Veressayev is well known in France for his "Memoirs of a Physician," a work that has been translated into almost every language. However, his reputation in Russia is not based on this book, which is considered his masterpiece, but rather on his stories and tales. Let us, however, first take a glance at the life of this author, a life so closely connected with the subjects of his works that it forms an indispensable commentary on them.

Veressayev, whose real name is Vikenty Smidovich, was born in 1867, in Tula. His father was a Pole and his mother a Russian. His father, a very pious and strictly moral man, was a well known and well liked physician. In 1877, the boy entered the local school and received his degree there seven years later. In 1884, he left for the University of St.Petersburg, where he enrolled in the department of historical sciences. Four years later, when he was twenty-four and a half, he received his degree of licentiate of letters.[5] Most of his class-mates became school-teachers, but he preferred to pursue his studies. Medicine tempted him. He left for Zhouriev (formerly Dorpat, already famous for its department of medicine) and entered the university, where, at the end of six years, he received his doctor's degree.

Two years before, in 1892, a cholera epidemic had broken out in Russia. Young Smidovich, then a fourth-year student, asked to be sent immediately to a province in the East, where the epidemic was spreading like wildfire. He remained there several months, in fact until the plague had gone. As a doctor's assistant in an infirmary organized in one of the mining districts of the government of Ekaterinoslav, he witnessed a peasant revolt in which several doctors were killed and others cruelly burned by the exasperated and ignorant mob. Veressayev has traced these sad events with tremendous power in his story, "Astray."

His doctor's degree in his pocket, he went to Tula, where he practised for several months, but soon the position of house-surgeon was offered to him in the Botkin Hospital in St.Petersburg. He remained there seven years, till 1901, when, by order of the Minister of the Interior, who has charge of all hospital appointments, he was forced to retire from office and was expelled from St.Petersburg and forbidden to reside in either of the two capitals, Moscow or St.Petersburg. The reason for this was, that the name Veressayev appeared on the petition of the "intellectuals" which had been given to the Minister of the Interior, protesting against the brutal attitude of the police during a student manifestation in the Kazan cathedral on March 4, 1901. This petition brought severe punishment to almost all the people whose names were signed to it. Veressayev went abroad; he visited Italy, France, Germany and Switzerland.

Gifted with poetic inspiration, he had begun writing at an early age. He was not more than fourteen when he translated some poems of Koerner and Goethe into Russian verse. Later, when at college, he wrote some short prose tales, which were published in various papers. But it was in 1896, when the "Russkoe Bogatsvo," the large St.Petersburg review, had published his two important stories, "Astray" and "The Contagion," that renown came to him. It came so suddenly that it troubled him and was almost a blow to his modesty, which is one of the sympathetic traits of his personality.

In fact, there came a time when the attention of the literary world, especially among the younger generation, became so wrapped up in his works that Gorky and Tchekoff sank to a second level. This enthusiasm was caused by the fact that Veressayev's works answered a general need. They brought into the world of literature a series of characters who summed up the rising fermentation of new ideas and seemed to be spokesmen, around whom the Russian revolutionary forces gathered,—forces which, up to this time, had been scattered. An era of struggle for liberty began.

It is rather important, I think, for the proper understanding of this period to say a few words concerning its history.

The struggle of the younger generation against the autocracy began about 1860, at the time of the freeing of the serfs, a period known in Russia as the "epoch of great reforms." These ameliorations, which extended into almost every domain of Russian life, left intact the autocracy, which, under pretence of protecting itself, fought successfully against all activity and thus brought about, among the younger generation, a general movement towards freedom and socialism. But the autocracy found its best help in the ignorance of the people. Urban commerce, little developed at that time, practically interested only the peasants—which means nine-tenths of the population of Russia. It was natural, then, that the peasants should become the principal object of the revolutionary propaganda, and that tremendous efforts should be made on all sides in order to awaken them from their dangerous sleep.

The peasant uprisings in the history of Russia, especially the two revolts directed by Stepan Razin in the 17th century, and Pugachev in the 18th, proved the fact that the masses could unite in a general insurrection. This time, the "intellectuals" joined. As they advocated a sort of communism, periodic redivisions of land according to the growth of the population, and as they harped on the tradition that land was a gift of God which no one had a right to own, we can easily see that the agricultural proletariat would welcome with open arms the socialistic ideas.

Although this popular movement did not affect many people, it was attacked with such pitiless cruelty, that the revolutionists decided to have recourse to the red terror in order to fight the white terror which was cutting down their ranks. The secret goal of this movement was to replace the autocratic rÉgime with political institutions emanating from the will of the people. In order to accomplish its reforms more quickly, this party, which called itself the "Popular Will," incited several attempts at murder; Russia then witnessed dynamite outrages against imperial trains and palaces, and finally, the assassination of the Emperor Alexander II. For a moment the autocratic rÉgime seemed to totter under these sudden and fierce blows, but it soon recovered. The white terror proved to be stronger than the red. Many executions and banishments helped to crush the partisans of the "Popular Will;" then, when the movement had been checked, the authorities began to repress even the slightest desire for independence on the part of the press, the universities, or any other institutions which could do good to the people. Dejection and disillusion dominated this period from 1880 to 1900, which has been so faithfully portrayed in the works of Tchekoff.

Nevertheless, in spite of the fact that their ideals had come to nought, those of the red terror had not disappeared, and hope remained in their breasts.

Tchekoff was still living when new symptoms of fermentation appeared in Russia, and he could have alluded to this in his later works. But he did not have a fighting nature, and, in his solitude, he looked at conditions with melancholy scepticism. There was need of a man, a writer—like Gorky several years later—born right in the midst of this movement, who would be the very product of it, and for whom its ideas would be a reason for existence.

Veressayev was this man and writer, and it is as much by his political opinions as by his literary talents that he gained such a wide-spread reputation. If his works are not always irreproachable from a literary standpoint, they are always accurate in describing exactly what the author himself has seen and lived through.

Veressayev, in three great stories, gives us the three phases of the movement between 1880 and 1900. These three stories, "Astray," "The Contagion" and "At the Turn," are of such extreme importance, that in the following pages there will be a detailed analysis of each of them.

The two protagonists of the story, "Astray," are Dr.Chekanhov and his cousin Natasha. The former is at the end of his moral life, the latter is on the threshold, and both of them are "astray," because the one has not found the road on which to travel through life, and the other is just beginning to look for it. The entire existence of Chekanhov is dominated by the idea that it is his duty to serve the people, which was the basis of the activity of the "narodnikis." According to him, the "intellectuals," who represent a small and privileged fraction of the population, are the debtors of the people and ought to pay their debt by giving the people knowledge and comfort. This theory is burned into his very soul; it is the leading thought that directs all of his actions. At this epoch, few men showed such absolute devotion. From 1880 to 1890, after the cruel suppression of the movement of the "narodnikis," there was a stop in this revolutionary activity. Unaware of this pacification, Chekanhov makes great exertions; as a doctor, he combats disease and saves several people. But how exhaust the source of this evil, this misery, which is increased by a despotic social order? Chekanhov spends his energy in vain; where else shall he apply his strength?

The famine of 1891! Dr.Chekanhov speaks only of his despair: "A terrible malady beats down on one after another of the inhabitants; it is an epidemic of typhoid caused by the privations which left us numb and weak." In 1892 an epidemic of cholera broke out. In spite of the prayers of his parents, the young man rushes off to the most infected district. One day, he penetrates into an infected hovel. The children are sprawling everywhere, the mother is foolish and stupid, and the father, weakened by prison labor, has come down with cholera. The wife forbids the doctor, whom she accuses of poisoning the sick, to approach her husband. Scorning the danger, in order to encourage the sick man, the doctor drinks out of the very cup which the invalid has used. Nothing counts with him as long as he can inspire confidence and save people from death.

"What good is there in love between good and strong people," adds Chekanhov, after having noted down this cure in his "Journal," "since it results only in miserable abortions? And why are the people held down to work which is so rough and unpleasant? What motive supports them in their painful labor? Is it the desire to preserve their infected hovels?"

At the end of these reflections could not Chekanhov, absolutely in despair, have abandoned his task? No, he knew how to keep up his devotion. Sacrificing his life for others, Chekanhov begins to love life again. He says to himself: "Life is good ... but will it be for a long time?" We do not catch the answer.

Furious voices are heard, and a savage and cruel mob calls him a poisoner and hurls itself upon him, beating and striking him.

Exhausted by the blows and jeered at by those whom he had considered his brothers in need and for whom he had put himself in constant peril, he lies stretched out on his bed, suffering severely; but he nourishes no grudge against his tormentors; on the contrary, his apostle-like character is moved with pity at the thought of these uncultured and ignorant beings so unconscious of the evil that they are doing. And several days before his death he writes the following tragic words in his "Journal," almost terrifying in their simplicity:

"They have beaten me! They have beaten me like a mad dog because I came to help them and because I used all my knowledge and strength, in one word, gave all that I had. I am not thinking now about how much I loved these people and how badly I feel at the way they have treated me. I simply did not succeed in gaining their confidence; I did succeed in making them believe in me for a while, but soon a mere trifle was enough to plunge them back among their dark shadows and to awaken in them an elemental, brutal instinct. And now I have to die. I am not afraid of death, but of a tarnished life full of empty remorse. Why have I struggled? In the name of what am I going to die? I am only a poor victim stripped of the strength of an ideal and cared for by no one.... It had to be so, for we were always strangers to them, beings belonging to another world; we scornfully avoid them, without trying to know them, and a terrible abyss separates us from them."

It is interesting to note how Chekanhov is regarded by the new generation and especially by the woman he loves, his cousin Natasha. She believes in him, she expects a gospel of life from him; but Chekanhov cannot respond to her; he adheres to such vague expressions as: "work," "idea," "duty towards the people." He says to her: "You want an idea which will dominate you entirely and which will lead you to a definite goal; you want me to give you a standard and say: 'Fight and die for it.' I have read more than you, I have had more experience than you, but like you, I Do Not Know, and that is our torture." According to Chekanhov, all of his generation are in the same position: it is Astray, without a guiding star, it is perishing without realizing it.... Finally, in order to avoid the pressing questions of Natasha, who would like to work and sacrifice herself for the poor, he points out to her the salutary work of the village school-mistress. A few days later he dies, welcoming death with joy.

While the people who were ending their existence and those who were beginning it were so carefully looking for a field of action, the uncultivated ground of Russian life was gradually being cleared by the slow evolution of an economic movement. Between 1895 and 1900, as a result of the natural development of national commerce, the number of city workingmen grew to vast proportions and they formed an important class, which, on account of its situation, was much more qualified than the peasants to interest itself in the ideas of socialism and liberty. So from the very midst of the people certain individuals appeared capable of adopting progressive ideas; Marxism awaited them, the theory which is the basis of European democratic socialism. This doctrine was nothing new in Russia. But formerly, the proletariat of the cities had been very little developed and the Marxian doctrines had been of theoretical interest only.

"The Contagion" has for its heroine Natasha,—the Natasha that we have already met, but how transformed! She has at last found her bearings. If, in 1892, she was waiting for the right road to be shown to her, in 1896 she was enthusiastically following the new road opened by the doctrines of Marx.

In Zharoshenko's famous picture, "The Student," Uspensky notes something new in this type of femininity. He calls it "the masculine trait"; it is the mark of thought. He sees there the harmonious fusion of a young girl and an adolescent boy, with an expression neither feminine nor masculine, but exceptionally human. And this transforms Zharoshenko's "Student" into a luminous personification, unknown up to this time, a type which synthesizes "le type humain."

In the work of Veressayev this student is Natasha. Reflection has ripened her mind since her last talk with poor Chekanhov. She has become a regular "mannish woman," having seen and thought a great deal. She has traveled; she has lived in St.Petersburg and in the south of Russia. Full of courage and energy, she claims to be fully satisfied with her lot; she begs her companions to follow the road she has found, and when they refuse she becomes angry with them. In company with her comrade Dayev she vigorously attacks the convictions of the men of Kisselev, who see sufficient safety in the workingmen's associations; she rises up, in the name of Marxism, against the "narodnikis," whom she considers ingenuous idealists; she refuses to endorse the theories of the "intellectuals," who oppose the thought of any great work, since they believe that smaller deeds are more immediately realizable. When one of them, a doctor, TroÏtsky, ends his conversation with her with these words: "It is not necessary to wear one's brains out trying to solve difficult problems while there is so much immediate need and so few workers," she puts an end to the discussion. Shrugging her shoulders, in a trembling voice she answers: "How can you live and think as you do? New problems confront us, and you stand before them and do nothing, because you have lost confidence. I can't work any longer with you, because it would mean dedicating myself blindly to 'spiritual death.'"

Veressayev does not show us how she solves the problems of which she speaks. The adepts of this sort of social apostleship usually propagate their ideas among the workingmen, help them, and play a part in conspiracies. Natasha offers herself up. But the censorship has not allowed Veressayev to carry his subject on, and he has limited himself to showing us Natasha in company with her friends and disciples, giving herself up to oratorical tilts, discussing principles, and uttering long discourses full of passion, faith, and juvenile impatience,—discourses which unfortunately are mistaken in their reasoning.

In realizing from the socialist ideal the logical and inevitable consequence of capitalism, which continues according to a law independent of human will, the Marxian doctrine dissipates the doubts and consolidates the faith of those who adopt it. According to this faith, the socialists do not have to create socialism, they only have to coÖperate in the historical process which will inevitably make socialism grow. In thus recognizing the supremity of the law of history, socialism, utopian up to this time, becomes scientific and, under its new form, it is no longer subject to the influence of personal opinions, no matter how full of genius they may be. But this "scientific socialism," which, on account of the backwardness of political economy, could be only a step ahead, was taken by the younger generation of Russia as the "dernier mot" of the science. The result was, that several narrow and exclusive dogmas were grafted on this doctrine. Thus, the theory of "class struggle" transformed itself into the absolute negation of all community interests between the diverse social strata. The "materialistic"—or rather "economic"—point of view, according to which the products of spiritual activity in the history of humanity lose all independence, being only the consequences of economic organization, generated scorn for all idealism; and the proletariat character of the socialistic movement impelled society to divide into two hostile and irreconcilable parts, one of which is made up of the proletariats, the other of the elements opposed to socialism. To this last party the enormous mass of half-starved peasants joined itself. The peasants, according to the Marxian doctrine, cannot understand socialism until they have become proletariats themselves, instead of becoming miserable landed proprietors. And this "proletariazation" of about 100,000,000 peasants, the fervent Marxists consider a fatal and desirable event in the near future.

These theories, carried to excess, were sure to excite a reaction. It manifested itself by a neo-idealistic movement, which found the principal cause of social progress in the tendency of humanity to attain supreme development and perfection. Then there were the "narodnikis" who considered the "proletariazation" of the Russian peasant impossible and inopportune. There were also the various groups of Socialists who applauded the criticism that Bernstein made on the Marxian orthodoxy. So several deviations were made from the original theory; there were grave dissensions and interminable and bitter controversies. All this occupies a large part of "At the Turn," one of Veressayev's novels, in which these events are traced with almost stenographic exactitude.

The characters are, Tanya, a fanatic Marxist; her brother, Tokarev, whose soul is a field for spiritual battles; and Varenka, a village school-mistress. There are several eccentric characters around them, such as Serge, a young apostle of a somewhat Nietzschean egoism, Antsov and others. Tanya is none other than Natasha of "Astray," with this great difference, however, that Tanya has found truth already formulated for her, and does not have to grope about for it. Nevertheless, the essential characteristics of the two girls are the same. They both have the same joyous self-denial, the same love of life, the same courage in face of difficulties, and also the same faith in a better future. Tanya has lived during the whole winter with her comrades in a region devastated by the famine, and she has spent there all that she possesses. At Toliminsk, where she arrives after a long walk, she speaks of her meagre living and tells amusing stories without suspecting her wonderful heroism.

But this young girl, full of the joy of life and ready for any sacrifices, is pitiless towards her theoretical adversaries and has absolutely no compassion for them. The passage in "Crime and Punishment," in which Dostoyevsky depicts one of his heroes in the following manner: "He was young, he had abstract ideas, and was, consequently, cruel," perfectly fits Tanya. Veressayev tells the following incident: "One day, when she was at the station, some peasants rushed down from the platform. A railroad guard struck one of the peasants. The peasant put his head down and ran off.... Tanya, knitting her brows, said: 'That's good for him! Oh, these peasants!' And her eyes lighted up with scorn and hate...."

Just as Tanya brings Natasha to our mind, so does Varenka make us think of Dr.Chekanhov; the same feeling of duty governs them both. But, while Chekanhov wanted to devote himself to the social problem, without ever succeeding in doing so, because he did not exactly see the principles, Varenka was able to devote herself to her work without mental reservation. However, she refuses to, because she has not enough enthusiasm for this sort of research. Her understanding, which is deeper and broader than Tanya's, sees the error, the narrowness of her doctrine; she cannot admit it, and, fired by a desire to devote herself body and soul to some useful work, she chooses the laborious profession of a school-mistress in the village. But this humble and unpleasant career does not satisfy her. Little by little ennui and anguish drive her to suicide.

Between Tokarev, Tanya's brother, and Varenka, the contrast is complete. While still a student, he had accepted, with all the ardor of youth, the idea of duty, and he desired to give himself up to the cause of justice and truth; but, having encountered many obstacles, he felt, when he had reached his thirtieth year, that the sacred fire was going out.

He now dreamed only of his personal happiness, and of poor theories that justified this egoism. An assured material existence, comfort, a happy domestic life, work without risks, without sacrifices, but useful enough in appearance to satisfy the conscience, attracted him irresistibly. He then went to work to tear out his former ideas, which had taken a pretty firm root. Urged on by his conscience, which protested, he forced himself at times to resurrect his youthful enthusiasm; he thought a great deal about morals, about duty, and he read many books treating this subject; he says: "I feel that something extremely necessary has left me. My feelings about humanity have disappeared and nothing can replace them. I read a great deal now, and I am directing my thoughts towards ethics. I try to give morality a solid basis and I try to make clearer to myself the various categories of duty.... And I blush to pronounce the word, 'Duty.'"

Nevertheless, Tokarev tries, at times, to justify his inclinations towards peaceable bourgeois prosperity to the struggling youth who surround his sister Tanya. These cruel young people, however, answer him only with sarcastic remarks, and caustic arguments, and do not hesitate to express their doubts as to the sincerity of his opinions. To his conscience, they are like a living reproach from the past. Once he also was intolerant towards others as these people are towards him to-day. And that is why he suffers under their condemnation of him. He defends himself weakly, and after one of his oratorical tilts, he falls into such spiritual depression, that he almost thinks of suicide.

These, then, are the three main characters of Veressayev's novel. In the background we have the secondary characters. We have the proud proprietor and his wife, both of them liberals; we have the pedagogue Osmerkov, who does not like talented people because they bother everybody; and then there are the respectable inhabitants of Gniezdelovka, Serge's father and mother, who are entirely absorbed with their household and with cards.

"The Comrades" is a variation on this theme: old school friends, who formerly had been wrapped up in a great ideal, are now living a life of shabby prosperity, and they feel that they have deteriorated, although they do not dare to confess it to each other.

And Veressayev profits by this to generalize on the causes of this fatal fall after the unselfish enthusiasms of youth. He sees them especially in a mysterious force: "The Invisible," already studied by Maeterlinck, Ibsen, Tchekoff, and especially by de Maupassant; and he sees them in the unhappy conditions of Russian history, which created a social and political organization favorable only to those who crawl along and not to those who plan.

Let us now analyze the stories in which Veressayev describes the life of the people.

The story of "The Steppe" is as follows: One beautiful autumn evening two men meet on the steppe. One of them, the forger Nikita, is returning to his native land; he is wounded in the leg and it is hard for him to walk. He is looking for work. The other is a professional beggar.

The beggar, who is never hungry because he has no scruples, offers Nikita something to eat. After resting a short while, the travelers continue on their way. In the first village that they come to, the pilgrim beggar makes a speech to the inhabitants and sells them certain "sacred properties" which he keeps in his bag. After pocketing gifts of money and various other things, the false pilgrim pursues his way, still accompanied by Nikita. On the road once more, he offers to share with his comrade the fruits of his "work," but the latter refuses.

"What a fool!" cries the beggar, and bursts out laughing. But Nikita, indignant, gives him a heavy blow and leaves him for good.

"For a Home" and "In Haste" gave Veressayev an opportunity to note one of the characteristic traits of the ambitious villagers: their strong desire to preserve their homes and to propagate the race.

In the first of these stories, two old people, Athanasius and his wife, want to marry their daughter Dunka, but the "mir,"—the assembly of peasants,—egotistical and inflexible towards people who are growing weak, oppose them. "We have not enough land for our own children," is the answer of the "mir." Dunka remains unmarried, and dies at an early age. Her mother soon follows her. Old Athanasius lives alone in his freezing "isba," which is in a state of ruin, while the neighboring isbas, solid and austere, "spitefully watch him die."

In the last story, we have a widower who is the father of five children, and is therefore looking everywhere for a woman with some bodily defect, because he knows that other women will not want to have anything to do with him.

It is the same wish to preserve his home that makes a peasant go to the city to earn his living while he leaves his family in the country to take care of the house.

The peasant is, besides, entirely engrossed with the difficulties of existence. Necessity often urges him to desperate acts.... Some, who are almost starving, ingratiate themselves with the raftsmen. They force wages down by asking only 5 copecks (5 cents) a day.... If they are contented with this absurd pay, it is because they avoid seeing how their little children are suffering at home. "It's hard living at present; there is not enough space; ground is scarce and there are too many people." "Men haven't room enough," says a sad-looking man with prominent cheek-bones. "But," he goes on, "they tell me that sickness has struck our village, and that the men are losing blood! Is that true?" "Yes, it's true!" "So much the better! That will clean out the people; it will be easier to live then," he concludes, thoughtfully. (From "In the Cold Spell.")

In almost all the work of Veressayev a voice proclaims that the Russian peasant is near his end; that he is not useful to any one. The poverty of the villages is painted in the most sombre colors. The people are unanimous in believing that the struggle for life has become terrible. "On what will you live?" one asks the other. "The earth does not nourish us. The holdings are small; in summer, one must cultivate, and in winter the cottages have to be closed while we look for work or charity. What is there to eat? Hay! Let us thank God that the cattle have enough of that. Oats? We have to give four hectoliters and two measures of our oats to the common granary.... And taxes and clothes? coal-oil, matches, tea, sugar? Tell me, how can one live?"

The unfortunates even go so far as to bless war and epidemics. "Everything went better then. Men lived peacefully in the fear of God, the Lord took care of every one. War, smallpox, famine came and cleaned out the populace; those that remained, after having got the coffins ready, lived easier. God pitied us. Now there is no more war; He leaves us to our own poor devices."

Speeches like this abound in the works of Veressayev. A dull sadness, bordering on despair, breathes forth from the pages. It seems, at times, as if the Russian peasant could never awake from his torpor, because the author represents him as full of infinite egoism, without any spirit of solidarity, sacrificing everything for love of his sorry little house and his morsel of ground, which is insufficient to nourish him. But we must remember that the Marxian point of view, which the author takes, explains in part the horror of such pictures.

According to Veressayev the poor peasants can better their position only by getting rid of their land, in order to become free proletarians. But if the peasant class is unfortunate, it is so, for the most part, because it is the most exploited and the most oppressed. It is not, then, the getting rid of their land that will bring the peasants salvation; on the contrary, they must fight for it against their oppressors. The peasants are beginning to understand the necessity of this struggle, and their late uprisings in several provinces have shown that they lack neither solidarity nor organization.

In the story called, "The End of Andrey Ivanovich," which is about the working class of Russia, we see the transformation of a peasant into a "city man." In his new surroundings, it is true, the wine-shop plays an important rÔle, but schools are organized there which inspire a taste for reading, and "thought" gradually awakens.

Andrey has not yet rid himself of his rustic unsociability; however, he is beginning to become civilized, and is receiving city culture. He tries to free himself from his misery, from his degradation. He beats his wife when he is drunk, but, at the same time, he gets angry at a friend when he beats his mistress.... According to his own confession he reads many useless things, nevertheless he can become interested in a serious work. If he drinks to excess, it is to "drive away the thoughts" that torment him. He wants to analyze every question and find out what is at the bottom of it. He is the spiritual brother of Natasha, Chekanhov, and Tanya.

The sequel to this story is "The Straight Road." This time we are transported into the world of factory workers, a world lamentable for its misery, despair, and crime. Andrey Ivanovich's wife, Alexandra Mikhailovna, being without resources after the death of her husband, with a little daughter in arms, enters a book-binding establishment, belonging to a man named Semidalov. But the foreman, a vicious and evil-minded man, reigns as despot. It is he who gives out the work. The young girls who listen to his advances are sure of being shown partiality; the others are badly treated. As Alexandra wants to live honestly, her work in the shop is made very hard. Her best friend, Tanya, who inadvertently spilled oil on some paper and could not pay for the damage, had to give herself to the foreman. Finally Tanya despairs and ends by drowning herself. Alexandra is saved, thanks to a "loveless" marriage with the locksmith, Lestmann. She accepts this union so that she will not have to starve and can remain "straight." Thus, the "straight road" which Alexandra wanted to follow has forced her finally to sell herself, to marry a man whom she does not love.

Each page of Veressayev's work exists merely to throw light on this or that social question, considered from a well defined point of view. The secret of his success rests mostly in the frank, sincere manner in which he has approached certain problems. At the same time, all of his work breathes forth a deep and tender love for those who suffer. In reality, there is not a single book by Veressayev which might not be a confession; all that he writes he has already experienced himself, and his work vibrates with a delicate and personal emotion. It is only necessary to read "The Memoirs of a Physician," which is almost an autobiography, in order to perceive the moral relationship that exists between Veressayev and the heroes of his stories.

This book is the confession of a physician from the time of his early studies. The young man is astonished at the number of maladies that exist and by the unbelievable variety of keen suffering that nature inflicts upon the human species, man. Soon he is obliged to make a discovery that stuns him: that medicine is incapable of curing many evils. It only gropes about, trying thousands of remedies before it arrives at a sure result. The scruples and anxiety of the student increase, especially after an autopsy on a woman in the amphitheatre, when the professor announces that the woman has succumbed because the surgeon, who was operating, swooned, and ends by saying: "In such difficult operations the very best surgeons are not safe from accidents of this kind." After this, the professor shook hands with his colleague and every one left. At that time, doubt entered the mind of the young man. And so, within a period of ten years, he passes from extreme optimism to the same degree of pessimism.

We follow him in the hospitals, where he is scandalized by the brutality of the teaching, which makes use of the unwilling bodies of sick people. "Not being able to pay for their treatment in money, they have to pay with their bodies." Finally, the student becomes a doctor himself. Full of faith and knowledge, he starts practice in a small market-town of central Russia. But his work soon cools him down; in the clinic he had studied mostly exceptional cases; now he is disconcerted by simple and every-day sicknesses. His ignorance leads to the following tragic case:

One day, a poor and widowed washerwoman brings him her sick child, whom she does not want to take to the hospital because her two oldest children died there. The child is a weak boy of eight years who has caught scarlet-fever. At first, the inside of the throat begins to swell, and, to prevent an abscess, the doctor orders rubbings with a mercurial ointment. The next day, he finds the boy all aquiver and covered with pimples. "There is no mistake," he says, "the rubbing has spread the infection into the neighboring organs and a general poisoning of the blood has taken place. The little boy is lost.... All that day and night I wandered about the streets. I could think of nothing, and I felt crushed by the horror of the thing. Only at times this thought came into my mind: 'I have killed a human being!'" The child lived ten days more. The night before his death Veressayev comes to see him. The poor mother is sobbing in a corner of the miserable room. She pulls herself together, however, and taking three rubles out of her pocket, offers them to the trembling doctor, who refuses them. Then this woman falls down on her knees and thanks him for having pitied her son. "I'll leave everything, I'll give up everything," sobs the doctor.... "I have decided to leave for St.Petersburg to-morrow in order to study some more even if I die of hunger!"

Once the resolution was made to pursue his studies in a more practical manner, he becomes the house-surgeon of a hospital. But even there a mass of problems disturb him. He sees how dangerous the simplest operations are; he is frightened by the unrestraint of the doctors, who try new methods on the sick, methods the effects of which are not known, methods that result in the patient's being inoculated with more sickness. Medicine cannot progress without direct experimentation, and experience is gained at the expense of the more unfortunate. Nevertheless, Veressayev does not argue against this way of working; he shows the facts, and leaves it to the reader to decide. On the other hand, he does not hide his fear of the common ignorance of all doctors. Every individual differs from his neighbor. How distinguish their idiosyncrasies? Once the scope of a sickness is known, what remedy shall be used? Some say this, others, that. How shall one choose? Veressayev has felt all of this; he has tried to harden himself against the unreasonable ingratitude of some, the scepticism of others; he realizes that patience, resignation, and heroism are needed in order to struggle against and support the mortifications in the career of a doctor. How much easier it would be not to consider medicine as infallible; to study it as an art rather than as a science. But people prefer to believe that doctors know everything. They do not want to see the reality, and this is the reason why sad, and at times tragic conflicts arise between patient and physician.

Finally, what could the most perfect medical science and the cleverest doctor do against the enormous mass of sickness and suffering that are the inevitable result of the social evils, of which poverty is the most conspicuous? How can one tell a man that his trade is running him down and that he does not get enough nourishment? How can one order a man to eat better food, to get more sleep and more pure air? First, and most important, is the necessity of curing the social organism.

It is easy to see why this book made many enemies for its author. There is too much frankness and conscientiousness in these studies not to anger those who have their greatest interest in concealing the truth! The upright man who sees primarily in medicine a means to relieve human suffering, cannot realize without sadness the many abuses hidden under the name of this science.

"In the War," recently published, is the story of Veressayev's campaign in Manchuria. In this work, the author has painted vividly the peregrinations of his moving hospital, and also the terrible sufferings of the Russian army. By the thousands, the starved children of the campaign, the Russian foot-soldiers, stoics and fatalists, sacrificing their lives for a strange and incomprehensible cause, pass before the eyes of the reader. And in the background, detaching themselves from the crowd, in their gold and silver embroidered uniforms, are "the heroes of the war, these vultures of the advance and rear-guard, who enrich themselves at the expense of the unfortunate soldiers." A number of these great chiefs, whose infamy was evident at the end of the war, since they had shown themselves incapable of dealing with the foreign enemy, had distinguished themselves by the ferocity they exhibited in quelling internal troubles. As to the military doctors, the greater number of them went into the campaign only for commercial gain. Among the nurses who accompanied them, aside from those who were real heroines of goodness and devotion, there were many who prostituted themselves shamefully.

Corruption, carelessness, disorder, and cowardice are shown on every page of this story, as well as the terrible suffering endured by the wounded in the hospitals. The wounded were the real martyrs of this frightful campaign.

Veressayev, like all of his heroes and heroines, wants to help the people, and for this reason he gets in touch with the revolutionists who consecrate their work to political and social regeneration, under the various titles, "narodnikis," Marxists, Socialists, idealists and so on.... Which of these does he prefer? We do not know. We find the influence of Marx in his ideas, but we cannot affirm that he is an absolute Marxian. It seems as if Veressayev, troubled by the innumerable divergencies of opinion, asks himself secretly: "Will this war lead to the unity of opinion and program, so necessary for victory, or by its quarrels will it only retard the harmony so much sought after?"

It is not discussion that will finally lead to unity, but rather life itself, with all its realities.

It would be most interesting to read a sequel to the three famous novels of Veressayev—"Astray," "The Contagion," and "At the Turning"—in which he would give us the psychology of his former heroes under present conditions. To-day, the people are not "astray"; the field is big enough for every one to find the place that best suits his ideas, tastes, and temperament. Dr.Chekanhov, if he were living now, instead of being maltreated by the people, would certainly be their well beloved champion, and perhaps represent them in the Duma; the timid Tokarev, in spite of his aversion to the ideas of the revolutionists, could find a place in the liberal party of the Reforming Democrats, or at least among the Octobrists; the unfortunate Varenka would not be worn out by her work as school-mistress, for she would be supported by the peasants. The peasants themselves are not the miserable and resigned creatures of Veressayev's earlier stories. Certainly, liberty is not yet a legal thing in Russia, and the Duma is still an unstable institution, but the end of absolutism is near, for a great event has taken place in the empire of the Tsar, namely, this awakening of the feeling of human dignity, and the spirit of revolt among the lower strata of the Russian people, which in the past, by its unconsciousness, formed the granite pedestal of autocracy. The struggle is terrible, but confidence in final victory redoubles the energy of the strugglers. A certain Russian was right when he said: "Formerly, life was formidable, but now it is both formidable and gay."

In reading the works of Veressayev, Tchekoff, and other painters of modern Russian society, it is easy to note that not one of them anticipated this sudden change of scenery on the Russian political stage, a change which, however, was being prepared in the souls of the peasants. But let us not reproach them! Russia will always remain an enigma.

There is a very old story about the son of the peasant Ilya Murometz. After remaining lazily resting in his "isba" for thirty years, he suddenly arose, and began to walk with such fury that the earth trembled. How could these writers conceive the time when this lazy giant would make up his mind to walk? It is enough to have the assurance that now, no matter what happens, since he has arisen, he will not lie down again.