Chapter X: Act I: (room in the Burgomaster’s house). SCENE 1. THE BURGOMASTER, (3)

It is true, Shishkóv even then raved of reëstablishing the ancient style, but his influence was limited. The real popular diction was used only by the Frenchified Count Rostopchín in his proclamations and appeals.

In measure as the war was being forgotten, this patriotism cooled down and finally deteriorated, on the one hand, into a low, cynical flattery of _The Northern Bee_, on the other, into the trivial patriotism of Zagóskin,[9] who called Shúya,[10] Manchester and Shebúyev, a Raphael, and who boasted of the bayonets and the expanse from the ice of Torneå to the Tauric Mountains----

In the reign of Nicholas the patriotism was transformed into something knout-like and official, especially in St. Petersburg, where this uncouth tendency ended, according to the cosmopolitan character of the city, in the _invention_ of a national hymn from Sebastian Bach, and, by Prokópi Lyapunóv, from Schiller.

To cut loose from Europe, from enlightenment, and from revolution, which kept him in terror ever since the 14th of December, Nicholas, on his side, raised the banner of _Orthodoxy_, _autocracy_, and _nationality_, which was worked out in the manner of a Prussian standard, and supported by any thing and everything: by the uncouth novels of Zagóskin, the uncouth iconography, the uncouth architecture, by Uvárov, by the persecution of the Uniates, and by _The hand of the Almighty has saved the fatherland_.[11]

The meeting of the Moscow Slavophiles with the Petersburgian Slavophilism of Nicholas was a great misfortune for them. Nicholas took refuge in nationality and Orthodoxy from revolutionary ideas. There was nothing in common between them but words. Their extremes and insipidities were all unselfishly insipid, without any relation whatsoever to the Third Division,--which, of course, did not in the least hinder their insipidities from being exceedingly insipid.

Thus, for instance, there passed through Moscow, at the end of the thirties, the Panslavist Gaj, who later played some indefinite rôle as a Croatian agitator and at the same time was near to Ban Jelačić. Muscovites believe in foreigners in general; Gaj was more than a foreigner, and more than one of their own,--he was both. He, consequently, had no difficulty in engaging the sympathy of our Slavs for the fate of their suffering Orthodox brothers in Dalmatia and Croatia; an enormous subscription was taken up in a few days, and in addition to that Gaj was given a dinner in the name of all the Servian and Ruthenian sympathies. At the dinner one of the Slavophiles, who by his voice and by his profession was more gentle than the rest, a man of _red_ Orthodoxy, who, no doubt, was heated by the toasts for the Montenegrin ruler, and for all kinds of great Bosnians, Bohemians, and Slovaks, improvised a poem in which occurred the following not quite Christian expression:

“I shall drink the blood of Magyars and of Germans.”

All who were still in their senses heard this phrase in disgust. Fortunately the witty statistician Andrósov saved the bloodthirsty bard: he jumped up from his chair, grabbed a fruit knife, and said: “Gentlemen, pardon me, I shall leave you for a moment; it has just occurred to me that my landlord, the old piano-tuner Diez, is a German; I ’ll just run down to cut his throat, and I ’ll be back in a trice.”

A thunderous laughter drowned the indignation.

[9] Russian novelist of the beginning of the century.

[10] Manufacturing town in the Government of Vladímir; famous for its
raw sheepskins.

[11] A line in Ózerov’s tragedy _Dimítri Donskóy_ (see vol. i., p.
418).

Nikoláy Platónovich Ogarév. (1813-1877.)

Ogarév was born in the Government of Pénza, in the estate of his
father, where he was educated till his fourteenth year. He then
attended the Moscow University, but before he finished his course he
was arrested for singing some revolutionary songs, and was exiled to
his father’s estate. He later passed his life abroad, aiding Herzen in
his revolutionary propaganda. Though mainly known as a propagandist,
he excels even more as a poet. His tender verses remind of Lérmontov,
with whom he has much in common. Among his best poems are his
_Monologues_, _The Village Watchman_, _The Sea of Life_.

In C. T. Wilson’s _Russian Lyrics_ are given: _Notturno_, _The Old
House_, _The Village Watchman_, _The Child_, _Hidden Love_, and
_Death_; in Free Russia: by Charlotte Sidgwick, in vol. xi., No. 11,
_To Iskander_, in vol. xii., Nos. 6-7, _Summer_; by J. E. Lewis, in
vol. xii., Nos. 8-10, _The Commandment_; by Mary Grace Walker, in vol.
xii., No. 3, _A Prayer_.

TO ISKÁNDER[12]

In days of my boyhood so gentle and tender,
In days of my passionate youth in its splendour,
Through manhood, while slowly to age I surrender,--
Through all of my life and within my endeavour,
One word in my ears there is ringing for ever--
“Liberty! Liberty!”

Tormented by slavery, sad and dejected,
In alien lands all unknown and rejected,
I live but to utter that name long neglected;
Across the wide seas and the countries that sever,
One word to my motherland calling for ever--
“Liberty! Liberty!”

It came o’er the waves to the place of my wailing,
’Mid silence, at midnight,--a rumour assailing
My senses, through darkness and tempest prevailing--
I hear it! my heart can abandon it never,
That voice from my country that sounds on for ever--
“Liberty! Liberty!”

My heart, long accustomed to doubt in its yearning,
Sprang up as it throbbed with new ecstasy burning,
Like a bird from its cage to the wide world returning;
It sings a farewell to its prison for ever,
While solemn and clear rings the note of endeavour--
“Liberty! Liberty!”

In the dreams I behold, with the snows that surround him,
The peasant, long-bearded,--the glad news has found him,--
He shakes from his great limbs the fetters that bound him,--
And speaks the glad word, the unchanging for ever
Eternal,--the future can silence it never--
“Liberty! Liberty!”

But if there should chance,--if there came any reason,--
To fear for that Liberty, let her in season
Cry out, and I fly to encounter the treason;
And if from that uttermost struggle I never
Return, I can call with the cry “Live for ever,
Liberty! Liberty!”

It may be I die with the strangers around me,
Yet hope and belief in the future have found me,
O comrade! ere Death in his shackles has bound me;
That name do thou whisper, to last me for ever,
That name--of our love, of our faith and endeavour--
“Liberty! Liberty!”

--Transl. by Charlotte Sidgwick in Free Russia, vol. xi., No. 11.

[12] Pseudonym of Herzen; see p. 236.

MONOLOGUES

What I wish? What?---- Oh, there are so many wishes, and their host is so eager for a sally, that at times it seems that by their inward agitation my brain will burn and my breast will burst. What I wish?---- Everything, in all its fulness! I thirst to know, I yearn for deeds, I still desire to love with senseless pining, I want to feel the whole thrill of life!

I feel in secret all the wishes vain, and life is niggardly, and inwardly I am feeble,--my striving will be silent and unanswered, and in endeavours will my strength be wasted. I seem unto myself, oppressed by suffering, a kind of miserable, puny fool, a creature lost in endless space, wearing away in empty fermentation.

It is not given to us to embrace at once the spirit of eternity, and the cup of life we quaff in swallows; what we have drunk we most regret,--the empty bottom shows more and more. With every day the soul feels heavier the aging, and it is more painful to remember, and more terrible to wish, and to live appears bold recklessness,--but the pulse cannot stop beating. And I live on in hopeless striving, and take upon myself the cross of life, and all the fervour of my soul I bear in eager motion, grasping and losing moments after moments----

And I wish all! What?---- Oh, there are so many wishes, and their host is so eager for a sally, that at times it seems that by their inward agitation my brain will burn and my breast will burst.

THE VILLAGE WATCHMAN

The night is dark, and clouds abound,
Appears the white snow everywhere;
The crackling frost pervades the ground,
And frigid is the atmosphere.

On either side the long, broad street
The peasants’ cottages are seen;
The solitary watchman’s feet
Are heard, as he moves on between.

Cold is he now; the hollow gale
Fills with violent blast the air;
The frost has touched his visage pale,
And whitened all his beard and hair.

Joy has fled from his gloomy brow,
He finds it hard to be alone;
Through the dark night, and blinding snow,
His song resounds with mournful tone.

By moonless nights he paces late,
Watching until the morn comes round;
His hammer upon the iron plate
Gives out a dreary, dismal sound.

And swaying ever to and fro,
The board prolongs its dreadful moan;
The heart dies down with feelings low,
And sorrow weighs it, lorn and lone.

--From C. T. Wilson’s _Russian Lyrics_.

Count Aleksyéy Konstantínovich Tolstóy. (1817-1875.)

Count Tolstóy’s youth was passed in the estate of his uncle in the
Government of Chernígov. He was early attached to the Russian legation
at Frankfurt, and travelled extensively in Germany, France, and
Switzerland. Upon his return to Russia, he settled in St. Petersburg
and devoted himself to literature. He at first wrote a series of
lyrics and some ballads which are perfect in technique but lack
animation. After the Crimean War he was attached to the Court, and his
renewed literary activity bore better fruits: the result of his
careful historical investigations was the novel _Prince Serébryany_
and the tragedy _The Death of Iván the Terrible_. There is no
historical novel in Russian that surpasses _Prince Serébryany_ in its
artistic setting and scrupulous adherence to facts. Tolstóy also wrote
two other tragedies that form a trilogy with _The Death of Iván the
Terrible_, but they are weaker in execution. Towards the end of his
life he wrote a number of ballads in the style of the ancient Bylinas,
of which _Alésha Popóvich_ is the best.

_Prince Serébryany_ has been translated three times: _Prince
Serebrenni_, translated by Princess Galitzine, 2 vols., London, 1874;
_Prince Serbryani_, an Historical Novel of the Times of Iván the
Terrible and of the Conquest of Siberia, by Jeremiah Curtin, New York
and London, [1892]; _The Terrible Czar_, translated by Capt. H. C.
Filmore, London, 1892 (and 1893, 1895). The following poems are to be
found in English translation: _Believe it not_, _The Scolding_, in
John Pollen’s _Rhymes from the Russian_; _Speys the Dwarf_, _The
Sinner_, in C. T. Wilson’s _Russian Lyrics_; in The Anglo-Russian
Literary Society, No. 21, by F. P. Marchant, _Prince Mikhailo Repnin_
and _Dearest Country_, No. 23, by N. Shishkoff, _You know I like to
seek_, _Into my soul so full of vain illusions_, _Where planets roll_,
and _Autumn_, No. 25, by H. Havelock, _The Kurgan_; in Free Russia, by
Elizabeth Gibson, in vol. xi., No. 3, _A Prayer_ and _The Convicts_,
in Nos. 6 and 7, _The Sorrows of Ages Departed_; in the Library of the
World’s Best Literature, reprint of J. Pollen’s _Believe it not_, and
_Renewal_, by Prince Wolkonsky.

FROM “PRINCE SERÉBRYANY”

Tsar Iván Vasílevich was praying. The perspiration was already rolling down his face; the bloody marks, imprinted upon his high forehead by former prostrations, were now more clearly defined by the new devotion. Suddenly, a rustling sound in the room caused him to turn around. He saw his nurse Onúfrevna.

His nurse was an old woman. She had been taken to the Upper Apartments by Grand Prince Vasíli Ivánovich of blessed memory, she had served under Eléna Glínski. Ioánn was borne in her arms, and in her arms did the dying father bless him. They said of Onúfrevna that much was known to her which nobody even suspected. During the minority of the Tsar, the Glínskis had been afraid of her; the Shúyskis and Byélskis tried in every way to gain her favour.

Onúfrevna discovered many hidden things through divination, and she was never mistaken. She predicted of Prince Telepnév during his very greatness,--Ioánn was then only four years old,--that he would die of starvation. And so it happened. Many years had passed since then, but that prediction was still fresh in the memory of old men.

It was now almost the tenth decade that Onúfrevna was ending. She was bent nearly double; the skin of her face was so wrinkled that it resembled tree bark, and as moss grows out on old bark, so grey tufts of hair burst out of her chin. She had long ago lost her teeth; her eyes, it seemed, could not see; her head shook convulsively.

Onúfrevna bent with her bony hand on a staff. She looked at Ioánn for a long time, drawing in her seared lips, as if she were chewing or muttering something.

“Well?” at last said the nurse with a dull, trembling voice, “are you praying, father? Pray, pray, Iván Vasílevich! It will take a great deal of praying to get forgiveness. If you had only your old sins upon your soul! God is merciful, and He might have forgiven you! But you add every day a new sin, and many a day even two or three of them.”

“Hush, Onúfrevna,” said the Tsar, rising, “you do not know what you are saying!”

“I do not know what I am saying! Have I grown insane,--what?”

And the lifeless eyes of the old woman suddenly sparkled.

“What have you been doing at the table to-day?----Why did you poison the boyár? You thought I did not know it! Well? Why do you frown? Wait, when your hour of death will strike, just wait! Your sins will stick to you, like a thousand thousand puds; they will pull you down to the bottom of hell. And the devils will run up and will catch you on their hooks!”

The old woman again began to chew.

The fervent prayer had prepared the Tsar for pious thoughts. His irritable imagination had more than once presented to him a picture of the future chastisement, but his power of will vanquished the terror of the torments beyond the grave. Ioánn assured himself that this fear and his bites of conscience were provoked in him by the fiend of the human race, in order to distract the anointed of God from his high purposes. The Tsar opposed prayer to the cunning of the devil; but he often succumbed to the cruel onrush of his imagination. Then despair took possession of him as with iron claws. The unrighteousness of his acts appeared in all its nakedness, and the abyss of hell yawned terribly before him. But that lasted only a short time, Ioánn immediately regretted his pusillanimity. In anger at himself and at the spirit of darkness, he, to spite hell and to oppose his conscience, again started upon his work of blood and villainy, and never did his cruelty reach such dimensions as after an involuntary exhaustion.

Now the thought of hell, illuminated by the approaching storm and the prophetic voice of Onúfrevna, stirred him through and through with a feverish chill. He seated himself upon the bed. His teeth chattered against each other.

“Well, father?” said Onúfrevna, softening her voice. “What is the matter with you? Are you ill? That ’s it, you are ill! I have given you a good fright! But you need n’t be frightened, father. Only repent, and stop sinning. I, too, am praying for you, day and night, and now I shall pray more than ever. Why should n’t I? I had rather forfeit heaven, if I could gain forgiveness for you.”

Ioánn looked at his nurse,--she seemed to be smiling, but her stern face was not lit up by a smile that was reassuring.

“Thank you, Onúfrevna, thank you. I am feeling easier; go, the Lord be with you!”

“Yes, yes, easier! Your terror leaves you the moment you are consoled! And you at once drive me away! The Lord be with me, you say! But you, father, had better not count too much upon God’s long-suffering. Even God’s patience will give way in your case. Beware, He will renounce you, and Satan will rejoice and--plump! will enter into you. There, you have begun to shake again! It will not hurt you to drink a glass of mulled honey. Drink a glass, father! Your father, the kingdom of heaven be his, used to drink mulled honey at night! And your mother, God grant her soul rest, was fond of mulled honey. And it was with mulled honey that the accursed Shúyskis poisoned her.”

The old woman became absent-minded. Her eyes were dimmed; she again began to chew, all the time shaking her head.

Suddenly something knocked at the window. Iván Vasílevich shuddered.

The old woman made the sign of the cross with her trembling hand.

“Just see,” she said, “how it is raining! And it is beginning to lighten! And there is also thunder, father; God have mercy upon us!”

The storm increased in fury, and soon the sky was disturbed by uninterrupted peals of thunder and a continuous sheet of lightning.

Ioánn shuddered at every thunderclap.

“What a chill you have, father! Wait a moment, I ’ll have them make you some mulled honey.”

“It is not necessary, Onúfrevna, I am well.”

“Well! Why, your face does not show it! You had better lie down on your bed and cover yourself with a quilt. What a bed you have here! Nothing but boards. What a queer notion! Is that proper for a Tsar? That is all right for a monk, but you are not a monk!”

Ioánn did not answer. He was intent on listening to something.

“Onúfrevna,” he suddenly said in fright, “who is walking there in the corridor? I hear somebody’s steps!”

“Christ be with you, father! Who should be walking now? It is your imagination.”

“No, there is someone walking there! Somebody is coming here! Go and look, Onúfrevna!”

The old woman opened the door. A cold wind burst into the room. Beyond the door appeared Malyúta.

“Who is that?” asked the Tsar, leaping up.

“Your red dog, father,” answered the nurse, casting an angry glance at Malyúta, “Gríshka Skurátov. How the accursed one has frightened me!”

“Lukyánych!” said the Tsar, made happy by the arrival of his favourite, “you are welcome; where do you come from?”

“From the prison, sir. I was at the inquest, and I have brought the keys.”

Malyúta bowed low to the Tsar and looked askance at the nurse.

“The keys!” grumbled the old woman. “They will flog you in the other world with red hot keys, you Satan! Upon my word, you are Satan! Your very face is that of a devil! Though somebody else may escape the eternal fire, you won’t. You, Gríshka, will be licking hot pans for all your calumnies! You, accursed one, will be boiling in pitch, remember my word!”

Lightning illuminated the threatening woman, and she was terrible with her uplifted staff and her sparkling eyes.

Malyúta himself felt a little uncomfortable; but Ioánn was emboldened by the presence of his favourite.

“Pay no attention to her, Lukyánych,” he said, “know what you are about, and don’t listen to women’s babble. But you, old fool, go away and leave us!”

Onúfrevna’s eyes sparkled once more.

“Old fool?” she repeated. “You will think of me in the next world! All your companions, Ványa, will receive their retribution, and they will receive it even in this world, every one of them, Gryaznóy, Basmánov, and Vyázemski. Each of them will receive his due, but this one,” she continued, pointing with her staff at Malyúta, “this one will not receive his due: there is no adequate punishment for him in this world; his punishment is in the lowermost pit of hell; there a place is ready for him, and the devils are waiting for him and rejoicing! And there is a place there for you, too, Ványa,--a big, warm place!”

The old woman went out, shuffling her feet and making a noise with her staff.

Ioánn was pale. Malyúta did not speak a word. The silence lasted quite a while.

“Well, Lukyánych?” said the Tsar at last, “do the Kolýchevs confess?”

“Not yet, sir. But they will, or they won’t get off so easily from me!”

Ioánn asked for the details of the inquest. The conversation about the Kolýchevs gave another direction to his thoughts. It appeared to him that he might be able to fall asleep. He sent Malyúta away, lay down upon his bed, and lost consciousness.

He was awakened as if by a sudden push. The room was weakly lighted by the lamps before the images. A moonbeam passed through the low window and glittered on the painted flourishes of the couch. A cricket chirped behind the couch. A mouse nibbled somewhere at the wood.

Iván Vasílevich was again terrified amidst this silence.

Suddenly it seemed to him as though the floor was being raised and a poisoned boyár looked out from underneath.

Such visions were common occurrences with Ioánn. He ascribed them to the persecutions of the devil. To get rid of the apparition, he made the sign of the cross.

But the apparition did not disappear, as it did formerly.

The dead boyár kept on looking at him awry. The eyes of the old man bulged out, and his face was as blue as then, at dinner, when he drank the cup sent him by Ioánn.

“That ’s again the devil’s incitement!” thought the Tsar. “But I will not submit to the power of Satan, and I will crush the cunning of the devil. Let God arise, and may His foes be dispersed!”

The dead man slowly rose from the floor and came nearer to Ioánn.

The Tsar wanted to cry out, but he could not. There was a terrible din in his ears.

The dead man bowed before the Tsar.

“Hail, Iván!” spoke a hollow, unearthly voice. “I greet you, who have destroyed an innocent man.”

These words re-echoed in the very depth of Ioánn’s soul. He did not know whether he heard them from the apparition, or whether his own thought found expression in sounds tangible to the ear.

Then another board was raised; underneath appeared the face of Daníla Adáshev who had been executed by Ioánn four years before.

Adáshev, too, rose from the floor, bowed to the Tsar, and said:

“Hail, Iván! I greet you who have executed an innocent man!”

After Adáshev there appeared the boyár’s wife Maria who had been executed together with her children. She rose from the floor, with her five sons. They all bowed to the Tsar, and all said:

“Hail, Iván! I greet you!”

Then appeared Prince Kurlyátev, Prince Obolénski, Nikíta Sheremétev, and other persons who had been killed or executed by Ioánn.

The room was filled with dead people. They all bowed low to the Tsar, and all said:

“Hail, hail, Iván! I greet you!”

And there rose monks, hermits, nuns, all in black garments, all pale and blood-covered.

And there appeared warriors who had been at Kazán with the Tsar. Upon them gaped terrible wounds, that were not gained in battle, but were inflicted by the executioner.

And there appeared maidens in torn garments, and young women with suckling babes. The children stretched their bloody hands to Ioánn and lisped:

“Hail, hail, Iván, who have made us innocent ones to perish!”

The room was ever more filled with apparitions. The Tsar could no longer distinguish his imagination from reality. The words of the apparitions were repeated in hundred-fold echoes, while the prayers for the dead and the singing of the vigils resounded above Ioánn’s ears. His hair stood on end.

“In the name of the living God,” he spoke, “if you are evil spirits sent by the power of the devil,--perish! If you are, in truth, the souls of those I have executed,--wait for the terrible judgment of the Lord! God will judge us all!”

The dead people moaned and circled around Ioánn, like autumn leaves driven by the whirlwind. The singing of the vigils sounded more pitifully, the rain again beat against the window, and amidst the howl of the wind, the Tsar thought he heard the sound of trumpets and a voice calling:

“Iván, Iván, to the judgment, to the judgment!”

The Tsar cried out aloud. The sleeping guards ran from the adjoining apartments into the bedroom.

“Rise,” cried the Tsar, “all who are asleep now! The last day has come! The last hour has come! Let us to the church, all after me!”

The courtiers bestirred themselves. The large bell was rung. The opríchniks who had just fallen asleep heard the familiar sound, and they jumped up from their couches and hastened to dress themselves.

Many were feasting at the house of Vyázemski. They were sitting at the wine cups and singing drinking songs. When they heard the sound of the bell, they jumped up from their seats, donned black cloaks over their rich garments, and covered their heads with high hoods. The whole palace quarter came into motion. The church of the Mother of God was brilliantly illuminated. The excited inhabitants rushed to their gates and saw a multitude of lights that wandered in the palace from room to room. Then the lights formed a long chain, and the procession meandered along the outward corridors that connected the palace with the temple of God.

All the opríchniks, who were dressed in the identical black cloaks and hoods, carried pitch torches. Their light was wonderfully reflected upon the carved pillars and wall decorations. The wind scattered the cloaks, and the moonlight and the light of the torches was reflected on the cloth, the pearls, and the costly stones. The Tsar marched in front, dressed as a monk, and he beat his breast and called out, sobbing aloud:

“Lord, have mercy on me, sinful man! Have mercy on me, stinking dog! Have mercy on my evil head! Pacify, O Lord, the souls of those who have been innocently killed by me!”

Before the doors of the temple Ioánn fell down exhausted. The torches illuminated an old woman that was sitting on the steps. She stretched out her trembling hand to the Tsar.

“Rise, father!” said Onúfrevna. “I will help you. I have been waiting for you for a long while. Come, Ványa, let us pray together!”

Two opríchniks held up the Tsar under his arms. He entered the church.

New processions, also in black cloaks, also in high hoods, were hastening over the streets with lighted torches. The doors of the temple swallowed ever new opríchniks, and the gigantic forms of the saints looked at them with disfavour from the walls and the vault of the church.

In the night, which had till then been speechless, there was suddenly heard the singing of several hundred voices, and the sound of the bell and the chant of the psalms were borne afar.

The prisoners awoke in their dungeons and, rattling their chains, began to listen.

“The Tsar is reading the matins!” they said. “O Lord, soften his heart, put mercy into his soul!”

Small children that were sleeping by the side of their mothers awoke in terror and began to cry. Many a mother could not quiet her babe for a long time.

“Hush!” she finally said. “Hush, or Malyúta will hear you!”

At the mention of Malyúta the child stopped crying and in its fright pressed close to its mother, and during the stillness of the night there were again heard the psalms of the opríchniks, and the continuous ringing of the bell.

THE DEATH OF IVÁN THE TERRIBLE