The dignitaries of the Church had been paying unwonted honours to characters which had probably been traced by a schismatic pen. their regimental motto become their protest | one in Cyrillic, the other in Glagolitic letters. -let the legend which hitherto has been well obeyed by both corps on the field of battle be supplemented by an affix of interrogation, and be henceforth blazoned on their arms and accoutrements after this fashion QUO FAS ET GLORIA DUCUNT? That the study of Slavonic literature should have made little progress in France at the time of the Czar's visit is scarcely to be wondered at. But it does seem strange that it should always have been regarded in our own country with an indifference bordering upon contempt, and this carelessness is especially remarkable in the case of Russian literature. Some of the Slavonic peoples, such as the Czekhs, for instance, or the Bulgarians, do not form important nationalities, and have few interests in common with us. But this can scarcely be said of the Russians, and yet the language their many millions speak has always been thought utterly unworthy of our attention. As to the books they read, so little is known about them here, that the traveller who returns from Russia, and affirms that it really possesses a national literature, is often listened to with more astonishment than belief. Yet no one can have any doubt upon the subject who has ever spent an hour in the warehouse of any of the great publishing houses at St. Petersburg, or who has ever strolled along the Paternoster Row of Moscow, the long line of bookshops which extends from the St. Nicholas gate of the Kremlin to the northern angle of the "Chinese City." Merely by looking at the titles of the new books in their windows, it is easy to discover that the Russian publishers are by no means idle. It is true that many of these books are translations, but there are also numbers of original works, chiefly travels, biographies, histories, and critical, statistical, and philosophical essays, together with a good many novels, and a very few poems. try is just now at a discount in Russia. Indeed, all romantic literature is to a certain extent discouraged. Young Russia is bent on studying natural science and metaphysics, and under its influence Fact has become inordinately hard of late years, and Fiction has taken to assuming an unusually reflective and studious air. In some modern Russian novels the romantic element seems to bear an unduly small proportion to that which at least affects to be philosophical, and the position of the artist to be unfairly subordinated to that of the teacher. In many instances this is of no importance, but it seems to be not a little unfortunate when the artist is one of real power. Of course, really great artists are but rarely to be met with in any country; but Russia at this moment possesses at least one writer who is worthy to be ranked among them, and it is to his In the days of old, when a new king of Poe works that we now propose to call the atten- | which he excels, of men whose lives have tion of our readers. been a mistake, whose careers have been a Ivan Turguenief's* writings have gained failure, and of women whose love has been a great and widely-extended reputation in unhappy, whose hopes have not been fulfilled. France and in Germany, but in England we This same sympathetic feeling carries him fancy that they are but little known. It is even further. The dumb animals themselves true that two of his novels have been pub- become articulate for him. No one will lished in English, the one under the title of doubt the truth of this who has read the Fathers and Sons, and the other under that of different sketches of dogs which are scatterSmoke, or Life at Baden-Baden, but the first ed about his works. It is probably a someappeared at New York, and is little known what similar feeling which accounts for on this side of the Atlantic; and the other another of his merits,-his singular power was translated in so singular a manner that of describing nature. In this respect, asin M. Turguenief felt himself bound to protest some others also, he reminds us of the auagainst its being supposed to convey a just thor of The Village on the Cliff. He has to idea of his work. Another book of his was a great extent her wonderful faculty of givtranslated from the French, several years ing in a very few touches not only the outago, under the title of Russian Life in the ward presentment of a landscape, but also Interior; but unfortunately it differs consid- the inner meaning which reveals itself to the erably from the Russian original. No doubt eyes of those who are represented as lookit was made from that eccentric French ver-ing at it. Another great merit in his stories sion against which M. Turguenief most is the purity of their tone. In this they vigorously protested at the time when it ap- offer a refreshing contrast to the cynical senpeared. It is evident, then, that M. Tur- suality of the modern French school, while guenief has not yet had a fair hearing in at the same time they are utterly opposed to England, otherwise we feel sure that full anything like insipid sentimentality. It is justice would long ago have been done to easy to trace in them the influence of a his merits. Of how great those merits are shrewd and sarcastic humour, but it is one we hope to be able to give at least some idea which is also kindly. There is a touch of in the following rapid sketch of his leading east wind in the air which breathes around works. the majority of them, but is healthy and invigorating. Vice is never made seductive in them, nor are apologies offered for crime. Some of the best characters introduced into them are those of pure-hearted young girls, whose lives one feels must be honest and true, and of men who, even if they have at times been weak or erring, have, on the whole, battled manfully against their lower tendencies, and at last attained to a nobler life. Along with this elevation of feeling should be classed our author's generous indignation against all oppression and wrong, and especially that sympathy with the so long trodden down masses of his countrymen which gives so much animation to his pictures of peasant life. It needed no slight courage in a Russian writer seventeen years ago to speak as M. Turguenief did about the sorrows and the sufferings of the common people. Last, but not least, in the list of M. Turguenief's merits, must be mentioned the great beauty of his style. Never redundant, never bald or poor, it serves equally well for all occasions. Even in a translation it is easy to recognise the felicity of his expressions, the neatness of his dialogue, and the richness of his imagery. Before commencing it, however, it will be as well to say a few words about the principal grounds on which rest M. Turguenief's claims to be considered a great writer of fiction. In the first place, he is original. In his careful studies of men and women he sometimes reminds us of Balzac, and sometimes of Thackeray; but there are few traces of imitation in his work. Then he has genuine creative power. His characters impress us with a sense of their vitality, their movements are natural, their talk is easy and unconstrained. And they have marked individuality, standing out clearly one from another. With him the same lay figure does not enter into a series of pictures, with merely a change of costume. There is great variety in his drawing. If it sometimes shows signs of mannerism, it is at all events clear that he has studied a multitude of models. In the next place, he is a most "sympathetic" writer. He enters, as if by instinct, into the feelings of the persons to whose ideas he gives expression. And this lends a great charm to the descriptions, in It is difficult to write a Russian name correctly self Tourguéneff. In Germany he becomes Turgen- One of the most characteristic of M. Turguenief's works is that which first made his name known, the Zapiski Okhotnika, or "A Sportsman's Notes." The stories it that the terrible tragedies of olden days are no longer likely to be repeated, that the Russian proprietor is free from those fatal temptations which beset the man inte whose hands is given absolute power over his fellow-men, and that the Russian peasant is no longer a mere chattel, something but a little higher than the beasts of the field, it is well that there should be some record of the mental degradation, the physical suffering, to which the old system gave rise. There is no lack in Russia, even among our own countrymen, of critics whose sympathies are with the past, whose tendencies are retrograde, whose leading idea is that the common people should be ruled by the stick, and who consider slavery so patriarchal" an institution as almost to have acquired a religious character. For the benefit of readers whom those opinions about the 'emancipation might affect, it is very good that such pictures should be generally available as those which M. Turguenief has drawn of patriarchal manners. contains are exceedingly interesting, even Let us take a glance at a few of their more striking figures, beginning with that affable and judicious proprietor, Arcady Pavlich Penochkine. He is a young man who is well received and well spoken of in society, especially by the ladies, on whom the elegance of his manners has made a deep impression. He has received a good educa tion, and he has some acquaintance with music. He dresses with taste, he affects French literature, and he plays cards to perfection. As regards his peasants, he is, according to his own account, severe but just. When he punishes them it is alwaysfor their good. "One must treat them like children," he says, and if he has to strike a blow, it is done calmly, and without any sign of anger; it is even accompanied by gentle words of expostulation, only at such times he sets his teeth a little, and his mouth assumes a disagreeable expression. Such is the refined and polished gentleman at whose house M. Turguenief's sportsman happens to spend a night. Everything is admirably managed there, and the servants are disciplined to perfection, only their countenances wear an anxious look which prevents the guest from being quite at his ease in their presence. At breakfast, in the morning, Arcady Pavlich appears to be in an exceedingly good humour. Presently, however, he lifts a glass of wine to his lips, and his face immediately darkens. "Why hasn't the chill been taken off the wine?" he asks. The servant he addresses grows pale, but makes no reply. "Surely you hear my question, my good friend?" quietly continues his master, without taking his eye off 1 of their turn, and now he wants to take this my third son from me. Yesterday, my father, he took away my last cow from me, and beat my wife; don't let him utterly destroy us, O our supporter!" The proprietor turns to his steward and asks what all this means. The reply is that the old man is idle, and a drunkard, and insolent, and that he is greatly in debt to his master. Arcady Pavlich turns with dignity to his suppliants, and reads them a lesson on the evils of drunkenness and sloth, and the extreme wickedness of not paying what is due to a landlord. "Father, Arcady Pavlich!' cried the old man in despair, 'have pity! protect us! I insolent! As before the Lord God, I declare that we are utterly ruined. Sofron Yakovlich [the Bourmister] hates me, and why does he hate me? God be his judge! He will utterly ruin us, father. . . Behold this is the only son I have left-and him too old man's yellow eyes, over which the lids dropped heavily. 'Pity us, my Lord, protect "And it isn't us only-' the young peasant was beginning. us. -tears filled the him. The unfortunate servant fidgets a เ "Arcady Pavlich turned his back on them. 'Always unpleasantnesses,' he muttered between his teeth, and went homewards. The two suppliants remained where they were ment, and then, without looking behind them a little longer, gazed at each other for a mowent slowly home."* Soon after witnessing this pleasant scene, the narrator is shooting in the neighbourhood, and he asks the peasant who accompa nies him a few questions about Arcady's estate. His companion gives him an account of how Shipilovka is managed. Sofron the Bourmister, he says, is its real master. All the peasants are in debt to him, and he does what he likes with them, uses them as he pleases, squeezes all their money from them, It may be as well to state that the extracts in this article are translated from the original Russian. and they dare not complain. Then the sportsman describes what had occurred in his presence. The peasant expresses his pity for Antip. "The poor old man will be utterly ruined," he says; "the Bourmister will have him beaten to death. The fact is, he has borne him a grudge ever since one day when the old man had words with him in the Communal Assembly, and he will never rest till he has eaten him up. He has already deprived Antip of two sons, heartless wretch that he is." And there the story ends, without a word of comment. Here is another illustration of the working of that system which so often demoralized the lord as much as it degraded the vassal. It is taken from one of the stories in which M. Turguenief has depicted the position of a girl of the peasant class, whose youth and beauty only serve to bring sorrow upon her. The lot of women has always been a hard one in Russia, but as a general rule the peasant's wife or daughter has been inured to hardship all her life, and therefore may not feel it very keenly. Now and then, however, it has happened that she has been raised for a time from her position of humility and privation, and either from caprice or affection she has been well and kindly treated, and may even have grown habituated to a life of luxury. She has become conscious of feelings and emotions which had never manifested themselves before, new tastes have developed themselves, and a power of enjoyment has become hers which entails a corresponding capacity for suffering. And then, perhaps, without a moment's warning, in the very height of her new-born happiness, she has suddenly been deprived of everything which has made existence pleasant to her, and has been sent back with ignominy to the dull monotony, often the crushing misery, of the peasant's life. And to bring about this change, to inflict this punishment, and then tranquilly to watch its operation, was often the special delight of some mean nature, the favourite revenge prompted by feminine vindictiveness. A proprietor named Karataef has fallen in love with a young peasant girl who belongs to one of his neighbours, an old lady of considerable wealth. It is more than a passing fancy, for Matrena is well fitted to gain and retain his affections; so he determines to purchase her from her mistress. One day, therefore, he calls upon the old lady, imagining that it is only a question of money, and that all he has to do is to pay some five hundred roubles; but, to his utter consternation, the old lady will have nothing to say to his offer beyond giving him a sound scolding, and some excellent advice about good conduct. Not only does she absolutely refuse to sell Matrena, but she banishes the poor girl to a distant village among the steppes. Her would-be purchaser is in de spair. The image of Matrena is always before his eyes, coarsely clad, and exposed to the inclemency of the weather and the blows of a brutal overseer. At length one day he rides over to her place of exile, and manages to obtain an interview with her. The poor girl has grown pale and thin, the tears pour from her eyes. He tells her that she must not go on living there, that he will carry her off. At first she refuses, although weeping bitterly, and the following conversation ensues :— Why should you stay here ?" he asks; "you couldn't be worse off than you are now. Tell me truly you've felt the weight of the starost's* hand, haven't you ?" Matrena's cheeks grow red and her lips quiver. "But," she says, "it would be the ruin of my people at home." "Why, what would they do to your people-exile them ?" "Oh yes! They would be sure to exile my brother at all events." "And your father?" "No, not my father; he is the only good tailor they have." There, then, you see he wouldn't be hurt; and it wouldn't kill your brother." And so at length he prevails, and one night he carries her off to his house. He For some time he is perfectly happy. Matrena becomes dearer to him every day. She can play the guitar, and sing and dance; she even learns to read and write. Her father finds out where she is, and comes secretly to visit her. All goes well till one unfortunate day, when, while she is driving Karataef in his sledge, she takes it into her head to pay a visit to the village of her mistress. Unluckily the old lady meets them, and recognises her runaway slave. The next day she commences a lawsuit against her neighbour for stealing her live stock. manages for a time to stave off inquiry, but the old lady is obstinate, and declares she is ready to spend ten thousand roubles on the suit rather than give it up. Things go badly with him. Costs accumulate, and he becomes crippled by debts; at last he falls ill from anxiety. One evening, when he is alone in his room-for Matrena has been hidden away in a farm at a short distance from his house-the door opens, and she enters. At first he thinks that she has been driven from her hiding-place, but she tells him that she has come of her own accord,—that she cannot bear to see him ruined for her sake, and that she is going to give herself up to her mistress. He remonstrates with her, but she says that her mind is made up, that she *The starosta is the head of a commune. |