Under the influence of the romantic movement in western Europe, in the '30's of the nineteenth century, and in particular under the deep impression made by Sir Walter Scott's novels, historical novels and historical studies began to make their appearance in Russia, and in the '50's underwent two periods of existence, which totally differed from each other.

During the first period the romance-writers, including even PÚshkin, treated things from a governmental point of view, and dealt only with such epochs, all more or less remote, as the censorship permitted. For example, ZagÓskin, the best known of the historical novelists, wrote "Áskold's Grave," from the epoch of the baptism of the Russians, in the tenth century, and "YÚry MiloslÁvsky," from the epoch of the Pretender, early in the seventeenth century; while LazhÉtchnikoff wrote "The Mussulman," from the reign of IvÁn III., sixteenth century, and "The Last Court Page," from the epoch of Peter the Great's wars with Sweden. The historical facts were alluded to in a slight, passing way, or narrated after the fashion of KaramzÍn, in lofty terms, with artificial patriotic inspiration. As the authors lacked archÆological learning, the manners and accessories of the past were merely sketched in a general, indefinite way, and often inaccurately, while the pages were chiefly filled with the sentimental love-passages of two or three virtuous heroes of stereotyped patterns, who were subjected to frightful adventures, perished several times, and were resuscitated for the purpose of marrying in ordinary fashion at the end.

In the '50's people became far too much interested in the present to pay much heed to the past. Yet precisely at that time the two finest historians came to the front, SergyÉi M. SoloviÉff and N.I. KostomÁroff, and effected a complete revolution in historiography. SoloviÉff's great history brings the narrative down to the reign of Katherine II. KostomÁroff dealt with periods, giving a complete picture of each one; hence each study, while complete in itself, does not of necessity always contain the whole career of the personages who figure in it. But both writers are essentially (despite KostomÁroff's not very successful attempts at historical novels) serious historians.

As we have already seen, the novels of the two Counts TolstÓy, "War and Peace" and "Prince SerÉbryany," stand quite apart, and far above all others.

But among the favorites of lesser rank are GrigÓry PetrÓvitch DanilÉvsky (born in 1829), whose best historical novel is "MirÓvitch," though it takes unwarrantable liberties with the personages of the epoch depicted (that of Katherine II.) and those in the adjacent periods. Less good, though popular, is his "Princess TarakÁnoff," the history of a supposed daughter of the Empress Elizabeth.

Half-way between the historians and the portrayers of popular life, and in a measure belonging to both ranks, are several talented men. The most famous of them was PÁvel IvÁnovitch MÉlnikoff (1819-1883), whose official duties enabled him to make an exhaustive study of the "Old Ritualists"³³ along the middle Volga.

His two novels, "In the Forests" and "On the Hills" (of the eastern and western banks of the Volga, respectively), are utterly unlike anything else in the language, and are immensely popular with Russians. They are history in that they faithfully reproduce the manners and beliefs of a whole class of the population; they are genre studies of a very valuable ethnographical character in their fidelity to nature. Long as they are, the interest never flags for a moment, but it is not likely that they will ever appear in an English translation. Too extensive and intimate a knowledge of national ways and beliefs (both of the State Church and the schismatics) are required to allow of their being popular with the majority of foreigners who read Russian; for the non-Russian reading foreigner an excessive amount of explanatory notes would be required, and they would resemble treatises. But they are two of the most delightful books of the epoch, and classics in their way. MÉlnikoff wrote, for a long time, under the pseudonym of "AndrÉi PetchÉrsky."

NikolÁi SemÉnovitch LyeskÓff (1837-1895), who long wrote under the pseudonym of "M. StebnÍtzky," is another author famous for his portraits of a whole class of the population, his specialty being the priestly class. He was of noble birth, and was reared in luxury, but was orphaned and ruined at a very early age, so that he was obliged to earn a hard living, first in government service, then as traveler for a private firm. This extensive traveling afforded him the opportunity of making acquaintance with the life of all classes of the population. He began to write in 1860, but a few incautious words, in 1862, raised a storm against him in the liberal press, which accused him of instigating the police to their attacks upon young people. As Count TolstÓy remarked to me, this incident prevented LyeskÓff ever receiving the full meed of recognition which his talent merited; a large and influential section of the press was permanently in league against him. This, eventually, so exasperated and embittered LyeskÓff that he really did go over to the conservative camp, and the first result of his wrath was the romance "No Thoroughfare," published in 1865. Its chief characters are two ideal socialists, a man and a woman, recognized by contemporaries as the portraits of living persons. Both are represented as finding so-called socialists to be merely crafty nihilists. This raised another storm, and still further embittered LyeskÓff, who expressed himself in "To the Knife" (in the middle of the '70's), a mad production, wherein revolutionists (or "nihilists," as they were then generally called) were represented as condensed incarnations of the seven deadly sins. These works had much to do with preventing LyeskÓff from taking that high place in the public estimation which his other works (a mass of novels and tales devoid of political tendency) and his great talent would have otherwise assured to him. Of his large works, "The Cathedral Staff," with its sympathetic and life-like portraits of Archpriest SavÉly TuberÓsoff and his athletic Deacon Achilles, and his "Episcopal Trifles" rank first. The latter volume, which consists of a series of pictures setting forth the dark sides of life in the highest ecclesiastical hierarchy, created a great sensation in the early '80's, and raised a third storm, and the author fell into disfavor in official circles. Perhaps the most perfect of his works is one of the shorter novels, "The Sealed Angel," which deals with the ways and beliefs of the Old Ritualists (though in the vicinity of KÍeff, not in MÉlnikoff's province), and is regarded as a classic, besides being a pure delight to the initiated reader. Count L.N. TolstÓy greatly admired (he told me) LyeskÓff's "At the End of the World," a tale of missionary effort in Siberia, which is equally delightful in its way, though less great. Towards the end of his career, LyeskÓff was inclined to mysticism, and began to work over ancient religious legends, or to invent new ones in the same style.³⁴

The direct and immediate result of the democratic tendency on Russian thought and attraction to the common people during this era was the creation of a school of writers who devoted themselves almost exclusively to that sphere, in addition to the contributions from TurgÉneff, TolstÓy, DostoÉvsky. Among these was a well-known woman writer, MÁrya AlexÁndrovna MarkÓvitch, who published her first Little Russian Tales, in 1859, under the name of "MÁrko VovtchÉk." She immediately translated them into Russian, and they were printed in the best journals of the day. I.S. TurgÉneff translated one volume into Russian (for her Little Russian language was not of the supreme quality that characterized ShevtchÉnko's, which needed no translating), and DobroliÚboff, an authoritative critic of that period, expressed himself in the most flattering manner about them. But her fame withered away as quickly as it had sprung up. The weak points of her tales had been pardoned because of their political contents; in ten years they had lost their charm, and their defects—a too superficial knowledge of the people's life, the absence of living, authentic coloring in portraiture, its restriction to general, stereotyped types, such as might have been borrowed from popular tales and ballads, and excess of sentimentality—became too apparent to be overlooked by a more enlightened public.

The only other woman writer of this period who acquired much reputation may be mentioned here, although she cannot be classed strictly with portrayers of the people: NadÉzhda DmÍtrievna KhvÓshtchinsky, whose married name was ZaiÓntchkovsky, and who wrote under the pseudonym of "V. KrestÓvsky" (1825-1889). She published a great many short stories of provincial town life, rather narrow as to their sphere of observation. Her best work was "The Great Bear" (referring to the constellation), which appeared in 1870-1871.³⁵

When literature entered upon a fresh phase of development in the '70's of the last century, the careful study of the people, two men headed the movement, Glyeb IvÁnovitch UspÉnsky and NikolÁi NikolÁevitch ZlatovrÁtsky. UspÉnsky (1840) took the negative and pessimistic view. ZlatovrÁtsky (1845) took the positive, optimistic view.³⁶

Like many authors of that period, adverse conditions hindered UspÉnsky's march to fame. Shortly after his first work, "The Manners of RasteryÁeff Street," began to appear in "The Contemporary," that journal was stopped. He continued it in another journal, which also was stopped before his work was finished, and that after he had been forced to cut out everything which gave a hint at its being a "continuation," so that it might appear to be an independent whole. He was obliged to publish the mangled remains in "The Woman's News," because there was hardly any other journal then left running. After the Servian War (generally called abroad "the Russo-Turkish War") of 1877-1878, UspÉnsky abandoned the plebeian classes to descend to "the original source" of everything—the peasant. When he published the disenchanting result of his observations, showing to what lengths a peasant will go for money, there was a sensation. This was augmented by his sketch, "Hard Labor"; and a still greater sensation ensued on the publication of his "'Tis Not a Matter of Habit" (known in book form as "The Eccentric Master"). In "Hard Labor" he set forth, contrary to all theoretical beliefs, that the peasants of villages which had belonged to private landed proprietors prior to the emancipation, were incomparably and incontestably more industrious and moral than the peasants on the crown estates, who had always been practically free men.³⁷

Readers were still more alarmed by the deductions set forth in his "An Eccentric Master." The hero is an educated man, MikhÁil MikhÁilovitch, who betakes himself to the rural wilds with the express object of "toiling there exactly like the rest, as an equal in morals and duties, to sleep with the rest on the straw, to eat from one pot with them" (the TolstÓyan theory, but in advance of him), "while the money acquired thus by general toil was to be the property of a group of people to be formed from peasants and from actually ruined former members of the upper classes." But the peasants, not comprehending the master's lofty aims, treated him as an eccentric fool, and began to rob him in all directions, meanwhile humoring him to the top of his bent in all his instincts of master. It ends in MikhÁil MikhÁilovitch becoming thoroughly disillusioned, dejected, and taking to drink after having expended the whole of his capital on the ungrateful peasants. This will serve to illustrate UspÉnsky's pessimistic point of view, for which he certainly had solid grounds.

While UspÉnsky never sought artistic effects in his work, and his chief strength lay in humor, in ridicule which pitilessly destroyed all illusions, ZlatovrÁtsky never indulges in a smile, and is always, whether grieving or rejoicing, in a somewhat exalted frame of mind, which often attains the pitch of epic pathos, so that even his style assumes a rather poetical turn, something in the manner of hexameters. Moreover, he is far from despising the artistic element. He established his fame in 1874 by his first large work, "Peasant Jurors."

As ZlatovrÁtsky (whose father belonged to the priestly class) regards as ideal the commune and the peasant guild (artÉl), with their individualistic, moral ideals of union in a spirit of brotherly love and solidarity, both in work and in the enjoyment of its products, his pessimism is directed against the Russian educated classes, not excepting even their very best representatives. This view he expresses in all his works which depict the educated classes: "The Golden Heart," "The Wanderer," "The KremlÉff Family," "The KaravÁeffs," "The Hetman," and so forth. In these he represents educated people—the better classes, called "intelligent" people by Russians—under the guise of sheep who have strayed from the true fold, and the only thing about them which he regards as a sign of life (in a few of the best of them) is their vain efforts to identify themselves with the common people, and thus, as it were, restore the lost paradise³⁸.

There are many others who have written sketches and more ambitious works founded on a more or less intimate study and knowledge of the peasants. On one of these we must turn our attention, briefly, as the author of one famous and heartrending book, "The Inhabitants of PodlÍpovo." FeÓdor MikhÁilovitch RyeshÉtnikoff (1841-1871) was one of three middle-class ("plebeian" is the Russian word) writers who made a name, the others being AlexÁnder IvÁnovitch LevÍtoff and NikolÁi IvÁnovitch NaÚmoff. For in proportion as culture spread among the masses of society, and the center of the intellectual movement was transferred from the noble class to the plebeian, in the literary circles towards the end of the '50's there appeared a great flood of new forces from the lower classes. The three writers above mentioned, as well as UspÉnsky and ZlatovrÁtsky, belonged to the priestly plebeian class. RyeshÉtnikoff's famous romance—rather a short story—was the outcome of his own hardships, sufferings, and experiences. He was scantily educated, had no Æsthetic taste, wrote roughly, not always grammatically, and always in excessively gloomy colors, yet he had the reputation of being a passionate lover of the people, despite the fact that his picture of the peasants in his best known work is generally regarded as almost a caricature in its exaggerated gloom, and he enjoys wide popularity even at the present time.

The spirits of people rose during the epoch of Reform (after the Emancipation of the serfs in 1861) and the general impulse to take an interest in political and social questions was speedily reflected in literature by the formation of a special branch of that art, which was known as "tendency literature," although its more accurate title would have been "publicist literature." The peculiarity of most writers of this class was their pessimistic skepticism. This publicist literature was divided into three classes: democratic, moderately liberal, and conservative.

At the head of the democratic branch stood the great writer who constituted the pride and honor of the epoch, as the one who most profoundly and fully reflected it, MikhÁil EvgrÁfovitch SaltykÓff (1826-1889). He was the son of landed proprietors, of an ancient family, with a famous name of TatÁr descent. He finished his education in the TzÁrskoe SelÓ Lyceum, which, from the time of PÚshkin on, graduated so many notable statesmen and distinguished men. The authorities of the Lyceum were endeavoring to exterminate the spirit of PÚshkin, who had died only the year before, and severely repressed all scribbling of poetry, which did not in the least prevent almost every boy in the school from trying his hand at it and dreaming of future fame. Thus incited, SaltykÓff, from the moment of his entrance, earned the ill-will of the authorities by his passionate love of verse writing and reading, and when he graduated, in 1844, it was in the lower half of his class, and with one rank lower in the civil service than the upper half of the class.In 1847 he published (under the name of "M. NepÁnoff") his first story, "Contradictions," and in 1848 his second, "A Tangled Affair," both in "The Annals of the Fatherland." When the strictness of the censorship was augmented during that same year, after "the PetrashÉvsky affair," all literary men fell under suspicion. When SaltykÓff asked for leave of absence from the service to go home during the holidays, he was commanded to produce his writings. Although these early writings contained hardly a hint of the satirical talents which he afterwards developed, the person to whom was intrusted the task of making a report of them (and who was a sworn enemy to the natural school and "The Annals of the Fatherland") gave such an alarming account of them that the Count TchÉrnysheff was frightened at having so dangerous a man in his ministerial department. The result was, that in May, 1848, a posting-trÓÏka halted in front of SaltykÓff's lodgings, and the accompanying gendarme was under orders to escort the offender off to VyÁtka on the instant.

In SaltykÓff's case, as in the case of many another Russian writer, exile not only removed him from the distracting pleasures of life at the capital, but also laid the foundation for his future greatness. In VyÁtka, SaltykÓff first served as one of the officials in the government office, but by the autumn he was appointed the official for special commissions immediately attached to the governor's service. He was a valued friend in the family of the vice-governor, for whose young daughters he wrote a "Short History of Russia," and after winning further laurels in the service, he was allowed to return to St. Petersburg in 1856, when he married one of the young girls, and published his "Governmental Sketches," with the materials for which his exile had furnished him. Two years later he was appointed vice-governor of RyazÁn, then transferred to Tver, where he acted as governor on several occasions. In 1862 he retired from the service and devoted himself to literature, but he returned to it a couple of years later, and only retired definitively in 1868. These items are of interest as showing the status of political exiles in a different light from that usually accepted as the unvarying rule.

As we have said, SaltykÓff's exile was of incalculable service to him, in that it made him acquainted with the inward life of Russia and of the people. This knowledge he put to unsparing use in his famous satires. In order fully to understand his works, one must be thoroughly familiar with the general spirit and the special ideas of the different periods to which they refer, as well as with Russia and its life and literature in general. SaltykÓff (who wrote under the name of "ShtchedrÍn") was very keen to catch the spirit of the moment, and very caustic in portraying it, with the result that very often the names he invented for his characters clove to whole classes of society, and have become by-words, the mere mention of which reproduces the whole type. For example, after the Emancipation, when the majority of landed proprietors were compelled to give up their parasitic life on the serfs, there arose a class of educated people who were seeking fresh fields for their easy, parasitic existence. One of the commonest expedients, in the '70's, for restoring shattered finances was to go to TashkÉnt, where the cultured classes imagined that regular gold mines awaited them. SaltykÓff instantly detected this movement, and not only branded the pioneers in the colonization of Central Asia with the name of "TashkÉntzians" (in "GospodÁ TashkÉntzy" Messrs. TashkÉntzians), but according to his wont, he rendered this nickname general by applying it to all cultured classes who had nothing in their souls but an insatiable appetite. In other works he branded other movements and classes with equal ineffaceableness.

His masterpiece (in his third and most developed period), the work which foreigners can comprehend almost equally well with Russians, is "GospodÁ GolovlÉvy" ("The Messrs. GolovlÉff"³⁹). It contains that element of the universal in humanity which his national satires lack, and it alone would suffice to render him immortal. The type of IÚdiushka (little Judas) has no superior in all European literature, for its cold, calculating, cynical hypocrisy, its miserly ferocity. The book is a presentment of old ante-reform manners among the landed gentry at their worst.

The following favorite little story furnishes an excellent example of SaltykÓff's (ShtchedrÍn's) caustic wit and satire:

The Story of how One Peasant Maintained Two Generals.

Once upon a time there lived and flourished two Generals; and as both were giddy-pated, by jesting command, at my desire, they were speedily transported to an uninhabited island.

The Generals had served all their lives in some registry office or other; they had been born there, reared there, had grown old there, and consequently they understood nothing whatever. They did not even know any words except, "accept the assurance of my complete respect and devotion."

The registry was abolished as superfluous, and the Generals were set at liberty. Being thus on the retired list, they settled in Petersburg, in PodyÁtchesky (Pettifoggers) Street, in separate quarters; each had his own cook, and received a pension. But all of a sudden, they found themselves on an uninhabited island, and when they awoke, they saw that they were lying under one coverlet. Of course, at first they could not understand it at all, and they began to talk as though nothing whatever had happened to them.

"'Tis strange, your Excellency, I had a dream to-day," said one General; "I seemed to be living on a desert island."

No sooner had he said this than he sprang to his feet. The other General did the same.

"Heavens! What's the meaning of this? Where are we?" cried both, with one voice.

Then they began to feel each other, to discover whether this extraordinary thing had happened to them not in a dream, but in their waking hours. But try as they might to convince themselves that all this was nothing but a vision of their sleep, they were forced to the conviction of its sad reality.

On one side of them stretched the sea, on the other side lay a small plot of land, and beyond it again stretched the same boundless sea. The Generals began to weep, for the first time since the registry office had been closed.

They began to gaze at each other, and they then perceived that they were clad only in their night-shirts, and on the neck of each hung an order.

"How good a little coffee would taste now!" ejaculated one General, but then he remembered what unprecedented adventure had happened to him, and he began to cry again.

"But what are we to do?" he continued, through his tears; "if we were to write a report, of what use would it be?"

"This is what we must do," replied the other General. "Do you go to the east, your Excellency, and I will go to the west, and in the evening we will meet again at this place; perhaps we shall find something."So they began their search to find which was the east and which the west. They recalled to mind that their superior official had once said, "If you wish to find the east, stand with your eyes towards the north, and you will find what you want on your right hand." They began to seek the north, and placed themselves first in one position, then in another, and tried all quarters of the compass in turn, but as they had spent their whole lives in the registry office, they could decide on nothing.

"This is what we must do, your Excellency; do you go to the right, and I will go to the left; that will be better," said the General, who besides serving in the registry office had also served as instructor of calligraphy in the school for soldiers' sons, and consequently had more sense.

So said, so done. One General went to the right, and saw trees growing, and on the trees all sorts of fruits. The General tried to get an apple, but all the apples grew so high that it was necessary to climb for them. He tried to climb, but with no result, except that he tore his shirt to rags. The General came to a stream, the fish were swimming there in swarms, as though in a fish-shop on the FontÁnka canal. "If we only had such fish in Pettifoggers Street!" said the General to himself, and he even changed countenance with hunger.

The General entered the forest, and there hazel-hens were whistling, blackcocks were holding their bragging matches, and hares were running.

"Heavens! What victuals! What victuals!" said the General, and he felt that he was becoming fairly sick at his stomach with hunger.

There was nothing to be done; he was obliged to return to the appointed place with empty hands. He reached it but the other General was already waiting for him.

"Well, your Excellency, have you accomplished anything?"

"Yes, I have found an old copy of the 'Moscow News'; that is all."

The Generals lay down to sleep again, but gnawing hunger kept them awake. They were disturbed by speculations as to who would receive their pension for them; then they recalled the fruits, fish, hazel-hens, blackcock, and hares which they had seen that day.

"Who would have thought, your Excellency, that human food, in its original shape, flies, swims, and grows on trees?" said one General.

"Yes," replied the other General; "I must confess that until this day I thought that wheaten rolls came into existence in just the form in which they are served to us in the morning with our coffee."

"It must be that, for instance, if one desires to eat a partridge, he must first catch it, kill it, pluck it, roast it.... But how is all that done?"

"How is all that done?" repeated the other General, like an echo. They fell into silence, and tried to get to sleep; but hunger effectually banished sleep. Hazel-hens, turkeys, sucking-pigs flitted before their eyes, rosy, veiled in a slight blush of roasting, surrounded with cucumbers, pickles, and other salads.

"It seems to me that I could eat my own boots now!" said one General.

"Gloves are good also, when they have been worn a long time!" sighed the other General.

All at once the Generals glanced at each other; an ominous fire glowed in their eyes, their teeth gnashed, a dull roar forced its way from their breasts. They began slowly to crawl toward each other, and in the twinkling of an eye they were exasperated to fury. Tufts of hair flew about, whines and groans resounded; the General who had been a teacher of calligraphy bit off his adversary's Order, and immediately swallowed it. But the sight of flowing blood seemed to restore them to their senses.

"The power of the cross defend us!" they exclaimed simultaneously; "if we go on like this we shall eat each other!"

"And how did we get here? What malefactor has played us this trick?"

"We must divert our minds with some sort of conversation, your Excellency, or there will be murder!" said the other General."Begin!" replied the other General.

"Well, for instance, what do you think about this, Why does the sun rise first and then set, instead of acting the other way about?"

"You are a queer man, your Excellency; don't you rise first, then go to the office, write there, and afterward go to bed?"

"But why not admit this reversal of the order; first I go to bed, have divers dreams, and then rise?"

"Hm, yes.... But I must confess that when I served in the department I always reasoned in this fashion: now it is morning, then it will be day, then supper will be served, and it will be time to go to bed."

But the mention of supper plunged them both into grief, and broke the conversation off short at the very beginning.

"I have heard a doctor say that a man can live for a long time on his own juices," began one of the Generals.

"Is that so?"

"Yes, sir, it is; it appears that, the juices proper produce other juices; these in their turn, engender still other juices, and so on, until at last the juices cease altogether...."

"What then?"

"Then it is necessary to take some sort of nourishment."

"Tfu!"

In short, no matter what topic of conversation the Generals started, it led inevitably to a mention of food, and this excited their appetites still more. They decided to cease their conversation, and calling to mind the copy of the "Moscow News" which they had found, they began to read it with avidity.

"Yesterday," read one General, with a quivering voice, "the respected governor of our ancient capital gave a grand dinner. The table was set for one hundred persons, with wonderful luxury. The gifts of all lands seemed to have appointed a rendezvous at this magical feast. There was the golden sterlet of the Sheksna, the pheasant, nursling of the Caucasian forests, and strawberries, that great rarity in our north in the month of February...."

"Tfu, heavens! Cannot your Excellency find some other subject?" cried the other General in desperation, and taking the newspaper from his companion's hand, he read the following: "A correspondent writes to us from TÚla: 'There was a festival here yesterday at the club, on the occasion of a sturgeon being caught in the river UpÁ (an occurrence which not even old residents can recall, the more so as private Warden B. was recognized in the sturgeon). The author of the festival was brought in on a huge wooden platter, surrounded with cucumbers, and holding a bit of green in his mouth. Doctor P., who was on duty that day as presiding officer, saw to it carefully that each of the guests received a piece. The sauce was extremely varied, and even capricious.' ..."

"Permit me, your Excellency, you also seem to be not sufficiently cautious in your choice of reading matter!" interrupted the first General, and taking the paper in his turn, he read: "A correspondent writes to us from VyÁtka: 'One of the old residents here has invented the following original method of preparing fish soup: Take a live turbot, and whip him as a preliminary; when his liver has become swollen with rage.' ..."

The Generals dropped their heads. Everything on which they turned their eyes—everything bore witness to food. Their own thoughts conspired against them, for try as they would to banish the vision of beefsteak, this vision forced itself upon them.

And all at once an idea struck the General who had been a teacher of calligraphy....

"How would it do, your Excellency," he said joyfully, "if we were to find a peasant?"

"That is to say ... a muzhÍk?"

"Yes, exactly, a common muzhÍk ... such as muzhÍks generally are. He would immediately give us rolls, and he would catch hazel-hens and fish!"

"Hm ... a peasant ... but where shall we find him, when he is not here?"

"What do you mean by saying that he is not to be found? There are peasants everywhere, and all we have to do is to look him up! He is certainly hiding somewhere about because he is too lazy to work!" This idea cheered the Generals to such a degree that they sprang to their feet like men who had received a shock, and set out to find a peasant.

They roamed for a long time about the island without any success whatever, but at last the penetrating smell of bread-crust and sour sheepskin put them on the track. Under a tree, flat on his back, with his fists under his head, lay a huge peasant fast asleep, and shirking work in the most impudent manner. There were no bounds to the wrath of the Generals.

"Asleep, lazybones!" and they flung themselves upon him; "and you don't move so much as an ear, when here are two Generals who have been dying of hunger these two days! March off, this moment, to work!"

The man rose; he saw that the Generals were stern. He would have liked to give them the slip, but they had become fairly rigid when they grasped him.

And he began to work under their supervision.

First of all he climbed a tree and picked half a score of the ripest apples for the Generals, and took one, a sour one, for himself. Then he dug in the earth and got some potatoes; then he took two pieces of wood, rubbed them together, and produced fire. Then he made a snare from his own hair and caught a hazel-hen. Last of all, he arranged the fire, and cooked such a quantity of different provisions that the idea even occurred to the Generals, "would it not be well to give the lazy fellow a little morsel?"

The Generals watched the peasant's efforts, and their hearts played merrily. They had already forgotten that they had nearly died of hunger on the preceding day, and they thought, "What a good thing it is to be a general—then you never go to destruction anywhere."

"Are you satisfied, Generals?" asked the big, lazy peasant.

"We are satisfied, my dear friend, we perceive your zeal," replied the Generals.

"Will you not permit me to rest now?"

"Rest, my good friend, only first make us a rope."

The peasant immediately collected wild hemp, soaked it in water, beat it, worked it—and by evening the rope was done. With this rope the Generals bound the peasant to a tree so that he should not run away, and then they lay down to sleep.

One day passed, then another; the big, coarse peasant became so skilful that he even began to cook soup in the hollow of his hand. Our Generals became jovial, light-hearted, fat, and white. They began to say to each other that, here they were living with everything ready to hand while their pensions were accumulating and accumulating in Petersburg.

"What do you think, your Excellency, was there really a tower of Babel, or is that merely a fable?" one General would say to the other, as they ate their breakfast.

"I think, your Excellency, that it really was built; because, otherwise, how can we explain the fact that many different languages exist in the world?"

"Then the flood must have occurred also?"

"The flood did happen, otherwise, how could the existence of antediluvian animals be explained? The more so as it is announced in the 'Moscow News'...."

"Shall we not read the 'Moscow News'?"

Then they would hunt up that copy, seat themselves in the shade, and read it through from end to end; what people had been eating in Moscow, eating in TÚla, eating in PÉnza, eating in RyazÁn—and it had no effect on them; it did not turn their stomachs.

In the long run, the Generals got bored. They began to refer more and more frequently to the cooks whom they had left behind them in Petersburg, and they even wept, on the sly.

"What is going on now in Pettifoggers Street, your Excellency?" one General asked the other.

"Don't allude to it, your Excellency! My whole heart is sore!" replied the other General.

"It is pleasant here, very pleasant—there are no words to describe it; but still, it is awkward for us to be all alone, isn't it? And I regret my uniform also."

"Of course you do! Especially as it is of the fourth class,⁴⁰ so that it makes you dizzy to gaze at the embroidery alone!"Then they began to urge the peasant: Take them, take them to Pettifoggers Street! And behold! The peasant, it appeared, even knew all about Pettifoggers Street; had been there; his mouth had watered at it, but he had not had a taste of it!

"And we are Generals from Pettifoggers Street, you know!" cried the Generals joyfully.

"And I, also, if you had only observed; a man hangs outside a house, in a box, from a rope, and washes the wall with color, or walks on the roof like a fly. I am that man," replied the peasant.

And the peasant began to cut capers, as though to amuse his Generals, because they had been kind to him, an idle sluggard, and had not scorned his peasant toil. And he built a ship—not a ship exactly, but a boat—so that they could sail across the ocean-sea, up to Pettifoggers Street.

"But look to it, you rascal, that you don't drown us!" said the Generals, when they saw the craft pitching on the waves.

"Be easy, Generals, this is not my first experience," replied the peasant, and began to make preparations for departure.

The peasant collected soft swansdown, and lined the bottom of the boat with it; having done this, he placed the Generals on the bottom, made the sign of the cross over them, and set sail. The pen cannot describe, neither can the tongue relate, what terror the Generals suffered during their journey, from storms and divers winds. But the peasant kept on rowing and rowing, and fed the Generals on herrings.

At last, behold Mother NevÁ, and the splendid Katherine Canal, and great Pettifoggers Street! The cook-maids clasped their hands in amazement at the sight of their Generals, so fat, white, and merry! The Generals drank their coffee, ate rolls made with milk, eggs, and butter, and put on their uniforms. Then they went to the treasury, and the pen cannot describe, neither can the tongue relate, how much money they received there.

But they did not forget the peasant; they sent him a wineglass of vÓdka and a silver five-kopÉk piece.⁴¹ "Make merry, big, coarse peasant!"

While TurgÉneff represented the "western" and liberal element (with a tinge of the "red") in the school of the '40's, and GontcharÓff stood for the bourgeois and opportunist ideals of the St. Petersburg bureaucrats, Count LyÉff NikolÁevitch TolstÓy penetrated more profoundly into the depths of the spirit of the times than any other writer of the period in the matter of analysis and skepticism which characterized that school, and carried them to the extremes of pitiless logic and radicalness, approaching more closely than any other to democratic and national ideals. But notwithstanding all his genius, Count TolstÓy was not able to free himself to any great extent from his epoch, his environment, his contemporaries. His special talents merely caused him to find it impossible to reconcile himself to the state of affairs existing around him; and so, instead of progressing, he turned back and sought peace of mind and a firm doctrine in the distant past of primitive Christianity. Sincere as he undoubtedly is in his propaganda of self-simplification and self-perfection—one might almost call it "self-annihilation"—his new attitude has wrought great and most regrettable havoc with his later literary work, with some few exceptions.

And yet, in pursuing this course, he did not strike out an entirely new path for himself; his youth was passed in an epoch when the ideal of personal perfection and self-surrender stood in the foreground, and constituted the very essence of Russian progress.

Count L.N. TolstÓy was born on August 28, O.S., 1828 (September 9th, N.S.), in the village of YÁsnaya PolyÁna, in the government of TÚla. His mother, born Princess VolkÓnsky (MÁrya NikolÁevna), died before he was two years old, and his father's sister, Countess A.T. Osten-Saken, and a distant relative, Madame T.A. ErgÓlsky, took charge of him. When he was nine years old the family removed to Moscow, and his father died soon afterwards. LyÉff NikolÁevitch, his brother DmÍtry, and his sister MÁrya then returned to the country estate, while his elder brother NikolÁi remained in Moscow with Countess Osten-Saken and studied at the University of Moscow. Three years later, the Countess Osten-Saken died, and another aunt on the father's side, Madame P.I. YÚshkoff, who resided in KazÁn, became their guardian. LyÉff NikolÁevitch went there to live, and in 1843 he entered the University of KazÁn in the philological course, but remained in it only one year, because the professor of history (who had quarreled with TolstÓy's relatives) gave him impossibly bad marks, in addition to which he received bad marks from the professor of German, although he was better acquainted with that language than any other member of his course. He was compelled to change to the law course, where he remained for two years. In 1848 he took the examination for "candidate" in the University of St. Petersburg. "I knew literally nothing," he says of himself, "and I literally began to prepare myself for the examination only one week in advance." He obtained his degree of candidate, or bachelor of arts, and returned to YÁsnaya PolyÁna, where he lived until 1851, when he entered the Forty-fourth Battery of the Twentieth Brigade of Artillery as "yÚnker" or supernumerary officer, with no official rank, but eligible to receive a commission as ensign, and thence advance in the service. This battery was stationed on the TÉrek River, in the Caucasus, and there TolstÓy remained with it until the Crimean War broke out. Thus during the first twenty-six years of his life he spent less than five years in towns, the rest in the country; and this no doubt laid the foundation for his deep love for country life, which has had so profound an effect upon his writings and his views of existence in general.

The dawning of his talent came during the four years he spent in the Caucasus, and he wrote "Childhood," "The Incursion," "Boyhood," "The Morning of a Landed Proprietor," and "The Cossacks." During the Turkish campaign he was ordered to the staff of Prince M.D. GortchakÓff, on the Danube, and in 1855 received the command of a mountain battery, and took part in the fight at TchÉrnaya, and the siege of SevastÓpol. The literary fruits of this experience were "SevastÓpol," in December, May, and August, three sketches.

It is convenient to finish his statistical history at this point with the statement that in 1862 he married, having firmly resolved, two years previously, that he never would do so, and clinched the bargain with himself by selling the big manor-house at YÁsnaya PolyÁna for transportation and re-erection elsewhere. Between that date and 1888 he had a family of fifteen⁴² children, of whom seven are still alive.

In his very first efforts in literature we detect certain characteristics which continue to distinguish him throughout his career, and some of which, on attaining their legitimate and logical development seem, to the ordinary reader, to be of extremely recent origin. In "Childhood" and "Boyhood" ("Youth," the third section, was written late in the '50's) we meet the same keen analysis which is a leading feature in his later works, and in them is applied with such effect to women and to the tender passion, neither of which elements enters into his early works in any appreciable degree. He displays the most astounding genius in detecting and understanding the most secret and trivial movements of the human soul. In this respect his methods are those of a miniature painter. Another point must be borne in mind in studying TolstÓy's characters, that, unlike TurgÉneff, who is almost exclusively objective, TolstÓy is in the highest degree subjective, and has presented a study of his own life and soul in almost every one of his works, in varying degrees, and combined with widely varying elements. In the same way he has made use of the spiritual and mental state of his relatives. For example, who can fail to recognize a self-portrait from the life in LevÍn ("Anna KarÉnin"), and in Prince AndrÉi BolkÓnsky ("War and Peace")? And the feminine characters in these great novels are either simple or composite portraits of his nearest relations, while many of the incidents in both novels are taken straight from their experience or his own, or the two combined.

It is useless to catalogue his many works with their dates in this place. Unquestionably the finest of them (despite the author's present erroneous view, that they constitute a sin and a reproach to him) are his magnificent "War and Peace" and "Anna KarÉnin." Curiously enough, neither met with prompt or enthusiastic welcome in Russia when they first made their appearance.⁴³ The public had grown used to the very different methods of the other celebrated romance-writers of the '40's, with whom we have already dealt. GontcharÓff had accustomed them to the delineation of character by broad, sweeping strokes; DostoÉvsky to lancet-like thrusts, penetrating the very soul; TurgÉneff to tender touches, which produced soft, melting outlines. It was long before they could reconcile themselves to TolstÓy's original mode of painting a vast series of miniature portraits on an immense canvas. But the effect of this procedure was at last recognized to be the very acme of throbbing, breathing life itself. Moreover, it became apparent that TolstÓy's theory of life was, that great generals, statesmen, and as a whole, all active persons who seem or try to control events, do nothing of the kind. Somewhere above, in the unknown, there is a power which guides affairs at its own will, and (here is the special point) deliberately thwarts all the efforts of the active people. According to his philosophy, the self-contained, thoroughly egotistical natures, who are wedded solely to the cult of success, generally pass through this earthly life without any notable disasters; they attend strictly to their own selfish ends, and do not attempt to sway the destinies of others from motives of humanity, patriotism, or anything else in the lofty, self-sacrificing line. On the contrary, the fate of the people who are endowed with tender instincts, who have not allowed self-love to smother their humanity, who are guilty only of striving to attain some lofty, unselfish object in life, are thwarted and repressed, balked and confounded at every turn. This is particularly interesting in view of his latter-day exhortations to men, on the duty of toiling for others, sacrificing everything for others. Nevertheless, it must stand as a monument to the fidelity of his powers of analysis of life in general, and of the individual characters in whose lot he demonstrates his theory.

This contrast between the two conflicting principles, a haughty individualism and peaceable submission to a higher power, of which the concrete representative is the mass of the population, is set forth with especial clearness in "War and Peace," where the two principal heroes, Prince AndrÉi BolkÓnsky and Pierre BezÚkoff, represent individualism.

In "Anna KarÉnin," in the person of his favorite hero, KonstantÍn LevÍn, TolstÓy first enunciates the doctrine of moral regeneration acquired by means of physical labor, and his later philosophical doctrines are the direct development of the views there set forth. He had represented a hero of much earlier days, Prince NekhliÚdoff, in "The Morning of a Landed Proprietor," as convinced that he should make himself of use to his peasants; and he had set forth the result of those efforts in terms which tally wonderfully well with his direct personal comments in "My Confession," of a date long posterior to "Anna KarÉnin." "Have my peasants become any the richer?" he writes; "have they been educated or developed morally? Not in the slightest degree. They are no better off, and my heart grows more heavy with every passing day. If I could but perceive any success in my undertaking; if I could descry any gratitude—but no; I see false routine, vice, distrust, helplessness! I am wasting the best years of my life in vain."

But NekhliÚdoff—TolstÓy was not alone in devoting himself to his peasants; before he withdrew to the country he had led a gay life in St. Petersburg, after resigning from the army, and in writing his fine peasant story, "PolikÚshka," setting up peasant-schools on his estate, and the like, he was merely paying his tribute to the spirit of the time (which reached him even in his seclusion), and imitating the innumerable village schools and Sunday schools in the capitals (for secular instruction of the laboring classes who were too busy for education during the week) in which the aristocratic and educated classes in general took a lively interest.⁴⁴ But the leisure afforded by country life enabled him to compose his masterpieces. "War and Peace," which was begun in 1864, was published serially in "The Russian Messenger," beginning in 1865, and in book form in 1869, and "Anna KarÉnin," which was published serially in the same journal, in 1875-1876. His style is not to be compared to that of TurgÉneff, with its exquisite harmony, art, and sense of proportion. TolstÓy writes carelessly, frequently repeats himself, not infrequently expresses himself ambiguously or obscurely. But the supreme effect is produced, nevertheless.

At last came the diametrical change of views, apparently, which led to this supreme artist's discarding his art, and devoting himself to religious and philosophical writings for which neither nature nor his training had fitted him. He himself dates this change from the middle of the '70's, and it must be noted that precisely at this period that strong movement called "going to the people," i.e., devoting one's self to the welfare of the peasants, became epidemic in Russian society. Again, as fifteen or twenty years previously, Count TolstÓy was merely swept onward by the popular current. But his first pamphlet on his new propaganda is ten years later than the date he assigns to the change. Thereafter for many years he devoted his chief efforts to this new class of work, "Life," "What Is to Be Done?" "My Confession," and so forth, being the more bulky outcome. Some of the stories, written for the people during this interval, are delightful, both in tone and artistic qualities. Others are surcharged with "morals," which in many cases either directly conflict with the moral of other stories in the same volume, or even with the secondary moral of the same story. Even his last work—"in my former style," as he described it—"Resurrection," has special doctrines and aims too emphatically insisted upon to permit of the reader deriving from it the pure literary pleasure afforded by his masterpieces. In short, with all due respect to the entire sincerity of this magnificent writer, it must be said that those who would enjoy and appreciate him rightly, should ignore his philosophico-religious treatises, which are contradictory and confusing to the last degree. As an illustration, let me cite the case of the famine in Russia of 1891-92. Great sums of money⁴⁵ were sent to Count TolstÓy, chiefly from America, and were expended by him in the most practicable and irreproachable manner—so any one would have supposed—for the relief of the starving peasants. Count TolstÓy and his assistants lived the life of the peasants, and underwent severe hardships; the Count even fell ill, and his wife was obliged to go to him and nurse him. It would seem that his conscience had no cause for reproach, and that the situation was an ideal one for him. But before that famine was well over, or the funds expended, he wrote a letter to a London newspaper, in which he declared that helping people by means of money was all wrong—positively a sin. He felt that collecting and distributing money was not the best thing of which he was capable, and called it "making a pipe of one's self," personal service with brains, heart, and muscles being the only right service for God or man. This service he certainly rendered, and without the money he could not have rendered it.

Nothing could more perfectly illustrate this point of view than the following little story, written in 1881, called "The Two Brothers and the Gold."

In ancient times there lived not far from Jerusalem two brothers, the elder AfanÁsy, the younger IoÁnn. They dwelt on a hill not far from the town, and subsisted on what people gave them. Every day the brothers spent in work. They did not toil at their own work, but at the work of the poor. Wherever there were men overwhelmed with work, wherever there were sick people, orphans and widows, thither went the brothers, and there they toiled and nursed the people, accepting no remuneration. In this wise did the brothers pass the whole week apart, and met only on Saturday evening in their abode. Only on Sunday did they remain at home, praying and chatting together. And the angel of the Lord descended to them and blessed them. On Monday they parted and each went his way. Thus the two brothers lived for many years, and every week the angel of the Lord came down and blessed them.

One Monday as the brothers were starting out to work, and had already separated, going in different directions, AfanÁsy felt sorry to part with his beloved brother, and halted and glanced back. IoÁnn was walking, with head bowed, in his own direction, and did not look back. But all of a sudden, IoÁnn also halted, and as though catching sight of something, began to gaze intently in that direction, shading his eyes with his hand. Then he approached what he had espied there, suddenly leaped to one side, and without looking behind him fled down the hill and up the hill, away from the spot, as though a fierce wild beast were pursuing him. AfanÁsy was amazed and went back to the place in order to find out what had so frightened his brother. As he came near he beheld something gleaming in the sunlight. He approached closer. On the grass, as though poured out of a measure, lay a heap of gold.... And AfanÁsy was the more amazed, both at the gold, and at his brother's leap.

"What was he frightened at, and what did he flee from?" said AfanÁsy to himself. "There is no sin in gold, the sin is in man. One can do evil with gold, but one can also do good with it. How many orphans and widows can be fed, how many naked men clothed, how many poor and sick healed with this gold. We now serve people, but our service is small, according to the smallness of our strength, but with this gold we can serve people more." AfanÁsy reasoned thus with himself, and wished to tell it all to his brother, but IoÁnn had gone off out of earshot, and was now visible on the opposite mountain, no bigger than a beetle.

And AfanÁsy took of his garment, raked into it as much gold as he was able to carry, flung it on his shoulders and carried it to the city. He came to the inn, gave the gold over to the innkeeper, and went back after the remainder. And when he had brought all the gold he went to the merchants, bought land in the town, bought stone and timber, hired workmen, and began to build three houses. And AfanÁsy dwelt three months in the town and built three houses in the town, one house, an asylum for widows and orphans, another house, a hospital for the sick and the needy, a third house for pilgrims and paupers. And AfanÁsy sought out three pious old men, and he placed one over the asylum, another over the hospital, and the third over the hostelry for pilgrims. And AfanÁsy had three thousand gold pieces left. And he gave a thousand to each old man to distribute to the poor. And people began to fill all three houses, and men began to laud AfanÁsy for what he had done. And AfanÁsy rejoiced thereat so that he did not wish to leave the city. But AfanÁsy loved his brother, and bidding the people farewell, and keeping not a single gold piece for himself, he went back to his abode in the same old garment in which he had quitted it.

AfanÁsy came to his mountain and said to himself, "My brother judged wrongly when he sprang away from the gold and fled from it. Have not I done better?"

And no sooner had AfanÁsy thought this, than suddenly he beheld, standing in his path and gazing sternly at him, that angel who had been wont to bless them. And AfanÁsy was stupefied with amazement and could utter only, "Why is this, Lord?" And the angel opened his mouth and said, "Get thee hence! Thou art not worthy to dwell with thy brother. Thy brother's one leap is more precious than all the deeds which thou hast done with thy gold."

And AfanÁsy began to tell of how many paupers and wanderers he had fed, how many orphans he had cared for, and the angel said to him, "That devil who placed the gold there to seduce thee hath also taught thee these words."

And then did AfanÁsy's conscience convict him, and he understood that he had not done his deeds for the sake of God, and he fell to weeping, and began to repent. Then the angel stepped aside, and left open to him the way, on which IoÁnn was already standing awaiting his brother, and from that time forth AfanÁsy yielded no more to the temptation of the devil who had poured out the gold, and knew that not by gold, but only by labor, can one serve God and men.

And the brothers began to live as before.⁴⁶

Unfortunately, the best of TolstÓy's peasant stories, such as "PolikÚshka," "Two Old Men" (the latter belonging to the recent hortatory period), and the like, are too long for reproduction here. But the moral of the following, "Little Girls Wiser than Old Men," is irreproachable, and the style is the same as in the more important of those written expressly for the people.

Easter fell early that year. People had only just ceased to use sledges. The snow still lay in the cottage yards, but rivulets were flowing through the village; a big puddle had formed between the cottages, from the dung-heaps, and two little girls, from different cottages, met by this puddle—one younger, the other older. Both little girls had been dressed in new frocks by their mothers. The little one's frock was blue, the big one's yellow, with a flowered pattern. Both had red kerchiefs bound about their heads. The little girls came out to the puddle, after the morning service in church, displayed their clothes to each other, and began to play. And the fancy seized them to paddle in the water. The younger girl was on the point of wading into the pool with her shoes on, but the elder girl says, "Don't go MalÁsha, thy mother will scold. Come, I'll take off my shoes, and do thou take off thine." The little lasses took off their shoes, tucked up their frocks and waded into the puddle, to meet each other. MalÁsha went in up to her knees, and says, "It's deep, Akuliushka—I'm afraid" "Never mind," says she; "it won't get any deeper. Come straight towards me." They began to approach each other, and AkÚlka says, "Look out, MalÁsha, don't splash, but walk quietly." No sooner had she spoken, than MalÁsha set her foot down with a bang in the water, and a splash fell straight on AkÚlka's frock. The sarafÁn was splashed, and some of it fell on her nose and in her eyes as well. AkÚlka saw the spot on her frock, got angry at MalÁsha, stormed, ran after her, and wanted to beat her. MalÁsha was frightened when she saw the mischief she had done, leaped out of the puddle, and ran home. AkÚlka's mother came along, espied the splashed frock and spattered chemise on her daughter. "Where didst thou soil thyself, thou hussy?" "MalÁsha splashed me on purpose." AkÁlka's mother seized MalÁsha, and struck her on the nape of the neck. MalÁsha shrieked so that the whole street heard her. MalÁsha's mother came out. "What art thou beating my child for?" The neighbor began to rail. One word led to another, the women scolded each other. The peasant men ran forth, a big crowd assembled in the street. Everybody shouted, nobody listened to anybody else. They scolded and scolded. One gave another a punch, and a regular fight was imminent, when an old woman, AkÚlka's grandmother, interposed. She advanced into the midst of the peasants, and began to argue with them. "What are you about, my good men? Is this the season for such things? We ought to be joyful, but you have brought about a great sin." They paid no heed to the old woman, and almost knocked one another down, and the old woman would not have been able to dissuade them had it not been for AkÚlka and MalÁsha. While the women were wrangling, AkÚlka wiped off her frock, and went out again to the puddle in the space between the cottages. She picked up a small stone and began to dig the earth out at the edge of the puddle, so as to let the water out into the street. While she was digging away, MalÁsha came up also, and began to help her by drawing the water down the ditch with a chip. The peasant men had just come to blows, when the little girls had got the water along the ditch to the street, directly at the spot where the old woman was parting the men.

The little girls came running up, one on one side, the other on the other side of the rivulet. "Hold on, MalÁsha, hold on!" cried AkÚlka. MalÁsha also tried to say something, but could not speak for laughing.

The little girls ran thus, laughing at the chip, as it floated down the stream. And they ran straight into the midst of the peasant men. The old woman perceived them, and said to the men, "Fear God! Here you have begun to fight over these same little girls, and they have forgotten all about it long ago, and are playing together again in love—the dear little things. They are wiser than you!"

The men looked at the little girls, and felt ashamed of themselves; and then the peasants began to laugh at themselves, and went off to their houses.

"Except ye become as little children, ye shall not enter the kingdom of heaven."

It is a pity that Count TolstÓy, the greatest literary genius of his time, should put his immense talent to such a use as to provoke, on his contradictions of himself, comment like the following, which is quoted from a work by V.S. SoloviÉff, an essayist and argumentative writer, who quotes some one on this subject, to this effect:

"Sometimes we hear that the most important truth is in the Sermon on the Mount; then again, we are told that we must till the soil in the sweat of our brows, though there is nothing about that in the Gospels, but in Genesis—in the same place where giving birth in pain is mentioned, but that is no commandment at all, only a sad fate; sometimes we are told that we ought to give everything away to the poor; and then again, that we never ought to give anything to anybody, as money is an evil, and one ought not to harm other people, but only one's self and one's family, but that we ought to work for others; sometimes we are told that the vocation of women is to bear as many healthy children as possible, and then, the celibate ideal is held up for men and women; then again, eating no meat is the first step towards self-perfection, though why no one knows; then something is said against liquor and tobacco, then against pancakes, then against military service as if it were the worst thing on earth, and as if the primary duty of a Christian were to refuse to be a soldier, which would prove that he who is not taken into service, for any reason, is already holy enough."

This may be a trifle exaggerated, but it indicates clearly enough the utter confusion which the teachings of Count TolstÓy produce on ordinary, rational, well-meaning persons.⁴⁷ In short, he should be judged in his proper sphere as one of the most gifted authors of any age or country, and judged by his legitimate works in his legitimate province, the novel, as exemplified by "War and Peace" and "Anna KarÉnin."The reform movement of the '60's of the nineteenth century ended in a reaction which took possession of society as a whole during the '70's. Apathy, dejection, disenchantment superseded the previous exultation and enthusiastic impulse to push forward in all directions. Dull discontent and irritation reigned in all classes of society and in all parties. Some were discontented with the reforms, regarding them as premature, and even ruinous; others, on the contrary, deemed them insufficient, curtailed, only half-satisfactory to the needs of the country, and merely exasperating to the public demands.

These conditions created a special sort of literary school, which made its appearance in the middle of the '70's, and attained its complete development in the middle of the '80's. We have seen that the same sort of thing had taken place with every previous change in the public sentiment. The first thing which impresses one in this school is the resurrection of artistic feeling, a passion for beauty of imagery and forms, a careful and extremely elegant polish imparted to literary productions in technique. None of the authoritative and influential critics preached the cult of pure art. Yet GÁrshin, the most promising of the young authors of the day, who was the very last person to be suspected of that cult, finished his works with the utmost care, so that in elegance of form and language they offer an example of faultless perfection. There can be no doubt that this renaissance of the artistic element of poetry, of beauty, was closely connected with the subsidence of the flood-tide of public excitement and agitation, which up to that time had carried writers along with it into its whirlpools, and granted them neither the time nor the desire to polish and adorn their works, and revel in beauty of forms.

VsÉvolod MikhÁilovitch GÁrshin, the son of a petty landed proprietor in the south of Russia, was born in 1855. Despite his repeated attacks of profound melancholia, which sometimes passed into actual insanity, and despite the brevity of his career (he flung himself down stairs in a fit of this sort and died, in 1889), he made a distinct and brilliant mark in Russian literature.

GÁrshin's view of people in general was thus expressed: "All the people whom I have known," he says, "are divided (along with other divisions of which, of course, there are many: the clever men and the fools, the Hamlets and the Don Quixotes, the lazy and the active, and so forth) into two categories, or to speak more accurately, they are distributed between two extremes: some are endowed, so to speak, with a good self-consciousness, while the others have a bad self-consciousness. One man lives and enjoys all his sensations; if he eats he rejoices, if he looks at the sky he rejoices. In short, for such a man, the mere process of living is happiness. But it is quite the reverse with the other sort of man; you may plate him with gold, and he will continue to grumble; nothing satisfies him; success in life affords him no pleasure, even if it be perfectly self-evident. The man simply is incapable of experiencing satisfaction; he is incapable, and that is the end of the matter." And in view of his personal disabilities, it is not remarkable that all his heroes should have belonged to the latter category, in a greater or less degree, some of the incidents narrated being drawn directly from his own experiences. Such are "The Red Flower," his best story, which presents the hallucinations of a madman, "The Coward," "Night," "Attalea Princeps," and "That Which Never Happened." On the other hand, the following have no personal element: "The Meeting," "The Orderly and the Officer," "The Diary of Soldier IvÁnoff," "The Bears," "NadÉzhda NikolÁevna," and "Proud Aggei."

Another writer who has won some fame, especially by his charming sketches of Siberian life, written during his exile in Siberia, is GrigÓry AlexÁndrovitch Matchtet, born in 1852. These sketches, such as "The Second Truth," "We Have Conquered," "A Worldly Affair," are both true to nature and artistic, and produce a deep impression.

Much more talented and famous is VladÍmir GalaktiÓnovitch KorolÉnko (1853), also the author of fascinating Siberian sketches, and of a more ambitious work, "The Blind Musician." One point to be noted about KorolÉnko is that he never joined the pessimists, or the party which professed pseudo-peasant tendencies, and followed Count L.N. TolstÓy's ideas, but has always preserved his independence. His first work, a delightful fantasy, entitled "MakÁr's Dream," appeared in 1885. KorolÉnko has been sent to Siberia several times, but now lives in Russia proper,⁴⁸ and publishes a high-class monthly journal.

Until quite recently opinion was divided as to whether KorolÉnko or TchÉkoff was the more talented, and the coming "great author." As we shall see presently, that question seems to have been settled, and in part by KorolÉnko's friendly aid, in favor of quite another person.AntÓn PÁvlovitch TchÉkoff (pseudonym "Tchekhonte," 1860) is the descendant of a serf father and grandfather. His volumes of short stories, "Humorous Tales," "In the Gloaming," "Surly People," are full of humor and of brilliant wit. His more ambitious efforts, as to length and artistic qualities, the productions of his matured talent, are "The Steppe," "Fires," "A Tiresome History," "Notes of an Unknown," "The Peasant," and so forth.

Still another extremely talented writer, who, unfortunately, has begun to produce too rapidly for his own interest, is IgnÁty NikolÁevitch PotÁpenko (1856), the son of an officer in a Uhlan regiment, and of a Little Russian peasant mother. His father afterwards became a priest—a very unusual change of vocation and class—and the future writer acquired intimate knowledge of views and customs in ecclesiastical circles, which he put to brilliant use later on. A delicate humor is the characteristic feature of his work, as can be seen in his best writings, such as "On Active Service"⁴⁹ and "The Secretary of His Grace (the Bishop)."

The former is the story of a talented and devoted young priest, who might have obtained an easy position in the town, among the bishop's officials, with certain prospect of swift promotion. He resolutely declines this position, and requests that he may be assigned to a village parish, where he can be "on active service." Every one regards the request as a sign of an unsettled mind. After much argument he prevails on his betrothed bride's parents to permit the marriage (he cannot be ordained until he is married), and hopes to find a helpmeet in her. The rest of the story deals with his experiences in the unenviable position of a village priest, where he has to contend not only with the displeasure of his young wife, but with the avarice of his church staff, the defects of the peasants, the excess of attention of the local gentlewoman, and financial problems of the most trying description. It ends in his wife abandoning him, and returning with her child to her father's house, while he insists on remaining at his post, where, as events have abundantly proved, the ministrations of a truly disinterested, devout priest are most sadly needed. It is impossible to convey by description the charm and gentle humor of this book.

But acclaimed on all sides, by all classes of society, as the most talented writer of the present day, is the young man who writes under the name of MaxÍm GÓrky (Bitter). The majority of the critics confidently predict that he is the long-expected successor of Count L.N. TolstÓy. This gifted man, who at one stroke, conquered for himself all Russia which reads, whose books sell with unprecedented rapidity, whose name passes from mouth to mouth of millions, wherever intellectual life glows, and has won an unnumbered host of enthusiastic admirers all over the world, came up from the depths of the populace.

"GÓrky" AlexÉi MaxÍmovitch PyeshkÓff was born in NÍzhni NÓvgorod in 1868 or 1869. Socially, he belongs to the petty burgher class, but his grandfather, on the paternal side, was reduced from an officer to the ranks, by the Emperor Nicholas I., for harsh treatment of the soldiers under his command. He was such a rough character that his son (the author's father) ran away from home five times in the course of seven years, and definitively parted from his uncongenial family at the age of seventeen, when he went afoot from TobÓlsk to NÍzhni NÓvgorod, where he apprenticed himself to a paper-hanger. Later on he became the office-manager of a steamer company in Ástrakhan. His mother was the daughter of a man who began his career as a bargee on the Volga, one of the lowest class of men who, before the advent of steam, hauled the merchandise-laden barks from Ástrakhan to NÍzhni NÓvgorod, against the current. Afterwards he became a dyer of yarns, and eventually established a thriving dyeing establishment in NÍzhni.

GÓrky's father died of cholera at Ástrakhan when the lad was four years old. His mother soon married again, and gave the boy to his grandfather, who had him taught to read and write, and then sent him to school, where he remained only five months. At the end of that time he caught smallpox, and his studies were never renewed. Meanwhile his mother died, and his grandfather was ruined financially, so GÓrky, at nine years of age, became the "boy" in a shoeshop, where he spent two months, scalded his hands with cabbage soup, and was sent back to his grandfather. His relations treated him with hostility or indifference, and on his recovery, apprenticed him to a draftsman, from whose harshness he promptly fled, and entered the shop of a painter of holy pictures. Next he became scullion on a river steamer, and the cook was the first to inculcate in him a love of reading and of good literature. Next he became gardener's boy; then tried to get an education at KazÁn University, under the mistaken impression that education was free. To keep from starving he became assistant in a bakery at three rubles a month; "the hardest work I ever tried," he says; sawed wood, carried heavy burdens, peddled apples on the wharf, and tried to commit suicide out of sheer want and misery.⁵⁰ "KonovÁloff" and "Men with Pasts"⁵¹ would seem to represent some of the experiences of this period, "KonovÁloff" being regarded as one of his best stories. Then he went to TzarÍtzyn, where he obtained employment as watchman on a railway, was called back to NÍzhni NÓvgorod for the conscription, but was not accepted as a soldier, such "holy" men not being wanted. He became a peddler of beer, then secretary to a lawyer, who exercised great influence on his education. But he felt out of place, and in 1890 went back to TzarÍtzyn, then to the Don Province (of the KazÁks), to the UkraÍna and BessarÁbia, back along the southern shore of the Crimea to the KubÁn, and thence to the Caucasus. The reader of his inimitable short stories can trace these peregrinations and the adventures incident to them. In TiflÍs he worked in the railway shops, and in 1892 printed his first literary effort, "MakÁr TchÚdra," in a local newspaper, the "KavkÁz." In the following year, in NÍzhni NÓvgorod, he made acquaintance with KorolÉnko, to whom he is indebted for getting into "great literature," and for sympathy and advice. When he published "TchelkÁsh," in 1893, his fate was settled. It is regarded as one of the purest gems of Russian literature. He immediately rose to honor, and all his writings since that time have appeared in the leading publications. Moreover, he is the most "fashionable" writer in the country. But he enjoys something more than mere popularity; he is deeply loved. This is the result of the young artist's remarkable talent for painting absolutely living pictures of both persons and things. The many-sidedness of his genius—for he has more than talent—is shown, among other things, by the fact that he depicts with equal success landscapes, genre scenes, portraits of women. His episode of the singers in "FomÁ GordyÉeff" (pp. 217-227) is regarded by Russian critics as fully worthy of being compared with the scenes for which TurgÉneff is renowned. His landscape pictures are so beautiful that they cause a throb of pain. But, as is almost inevitable under the circumstances, most of his stories have an element of coarseness, which sometimes repels.

In general, his subject is "the uneasy man," who is striving after absolute freedom, after light and a lofty ideal, of which he can perceive the existence somewhere, though with all his efforts he cannot grasp it. We may assume that in this they represent GÓrky himself. But although all his heroes are seeking the meaning of life, no two of them are alike. His characters, like his landscapes, grip the heart, and once known, leave an ineffaceable imprint. Although he propounds problems of life among various classes, he differs from the majority of people, in not regarding a full stomach as the panacea for the poor man. On the contrary (as in "FomÁ GordyÉeff," his most ambitious effort), he seems to regard precisely this as the cause of more ruin than the life of "the barefoot brigade," the tramps and stepchildren of Dame Fortune, with whom he principally deals. His motto seems to be "Man shall not live by bread alone." And because GÓrky bears this thought ever with him, in brain and heart, in nerves and his very marrow, his work possesses a strength which is almost terrifying, combined with a beauty as terrifying in its way. If he will but develop his immense genius instead of meddling with social and political questions, and getting into prison on that score with disheartening regularity, something incalculably great may be the outcome. It is said that he is now banished in polite exile to the Crimea. If he can be kept there or elsewhere out of mischief, the Russian government will again render the literature of its own country and of the world as great a service as it has already more than once rendered in the past, by similar means.

In the '70's and '80's Russian society was seized with a mania for writing poetry, and a countless throng of young poets made their appearance. No book sold so rapidly as a volume of verses. But very few of these aspirants to fame possessed any originality or serious worth. Poetry had advanced not a single step since the days of NekrÁsoff and ShevtchÉnko, so far as national independence was concerned.

The most talented of the young poets of this period was SemÉn YÁkovlevitch NÁdson (1862-1887). His grandfather, a Jew who had joined the Russian Church, lived in KÍeff. His father, a gifted man and a fine musician, died young. His mother, a Russian gentlewoman, died at the age of thirty-one, of consumption. At the age of sixteen, NÁdson fell in love with a young girl, and began to write poetry. She died of quick consumption shortly afterwards. This grief affected the young man's whole career, and many of his poems were inspired by it. He began to publish his poems while still in school, being already threatened with pulmonary trouble, on account of which he had been sent to the Caucasus at the expense of the government, where he spent a year. In 1882 he graduated from the military school, and was appointed an officer in a regiment stationed at KronstÁdt. There he lived for two years, and some of his best poems belong to this epoch: "No, Easier 'Tis for Me to Think that Thou Art Dead," "Herostrat," "Dreams," "The Brilliant Hall Has Silent Grown," "All Hath Come to Pass," and so forth. He retired from the military service in 1883, being already in the grasp of consumption. His poems ran through ten editions during the five years which followed his death, and still continue to sell with equal rapidity, so remarkable is their popularity. He was an ideally poetical figure; moreover, he charms by his flowing, musical verse, by the enthralling elegance and grace of his poetical imagery, and genuine lyric inspiration. All his poetry is filled with quiet, meditative sadness. It is by the music of his verse and the tender tears of his feminine lyrism that NÁdson penetrates the hearts of his readers. His masterpiece is "My Friend, My Brother," and this reflects the sentiment of all his work.⁵² Here is the first verse:

Another very sincere, sympathetic, and genuine, though not great poet, also of Jewish race, is SemÉn GrigÓrievitch Frug (1860-1916), the son of a member of the Jewish agricultural colony in the government of KhersÓn. He, like NÁdson, believes that good will triumph in the end, and is not in the least a pessimist.

Quite the reverse are NikolÁi MaxÍmovitch VilÉnkin (who is better known by his pseudonym of "MÍnsky" from his native government), and DmÍtry SergyÉevitch MerezhkÓvsky (1865) who, as a poet, is generally bombastic. His novels are better.

There are many other good, though not great, contemporary writers in Russia, including several women. But they hardly come within the scope of this work (which does not aim at being encyclopedic), as neither their work nor their fame is likely to make its way to foreign readers who are unacquainted with the Russian language. For those who do read Russian there are several good handbooks of contemporary literature which will furnish all necessary information.

QUESTIONS FOR REVIEW

1. How was Russia influenced by the romantic movement in western Europe?
2. Describe the character of the romances of the first period of the fifties.
3. What important historical works appeared at this time?
4. What popular novels were written by DanilÉvsky?
5. What were the chief works of MÉlnikoff, and why are they not likely to be translated into English?
6. Describe the career and influence of LyeskÓff.
7. Why was the fame of MarkÓvitch's work short-lived?
8. What difficulties did UspÉnsky encounter in his early attempts at writing?
9. Describe the effect produced by his "Hard Labor" and "An Eccentric Master."
10. What views of society did ZlatovrÁtsky express in his writings?
11. Why did RyeshÉtnikoff's "The Inhabitants of PodlÍpovo" become widely popular?
12. Give an account of the experiences of SaltykÓff.
13. How did he make use of the material gathered during his exile?
14. How did his writings contribute some new words to the Russian language?
15. What qualities does he show in "The Story of How One Peasant Maintained Two Generals"?
16. Give the chief events in the life of TolstÓy.
17. What characteristics of style did he show in his earliest writings?
18. How is he "subjective" in delineating his characters?
19. Why was his genius not at first appreciated?
20. What was his theory of life?
21. What change came into his life in the seventies?
22. How did this affect his writings?
23. How did his experience with famine sufferers affect his views?
24. What were GÁrshin's views of people in general?
25. How do his books bear out his theories?
26. What facts in KorolÉnko's life have influenced his literary development?
27. What characteristics does TchÉkoff show in his short stories?
28. What is the story of PotÁpenko's "On Active Service"?
29. Give the leading events of GÓrky's career.
30. How is his many-sided genius shown?
31. What ideals are expressed in his work?
32. Why has NÁdson's poetry such a firm hold on the popular mind?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

• DanilÉvsky: MirÓvitch. The Princess Tarakanova.
• PotÁpenko: A Russian Priest. A Father of Six. An Occasional Holiday.
• MaxÍm GÓrky: OrlÓff and His Wife. FomÁ GordyÉeff. (Translated by I.F. Hapgood.)
• L.N. TolstÓy: All of his works are available in English translations. There are several collections of his short stories.
• The Humor of Russia. (Selections.) E.L. Voynich.
• D.S. MerezhkÓvsky: The Death of the Gods. This is the first part of a trilogy, and is an historical novel of the time of Julian the Apostate. The other parts (announced for publication) are: Resurrection (time of Leonardo da Vinci) and The Anti-Christ (time of Peter the Great.)