In those days children were not bewildered by a pro- fusion of toys, as they are now. We had almost none, and were thus compelled to rely upon our own inventive- ness. Besides, we both had early acquired a taste for the theatre. The inferior carnival theatres, with the thieving and fighting shows, produced no lasting impression upon us: we ourselves played enough at robbers and soldiers. But the great star of the ballet, Fanny Elssler, came to Moscow, and we saw her. When father took a box in the theatre, he always secured one of the best, and paid for it well; but then he insisted that all the members of the family should enjoy it to its full value. Small though I was at that time, Fanny Elssler left upon me the impres- sion of a being so full of grace, so light, and so artistic in all her movements: that ever since I have been unable to feel the slightest interest in a dance which belongs more to the domain of gymnastics than to the domain of art.
Of course, the ballet that we saw — Gitana, the Spanish Gypsy — had to be repeated at home; its substance, not the dances. We had a ready-made stage, as the doorway which led from our bedroom into the class-room had a curtain instead of a door. A few chairs put in a half- circle in front of the curtain, with an easy-chair for M. Poulain, became the hall and the imperial lodge, and an audience could easily be mustered with the Russian_teacher, Ulidna, and a couple of maids from the servants’ rooms.
Two scenes of the ballet had to be represented by some TASTE FOR THE THEATRE 21 means or other: the one where the little Gitana is brought by the gypsies into their camp in a wheelbarrow, and that in which Gitana makes her first appearance on the stage, descending from a hill and crossing a bridge over a brook which reflects her image. The audience burst into frantic applause at this point, and the cheers were evidently called forth —so we thought, at least — by the reflection in the brook.
We found our Gitana in one of the youngest girls in the maid-servants’ room. Her rather shabby blue cotton dress was no obstacle to personifying Fanny Elssler. An over- turned chair, pushed along by its legs, head downwards, was an acceptable substitute for the wheelbarrow. But the brook! Two chairs and the long ironing-board of Andréi, the tailor, made the bridge, and a piece of blue cotton made the brook.” The image in the brook, however, would not: ‘appeat full, size, do what we might with M. Poulain’s little shaving- glass. After many unsuccessful endeavors we had to give it up, but we bribed Ulidna to behave as if she saw the image, and to applaud loudly at this passage, so that finally we began to believe that perhaps something of it could be seen.
Racine’s “ Phédre,” or at least the last act of it, also went off nicely; that is, Sdsha recited the melodious verses beautifully, — ‘A peine nous sortions des portes de Trézéne;”?
and I sat absolutely motionless and unconcerned during the whole length of the tragic monologue intended to apprise me of the death of my son, down to the place where, ac- cording to the book, I had to exclaim, “O, dieux!”
But whatsoever we might impersonate, all our perform- ‘ances invariably ended with hell. All candles save one were put out, and this one was placed behind a transparent paper to imitate flames, while my brother and I, concealed 22 MEMOIRS OF A REVOLUTIONIST from view, howled in the most appalling way as the con! demned. Uliana, who did not like to have any allusion. to the Evil One made at bedtime, looked horrified; but I ask myself now whether this extremely concrete represen- tation of hell, with a candle and a sheet of paper, did not contribute to free us both at an early age from the fear of eternal fire. Our conception of it was too realistic to resist skepticism.
I must have been very much of a child when I saw the great Moscow actors: Schépkin, Saddvskiy, and Shumski, in Gogol’s “ Revisdér” and another comedy; still, | remem- ber not only the salient scenes of the two plays, but even the forms and expressions of these great actors of the realistic school which is now so admirably represented by Duse. I remembered them so well that when I saw the same plays given at St. Petersburg, by actors belonging to the French declamatory school, I found no pleasure in their acting, always comparing them with Schépkin and Saddvskiy, by whom my taste in dramatic art was settled.
This makes me think that parents who wish to develop artistic taste in their children ought to take them occasion- ally to really well-acted, good plays, instead of ne them on a profusion of dealt “children’s pantomimes.”
V WueEn I was in my eighth year, the next step in my career was taken, in a quite unforeseen way. I do not know exactly on what occasion it happened, but probably it was on the twenty-fifth anniversary of Nicholas I.’s ac- cession, when great festivities were arranged for at Moscow. The imperial family were coming to the old capital, and the Moscow nobility intended to celebrate this event by a fancy-dress ball, in which children were to play an im- portant part. It was agreed that the whole motley crowd of nationalities of which the population of the Russian Empire is composed should be represented at this ball to greet the monarch. Great preparations went on in our house, as well as in all the houses of our neighborhood. Some sort of remarkable Russian costume was made for our stepmother. Our father, being a military man, had to appear, of course, in his uniform; but_ those of our relatives who were not in the military service were as busy with their Russian, Greek, Caucasian, and Mongolian costumes as the ladies themselves. When the Moscow nobility gives a ball to the imperial family, it must be something extraordinary. As for my brother Alexander and myself, we were considered too young to take part in so important a ceremonial.
And yet, after all, I did take part init. Our mother was an intimate friend of Madame N azimoff, the wife of the general who was governor of Wilno when the emancipation of the serfs began to be spoken of. Madame Nazimoff, who was a very beautiful woman, was expected to be present at the ball with her child, about ten years old, and to wear 24 MEMOIRS OF A REVOLUTIONIST some wonderfully beautiful costume of a Persian princess, in harmony with which the costume of a young Persian prince, exceedingly rich, with a belt covered with jewels, was made ready for her son. But the boy fell ill just be- fore the ball, and Madame Nazimoff thought that one of the children of her best friend would be the best substitute for her own child. Alexander and I were taken to her house to try on the costume. It proved to be too short for Alexander, who was much taller than I, but it fitted me exactly, and therefore it was decided that I should im- personate the Persian prince.
The immense hall of the house of the Moscow nobility was crowded with guests. Each of the children received a standard bearing at its top the arms of one of the sixty pro- vinces of the Russian Empire. I had an eagle floating over a blue sea, which represented, as I learned later on, the arms of the government of Astrakhan, on the Caspian Sea. We were then ranged at the back of the great hall, and slowly marched in two rows toward the raised platform upon which the Emperor and his family stood. As we reached it we marched right and left, and thus stood aligned in one row before the platform. At a given signal all standards were lowered before the Emperor. ‘The apothe- osis of autocracy was made most impressive: Nicholas was enchanted. All provinces of the empire worshiped the supreme ruler. Then we children slowly retired to the rear of the hall.
But here some confusion occurred. Chamberlains in ‘their gold-embroidered uniforms were running about, and I was taken out of the ranks; my uncle, Prince Gagarin, dressed as a Tungus (I was dizzy with admiration of his fine leather coat, his bow, and his quiver full of arrows), lifted me up in his arms, and plane me on the imperial platform.
Whether it was because I was the tiniest in the row of IN FAVOR WITH NICHOLAS I 25 boys, or that my round face, framed in curls, looked funny under the high Astrakhan fur bonnet I wore, I know not, but Nicholas wanted to have me on the platform; and there I stood amidst generals and ladies looking down upon me with curiosity. I was told later on that Nicholas Tis who was always fond of barrack jokes, took me by the arm, and, leading me to Marie Alexandrovna (the wife of the heir to the throne), who was then expecting her third child, said in his military way, ‘‘ That is the sort of boy you must bring me,” —a joke which made her blush deeply. I well remember, at any rate, Nicholas asking me whether I would have sweets; but I replied that I should like to have some of those tiny biscuits which were served with tea (we were never over-fed at home), and he called a waiter and emptied a full tray into my tall bonnet. ‘I will take them to Sasha,” I said to him.
However, the soldier-like brother of Nicholas, Mikhael, who had the reputation of being a wit, managed to make mecry. ‘* When you are a good boy,” he said, ‘ they treat you so,” and he passed his big hand over my face downwards; *‘ but when you are naughty, they treat you so,” and he passed the hand upwards, rubbing my nose, which already had a marked tendency toward growing in that direc- tion. Tears, which I vainly tried to stop, came into my eyes. The ladies at once took my part, and the good- hearted Marie Alexdndrovna took me under her protection. She set me by her side, in a high velvet chair with a gilded back, and our people told me afterward that I very soon put my head in her lap and went to sleep. She did not leave her chair during the whole time the ball was going on.
I remember also that, as we were waiting in the entrance- hall for our carriage, our relatives petted and kissed me, saying, ‘‘ Pétya, you have been made a page;” but I an- swered, “Iam nota page. I will go home,” and was very anxious about my bonnet which contained the pretty little biscuits that I was taking home for Sasha.
ee r 26 MEMOIRS OF A REVOLUTIONIST I do not know whether Sdsha got many of those biscuits, but I recollect what a hug he gave me when he was told about my anxiety concerning the bonnet.
To be inscribed as a candidate for the corps of pages was then a great favor, which Nicholas seldom bestowed on the Moscow nobility. My father was delighted, and already dreamed of a brilliant court career for his son. My step- mother, every time she told the story, never failed to add, ‘‘Tt is all because I gave him my blessing before he went to the ball.”
Madame Nazimoff was delighted, too, and insisted upon having her portrait painted in the costume in which she looked so beautiful, with me standing at her side.
My brother Alexander’s fate, also, was decided next year. The jubilee of the Izmaylovsk regiment, to which my father had belonged in his youth, was celebrated about this time at St. Petersburg. One night, while all the household was plunged in deep sleep, a three-horse carriage, ringing with the bells attached to the harnesses, stopped at our gate. A man jumped out of it, loudly shouting, “Open! An ordi- nance from his Majesty the Emperor.”
One can easily imagine the terror which this nocturnal visit spread in our house. My father, trembling, went down to his study. ‘“‘Court-martial, degradation as a sol- dier,”’ were words which rang then in the ears of every military man; it wasa terrible epoch. But Nicholas simply wanted to have the names of the sons of all the officers who had once belonged to the regiment, in order to send the boys to military schools, if that had not yet been done. A special messenger had been dispatched for that purpose from St. Petersburg to Moscow, and was now calling day and night at the houses of the ex-Izmaylovsk officers.
With a shaking hand my father wrote that his eldest son, Nicholas, was already in the first corps of cadets at Moscow; Se = DESTINED FOR A MILITARY CAREER 2?
that his youngest son, Peter, was a candidate for the corps of pages; and that there remained only his second son, Alexander, who had not yet entered the military career, A few weeks later came a paper informing father of the “ mon- arch’s favor.” Alexander was ordered to enter a corps of cadets in Orel, a small provincial town. It cost my father a deal of trouble and a large sum of money to get Alexan- der sent to a corps of cadets at Moscow. This new “favor” was obtained only in consideration of the fact that our elder brother was in that corps.
And thus, owing to the will of Nicholas I., we had both to receive a military education, though, before we were many years older, we simply hated the military career for its | absurdity. But Nicholas was watchful that none of the sons of the nobility should embrace any other profession than the military one, unless they were of infirm health; and so we had all three to be officers, to the great satisfaction of my father.
VI WEALTH was measured in those times by the number of “souls” that a landed proprietor owned. So many ‘souls’? meant so many male serfs: women did not count. My father, who owned nearly twelve hundred souls, in three different provinces, and who had, in addition to his peasants’ holdings, large tracts of land which were cultivated by these peasants, was accounted a rich man. He lived up to his reputation, which meant that his house was open to any number of visitors, and that he kept a very large household.
We were a family of eight, occasionally of ten or twelve; but fifty servants at Moscow, and half as many more in the country, were considered not one too many. Four coachmen to attend a dozen horses, three cooks for the masters and two more for the servants, a dozen men to wait upon us at dinner-time (one man, plate in hand, standing behind each person seated at the table), and girls innumerable in the maid-servants’ room,— how could any one do with less than this?
Besides, the ambition of every landed proprietor was that everything required for his household should be made at home, by his own men.
“How nicely your piano is always tuned! I suppose Herr Schimmel must be your tuner?” perhaps a visitor would remark.
To be able to answer, ‘I have my own piano-tuner,” was in those times the correct thing.
“What beautiful pastry!” the guests would exclaim, - when a work of art, composed of ices and pastry, appeared toward the end of the dinner. ‘Confess, prince, that it comes from Tremblé” (the fashionable pastry-cook).
THE AMBITIONS OF A LANDED PROPRIETOR 2$ “Tt is made by my own confectioner, a pupil of Tremblé, whom I have allowed to show what he can do,’ was a reply which elicited general admiration.
To have embroideries, harnesses, furniture, —in fact, everything, — made by one’s own men was the ideal of the rich and respected landed proprietor. As soon as the chil- dren of the servants attained the age of ten, they were sent as apprentices to the fashionable shops, where they were obliged to spend five or seven years chiefly in sweeping, in recelving an incredible number of thrashings, and in run- ning about town on errands of all sorts. I must own that few of them became masters of their respective arts. The tailors and the shoemakers were found only skillful enough to make clothes or shoes for the servants, and when a really good pastry was required for a dinner-party it was ordered at Tremblé’s, while our own confectioner was beating the drum in the band.
That band was another of my father’s ambitions, and almost every one of his male servants, in addition to other accomplishments, was a bass+viol or a elarinet in the band. Makar, the piano-tuner, alias under-butler, was also a flutist; Andréi, the tailor, played the French horn; the confectioner was first put to beat the drum, but he misused his instrument to such a deafening degree that a tremen- dous trumpet was bought for him, in the hope that his lungs would not have the power to make the same noise as his hands; when, however, this last hope had to be abandoned, he was sent to be a soldier, As to “spotted TYkhon,” in addition to his numerous functions in the household as lamp-cleaner, floor-polisher, and footman, he rendered him- self useful in the band, — to-day as a trombone, to-morrow as a bassoon, and occasionally as second violin.
The two first violins were the only exceptions to the rule: they were “violins,” and nothing else. My father had bought them, with their large families, for a handsome sum of money, from his sisters (he never bought serts from nor sold them to strangers). In the evcaings when he was not at his club, or when there was a dinner or an evening party at our house, the band of twelve to fifteen musicians was summoned. They played very nicely, and were in great demand for dancing-parties in the neighborhood; still more when we were in the country. This was, of course, a constant source of gratification to my father, whose permis- sion had to be asked to get the assistance of his band. Nothing, indeed, gave him more pleasure than to be asked for help, either in the way mentioned or in any other: for instance, to obtain free education for a boy, or to save somebody from a punishment inflicted upon him by a law court. Although he was liable to fall into fits of rage, he was undoubtedly possessed of a natural instinct toward leniency, and when his patronage was requested he would write scores of letters in all possible directions, to all sorts of persons of high standing, in favor of his protégé. At such times, his mail, which was always heavy, would be- swollen by half a dozen special letters, written in a most origi- nal, semi-official, and semi-humorous style; each of them sealed, of course, with his arms, in a big square envelope, which rattled like a baby-rattle on account of the quantity of sand it contained, — the use of blotting-paper being then unknown. The more difficult the case, the more energy he would display, until he secured the favor he asked for his © protégé, whom in many cases he never saw. My father liked to have plenty of guests in his house. — Our dinner-hour was four, and at seven the family gathered vound the samovar (tea-urn) for tea. very one belonging to our cirele could drop in at that hour, and from the time my sister Héléne was again with us there was no lack of” visitors, old and young, who took advantage of the privie lege. When the windows facing the street showed bright: light inside, that was enough to let people know that the family was at home and friends would be welcome.
SOCIAL AND FAMILY LIFE 3\ Nearly every night we had visitors. The green tables Were opened in the hall for the card-players, while the ladies and the young people stayed in the reception-room or around Héléne’s piano. When the ladies had gone, card- playing continued sometimes till the small hours of the morning, and considerable sums of money changed hands among the players. Father invariably lost. But the real danger for him was not at home: it was at the English Club, where the stakes were much higher than in private houses, and especially when he was induced to join a party of “very respectable ” gentlemen, in one of the “most respectable” houses of the Old Equerries’ Quarter, where gambling went on all night. On an occasion of this kind his losses were sure to be heavy.
Dancing-parties were not infrequent, to say nothing of a couple of obligatory balls every winter. Father’s way, in such cases, was to have everything done in a good siyle, whatever the expense. But at the same time such niggard- liness was practiced in our house in daily life that if I ‘were to recount it, I should be accused of exaggeration. It is said of a family of pretenders to the throne of France, renowned for their truly regal hunting-parties, that in their every-day life even the tallow candles are minutely counted. The same sort of miserly economy ruled in our house with regard to everything; so much so that when we, the chil- dren of the house, grew up, we detested all saving and counting. However, in the Old Equerries’ Quarter such a mode of life only raised my father in public esteem. “The old prince,” it was said, “seems to be sharp over “Money at home; but he knows how a nobleman ought to live,”.
In our quiet and clean lanes that was the kind of life which was most in respect. One of our neighbors, General D—~, kept his house up in very grand style; and yet the most comical scenes took place every morning between 32 | MEMOIRS OF A REVOLUTIONIST him and his cook. Breakfast over, the old general, smok« ing his pipe, would himself order the dinner.
‘“¢ Well, my boy,” he would say to the cook, who appeared in snow-white attire, “‘ to-day we shall not be many; only a couple of guests. You will make us a soup, you know, with some spring delicacies, — green peas, French beans, and soon. You have not given us any as yet, and madam, you know, likes a good French spring soup.”
Ves. sir.’
‘¢ Then, anything you like as an entrée.”
eh Vos, arr.”/ ‘Of course, asparagus is not yet in season, but I saw yesterday such nice bundles of it in the shops.”
‘‘ Yes, sir; eight shillings the bundle.”
“Quite right! Then, we are sick of your roasted chickens and turkeys; you ought to get something for a change.”
«6 Yes, yes; anything for a change.’
And when the six courses of the dinner had been decided on, the old general would ask, “‘ Now, how much shall I give you for to-day’s expenses? Six shillings will do, I suppose? ” ‘‘ One pound, sir.” ae ae ‘What nonsense, my boy! Here are six shillings; I assure you that’s quite enough.”: ‘‘ Hight shillings for asparagus, five for the vegetables.”
“Now, look here, my dear boy, be reasonable. Ill go as high as seven-and-six, and you must be economical.”
And the bargaining would go on thus for half an hour, until the two would agree upon fourteen shillings and six-_ pence, with the understanding that the morrow’s dinner should not cost more than three shillings. Whereupon the general, quite happy at having made such a good bargain, would take his sledge, make a round of the fashionable ECONOMY AND EXTRAVAGANCE 38 flops, and return quite radiant, bringing for his wife a iwttle of exquisite perfume, for which he had paid a fancy price in a French shop, and announcing to his only daugh- © ter that a new velvet mantle — “something very simple ” and very costly — would be sent for her to try on that afternoon.; All our relatives, who were numerous on my father’s side, lived exactly in the same way; and if a new spirit occa- sionally made its appearance, it usually took the form of some religious passion. Thus, a Prince Gagarin joined the Jesuit order, again to the scandal of “all Moscow; ”? another young prince entered a monastery, while several older ladies became fanatic devotees.
There was a single exception. One of our nearest rela- tives, Prince — let me call him Mirski, had spent his youth at St. Petersburg as an officer of the guard. He took no interest in keeping his own tailors and cabinet-makers, for his house was furnished in a grand modern style, and his Wearing apparel was all made in the best St. Petersburg shops. Gambling was not his propensity, — he played cards only when in company with ladies; but his weak point was his dinner-table, upon which he spent incredible sums of money.
Lent and Easter were his chief epochs of extravagance, When the Great Lent came, and it would not have been proper to eat meat, cream, or butter, he seized the oppor- tunity to invent all sorts of delicacies in the way of fish. The best shops of the two capitals were ransacked for that Purpose; special emissaries were dispatched from his estate to the mouth of the Volga, to bring back on post-horses (there was no railway at that time) a sturgeon of great size or some extraordinarily cured fish. And when Easter came, there was no-end to his inventions, _ Easter, in Russia, is the most venerated and also the jayest of the yearly festivals. It is the festival of spring, 34 MEMOIRS OF A REVOLUTIONIST the winter along the streets rapidly thaw, and roaring stro -run down the streets; not like a thief who creeps in ‘oy insensible degrees, but frankly and openly spring comes, — every day bringing with it a change in the state of the snow and the progress of the buds on the trees; the night frosts only keep the thaw within reasonable bounds. ‘The last week of the Great Lent, Passion Week, was kept in Mostow, in my childhood, with extreme solemnity; it was a tine of general mourning, and crowds of people went to the clarches to listen to the impressive reading of those passages of the Gospels which relate the sufferings of the Christ. Not only were meat, eggs, and butter not eaten, but even fish was refused; some of the most rigorous taking no food at all on Good Friday. The more striking was the contrast when Easter came.
On Saturday every one attended the night service, which began in a mournful way. Then, suddenly, at midnight, the resurrection news was announced. All the churches were at once illuminated, and gay peals of bells resounded from hundreds of bell-towers. General rejoicing began, All the people kissed one another thrice on the cheeks, repeating the resurrection words, and the churches, now flooded with light, shone with the gay toilettes of the ladies, The poorest woman had a new dress; if she had only oneé new dress a year, she would get it for that night. | At the same time, Easter was, and is still, the signal fo a real debauch in eating. Special Easter cream cheese, (pdskha) and Faster bread (kooltch) are prepared; ani every one, no matter how poor he or she may be, must hav be it only a small paskha and a small koolich, with at leas cne egg painted red, to be consecrated in the church, and t be used afterward to break the Lent. With most old Rut sians, eating began at night, after a short Easter mas! immediately after the consecrated food had been brougl The immense heaps of snow which have been lying os 1 LENT AND EASTER 35 from church; but in the houses of the nobility the ceremony was postponed till Sunday morning, when a table was cov- ered with all sorts of viands, cheeses and pastry, and all the servants came to exchange with their masters three kisses and a red-painted egg. Throughout Easter week a table spread with Easter food stood in the great hall, and every visitor was invited to partake.
On this occasion Prince Mirski surpassed himself. Whether he was at St. Petersburg or at Moscow, messengers brought to his house, from his estate, a specially prepared cream cheese for the paskha, and his cook managed to make out of it a piece of artistic confectionery. Other messen- gers were dispatched to the province of Névgorod to get a bear’s ham, which was cured for the prince’s Easter table. And while the princess, with her two daughters, visited the most austere monasteries, in which the night service would last three or four hours in succession, and spent all Passion Week in the most mournful condition of mind, eating only a piece of dry bread between the visits she paid to Russian, Roman, and Protestant preachers, her husband made every morning the tour of the well-known Milttin shops at St. Petersburg, where all possible delicacies are brought from the ends of the earth. There he used to select the most extravagant dainties for his Easter table. Hundreds of Visitors came to his house, and were asked “just to taste” this or that extraordinary thing.
The end of it was that the prince managed literally to eat up a considerable fortune. His richly furnished house and beautiful estate were sold, and when he and his wife were old they had nothing left, not even a home, and were com- ‘pelled to live with their children. | _ No wonder that when the emancipation of the serfs came, nearly all these families of the Old Equerries’ Quarter were tuined. But I must not anticipate events.
Vil To maintain such numbers of servants as were kept in our house would have been simply ruinous, if all provisions had to be bought at Moscow; but in those times of serfdom things were managed very simply. When winter came, father sat at his table and wrote the following: — ““To the manager of my estate, Nikdlskoye, situated in the government of Kaltiga, district of Meschévsk, on the river Siréna, from the Prince Alexéi Petrovich Kropotkin, Colonel and Commander of various orders.
“Qn receipt of this, and as soon as winter communication is established, thou art ordered to send to my house, situated in the city of Moscow, twenty-five peasant-sledges, drawn by two horses each, one horse from each house, and one sledge and one man from each second house, and to load them with [so many] quarters of oats, [so many | of wheat, and [so many] of tye, as also with all the poultry and geese and ducks, well frozen, which have to be killed > this winter, well packed and accompanied by a complete list, under the supervision of a well-chosen man;? and soy it went on for a couple of pages, till the next full stop was reached. After this there followed an enumeration of tell penalties which would be inflicted in case the provisions | should not reach the house situated in such a street, num- ber so and so, in due time and in good condition.
Some time before Christmas the twenty-five peasantsledges really entered our gates, and covered the surface of the wide yard.
‘“Hyol!”? shouted my father, as soon as the report of this great event reached him. “Kirytishka! Yegdrka!
LAYING IN SUPPLIES FOR WINTER 37 Where are they? Everything will be stolen! Frol, go and receive the oats! Uliana, go and receive the poultry! Kiryushka, call the princess! ”’ All the household was in commotion, the servants run- ning wildly in every direction, from the hall to the yard, and from-the yard to the hall, but chiefly to the maid-ser- vants’ room, to communicate there the Nikdlskoye news: “ Pasha is going to marry after Christmas. Aunt Anna has surrendered her soul to God,’”’ and so on. Letters had also come from the country, and very soon one of the maids would steal upstairs into my room.
“Are you alone? ‘The teacher is not in?”
“No, he is at the university.”
“Well, then, be kind and read me this letter from mother.”
And I would read to her the naive letter, which always began with the words, ‘‘ Father and mother send you their blessings for ages not to be broken.’”’ After this came the news: “ Aunt Eupraxie lies ill, all her bones aching; and your cousin is not yet married, but hopes to be after Easter; and Aunt Stepanida’s cow died on All Saints’ day.” Following the news came the greetings, two pages of them: “Brother Paul sends you his greetings, and the sisters Mary and Daria send their greetings, and then Uncle Dmitri sends his many greetings,” and so on. However, notwithstanding the monotony of the enumeration, each name awakened some remarks: ‘ Then she is still alive, poor soul, if she sends her greetings; it is nine years since she has lain motionless.” Or, ‘Oh, he has not forgotten me; he must be back, then, for Christmas; such a nice boy. You will write me a letter, won’t you? and I must not forget him then.”? I promised, of course, and when the time came I wrote a letter in exactly the same style.
When the sledges had been unloaded, the hall filled with _ peasants. ‘They had put on their best coats over their 38 MEMOIRS OF A REVOLUTIONIST sheepskins, and waited until father should call them into his room to have a talk about the snow and the prospects of the next crops. They hardly dared to walk in their heavy boots on the polished floor. A few ventured to sit down on the edge of an oak bench; they emphatically refused to make use of chairs. So they waited for hours, looking with alarm upon every one who entered father’s room or issued from it.
Some time later on, usually next morning, one of the servants would run slyly upstairs to the class-room.
“ Are you alone? ” ‘tVies,7” ‘Then go quickly to the hall. The peasants want to see you; something from your nurse.”
When I went down to the hall, one of the peasants would give me a little bundle containing perhaps a few rye cakes, half a dozen hard-boiled eggs, and some apples, tied in a motley colored cotton kerchief. ‘‘Take that: it is your nurse, Vasilisa, who sends it to you. Look if the apples are not frozen. I hope not: I kept them all the journey on my breast. Such a fearful frost we had.” And the broad, bearded face, covered with frost-bites, would smile radiantly, showing two rows of beautiful white teeth from beneath quite a forest of hair.