] Ronge was the founder of a school of Liberal Catholicism.

[83] Mickiewicz (1798-1855), the great Polish poet, author of _Pan Tadeusz_, spent some time in Russia and was a friend of Pushkin and his circle.

[84] Sigismund Krasinski (1812-1859), a Polish poet, author of _Nieboska Komedeja_, the _Undivine Comedy_.

[85] Lady Morgan (_née_ Sydney Owenson) (1789-1859), a lively Irish authoress (and something of an adventuress), published many novels as well as entertaining memoirs.

[86] _Mémoires d’un Prisonnier d’État au Spitzberg_, by Alexandre Andryane, is probably the work here referred to.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[87] Royer-Collard, Pierre Paul (1763-1845), was in 1811 Professor of Philosophy in Paris, opposed materialism, supported the Scottish School of Reid and Stewart, and originated the ‘Doctrinaire’ School of which Jouffroy and Cousin were afterwards representative.

[88] Friedrich Schlegel, German critic, author of _Lectures on the Philosophy of History_, and _History of Literature_, joined the Roman Catholic Church.

[89] Heinrich Leo (1799-1878), originally a Radical, went over to the reactionary side on hearing of the murder of Kotzebue. He was much influenced by Herder, and was suspected of leanings towards Catholicism.

[90] Friedrich Ludwig Jahn (1778-1852), commonly called ‘Vater Jahn,’ is chiefly known for his advocacy of gymnastic clubs. He was also connected with the formation of the _Burschenschaft_, a students’ association persecuted by the government authorities. He was in prison from 1819 to 1825.

[91] Prince Hohenlohe, nicknamed the ‘miracle-worker,’ was brought up by Jesuits, became a priest, preached in Munich and other towns, and set out to heal diseases. He was checked in his activities both by the Pope and the police.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[92] Translated by Juliet Soskice.

[93] Translated by Juliet Soskice.

[94] The name _Slav_ is derived from _Slovo_, _word_, _language_.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[95] ‘Moreover,’ he said to me in the presence of Homyakov, ‘they boast of speech, but in the whole race Homyakov is the only one who speaks.’

[96] Granovitaya Palata, the hall in the Kremlin in which the Tsar and his councillors used to meet before the time of Peter the Great.

[97] Novgorod, the most famous city in the earliest period of Russian history, was to some extent a republic under the rule of its princes from Rurik upwards. It was almost destroyed and was deprived of its liberties by Ivan III. in 1471.

[98] The Ulozhenie is the code of laws of Tsar Alexis Mihailovitch (father of Peter the Great), compiled in the seventeenth century.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[99] The Varangians were Scandinavian and Norman tribes, whose rulers were, according to tradition, summoned in 862 by the Northern Slavs to rule over them.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[100] Written at the time of the Crimean War.

[101] Shevyryov, professor of literature in Moscow University and author of a _History of Poetry_, in which he advances many fantastic theories. Pogodin was professor of history, and they were co-editors of the _Moskvityanin_.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[102] Konstantin and Ivan Aksakov were the sons of Sergey Timofeyevitch Aksakov (1791-1859), a writer of the first rank, some of whose charming pictures of the country and old-fashioned Russian life are now accessible in excellent translations by J. D. Duff.

[103] Alexandr Ivanovitch Turgenev, a distinguished person in his own day, now chiefly remembered for having been a very good friend to Pushkin, was one of the Turgenevs of Simbirsk, and not related to the famous Turgenev, who has left among his critical articles an obituary notice of this Alexandr Ivanovitch.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[104] The Larins and Lensky are characters in Pushkin’s _Yevgeny Onyegin_. Tchatsky is the hero of Griboyedov’s _Woe from Wit_, and Famussov is a character in the same play.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[105] Baron d’Holbach (1723-1789), of German origin, one of the French encyclopaedists, was the social centre round which all the leading literary and philosophic celebrities of Paris gathered. He was a passionate atheist, and an extremely good-hearted man, giving shelter to his worst enemies, the Jesuits, when they were persecuted.

[106] Delphine Gay (Mme. de Girardin) wrote witty verses, novels, and plays.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[107] Sobakevitch and Nozdryov are characters in Gogol’s _Dead Souls_.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[108] Novikov, a man of letters and mystic of the time of Catherine, was imprisoned and exiled for advocating the emancipation of the serfs.

[109] The Kireyevskys’ mother did not share their views. This is the only explanation I can discover for his being described as ‘lonely in his own family.’—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[110] From Lermontov’s translation of Goethe’s poem.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[111] Baron Haxthausen was a learned German who after a visit to Russia at this period wrote an account of the Russian system of land tenure.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[112] Both were authors of a very low order; Gretch, a trifle more stupid and less unscrupulous than Bulgarin, who was scurrilous in his attacks on Pushkin, and commonly believed to be in the pay of the police.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[113] Katchenovsky, Mihail Trofimovitch (1775-1842), of humble origin and largely self-educated, became editor of the _Vyestnik Yevropi_, and professor of Fine Arts, of Literature, and later on of History in Moscow University. His sceptical attitude on historical subjects gave offence, and he was superseded in the Chair of History by Pogodin.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[114] Yazykov, a friend of Pushkin’s.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[115] This Glinka, one of the founders of the League of Public Welfare, out of which the Decembrist movement developed, was exiled in 1826, but allowed to return later. He was a literary character of the mild and pious type.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[116] K. Kavélin’s article, and Yury Samarin’s reply to it. They are dealt with in the _Développement des Idées Révolutionnaires en Russie_.

[117] The famous chief of a band of robbers whose feats have passed into a legend. He flourished in France during the early part of the eighteenth century.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[118] The peace between France and Austria in 1797 was concluded at Campo Formio, a village in Italy.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[119] In the Time of Trouble at the beginning of the seventeenth century the famous Troitse-Sergievsky Monastery made an heroic resistance against the Poles. Avraamy Palitsyn, the Father Superintendent, together with the Abbot, issued manifestoes calling on the people to drive out the Poles and elect a Tsar.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[120] Lampi, J. B., was an Austrian painter who came to Petersburg in 1792, and painted portraits of Catherine, Potyomkin, and various distinguished persons.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[121] The popular writer Victor Joseph Étienne de Jouy (1754-1846) was known as the ‘hermit of the Chausseé d’Antin,’ the name of his most widely read prose work.

[122] Weiss, Bernhard (1827-1892), a learned German, who became adviser to the government in spiritual concerns, and author of many theological works.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[123] English in the original.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[124] English in the original.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[125] A character in Gogol’s _Inspector General_.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[126] I think while I am speaking of Dmitry Pavlovitch I ought not to omit to mention his last action in regard to me. After my father’s death he was left owing me forty thousand silver roubles. I went abroad without claiming this money. When he died, he directed his executors that I should be the first of his debtors to be paid, because I could officially claim nothing. I received the money by the next post after that by which I heard of his death.

[127] English in the original.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[128] The story of how one of the students got into the university is so full of the native flavour of the Nicholas period that I cannot resist telling it. The anniversary day with which we are all familiar from Pushkin’s superb verses was celebrated annually in the Lyceum. As a rule, on this day of parting from companions and seeing again former schoolfellows the young people were allowed to make merry. On one of these anniversaries a youth who had not yet finished his studies in a light-hearted moment flung a bottle at the wall; unluckily, the bottle struck a marble slab on which was inscribed in gold letters: ‘His Imperial Majesty the Emperor graciously deigned to visit us on such and such a date ...’ and broke a piece off it. A superintendent ran up, fell upon the culprit with terrible abuse, and tried to remove him. The youth, insulted before his comrades and exhilarated by the wine, tore the cane out of his hand and struck him with it. The superintendent promptly reported the incident; the youth was arrested and kept in detention on the terrible charge not merely of striking a superintendent but also of sacrilegious disrespect for a slab on which the sacred name of the monarch was inscribed.

He might very easily have been sent for a soldier had not another calamity saved him. At that very time his elder brother died. His mother, overwhelmed with grief, wrote to him that he was now her only hope and support, and urged him to make haste and finish his studies and come to her. The principal of the Lyceum, General Bronevsky I believe it was, was touched on reading this letter and resolved to save the youth without bringing it to the knowledge of Nicholas. He told the Grand Duke Michael of the incident, and the latter directed that he should be expelled from the Lyceum privately, and that that should end the matter. The youth left the Lyceum with a certificate on which he could not enter any educational institution, that is, almost every career was barred to him for he was not at all wealthy, and all this for damaging a slab adorned with the Imperial name! And even this was only thanks to the peculiar favour of Providence which killed his brother at the right moment, to a tenderness unheard of among generals, and an indulgence almost incredible in a grand duke! Being a young man of exceptional talent, he succeeded long afterwards in obtaining the right to attend lectures in the Moscow University.

[129] Translated by Juliet M. Soskice.

[130] Translated by Juliet M. Soskice.

[131] See p. 335, Vol. I.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[132] One of Gogol’s Mirgorod stories.

[133] Public prosecutor of the revolutionary tribunal under the Terror.—(_Translator’s Notes._)

[134] There is no difference of culture between husband and wife among the proletariat or the peasants, but there is a terrible equality of slavery and terrible inequality of power between the husband and the wife.

[135] The _Vehme_ or _Vehmgerichte_ were mediaeval German tribunals which tried capital charges and were greatly dreaded for their severity.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[136] Katkov, one of Stankevitch’s circle, afterwards became a Slavophil of the most reactionary type and editor of the _Moscow Gazette_.—(_Translator’s Note._)

[137] Barère de Vieuzac (1753-1841), a member of the Committee of Public Safety, nicknamed the Anacreon of the Guillotine.—(_Translator's Note._)