into the eyes of another, casting an indifferent glance upon a third, and giving a slight contortion to his lip as he passed a fourth: and from these looks every one knew that he liked the first boy, that to the second he was indifferent, that he intentionally did not notice the third, and that he disliked the fourth. This dislike was enough to terrify most of his victims,—the more so as no reason could be given for it. Impressionable boys had been brought to despair by that mute, unceasingly displayed aversion and those suspicious looks; in others the result had been a total annihilation of will, as one of the Tolstois — Theo- dor, also a pupil of Girardot —has shown in an autobio- graphic novel, ‘“‘ The Diseases of the Will.”
The inner life of the corps was miserable under the rule of the Colonel. In all boarding-schools the newly entered boys are subjected: to petty persecutions. The “ green- horns” are put in this way to a test. What are they worth? Are they not going to turn “sneaks”? And then the ‘old hands” like to show to newcomers the superiority of an established brotherhood. So it is in all schools and in prisons. But under Girardot’s rule these persecutions took on a harsher aspect, and they came, not from the comrades’ of the same form, but from the first form, — the pages de chambre, who were non-commissoned officers, and whom Girardot had placed in a quite ex- ceptional, superior position. His system was to give them carte blanche; to pretend that he did not know even the horrors they were enacting; and to maintain through them a severe discipline. To answer a blow received from a page de chambre would have meant, in the times of Nicholas L., to be sent to a battalion of soldiers’ sons, if the fact be- came public; and to revolt in any way against the mere caprice of a page de chambre meant that the twenty youths _of the first form, armed with their heavy oak rulers, would 76 MEMOIRS OF A REVOLUTIONIST assemble in a room, and, with Girardot’s tacit approval, administer a severe beating to the boy who had shown such a spirit of insubordination.
Accordingly, the first form did what they liked; and not further back than the preceding winter one of their favorite games had been to assemble the “ greenhorns” at night in a room, in their night-shirts, and to make them run round, like horses in a circus, while the pages de chambre, armed with thick india-rubber whips, standing some in the centre and the others on the outside, pitilessly whipped the boys. As arule the “circus” ended in an Oriental fashion, in an abominable way. The moral con- ceptions which prevailed at that time, and the foul talk which went on in the school concerning what occurred at night after circus, were such that the least said about them the better.
The Colonel knew all this. He hada perfectly organized system of espionage, and nothing escaped his knowledge. But so long as he was not known to know it, all was right. To shut his eyes to what was done by the first form was the foundation of his system of maintaining © discipline.
However, a new spirit was awakened in the school, and only a few months before I entered it a revolution had ~ taken place. That year the third form was different from what it had hitherto been. It contained a number of — young men who really studied and read a good deal; some of them became, later, men of mark. My first ac- — quaintance with one of them —let me call him von Schauff — was when he was reading Kant’s ‘Critique of® Pure Reason.” Besides, they had amongst them some off the strongest youths of the school. The tallest member — of the corps was in that form, as also a very strong young man, Késhtoff, a great friend of von Schauff. ‘The third form did not bear the yoke of the pages de chambre with TYRANNY OF THE PAGES DE CHAMBRE TT the same docility as their predecessors; they were disgusted with what was going on; and in consequence of an incident, which I prefer not to describe, a fight took place between the third and the first form, with the result that the pages de chambre got a very severe thrashing from their subor- dinates. Girardot hushed up the affair, but the authority of the first form was broken down. The india-rubber whips remained, but were never again brought into use. The circuses and the lke became things of the past.
That much was won; but the lowest form, the fifth, composed almost entirely of very young boys who had just entered the school, had still to obey the petty caprices of the pages de chambre. We had a beautiful garden, filled with old trees, but the boys of the fifth form could enjoy it little: they were forced to run a roundabout, while the pages de chambre sat in it and chattered, or to send back the balls when these gentlemen played ninepins. A couple of days after I had entered the school, seeing how things stood in the garden, I did not go there, but remained upstairs. JI was reading, when a page de chambre, with earroty hair and a face covered with freckles, came upon me, and ordered me to go at once to the garden to run the roundabout.
“T shan’t; don’t you see I am reading?” was my reply.
Anger disfigured his never too pleasant face. He was ready to jump upon me. I took the defensive. He tried to give me blows on the face with his cap. I fenced as best I could. Then he flung his cap on the floor.
ee Pick it up’ * Pick it up yourself.”
Such an act of disobedience was unheard of in the school. Why he did not beat me unmercifully on the spot I do not know. He was much older and stronger than I was.
Next day and the following days I received similar 78 MEMOIRS OF A REVOLUTIONIST commands, but obstinately remained upstairs. Then began the most exasperating petty persecutions at every step, — enough to drive a boy to desperation. Happily, I was always of a jovial disposition, and answered them with jokes, or took little heed of them. | Moreover, it all soon came to an end. The weather turned rainy, and we spent most of our time indoors. In the garden the first form smoked freely enough, but when | we were indoors the smoking club was “the tower.” It was kept beautifully clean, and a fire was always burning there. The pages de chambre severely punished any of the other boys whom they caught smoking, but they themselves sat continually at the fireside chattering and enjoying cigarettes. Their favorite smoking time was after ten o’clock at night, when all were supposed to have gone to bed; they kept up their club till half past eleven, and, to protect themselves from an unexpected interruption by Girardot, they ordered us to be on the watch. ‘The small | boys of the fifth form were taken out of their beds in | turn, two at a time, and they had to loiter about the staircase till half past eleven, to give notice of the approach | of the Colonel. We decided to put an end to these night watches. Long were the discussions, and the higher forms were consulted as to what was to be done. At last the decision came: | ‘“‘ Refuse, all of you, to keep the watch; and when they | begin to beat you, which they are sure to do, go, as many | of you as can, in a block, and call in Girardot. He knows— it all, but then he will be bound to stop it.” The question | whether that would not be “reporting” was settled in the negative by experts in matters of honor: the pages de chambre did not behave toward the others like comrades.
The turn to watch fell that night toa Shahovskoy, an old | hand, and to Selanoff, a newcomer, an extremely timid boy, | who even spoke in a girlish voice. Shahovskdy was called TYRANNY OF?THE PAGES DE CHAMBRE 79 upon first, but refused to go, and was left alone. Then two pages de chambre went to the timid Seldnoff, who was in ' bed; as he refused to obey, they began to flog him brutally with heavy leather braces. Shahovskédy woke up several comrades who were near at hand, and they all ran to find Girardot.
I was also in bed when the two came upon me, ordering me to take the watch. I refused. Thereupon, seizing two pairs of braces, — we always used to put our clothes in per- fect order on a bench by the bedside, braces uppermost, and the necktie across them, — they began to’ flog me. Sitting up in bed, I fenced with my hands, and had already received several heavy blows, when a command resounded, — “ The first form to the Colonel!” The fierce fighters became tame at once, and hurriedly put my things in order.
“Don’t say a word,” they whispered.
“The necktie across, in good order,” I said to them, while my shoulders and arms burned from the blows.
What Girardot’s talk with the first form was we did not know; but next day, as we stood in the ranks before march- ing downstairs to the dining-room, he addressed us in a minor key, saying how sad it was that pages de chambre should have fallen upon a boy who was right in his refu- sal. And upon whom? A newcomer, and so timid a boy as Selanoff was. The whole school was disgusted at this Jesuitic speech.
No need to say that that was the end of the watch-keep- Ing, and that it gave a final blow to the worrying of the hewcomers: it has never been renewed.
It surely was also a blow to Girardot’s authority, and he ‘Tesented it very much. He regarded our form, and me especially, with great dislike (the roundabout affair had been reported to him), and he manifested it at every oppor: tunity.
80 MEMOIRS OF A RE‘ OLUTIONIST During the first winter, I was a frequent inmate of the hospital. After suffering from typhoid fever, during which the director and the doctor bestowed on me a really paren- tal care, I had very bad and persistently recurring gastric attacks. Girardot, as he made his daily rounds of the hos- pital, seeing me so often there, began to say to me every morning, half jokingly, in French, “ Here is a young man who is as healthy as the New Bridge, and loiters in the‘ hospital.” Once or twice I replied jestingly, but at last, seeing malice in this constant repetition, I lost patience and — grew very angry.
‘How dare you say that?’ I exclaimed. “TI shall ask the ‘doctor to forbid your entering this room,” and so on.
Girardot recoiled two steps; his dark eyes glittered, his thin lip became still thinner. At last he said, ‘I have offended » you, have 1? Well, we have in the hall two artillery guns: shall we have a duel?” ‘a ‘‘T don’t make jokes, and I tell you that I shall bear no more of your insinuations,” I continued.
He did not repeat his joke, but regarded me with even | more dislike than before. | Every one spoke of Girardot’s dislike for me; but I paid no attention to it, and probably increased it by my indiffer- | ence. For full eighteen months he refused to give me the} epaulets, which were usually given to newly entered boys after one or two months’ stay at the school, when they had learned some of the rudiments of military drill; but I felt quite happy without that military decoration. At last, an officer — the best teacher of drill in the school, a man simply enamored of drill — volunteered to teach me; and when he saw me performing all the tricks to his entire sat- isfaction, he undertook to introduce me to Girardot. The Colonel refused again, twice in succession, so that the officer took it as a personal offense; and when the director of the COLONEL GIRARDOT 81 corps once asked him why I had no epaulets yet, he bluntly answered, “The boy is all right; it is the Colonel who does not want him;” whereupon, probably after a remark of the director, Girardot himself asked to examine me again, and gave me the epaulets that very day.
But the Colonel’s influence was rapidly vanishing. The whole character of the school was changing. For twenty years Girardot had realized his ideal, which was to have the boys nicely combed, curled, and girlish looking, and to send to the court pages as refined as courtiers of Louis XIV. Whether they learned or not, he cared little; his favorites were those whose clothes-baskets were best filled with all sorts of nail-brushes and scent bottles, whose “private ” uniform (which could be put on when we went home on Sundays) was of the best make, and who knew how to make the most elegant salut oblique. Formerly, when Girardot had held rehearsals of court ceremonies, wrap- ping up a page in a striped red cotton cover taken from one of our beds, in order that he might represent the Em- press at a baisemain, the boys almost religiously approached she imaginary Empress, seriously performed the ceremony of kissing the hand, and retired with a most elegant oblique dow; but now, though they were very elegant at court, they would perform at the rehearsals such bearlike bows that Wl roared with laughter, while Girardot was simply raging. formerly, the younger boys who had been taken to a court evee, and had been curled for that purpose, used to keep heir curls as long as they would last; now, on returning tom the palace, they hurried to put ‘hats heads under the old-water tap, to get rid of the curls. An effeminate ap- yearance was laughed at. To be sent to a levee, to stand here as a decoration, was now considered a drudgery rather han a favor. And when the small boys who were occa- jonally taken to the palace to play with the little grand sakes remarked that one of the latter used, in some game, 82 MEMOIRS OF A REVOLUTIONIST to make a hard whip out of his handkerchief, and use it freely, one of our boys did the same, and so whipped the grand duke that hecried. Girardot was terrified, while the old Sebastopol admiral who was tutor of the grand duke only praised our boy.
A new spirit, studious and serious, developed in the corps, as in all other schools. In former years, the pages, being sure that in one way or another they would get the neces- sary marks for being promoted officers of the guard, spent the first years in the school hardly learning at all, and only began to study more or less in the last two forms; now the lower forms learned very well. The moral tone also be- came quite different from what it was a few years before. Oriental amusements were looked upon with disgust, and an attempt or two to revert to old manners resulted in scandals which reached the St. Petersburg drawing-rooms. Guirardot was dismissed. He was only allowed to retain his bachelor apartment in the building of the corps, and we often saw him afterward, wrapped in his long military cloak, pacing along, plunged in reflections, — sad, I suppose, because he could not but condemn the new spirit which rapidly de veloped in the corps of pages.
II II Att over Russia people were talking of education. As soon as peace had been concluded at Paris, and the severity of censorship had been slightly relaxed, educational matters began to be eagerly discussed. The ignorance of the masses of the people, the obstacles that had hitherto been put in the way of those who wanted to learn, the absence of schools in the country, the obsolete methods of teaching, and the remedies for these evils became favorite themes of discus- sion in educated circles, in the press, and even in the draw- ing-rooms of the aristocracy. The first high schools for girls had been opened in 1857, on an excellent plan and with a splendid teaching staff. As by magic a number of men and women came to the front, who have not only ‘devoted their lives to education, but have proved to be re- markable practical pedagogists: their writings would occupy a place of honor in every civilized literature, if they were ‘known abroad.
The corps of pages also felt the effect of that revival. ‘Apart from a few exceptions, the general tendency of the three younger forms was to study. The head of the edu- ‘cational department, the inspector, Winkler, who was a well- ‘educated colonel of artillery, a good mathematician, and a man of progressive opinions, hit upon an excellent plan for stimulating that spirit. Instead of the indifferent teachers who formerly used to teach in the lower forms, he endeay- ored to secure the best ones. In his opinion, no professor was too good to teach the very beginnings of a ‘subject to the youngest boys. Thus, to teach the elements of algebra ‘in the fourth form he invited a first-rate mathematician and 84 MEMOIRS OF A REVOLUTIONIST a born teacher, Captain Sukhdnin, and the form took at once to mathematics. By the way, it so happened that this captain was a tutor of the heir of the throne (Nikolai Alex- Androvich, who died at the age of twenty-two), and the heir apparent was brought once a week to the corps of pages to be present at the algebra lessons of Captain Sukhdnin. Empress Marie Alexandrovna, who was an educated woman, thought that perhaps the contact with studious boys would stimulate her son to learning. He sat amongst us, and had | to answer questions like all the others. But he managed | mostly, while the teacher spoke, to make drawings very. nicely, or to whisper all sorts of droll things to his neigh- bors. He was good-natured and very gentle in his behavior, | but superficial in learning, and still more so in his affections. | For the fifth form the inspector secured two remarkable men. He entered our class-room one day, quite radiant, and told us that we should have a rare chance. Professor Klasoévsky, a great classical scholar and expert in Russian | literature, had consented to teach us Russian grammar, and, would take us through all the five forms in succession, shifting with us every year to the next form. Another university professor, Herr Becker, librarian of the imperial (national) library, would do the same in German. Professor’ Klasdvsky, he added, was in weak health that winter, but the inspector was sure that we would be very quiet in his.
class. The chance of having such a teacher was too good . to be lost. | He had thought aright. We became very proud of having university professors for teachers, and although there came voices from the Kamchatka (in Russia, the back benches of each class bear the name of that remote and uncivilized peninsula) to the effect that ‘the sausage- maker ’? — that is, the German — must be kept by all means: in obedience, public opinion in our form was decidedly in favor of the professors.
STUDYING GERMAN 88 ‘The sausage-maker’? won our respect at once. A. tall man, with an immense forehead and very kind, intelligent eyes, not devoid of a touch of humor, came into our class, and told us in quite good Russian that he intended to divide our form into three sections. The first section would be composed of Germans, who already knew the language, and from whom he would require more serious work; to the second section he would teach grammar, and later on German literature, in accordance with the estab- lished programmes; and the third section, he concluded with a charming smile, would be the Kamchatka. “ From you,” he said, “I shall only require that at each lesson you copy four lines which I will choose for you from a book. The four lines copied, you can do what you like; only do ‘not hinder the rest. And I promise you that in five years you will learn something of German and German literature. Now, who joins the Germans? You, Stackelberg? You, Lamsdorf? Perhaps some one of the Russians? And who joins the Kamchatka?” Five or six boys, who knew not a word of German, took residence in the peninsula. They most conscientiously copied their four lines, —a dozen or a score of lines in the higher forms, — and Becker chose the lines so well, and bestowed so much attention upon the boys, that by the end of the five years they really knew something of the language and its literature.
I joined the Germans. My brother Alexander insisted so much in his letters upon my acquiring German, which possesses so rich a literature and into which every book of value is translated, that I set myself assiduously to learn it. I translated and studied most thoroughly one page of a rather difficult poetical description of a thunderstorm; I learned by heart, as the professor had advised me, the con- jugations, the adverbs, and the prepositions, and began to read. A splendid method it is for learning languages. Becker advised me, moreover, to subscribe to a cheap illus 86 MEMOIRS OF A REVOLUTIONIST trated weekly, and its illustrations and short stories were a continual inducement to read a few lines ora column. I soon mastered the language.
Toward the end of the winter I asked Herr Becker to lend me a copy of Goethe’s “ Faust.’ I had read it in a- Russian translation; I had also read Turguéneff’s beautiful novel, “ Faust;’’ and I now longed to read the great work in the original. ‘‘ You will understand nothing in it; it is too philosophical,” Becker said, with his gentle smile; but he brought me, nevertheless, a little square book, with the pages yellowed by age, containing the immortal drama. He little knew the unfathomable joy that that small square | book gave me. I drank in the sense and the music of | every line of it, beginning with the very first verses of the | ideally beautiful dedication, and soon knew full pages by: heart. Faust’s monologue in the forest, and especially the lines in which he speaks of his understanding of nature, — ‘Thou Not only cold, amazed acquaintance yield’st, But grantest that in her profoundest breast I gaze, asin the bosom of a friend,’? — simply put me in ecstasy, and till now it has retained its power over me. Every verse gradually became a dear friend. And then, is there a higher esthetic delight than to read poetry in a language which one does not yet quite) thoroughly understand? The whole is veiled with a sort of slight haze, which admirably suits poetry. Words, the trivial meanings of which, when one knows the language colloquially, sometimes interfere with the poetical image they are intended to convey, retain but their subtle, elevated sense; while the music of the poetry is only the more strongly impressed upon the ear.
Professor Klasdévsky’s first lesson was a revelation to us. He was a small man, about fifty years of age, very rapid im PROFESSOR KLASOVSKY 87 his movements, with bright, intelligent eyes and a slightly sarcastic expression, and the high forehead of a poet. When he came in for his first lesson, he said in a low voice that, suffering from a protracted illness, he could not speak loud enough, and asked us, therefore, to sit closer to him. He placed his chair near the first row of tables, and we clustered round him like a swarm of bees.
He was to teach us Russian grammar; but, instead of the dull grammar lesson, we heard something quite different from what we expected. It was grammar; but here came in a comparison of an old Russian folk-lore expression with a line from Homer or from the Sanskrit Mahabharata, the beauty of which was rendered in Russian words; there, a verse from Schiller was introduced, and was followed by a sarcastic remark about some modern society prejudice; then solid grammar again, and then some wide poetical or philosophical generalization.
Of course, there was much in it that we did not under- stand, or of which we missed the deeper sense. But do not the bewitching powers of all studies lie in that they sontinually open up to us new, unsuspected horizons, not ret understood, which entice us to proceed further and fur- her in the penetration of what appears at first sight only n vague outline? Some with their hands placed on one mother’s shoulders, some leaning across the tables of the irst row, others standing close behind Klasdévsky, our eyes littering, we all hung on his lips. As toward the end of he hour, his voice fell, the more breathlessly we listened. he inspector opened the door of the class-room, to see how ve behaved with our new teacher; but on seeing that aotionless swarm he retired on tiptoe. Even Dautroff, a astless spirit, stared at Klasdvsky as if to say, “ That is ae sort of man you are?” Even von Kleinau, a hope- assly obtuse Circassian with a German name, sat motion- 8s. In most of the others something good and elevated 88 MEMOIRS OF A REVOLUTIONIST simmered at the bottom of their hearts, as if a vision of an unsuspected world was opening before them.: Upon me Klasévsky had an immense influence, which only grew with years. Winkler’s prophecy, that, after all, I might like the school, was fulfilled.
In Western Europe, and probably in America, this type of teacher seems not to be generally known, but in Rus- sia there is not a man or woman of mark, in literature or in political life, who does not owe the first impulse toward a higher development to his or her teacher of liter- ature. Every school in the world ought to have such a ‘teacher. ‘Each teacher in a school has his own subject, and there is no link between the different subjects. Only the teacher of literature, guided by the general outlines of the programme, but left free to treat it as he likes, can bind together the separate historical and humanitarian sciences, unify them by a broad philosophical and humane conception, and awaken higher ideas and inspirations in the brains and hearts of the young people. In Russia, that necessary task falls quite naturally upon the teacher of Russian literature. As he speaks of the development of the language, of the contents of the early epic poetry, of popular songs and music, and, later on, of modern fiction, of the scientific, political, and philosophical literature of his own country, and the divers esthetical, political, and philosophical currents it has reflected, he is bound to in. troduce that generalized conception of the development of human mind which lies beyond the scope of each of the subjects that are taught separately. 3 The same thing ought to be done for the natural science; as well. It is not enough to teach physics and chemistry astronomy and meteorology, zoélogy and botany. Th philosophy of all the natural sciences —a general view | nature as a whole, something on the lines of the “| volume of Humboldt’s “Cosmos ”— must be conveye! © OUR WRITING MASTER 89 the pupils and the students, whatsoever may be the ex- tension given to the study of the natural sciences in the school. The philosophy and the poetry of nature, the methods of all the exact sciences, and an inspired conception of the life of nature must make part of education. Perhaps the teacher of geography might provisionally assume this function; but then we should require quite a different set of teachers of this subject, and a different set of professors of geography in the universities would be needed. What is now taught under this name is anything you like, but it is not geography.
Another teacher conquered our rather uproarious form in a quite different manner. It was the teacher of writing, the last one of the teaching staff. If the ‘‘ heathen” — that is, the German and the French teachers — were regarded with little respect, the teacher of writing, Ebert, who was a German Jew, was a real martyr. To be insolent with him wasa sort of chicamongst the pages. His poverty alone must have been the reason why he kept to his lesson in our corps. The old hands, who had stayed for two or three years in the fifth form without moving higher up, treated him very badly; but by some means or other he had made an agreement with them: ‘One frolic during each lesson, but no more,’’ —an agreement which, I am. afraid, was not always honestly kept on our side.
One day, one of the residents of the remote peninsula soaked the blackboard sponge with ink and chalk and flung it at the caligraphy martyr. ‘Get it, Ebert!’’ he shouted, with a stupid smile. The sponge touched Ebert’s shoulder, the grimy ink spirted into his face and down on to his white shirt.
We were sure that this time Ebert would leave the room and report the fact to the inspector. But he only exclaimed, as he took out his cotton handkerchief and 90 MEMOIRS OF A REVOLUTIONIST wiped his face, ‘‘Gentlemen, one frolic,—no more to- day!” ‘The shirt is spoiled,” he added, in a subdued voice, and continued to correct some one’s book.
We looked stupefied and ashamed. Why, instead of reporting, he had thought at once of the agreement! ‘The feeling of the class turned in his favor. ‘ What you have done is stupid,’? we reproached our comrade. ‘ He is a poor man, and you have spoiled his shirt! Shame!” somebody cried.: The culprit went at once to make excuses. ‘One must learn, learn, sir,” was all that Ebert said in reply, with sadness in his voice.
All became silent after that, and at the next lesson, as if we had settled it beforehand, most of us wrote in our best possible handwriting, and took our books to Ebert, » asking him to correct them. He was radiant; he felt happy that day.
This fact deeply impressed me, and was never wiped out from my memory. To this day I feel grateful to that remarkable man for his lesson.
With our teacher of drawing, who was named Ganz, we never arrived at living on good terms. He continually re- ported those who played in his class. This, in our opin- ion, he had no right to do, because he was only a teacher of drawing, but especially because he was not an honest man. In the class he paid little attention to most of us, and spent his time in improving the drawings of those who took private lessons from him, or paid him in order to show at the examinations a good drawing and to get a good mark for it. Against those comrades who did so we had no grudge. On the contrary, we thought it quite right that those who had no capacity for mathematics or no memory for geography, and had but poor marks in these subjects, should improve their total of marks by ordering from a OUR TEACHER OF DRAWING 91 draughtsman a drawing or a topographical map for which they would get “a full twelve.” Only for the first two pupils of the form it would not have been fair to resort to such means, while the remainder could do it with un- troubled consciences. But the teacher had no business to make drawings to order; and if he chose to act in this way, he ought to bear with resignation the noise and the tricks of his pupils. Instead of this, no lesson passed without his lodging complaints, and each time he grew more arrogant.
As soon as we were moved to the fourth form, and felt ourselves naturalized citizens of the corps, we decided to tighten the bridle upon him. “It is your own fault,” our elder comrades told us, ‘that he takes such airs with you; we used to keep him in obedience.” So we decided to bring him into subjection.
One day, two excellent comrades of our form approached Ganz with cigarettes in their mouths, and asked him to oblige them with a light. Of course, that was only meant for a joke, — no one ever thought of smoking in the class- rooms, —and, according to our rules of propriety, Ganz had merely to send the two boys away; but he inscribed them in the journal, and they were severely punished. That was the last drop. We decided to give him a “ benefit night.” That meant that one day all the form, provided with rulers borrowed from the upper forms, would start an outrageous noise by striking the rulers against the tables, and send the teacher out of the class. However, the plot offered many difficulties. We had in our form a lot of “‘soody ” boys who would promise to join in the demon- stration, but at the last moment would grow nervous and draw back, and then the teacher would name the others. In such enterprises unanimity is the first requisite, because the punishment, whatsoever it may be, is always lighter when it falls on the whole class instead of on a few, 92 MEMOIRS OF A REVOLULIONIST The difficulties were overcome with a truly Machiavel. lian craft. At a given signal all were to turn their backs to Ganz, and then, with the rulers laid in readiness on the desks of the next row, they would produce the required noise. In this way the goody boys would not feel terrified at Ganz’s staring at them. But the signal? Whistling, as in robbers’ tales, shouting, or even sneezing would not do: Ganz would be capable of naming any one of us as having whistled or sneezed. The signal must be a silent one. One of us, who drew nicely, would take his drawing to show it to Ganz, and the moment he returned and took his seat, — that was to be the time!
All went on admirably. Nesddoff took up his drawing, and Ganz corrected it in a few minutes, which seemed to us an eternity. He returned at last to his seat; he stopped for a moment, looking at us; he sat down...All the form turned suddenly on their seats, and the rulers rattled merrily within the desks, while some of us shouted amidst the noise, ‘Ganz out! Down with him!” The noise was deafening; all the forms knew that Ganz had got his benefit night. He stood there, murmuring something, and finally — went out. An officer ran in, —the noise continued; then the sub-inspector dashed in, and after him the inspector. The noise stopped at once. Scolding began.