^mrn^ ^ONMRSJjjt ^UBAHCflGu SlSUDHVSOl'^ %QAIHfl-3^^ ^mm-f^ ^t?AWiiaiw^ ^lOSAHCnfi^ 5SlQAlNftlV«^^ ^lOSANCn^^ "^m^mi^ § 1 ir^ ^ ^OFCAllFOMj^ i ^OFCAllFOft^ i' OS ^nvjian-?^ ^j^DNvsoi'^ ^•UBRARYQ^ ^OF-Wtm^ ^(?Aaviian# ^53a!l)NIVtRS{>;k. =3 yj ' ■^aAiNfi-att^^ SO -j^lUBRAIfVC^ ^OFOOJFW^ ^c^Aiivaari-^ 4^1-UBRARYQr ^. mi^ %BW»an'^ ■'JisowHifflS?' ^oim-s^ '^iw ^;«MIIIIVB% ^UB*«a% ^OKMIfMS^^ ^OfCAU ii2^i i(Qcs t'bp^i $S/f ^J'iimsoi^ %aAiNfl#?^ '^(?;UiviiainJs'^ %jsm > CO ' so il i I i^ - ^5S«IIWVHI% ^lOSAW ^toivan'^ ,^UNIV!R% "^BAIM # '^MIIBRARYQ<^^ .iJrtEUN!VF% ^UBWC IMli Mi i^i m By DMITRI MEREJKOWSKI THE DEATH OF THE GODS. Authorized English Version by Herbert Trench. 12° . THE ROMANCE OF LEONARDO DA VINCI: THE FORERUNNER. (The Resurrection of the Gods.) Authorized Enghsh Version from the Russian. 12°. With 8 lUustrations . Artist's Edition, with 64 illustrations. 2 vols., PETER AND ALEXIS. Authorized English Version from the Russian, 12" .... Q. P. PUTNAM'S SONS New York London PETER AND ALEXIS The Romance of Peter the Great BY DMITRI MEREJKOWSKI AUTHOR OF "the death OF THE GODS" (THE EMPEROR JULIAN) AND "the ROMANCE OF LEONARDO DA VINCI" Sole Authorised Translation from tlie Russian G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS NEW YORK AND LONDON ^be f^nichecbocher g)re60 Clop- c^ PREFATORY NOTE THIS remarkable novel, the first by Merejkowski on a purely Russian theme, completes the alread}' famous historical Trilogy, of which The Death of the Gods, and The Forerunner, or Romance of Leonardo da Vinci, were the two former instalments. For some account of the author, and of the main idea underlying the Trilogy, the reader is referred to the English preface to The Death of the Gods. These novels, which may be read independently of each other, have been very successfully translated into all the prin- cipal European languages ; and the exclusively authorized English translations of them, published in England by Messrs. Archibald Constable, and in the United States by Messrs. Putnam, are being again issued in new editions respectively in both countries. The present translation, although it is feared much like Heine's " stuffed moonbeam," has been made direct from the Russian original, and pains have not been spared to render it exact. Thanks are due to Mr. W. R. Morfill, Reader in Russian to the University of Oxford, for his kind assistance on one or two difficult points. A word of explanation is due to the English and American public with regard to the purpose of the present work. No one who knows Merejkowski personally, no one who reads his story with a fair mind, will imagine for a moment that it is written to please or to amuse the " young person." It is intended for men and women. It is a simple and earnest psychological study of the most moving episode in the life of the greatest of the Romanoff princes. It is a sketch, vivid and true, of classes and conditions, — of court and society,— of peasants and wild religious i> 95253 Slavic 51810. 6 PREFATORY NOTE beliefs — in Russia at the beginning of the eighteenth cen- tury. As regards the bulk of her population she has not materially changed. Russia at that time lay in a position relative to Europe precisely analogous to that occupied by Japan thirty-five years ago. The vaster country, as the reader will see, was beginning, through the person of its sovereign, humbly to learn of the civilised West, just as Japan began to do so also through her sovereign's efforts in 1868. But in this book a strange additional feature of interest for the present moment is a psychological feature. The character of the Romanoff family is a persistent one ; and in the course of this novel, with its single terrific scene, dull indeed will be the reader who does not step by step more clearly discern in the soul of the luckless Alexis the very lineaments and complexion of Nicholas, the now living occupant of the Russian throne. This is the key to the book. Possibly before another year has expired, perhaps even before these words are being read, he will occupy the throne no longer; and the forces that may remove him would be essentially the same forces as those which decided the fate of Alexis. London, September, 1905. CONTENTS PAGE Book I. The Venus of Petersburg .... 9 Book II. Antichrist ...... Book III. The Private Journal of the Tzarevitch Alexis .... Book IV. The Flood ...... Book V. Desolation of the Holy Places Book VI. The Tzar's Son in Exile Book VII. Peter the Great .... Book VIII. The Were-Wolf ..... Book IX. The Red Death ..... Book X. Father and Son ..... 51 99 171 227 271 333 415 461 Epilogue The Christ Who is to Come . . , , . .513 Book I THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG CHAPTER I " yfNTICHRIST is coming. He, the last of devils, has ■*^ not yet come himself ; but the world is teeming with his progeny. The children are preparing the way for their father. They twist everything to suit the designs of Anti- christ. He will appear in his own due time, when every- where all is prepared and the way smoothed. He is already at the door. Soon will he enter ! " Thus spake an old man of fifty, a clerk, judging by his clothes, to a young man, who, wrapped in a nankeen dress- ing gown, with slippers on his bare feet, was seated at a table. " And how do you know all this ? " asked the young man. " Of that day it is written : Neither the Son, nor the angels know ; but you seem to know." He yawned, and then after a moment's silence asked : " Do you belong to the heretics — the Raskolniks ? " " No, I am an Orthodox." " Why did you come to Petersburg ? " " I have been brought here from Moscow, together with my account books. An informer reported me for taking bribes." " Did you take them ? " " I did. I was not compelled to, neither did I do it for the sake of extortion, but in all fairness, and with a clean conscience, being satisfied with whatever was freely given me for the clerk- work I did." 10 PETER AND ALEXIS He said it so simplj' that it was evident he did not con- sider bribe-taking necessaril}' a fault. " The informer could add nothing to the proof of my guilt, which was disclosed b}' the entries made in certain agents' books, showing that they had for years been wont to give me trifling sums, amounting in all to two hundi^ed and fifteen roubles ; and I have nothing wherewith to repay the sum. I am poor, old, sad, wretched, disabled, destitute ; and unable any longer to do my work, I beg to be discharged of it. Most merciful Highness ! open your bowels of compassion unto me, and protect a defenceless old man ; cause me to be exempted from this unjust payment ! Have mercy upon me, I beseech you, Tsarevitch Alexis Petrovitch ! " Alexis had met this old man some months ago in Peters- burg, at St. Simeon and St. Anne's Church. Noticing him because of his unshaven, grizzled beard — so unusual for clerks — and his zealous reading of the Psalms in the choir, the Tsarevitch had asked him his name, position, and whence he came. The old man had introduced himself, as a clerk of the Moscow Arsenal, Larion Dckoukin by name. He had come from Moscow and was now staving in the house belonging to the woman who made the consecrated bread at St. Simeon's ; he had mentioned his poverty, the informer's disclosure, and also, almost in his first words, had referred to Antichrist. The Tsarevitch had been touched by the pitiable condition of the old man and told him to come to his house, promising to help him with money and advice. Now that he stood before him in his torn coat he looked the very image of a beggar. He was one of those poor ordinary clerks, nicknamed in Russia " ink}' souls," " petti- foggers." Hard were his wrinkles as though fossilized, hard the cold look in the small dim eyes, hard his neglected grizzled beard, his face colourless and dull as the papers which he had been copying and had pored over may be for thirty years in his office. He had accepted bribes from agents " in all fairness " ; he may have even been guilty of roguery, and this was the conclusion he had suddenly arrived at : Antichrist is coming ! " Is he not simply an impostor ? " surmised the Tsare- vitch, looking steadily at him. There was nothing THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG ii deceitful or sly in this face, but rather something artless and helpless, sombre and stubborn, as with people who are possessed by an idee fixe. " There was yet another reason for my coming here," added the old man, and then stopped short, unable to con- tinue ; the idee fixe was slowly working its way through his hard features. He cast down his eyes, fumbled with one hand in his breast pocket, pulled out some papers, which had apparently slipped into the lining through the pocket- hole, and gave them to the Tsarevitch. They consisted of two thin, greasy, quarto booklets, filled with the large legible handwriting of a clerk. Alexis began to read them carelessly, but gradually be- came more and more absorbed. At the beginning came passages from the Holy Fathers, the prophets, and the Apocalypse, with reference to Anti- christ and the end of the world. Then followed an appeal to the chief clergy of great Russia, and of the world, together with a prayer that they would forgive him, Dokoukin, his impudence and rudeness for thus writing this without their fatherly blessing, prompted as he had been solely by much suffering, sorrow and zeal for the Church, and with a further prayer that they would also intercede on his behalf with the Tsar and entreat him to show mercy unto himself, and vouchsafe him a hearing. Then followed what was evi-. dently Dokoukin's main idea, " God has ordained man lo be master of himself (to exercise self-will, to be autono- mous,)" and at the end came an accusation against the Tsar Peter : " Nowadays we are cut off from this divine gift^ife absolute and free ; as well as deprived of houses, markets, agriculture, handicrafts and all the old estabhshed trades and laws, and, what is worse still, of Christian religion. We are hunted from house to house, from place to place, from town to town ; we are insulted and outraged. We have changed all our customs, our language and dress ; we have shaved our heads and beards, we have basely defiled our- selves ; we have lost all that was characteristic both of nature and bearing, and in no wise differ now from the foreigners ; we have once and for all mingled with them, got used to their ways, broken our Christian vows, and for- 12 PETER AND ALEXIS saken the holy churches. We have turned away from the East, and directed our footsteps toward the West, we have travelled along strange and unknown paths and have per- ished in the land of oblivion. We have adopted strangers and have showered good gifts upon them, while our own countrymen are left to die of hunger, to be beaten on dis- traint and ruined absolutely by unbearable taxation. It is inexpedient to give utterance to everything ; more becom- ing is it to place a bridle on one's tongue But the heart is sore distressed to see the desolation of the New Jerusalem, and the troubled people smitten with insufferable scour- ges ! " " All this," ran the conclusion, " is done unto us for the sake of the Lord Jesus Christ. O Secret Martyrs ! fear not, neither despair, but rise valiantly and arm yourselves with the cross to repel the power of Antichrist. Suffer for the Lord's cause, bear all patiently for yet a little while ! Christ will not forsake us. Unto Him be praise now and ever more, world without end. Amen." " What was your reason for writing this ? " asked the Tsarevitch, when he had read through the booklet. " A little while ago I dropped a letter like this in the porch of St. Simeon's," answered Dokoukin, " but those who found the letter simply burnt it, neither reporting it to the Tsar nor making any inquiries about it. This petition here I think of nailing up somewhere in the Trinity Church, near the Tsar's palace, so that whoever reads it may be informed and may report it to his Majesty. And I wrote this to bring about a reform, so that the Tsar, should he once come to himself again, might amend his ways." " A cheat," flashed across Alexis' mind, "and possibly an informer. Why in the devil's name did I thus commit myself ? " " Are you aware, Dokoukin," said the Tsarevitch, look- ing straight into his face, " are you aware of the fact that it is my duty, as citizen and son, to report these, your sedi- tious and rebellious writings, to my father the Sovereign ? And the twentieth article of the military regulations reads : ' Whosoever shall use seditious language against his Majesty shall forfeit his life by having his head cut off.' " THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG 13 " It is for you to decide, Tsarevitch. For myself I am willing to suffer for Christ's sake." He said it in the same unpretentious manner as when he was speaking about bribes. Alexis eyed him yet more closely. Before him was the same ordinary clerk, the petti- fogger, with the same cold look and dull face. Only some- where deep in his eyes something was again struggling forth. " Are you in your right senses, old man ? Consider what you are about ! Once in the torture chamber, there will be an end of joking ; you will be hanged by the ribs and smoked to death like Gregory of Talitsa." Gregory of Talitsa was one of those prophets, preaching the approach of the judgment day, who had declared that Tsar Peter was the Antichrist, and for this reason he had suffered the cruel death of being smoked on a slow fire. " With God's help I am ready to give up my Hfe," answered the old man. " To-day, to-morrow, we all must die once. It is meet to have done something good with which to come before God, lest death should be our lot there also." His manner remained as simple as before, yet there was something in the calm face and subdued voice which in- spired the conviction that this arsenal clerk, discharged for having yielded to bribery, would really meet death without flinching, like one of those " Secret Martyrs " he mentioned in his petition. " No," the Tsarevitch promptly decided, " he is neither a cheat nor a spy, but either mad or, in truth, a martyr." The old man hung his head, and added in a yet lower tone, as if to himself, forgetful of the other's presence : " God has commanded man to be master of himself." Alexis rose and, without another word, tore a page from the booklet, lit it at a lamp which was glimmering before the images, uncovered the draught hole, opened the stove door, shoved in the papers, and waited ; he stirred them from time to time till they were reduced to ashes, then went up to Dokoukin, who all the time stood watching him, laid his hand on his shoulder and said : — " Listen, old man, I will report you to none. I see you 14 PETER AND ALEXIS are an honest man ; I trust you. Tell me, do you wish me well ? " Dokoukin did not repl3% yet his look made words un- necessary. "If you do, then banish all this nonsense from your head ! Never even dare so much as think of writing such seditious letters ; this is not the time for them. If it were known you had been to see me, I too should fare ill. Go, God be with you, and don't come again. Don't talk with any one about me. Should you be questioned, keep your own counsel, and leav^e Petersburg as quickly as possible. Now will you remember what I tell you ? " " What else can one do but obey you ? " said Dokoukin, " the Lord knows I am your faithful servant unto death." " Don't fret about the informer's report," continued Alexis, " I'll put in a word where it is necessary, rest assured you shall be exempt from it all. Now go — or no, wait, give me your handkerchief." Dokoukin handed him a dark blue chequered handker- chief, faded, full of holes, as miserable looking as the owner. Alexis opened a drawer in his small walnut wood desk, which stood next to the table, took from it without counting about twenty roubles in silver and copper — a whole treasure for the destitute Dokoukin — wrapped the money in the hand- kerchief, and gave it back with a kindly smile. " Take this for thy journey. On thy return to Moscow order a mass at the Archangel Cathedral, and have God's servant Alexis remembered. Only be careful and don't let it be known who this Alexis is ! " The old man took the money, yet neither thanked him nor stirred. He stood as before, with his head hung down. At last he lifted his eyes, and began in a solemn voice a speech which he had probably prepared beforehand : — / " As of old God quenched Samson's thirst by means of an ass's jawbone, so to-day has not the same God used my igno- rance as a means to convey something useful and refreshing to you ? " But he suddenly broke down, his voice gave way, his solemn speech stopped short, his lips trembled, he staggered and fell at Alexis' feet. " Have mercy, our Father, listen to us, poor, groaning, THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG 15 and lowliest of slaves ! Work zealously for the Christian faith ; build up, control, give to the Church peace and unity of spirit. Tsarevitch ! Fair child of the Church, our sun and Russia's hope ! the world is waiting to be enlightened by thee. The scattered sons of God rejoice in thee. Who but thou can succour us ? We all are lost without thee, our beloved ! have mercy ! " The old man knelt before Alexis, embracing his knees, weeping, and covering his feet with kisses. The Tsare- vitch Ustened, and this desperate prayer seemed to gather into itself and give expression to the wrongs of all those who were perishing, outraged, and goaded to despair, a cry from the whole people for help. " Enough, enough, old man," he said, stooping and trying to lift him, " Am I then blind and deaf ? Does not my heart ache for you ? The sorrow is common to us. I feel the same as you do. Should God once grant me to rule over this country, I will do all I can to ease the people's lot. Nei- ther will I then forget you ; I need faithful servants. And meanwhile bear patiently, and pray God to speed the fulfil- ment, for His holy will worketh in all things." He helped him up. The old man looked very weak and pitiful ; but his eyes glowed with such joy, as though he already beheld the salvation of Russia. Alexis embraced, and kissed him on his forehead. " Good-bye, Dokoukin, we shall meet some day, God willing. The Lord be with thee ! " When Dokoukin left, the Tsarevitch returned to his leather armchair — which was old and well-worn, with the hair stuffing peering through the^holes, yet remarkably soft and comifortable, and there he sank into a kind of doze or torpor. Alexis was twenty-five years old, tall, slim, narrow across the shoulders and in the chest ; his face, too, was thin and strangely long, as if drawn out and pointed at the chin ; it looked old, sickly, and sallow, like the fac? of people who suffer from kidney disease ; his mouth was very small, pitiful and childlike ; long tufts of straight black hair surrounded his large open arched brow. Such faces are common among monastic novices, country deacons, and choristers. Yet i6 PETER AND ALEXIS when he smiled his eyes would light up with intelligence and kindliness ; his face would suddenly become young and handsome and shine as with some soft inner light. At such moments he resembled his grandfather, the gentle Tsar Alexis. As he was now, wrapped in a dirty dressing gown, worn- out slippc's on his bare feet, sleepy, unshaven, his hair unkempt, he little looked hke Tsar Peter's son. Last night's drinking bout had given him a severe headache ; the best part of the day had gone while he slept it off ; it was well on towards evening when he got up. His disarranged couch, with its large crumpled feather bed and sheets, could be seen through the open door in the next room. Upon the writing table there lay scattered before him sundry rusty mathematical instruments, covered with dust ; a broken antique censer filled with frankincense, a tobacco grater, meerschaum pipes, an empty hair-powder box, now used as an ash tray, piles of paper and books, all in a muddle ; notes on Baronius' " Universal Chroni le," in Alexis' own handwriting, were covered up by a heap of packet tobacco ; a half eaten cucumber was lying on the open page of a tat- tered book, whose title ran : " Geometry or Earth — mea- surement by root and compass, for the instruction of know- ledge-loving painstakers " ; a well picked bone was left on a pewter plate, and close by a sticky liqueur glass with a fly buzzing in it. Innumerable flics were crawling and buzzing in black swarms over the walls, hung with torn, dirty grass- green oilcloth, over the smoked ceiling, and the dim panes of the double.windows, which had been left in regardless of the hot June weather. Flies were buzzing all around him, and dro^ysy thoughts swarmed like flies in his mind. He remembered the fight which had ended last night's drinking bout ; Jibanda struck Sleepyhead, Sleepyhead Lasher, and then Father Hell. Starling and Moloch had rolled under the table. These were nicknames which Alexis had given to his boon companions, " for his private diversion." Alexis also remembered beat- ing and pulling somebod3''s hair, but who this somebody was, he could not recall. Last night it had amused him, to- day he felt ashamed and miserable over it. His head was again beginning to ache. He longed for THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG 17 another glass to cure this drunken headache ; but he was too lazy to go and get one, too lazy even to call out to his servants. Yet the next moment he would be obliged to dress, pull on his tight-fitting uniform, buckle his sword, put on the heavy wig, which would only intensify his headache, and present himself at the Summer Garden for a masque where all were ordered to appear, under threat of terrible punishment for the defaulter. He heard the voices of children skipping and playing in the courtyard. A sickly ruffled green-finch twittered plain- tively from time to time in his cage over the window. The pendulum of a tall upright English striking clock, an old present from his father, was ticking monotonously. Seem- ingly interminable, melancholy runs of scales reached his ears from the apartment overhead. It was his wife the _Crown Princess Charlotte, who was playing on a tinkling old German spinet. All at once he remembered how last night, when drunk, he had railed about her to Jibanda and Lasher : " I am encumbered with a devil of a wife. Come when I will to her, she is always bad tempered, and will not speak to me. Such a mighty personage ! " " This won't do," he thought now, " I talk too much when I am drunk, and afterwards I am sorry for it." Was it her fault that, when but a child, she was forced to marry him, and by what right did he mock her ? Sick; lonely, abandoned by all, in a foreign land, she was as unhappy as himself. Yet she loved him, perhaps she was the only one who did love him. He remembered their recent quarrel ; how she had called out : " The lowest cobbler in German^/ treats his wife better than you do ! " He had angrily shrugged his shoulders : — " Go back to Germany then, God speed you ! " " Yes, I would, if I were not " She had not continued, but had burst into tears pointing to herself : she was with child. How well he remembered those pale blue eyes, swollen with tears trickling down her cheeks, washing off the powder she, poor girl, had specially put on for him. Her usually plain features had become haggard and plainer yet during pregnancy : a pathetic, helpless face. And yet he himself loved her, or at any rate he pitied her, at times with some strange, hopeless, desperate, poignant, well nigh overwhelm- ing feeling of pity. Why then did he torture her ? Was he 6 i8 PETER AND ALEXIS bereft of all sense of sin and shame ? He would have to answer for her before God. The flies seemed quite to distract him. A hot slanting ray of the red setting sun, coming through the window, just caught his eyes. At last he altered the position of his arm-chair, turned his back to the window, and fixed his eyes on the stove. It was a huge stove, built of Russian glazed tiles imitated from the Dutch, clamped together at the corners with brass. It was decorated with carved pillars, flowered recesses, and sockets. Various curious animals, birds, human beings, and plants were represented on a white ground in thick red, green, and dark violet colours ; under each design there was an inscription in Slavonic characters. The colours glowed with unusual brightness in the glare of the setting sun, and for the hundredth time Alexis looked at these designs with drowsy curiosity and read over the inscriptions : under a man with a musical instrument he legend : " I make melody ; " under a man sitting in an arm-chair with a book, " Improv- ing the mind ; " under a full blown tulip the words : " My scent is sweet ; " under an old man kneeling before a beauty the words : " No love for an old man ! " under a couple sitting under a tree the words : " Taking good coun- sel together : " a birch elf, French comedians, a Japanese priest, the goddess Diana and the legendary bird Malko- thea. Meanwhile the flies go on buzzing ; the pendulum ticks ; the green-finch pipes in a melancholy tone ; the sound of scales from above, the voices of children rise from the court below. The sharp red ray of sunlight grows duller and fainter, the coloured figures assume life, the French comedians play leap-frog with the birch elf. and the Japan- ese priest winks at the bird Malkothea. Everything begins to lose precision ; his eyelids grow heavy, and but for the large sticky black fly, no longer buzz- ing in the glass, but in his head, all would be so quiet, so peaceful, in this dark red gloom. Suddenly a shudder went through him ; he started up. " Have mercy upon us ! " The words seemed to thunder within him with violent force. He cast a look round his untidy room, and at himself, and his cheeks, bathed a mo- THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG 19 ment since in the red blaze of the setting sun, were now glowing with shame. A goodly Hope of Russia indeed ! Brandy, sleep, indolence, hes, filth, and a ceaseless craven fear of his father. Was it really too late ? Was this really to be the end ? Could he but shake himself free, and run away ! " Suffer for Christ's sake," again Dokoukin's words came to his mind, — " God willed man to be master of himself." Yes, he would join them ere it is too late. They, the Secret Mai- tyrs, are calling and waiting for him. He started up as if really intending to act upon his im- pulse — to do something irrevocable ; as he stood there, indecisive, his heart sank with foreboding. The slow melodious brass chime of the clock rang out through the stillness. It struck nine. When the last stroke had died away, the door was gently pushed open, and a head peered into the room ; it was his valet, the aged Ivan Afanassieff. " It is time to be going. Would you not like to get ready ? " He muttered it in his usual grumpy voice, as if he were chiding Alexis. " No thank you, I am not going," said Alexis. " As you please. The order was for everyone to be present ; your father will again be wrathful." " Go, go." Alexis was going to turn him out of the room, when looking at this nilfied, unkempt, unshaven, unwashed, sleepy face, he suddenly remembered, that it was this man he had pulled by the hair on the previous night. Alexis fixed on him a long perplexed gaze, as if he had only a' this moment fully awakened. From the window the last ray of sunlight had died away ; immediately the room lost all its brightness, and grew dreary ; it seemed as if some monstrous grey cobweb, which up to that moment had been lurking in the dirty ceiling, was now gradually descending, filling the space with a dense net of dinginess. The head continued to peer through the door, as if it had stuck there, moving neither to nor fro. " Have you at last decided whether you will dress or not ? " repeated Ivan in a yet gruffer voice. Alexis waved his hand in utter helplessness. 20 PETER AND ALEXIS " I will, it's all the same ! " and seeing the head did not disappear, but apparently awaited further orders, he added : " Just another glass of orange liqueur. My head is split- ting from last night's drinking bout " The old man said nothing, yet his look plainly intimated, "It is not your head which ought to be aching after last night." Left to himself, the Tsarevitch clasped his fingers, stretched out his arms till all the joints cracked, and yawned. Shame, fear, sorrow, repentance, thirst for immediate heroism, all dissolved in this slow, hopeless yawn, which neither pain nor contortions could repress, which was more awful than any sob or groan. ***** In an hour's time, washed and shaved, with hardly any trace of drink about him, dressed in a tightly-fitting officer's uniform of the Preobrazhensky Regiment, of green cloth with red facings and golden galoon, he was wending his way to the Summer Palace along the Neva in a six-oared boat. CHAPTER II IT was the twenty-sixth of June, 1715 ; a festival in honour of Venus had been arranged for that day in the Summer Garden. Her statue, newly arrived from Rome, was to be placed in the pavilion overlooking the Neva. " I will have a braver garden than the French King at Versailles," boasted Peter. When away on campaigns, at sea or in foreign lands, the Tsaritza used to supply him with news about his favourite nursling : " Our garden has come on beautifully, better than last year. The avenue leading from the palace is almost entirely overshadowed with maple and oak trees. Whenever I go out, I am grieved not to have you, my heart's joy, with me. Our garden is gradually becoming green, there is already a strong smell of resin in the air," — she was referring to the scent of the trees just bursting into leaf. The Summer Garden, in fact, was laid out on the same plan as the renowned park at Versailles, with smoothly shorn trees, flower beds in geometrical figures, straight canals, square lakes, swans, islets, bowers, ingenious water-sprays, endless avenues, prospects, high leafy hedges, and espaliers which resembled the walls of some grand reception hall. Here people were encouraged to walk about, and when tired to seek rest and seclusion, for which a goodly number of benches, pavilions, labyrinths and green lawns were provided. Yet, nevertheless, the Tsar's garden was far inferior to the gardens at Versailles. The pale northern sun drew but puny tulips from the 21 - 22 PETER AND ALEXIS fat Rotterdam bulbs. Only the humbler boreal flowers grew freely, such as, for instance, Peter's favourite, the scented tansy, double peonies, and melancholy bright dahlias. Young trees, brought here with incredible trouble by sea and by land even a distance of i,ooo miles — from Prussia, Poland, Pomerania, Denmark, and Holland — were also far from flourishing ; the foreign soil nourished their roots but scantily. On the other hand, as at Versailles, all along the main alleys marble busts and statues were placed. Roman emperors, Greek philosophers, Olympian gods and goddesses seemed to look at one another in amazement, unable to understand how they got into this wild country of the " Hyperborean Barbarians." These statues, however, were not the antique originals, but feeble imitations by second-rate Italian and German masters. The gods appeared to have only just taken off their wigs and embroidered coats, the goddesses their lace-trappings and robes ; they seemed to wonder at their scarcely decent nakedness, and resembled affected cavaliers and dames who had been taught the delicacies of French politeness at the court of Louis XIV. and the Duke of Orleans. Alexis was walking along one of the side alleys, which led from the large lake in the direction of the Neva. He was accompanied by a funny, hobbling, bow-legged crea- ture, who wore a shabby foreign-cut coat, a huge wig and a flurried confused expression, like some one suddenly aroused from his sleep. He was the head of the Armoury department and of the new Printing Works, the first master-printer in Petersburg — Michael Avramoff. The son of a deacon, at the age of seventeen, Avramoff had been taken straight from the Breviary and Psalms to a trading vessel at Kronslot ; the vessel was bound for Amsterdam with a cargo of tar, skins, leather, and a dozen " Russian youths," who had been selected by Peter's command from " sharp youngsters," for instruction abroad. After some study of geometry and more at classic mytho- logy, Avramoff had received commendations and a diploma from his teachers. Not stupid by nature, he seemed to have been stunned and baffled by a too sudden transi- tion from the Psalms and Breviary to the Fables of Ovid THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG 23 and Virgil, and never to have recovered. His mind had undergone something Hke a fit of convulsions to which little children aresubject, when suddenly startled from their sleep, and ever since his face had retained that expression of stupefaction. " Tsarevitch, I confess to you, as before God," spoke Avramoff in a monotonous whining tone, like the buzzing of a gnat, " my conscience is uneasy, in that being Chris- tians we yet worship idols." " What idols ? " asked the Tsarevitch in amazement. Avramoff pointed to the marble statues along both sides of the alley. " Our fathers and forefathers placed holy icons in their houses and along the roads, but we are ashamed to do like- wise, and set up shameless idols instead. When God's images have God's power in them, the devil's images in like manner will surely hold the devil's power. In the Most Foolish Conclave with the Kniaz-pope we have been serving the drunken god Bacchus ; and now, to-day, we are prepar- ing to worship that dissolute and obscene goddess Venus. These ceremonies are termed masquerades and are not accounted to us for sin ; for, they say, these gods have never existed, and their lifeless statues are placed in house and garden solely for the sake of ornament. But that is where folk fatally err ; because these ancient gods do really and verily exist." " You believe in their existence ? " Alexis' surprise in- creased. " Your royal Highness, according to the witness of holy men, I believe that the gods are evil spirits, who, being cast out of their temples in the name of the Crucified, sought refuge in dark and desert places, there pretending to be dead and non-existent till their hour should come. But when ancient Christianity grew feeble and a new infamy had sprung up, then these gods began to regain life, and leave their hiding places ; just as various worthless creeping things, scarabees and such like poisonous vermin, emerging from their eggs sting people, so the evil spirits emerging from their larvae, these ancient idols, sting and ruin Chris- tian souls. Do you remember Father Isaac's vision, recorded in the Holy Fathers ? How beautiful young men 24 PETER AND ALEXIS and maidens with faces bright as the sun, catching hold of the saint's hands, whirled him away in a mad dance to the strains of sweet music, and how when they had tired and dishonoured him they left him almost dead, and dis- appeared ? Then the Holy Father knew that he had been visited by the ancient Greek and Roman gods, Jove, Mercury, Apollo, Venus and Bacchus. Now the evil ones appear unto us sinners to-day, but in disguise, so to speak. And we welcome them, and mingling with them in obscene masquerades, we prance and dance, till in the end, we shall all rush headlong into some deep Tartarus, or, like a herd of swine, into the sea ; ignorant fools, not to realize that these beautiful, new, radiant, white devils are far more dangerous than the most churlish and blackest Ethiopian monstrosities ! " It was almost dark in the garden, though it was but the middle of June. Low, black, oppressive storm-clouds crept over the sky. Neither the fireworks nor the festival had as yet been started. The air was as still as in a room. Distant heat lightnings lit up the horizon, and each flash revealed marble statues of almost painfully dazzling white- ness among the green espaliers on both sides of the alley — it seemed as though white phantoms were flitting along the glades. After all Avramoff had been telling him the Tsarevitch looked at them with a new feeling. " Really," he thought, " they are just hke white devils." Voices became audible. B}' the sound of one of them, not loud but slightly husky, and also by the red glowing spot, which to all appearance came from the Dutch clay pipe, and disclosed the gigantic stature of the smoker, Alexis recognised his father. He swiftly turned the corner of the alley into a side path leading to a maze of lilac and box shrubs. " Like a hare," he angrily termed his action, which though almost instinctive was nevertheless cowardice. " What in the devil, Avramoff, are you always talking about ? " he continued, feigning annoyance in order to cover his shame. " Excess of reading seems to have muddled your brain." " I speak the pure truth, your royal Highness," retorted Avramoff, not in the least hurt, " I have myself experi- THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG 25 enced the power of those evil spirits ; it was Satan who enticed me when I asked your father, the Tsar, to let me print Ovid and Virgil. I have already issued one book with drawings of the gods and their mad doings, and ever since I seem to have been beside myself, and subject to insatiable lechery. The Lord has forsaken me, and all sorts of strange gods, especially Bacchus and Venus, have begun to haunt my dreams." " In what guise ? " asked Alexis, his curiosity now aroused. " Bacchus appeared to me in the shape of Martin Luther the heretic, just as you see him in paintings, a red-faced German with a belly as round as a beer barrel. Then Venus took the form of a girl whom I had known during my stay in Amsterdam : a nude body, white as foam, scarlet lips and impudent eyes. And when I awoke in the bath-house, for this devil's work happened there, the sly witch had changed to the priest's serf girl, Akoulina, who reviling me for hindering her having a bath, impudently struck me across the face with a bunch of wet birch twigs, and jumping into a snow drift in the yard — it happened in winter — she melted away in thin air." " But this might very possibly have really been Akoulina," laughed the Tsarevitch. Avramoff was going to retort but stopped short. Again voices became audible. Again a blood-red spot glimmered in the darkness. The narrow path of the dark maze had again brought father and son together in a place too narrow to avoid one another. Again the desperate thought flashed across Alexis' mind to hide himself somewhere, to slip through, or again dart as a hare into the low wood. But it was too late ; Peter had already caught sight of him from a distance, and called out : " Zoon ! " The Dutch " Zoon " signifies son ; he called him thus only in rare moments of graciousness. Alexis was all the more surprised,! as of late his father had quite given up talking to him either in Dutch or Rus ian^ He advanced towards his father, took his hat off, made a low bow, and kissed first the lappet of his coat, then the hard horny hand. Peter was attired in a well worn com- 26 PETER AND ALEXIS mander's uniform of the Preobrazhensky Regiment. It was of dark green cloth with red facings and brass buttons. " Thank you, Ahosha," said Peter, and Alexis' heart thrilled at this long unheard " Aliosha." "Thank you for the present you sent me. It came just in the nick of time. My own supj^ly of oak, which was being floated down on a raft from Kazan, perished in a storm on the Ladoga. But for your present, we should scarcely have finished our new frigate before the autumn ; the wood was of the best and strongest, like yours — true iron. It is long since I have seen such exceptionally good oak ! " The Tsarevitch knew that nothing pleased his father more than good timber for ship-building. On his own estate in the Porietzky district of the Novgorod govern- ment, Alexis had for some time secretly reserved a fine plantation of oak for the day w'hen he should be in special need of his father's favour. When he learnt that they would soon be wanting oak in the dockyard, Alexis had the timber felled and floated on a raft down the Neva just in time to supply his father. It was one of those timid, awkward services, which he had rendered frequently at one time, but of late more and more rarely. However, he did not deceive himself ; he knew it would soon be forgotten, like all his previous services, while increased severity would follow this momentary tenderness. Nevertheless a bashful joy flushed his face ; his heart throbbed with mad hope. He muttered something in a low, halting tone, about " always glad to give my father pleasure," and stooped again to kiss his hand. But Peter raised his head with both his hands. For one instant Alexis saw the familiar face, so terrible yet so dear to him, with its full round cheeks, the curly moustache, and the charming smile which flitted across the curved, ahnost femininely tender lips, he saw the large, dark, lucid eyes, which so fascinated him that he used to dream about them, as a love-sick youth would dream about the eyes of a beauti- ful woman. He recognized the odour familiar from his childhood : a mixture of strong tobacco, brandy, sweat, and something else, not disagreeable, a smell of soldiers' barracks, which usually filled his father's working room, " the office." He felt the touch, familiar also to him from THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG 27 his earliest years, of the hard, sHghtly bristly chin with the dimple in the centre, which seemed strangely out of place on this formidable face. He remembered, or was it only a dream, kissing this odd dimple, saying with delight : " It is just hke Granny's," when as a child his father used to take him on his knees. Peter, kissing his son on the forehead, said in his broken Dutch speech : " Good beware u ! This slightly stiff Dutch " you " in place of " thou " sounded to Alexis charmingly amiable. He seemed to have felt and seen all this in a flash of lightning. The lightning faded away and all disappeared. Peter had already passed a good way on, his head thrown back as was his wont, slightly twitching his shoulder, waving his right hand in a soldierly manner, walking at his usual rapid pace, which was so quick that those who accompanied him were obliged to keep up by running. Alexis went in the opposite direction following the same narrow path of the dark maze. Avramoff kept close be- hind ; he again began talking, but now about the Archi- mandrite of the Alexander Monastery, the Tsar's chaplain Theodosius Janovsky, whom Peter had appointed " Admin- istrator of Religious Affairs," and had thus raised above the first prelate, the aged occupant of the Patriarchal throne, — Stephen Javorsky. Theodosius was suspected of lean- ings towards Lutheranism, of secretly plotting to abolish the worship of icons, relics, the keeping of fasts, monasteries, the Patriarchate and other ancient statutes and customs of the Orthodox Church. Others surmised that Theodosius was dreaming of himself becoming Patriarch. " This Theodosius is a veritable atheist and a most insolent pagan," Avramoff continued. " He has wormed his way into the hard - worked monarch's holy con- fidence and enthralled him. He boldly destroys Chris- tian laws and traditions, and introduces an ambitious, luxurious, epicurean, almost swinish way of living. He, this mad heresiarch, tore the crown off the wonder- working Kazan icon of the Virgin ; ' Sexton, a knife ! ' he cried, cut the wire, tore off the embossed golden ornament, and put the spoil in his pocket, barefacedly, before the eyes 28 PETER AND ALEXIS of all ; and those who saw it were amazed and bewailed such impudence. Meanwhile he, the unclean vessel, the obscene one, turned away from God, made a compact with Satan, and, mad goat that he is, even wanted to spit and trample on the Life-giving Cross, the Saviour's image ! " The Tsarevitch gave no heed to Avramoff's prattle. He was musing over and trying by arguments to choke this unreasonable, and as it now seemed, childish joy. What was he expecting ? What was he hoping for ? A recon- ciliation with his father ? Was it possible ? Did he him- self really wish for one ? Had not something taken place, which could never be forgotten or forgiven ? He remem- bered hiding himself in cowardly fear a moment ago ; he remembered Dokoukin and his " denunciatory petition against Peter," and many other far more terrible, unanswer- able denunciations. It was not for his own sake merely that he had rebelled against his father. And yet, a few kind words, one smile, had sufficed to melt and soften his heart. He is again willing to fall at his father's feet, for- get and forgive everything and himself implore for pardon, as if he alone were the guilty one. He is ready, for another such caress, another such smile, to surrender his soul to him anew. " Is it possible," he thought almost terrified, " that I love him so much ? " Avramoff continued talking like a gnat humming in one's ear. The Tsarevitch caught his last words : " When St. Mitrofane of Voronesh saw Bacchus, Venus and other gods standing on the roof of the Tsar's palace, he said : ' I cannot enter the house until the Tsar orders these idols, which mislead the people, o be taken down.' And the Tsar, honouring the hoi}' man, had them all removed. That's how it was in the past ; but to- day, who dares speak the truth to the Tsar ? Not Theo- dosius the unclean one, who turns icons into idols. Woe unto us ! It has come to such a pass that, this very day. at this very hour, the Virgin's holy picture will be replaced by a devilish, mischievous image of Venus ! And the monarch your father " " Leave nie alone, you fool," the Tsarevitch exclaimed wrathfully. " All of you leave me alone ! What are you always at me for ? Damnation ! " and he used some ribald expressions. " What have I to do with you ? I neither THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG 2g know nor desire to know anything. Go and complain to my father : he will see to your rights — " They were approaching the Skipper's square near the fountain in the middle alley. A crowd had gathered there. They soon attracted attention and many an ear tried to catch their conversation. Avramoff had paled, he seemed to have shrunk and grown shorter, and eyed Alexis with a furtive look, the look of a child frightened in his sleep, who at any moment might be taken by a fit of convulsions. Alexis felt sorry for him. " Don't fear, Avramoff ! " he said with a kind, bright smile, which recalled not his father's, but the smile of his grandfather Alexis. " Never fear — I won't denounce you, I know you love me — and my father. Only don't talk such a lot of trash again ! " And with a sudden shadow over- casting his countenance, he added in a lower tone : " Even if you should be right, what is the good of it ; who wants truth nowadays ? The lash cannot vie with the axe ; no- body will hsten to you, nor to me." Between the trees flashed the first lights of the illumina- tions : many-coloured lanterns, firepots, pyramids of tallow candles placed in the windows and between the carved pillars of the open roofed gallery overlooking the Neva. Everything had been very ingeniously and plenti- fully decorated. The gallery consisted of three long narrow pavilions, in the centre of which, under a glass dome, specially constructed by the Fench architect Leblond, a place of honour had been prepared — a marble pedestal for the Venus of Petersburg. CHAPTER III " T HAVE purchased a Venus," wrote Beklemisheff X to Peter from Italy. " She is highly prized in Rome. The statue differs in no wise from the celebrated Florentine Venus, and is even in better preservation. She was found by some workmen, who discovered her when digging the foundation for a new house ; she had been over two thousand years in the ground. She has for a long time stood in the Papal Garden. I have had to con- ceal her for fear of eager purchasers. I am as yet uncertain whether they will let her go. However, she already belongs to your Majesty," Peter entered into communication with Clement XI. through his plenipotentiary Savva Ragousinsky and the Cardinal Ottobani, seeking permission to remove the statue to Russia. For a long time the Pope would not agree to this. The Tsar was even ready to carry the Venus off by stealth. At last, after many diplomatic negotiations and wirepullings, the permission was obtained. " Captain," wrote Peter to Jagoushinski, " the superb statue of Venus must be taken from Leghorn to Innsbruck by land, and thence by water along the Danube to Vienna, under the care of a special guard. And have her addressed to yourself in Vienna, As the statue is of repute there also, it would be advisable to have a carriage stand made with springs on which she may be conveyed to Cracow, and thus avoid all risk of damage, from Cracow she might be sent on by water." Along seas and rivers, over hills and dales, through towns and deserts, and finally across the miserable settlements, dark forests and bogs of Russia, everywhere carefully THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG 31 watched, by Peter's will, now rocked on the sea waves, now on carriage-springs in her dark box, as in a cradle or cofhn, the goddess journeyed from the Eternal City to the newly- born town of Petersburg. When she had safely arrived, the Tsar, much as he would have liked a look at the statue, which he had been expecting for so long, and about which he had heard so much, nevertheless overcame his impatience and resolved not to open the box until the first solemn appearance of Venus at the festival in the Summer Garden. Small boats, wherries-, canoes, punts, and other new-fashioned river- craft came to the wooden steps which led straight down to the water, and moored at the iron rings of the poles which had been driven in close to the shore. The newly arrived guests came up the steps to the Central Pavilion ; here, in the flare of numerous lights, an ever-increasing crowd, sumptuously arrayed, was moving to and fro. The men wore coloured velvet and silk coats, three-cornered hats, swords, stockings and buckled shoes with high heels ; on their heads towered large wigs, arranged in magnificent but unnatural curls — black, fair, and occasionally powdered. The ladies wore large, wide-hooped skirts — robes rondes — after the latest Versailles fashion, with long trains, beauty spots and rouge on their faces, lace, feathers, and pearls in their hair. But in this resplendent throng there could be also seen military uniforms of plain coarse cloth, even the short jackets of sailors and skippers, and the tarry boats and leather caps of Dutch mariners. The crowd separated to allow a strange procession to pass. Strong Royal Grenadiers were bending under the weight of a long, narrow packing-case, very much like a coffin, which they bore on their shoulders. Judged by the size of the coffin, the body was of superhuman height. They placed the case on the ground. The Tsar without any help proceeded to open it, handling the joiners' tools with great rapidity and skill. He was in a hurry, and pulled at the nails with such impatience that he severely scratched one hand. The people thronged round on tiptoe, trying to catch a glimpse over one another's shoulders. The Privy Councillor, Peter Tolstoi, who had lived for 32 PETER AND ALEXIS many j^ears in Italy, a learned man and a poet — he was the first to translate Ovid's Metamorphoses into Russian — was describing to the ladies around him, the ancient ruins of the Venus temple. " On my way to Castello-di-Baia, near Naples (the town had fallen into ruins and its site was overgrown with wood) I saw a shrine dedicated to the goddess Venus. The temple was built in first-rate style, with tall pillars ; the arches were decorated with representations of the pagan gods. I also saw there other shrines dedicated to Diana, Mercury, and Bacchus. The cursed tormentor Nero had sacrificed to them in those places, and he is now atoning in hell for his inordinate devotions." Peter Tolstoi opened his mother-of-pearl snuff-box — on its lid was represented three lambs, and a sheoherd loosening the girdle of a sleeping shepherdess — offered the snufi-box to the pretty Princess Tsherkassky, took a pinch himself, and added with a languid sigh : " During my stay in Naples (I remember it so well !), I was inamorato with a certain cittadina Francesca, cele- brated for her beaut3^ She cost me over 4.000 roubles ; and to this day I cannot free my heart from that tender recollec- tion." He spoke Italian so well that he liked interspersing his native speech with Italian words : " inamorato " for in love ; " cittadina " for citizen's wife, and so on. Tolstoi was seventy, yet did not look more than fifty, so strong, alert and fresh was he. The Tsar had often expressed the opinion that Tolstoi's politeness towards ladies "could outdo that of any younger devotee of Venus." A feline suppleness of gait, a low velvety voice, velvety amiable smile, velvety eyebrows, amazingly thick, black and possibly painted : " He is all velvet, yet not without spikes," people used to say of him. Even Peter himself, as a rule so careless with regard to his " eaglets," thought it wise " to keep a stone close at hand when dealing with Tolstoi." There was many a dark, wicked, and even bloody stain on the conscience of this polite worthy, but he knew the secret of effacing all traces of his misdoings. The last nails gave way, the wood cracked, the lid was lifted, and the case opened. At first something of a greyish THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG 33 yellow tint struck the eyes, something which suggested the dust of putrefied bones. These were pine shavings, chips, felt, and combings of wool which had been put there for soft packing. Peter with both hands was routing among them, and when at last he came to the marble body, he joyfully exclaimed : " Here she is ! " The lead was already being melted for the soldering of the iron tie-rods which were to fix the foot of the statue to the pedestal. The architect Leblond busied himself in getting ready a kind of hoist with steps, ropes, and pulleys. But the statue had first to be raised by hand out of the case. The servants were assisting Peter. When one of them clasped " the naked wench " in coarse joke, the Tsar rewarded him with such a ringing buffet on the ears, that every one present at once felt a certain respect for the goddess. Flakes of wool were falling off the smooth marble, like grey clods of earth, while again, just as two hundred years ago in Florence, the risen goddess was emerging from her tomb. The ropes tightened, the pulleys squeaked, she rose higher and higher. Peter stood on a ladder, and fixing the statue to the pedestal, he held her with both anns, as in an embrace. " Venus in the embrace of Mars ! " Leblond, the emotional lover of classics, could not help ejaculating. " How beautiful they both are ! " exclaimed a young maid of honour belonging to the Crown Princess Charlotte's household. " Were I the Tsaritza, I should be jealous." Peter was almost as tall as the statue, and his human face remained noble in the presence of this divine one : the man was worthy of the goddess. A last tremor, a last vibration, and she stood immovably upright and firm on the pedestal. It was the work of Praxiteles : Aphrodite Anadyomene, the Foam-born, and Urania the Heavenly, the ancient Phoenician Astarte, the Babylonian Mellita, the Mother of Life, the great foster mother, she who had scattered the seed of stars over the blue vault, and shed the Milky-way from her breast. 34 PETER AND ALEXIS She was the same now, as on the hillside in Florence where Leonardo da Vinci's pupil had looked at her with superstitious fear ; or, yet earlier, when in the depths of Cappadocia, in the forsaken temple near the old castle of IMacellum, her last true worshipper had praj^ed to her, that pale boy in monk's attire, the future Emperor Julian the Apostate. She had remained the same inno- cent yet voluptuous goddess, naked and not ashamed. From that very day when she rose from her millenial tomb far away in Florence, she had progressed further and further, from age to age, from people to people, halting nowhere, till in her victorious march she had at last reached the limits of the earth, the Hyperborean Scythia, beyond which there remains nought but chaos and darkness. And having fixed herself on the pedestal she for the first time glanced with a look of surprised curiosity around this strange new land, these flat moss-covered bogs, this curious town, so like the settlements of nomads ; at this sky, which was the same day and night, these black, drowsy, terrible waves so like the waves of the Styx. This land resem- bled but little her radiant Olympian home ; it seemed as hopeless as the land of Oblivion, the dark Hades. Yet the goddess smiled as the sun would have smiled had he penetrated into Hades. Peter Tolstoi, yielding to the entreaties of the ladies, declaimed some verses dedicated to Cupid, taken from Anacreon's ancient hymn to Eros. Cupid once upon a bed Of roses laid his weary head ; Luckless archer, not to see Within the leaves a slumbering bee ! The bee awak'd — with anger wild The bee awak'd, and stung the child. Loud and piteous are his cries ; To Venus quick he runs, he flies ! "Oh, mother! — I am wounded though — I die with pain — in sooth I do Stung by some little angry thing. Some serpent on a tiny wing — A bee it was — for once I know I heard a rustic call it so." Thus he ipoke, and she the while Heard him with a soothing smile ; THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG 35 Then said, " My infant, if so much Thou feel the little wild bee's touch, How must the heart, ah Cupid ! be. The hapless heart that's stung by thee ! " The ladies, who had never heard any poetry except sacred chants and psalms, were charmed. It came very appropriately, for the next moment Peter himself, as the signal to begin the fireworks, ht and started a flying machine in the shape of Cupid bearing a burning torch. Along an invisible wire Cupid glided down from the gallery to a raft on the Neva, where screens had been erected for " fire diversions " in wicker work designs, and with his torch he set the first allegory on fire — two flaring red hearts on an altar of dazzhng light. On one of them was traced in green light a Latin P, on the other a C — Petnis, Caterina. The two hearts merged into one, the inscription appeared : " Out of two I create one." Venus and Cupid blessed the wedlock of Peter and Catherine. Another configuration appeared, a transparent luminous picture with two designs ; on the one side the god Neptune looking towards Cronstadt, the newly erected fortress in the sea, with the inscription " Videt et stupescit — He sees and is amazed." On the other — Petersburg, the new town amidst marshes and woods, with the inscription " Urbs ubi sylva fuit." Peter, a great lover of fireworks, managing everything himself, explained the allegories to the audience. With pealing hiss, in sheaves of fire, numerous rockets soared into the heavens, and there, in the vaulted dark- ness, dissolved into a rain of slowly dropping and fading red, blue, green and violet stars. The Neva reflected and multiplied them in her black mirror. Fiery wheels were set turning ; fiery jets sprang forth ; serpents began to hiss and twirl ; water and air balls, bursting like bombs, crashed with a deafening noise. A fiery hall appeared with blazing pillars, flaming arches and staircases, and in its centre, dazzling as the sun, shone forth the last tableau : a sculptor — was it the Titan Prometheus ? — standing before an unfinished statue, which he is hewing with chisel and hammer out of a block of marble. Above on a pedi- ment was the All-seeing Eye in a glory, with the inscription. 36 PETER AND ALEXIS " Deo adjuvante." The stone block represented ancient Russia. The statue, although unfinished, already bore the semblance of the goddess Venus — she was the new Russia. The sculptor was, in fact, Peter himself. This tableau did not quite succeed : the statue burnt down too quickly and crumbled at the sculptor's feet. He seemed to beat the air; then the hammer too crumbled away, and the hand remained still. The All-seeing Eye grew dim ; it leered suspiciously and gave an ominous wink. No one, however, paid any attention to this ; all were occupied by a new spectacle. In clouds of smoke, illumined by a rainbow of Bengal lights, there appeared a huge mon- ster, neither horse nor dragon ; with pointed wings and fins, and its tail covered with scales, it came swimming along the Neva from the fortress towards the Summer Garden, towed by a flotilla of rowing boats. In a gigantic shell on the monster's back, sat Neptune, with a long white beard and a harpoon at his feet — sirens and tritons blowing trumpets : " The tritons of the Northern Neptune sound the fame of Russia's Tsar wherever they go," explained one of the onlookers, the chaplain of the fleet, Gabriel Boushin- sk3^ The monster was dragging after it six pair of empty barrels tightly bunged, with the cardinals of the " most Foolish Conclave " sitting astride, one on each barrel, securely strapped so cis to prevent their falling into the water ; they swam in this procession, pair after pair, loudly blowing their cow horns. After this followed a raft made up entirely of such barrels ; it carried a huge tub filled with beer on which the Kniaz-Pope, prelate of Bacchus, floated in a wooden ladle as in a boat ; Bacchus himself sat on the edge of the tub. Accompanied by strains of solemn music, this huge water machine slowly approached the Summer Garden, stopped at the Central Pavilion, where the gods landed. Neptune turned out to be the Tsar's court jester, the old boyar Tourgenev ; the sirens, with their long fish-tails dragging after them, like long trains, almost concealing their feet, were serf girls ; the tritons, the stable-men of the Admiral Apraksin ; the Satyr or Pan accompanying Bac- chus was the French dancing master of Prince Mcnshikoff ; THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG zi the adroit Frenchman executed such gambols, that one could believe he had goat's legs like a real faun. In Bacchus, wearing a tiger's skin and a wreath of artificial grapes, with a sausage in one hand and a brandy bottle in the other, they recognised Konon Karpoff, the leader of the court choristers ; he was exceptionally fat and had a ruddy face ; to make him appear more real, he had for three whole days been pitilessly filled with brandy, so that, according to his companions, " he had grown like a ripe cranberry," and thus become a veritable Bacchus. The gods surrounded the statue of Venus. Bacchus, reverently supported by the cardinals and the mock-Pope, fell on his knees before the statue, bowed before her very low, and proclaimed in a thunderous bass voice, worthy of a cathedral precentor : " Most honourable mother Venus, thy humble serv^ant Bacchus, born of Semele, the creator of wine and joy, petitions thee against thy son Eros. Do not allow him, that mad Eros, to hurt us thy people, to ruin our souls, to wound our hearts ; may it please thee. Gracious Queen, to be merciful unto us." The cardinals responded with " Amen." Drunk as he was, by force of habit Karpoff was just going to start a church hymn in response, but was checked in time.. Then the Kniaz-Pope, the Tsar's aged tutor, a boyar and table-companion in Tsar Alexis' time, Nikita Zotoff, in a burlesque mantle of red velvet trimmed with ermine, on his head a threefold tiara crowned with the indecent figure of a naked Eros, placed before the statue, on a brazier made of kitchen turnspits, a round brass pan, such as was com- monly used for preparing hot punch. Pouring some brandy into it, he lit it. On long poles, bending with the weight, the Tsar's grenadiers brought in a tub of peppered brandy. Besides the clergy, who were present at this festival, as at all similar burlesques, all the guests, both cavaliers and dames and even young girls, were obliged to approach the tub one by one ; they had to accept a large wooden spoonful of brand}', were expected to all but empty it, and pour the few remaining drops on the altar fire. Then the cavaliers kissed ^'enus ; the older ones her foot, the younger ones her hand, while the ladies greeted her with ceremonious courtesy. The ceremonies, every detail of which had been 38 PETER AND ALEXIS thought out and arranged for by the Tsar, had to be punctiHously gone through under pain of severe punish- ment, even lashing. The old Tsaritsa Proscovy, Peter's sister-in-law, his brother John's widow, also drank brandy from the tub and curtsied before Venus. She, as a rule, tried to please Peter and yielded to all his new-fangled ideas ; it was of no use trying to sail against the wind. Yet when the dignified old dame, dressed in her dark widow's jerkin — Peter allowed her to wear the old style of dress — made the curtesy after the foreign manner before " the shameless naked wench," she felt very uneasy at heart. " I would rather be dead than see all this ! " thought she. The Tsarevitch also humbly kissed the hand of Venus. Avramoff tried to hide himself, but he was soon found out and brought back by force ; although he quaked, and paled, and shuddered, and sweated, and almost swooned, when, kissing Satan's image, he felt his lips touch the cold marble, yet he accurately performed the ceremony, watched by the keen eye of the Tsar whom he feared even more than the " white devils." The goddess seemed to look down upon these desecra- tions of the gods, this play of the barbarians, without the least wrath. They adored her involuntarily, even in this scoffing ; the burlesque tripod became a real altar on which in the flickering bluish flame, thin as the serpent's sting, burnt the soul of Dionysus, her brother god. And illu- mined by this flame the goddess smiled her subtle smile. The banquet began. At the top end of the table, under a canopy made of hop foliage and whortleberries, which grew on the hillocks of the native marshes and took the place of the classic myrtle, sat Bacchus astride a barrel from which the Kniaz-Pope filled the glasses with wine. Tolstoi, addressing himself to Bacchus, declaimed another poem by Anacreon. When Bacchus, Jove's immortal boy, The rosy harbinger of joy. Who, with the sunshine of the bowl. Thaws the winter of our soul ; When to my inmost core he glides, And bathes it with his ruby tides, A flow of joy, a lively heat. Fires my brain, and wings my feet ! THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG 39 'Tis surely something sweet, I think, Nay, something heavenly sweet, to drink ! Sing, sing of love, let music's breath Softly beguile our rapturous death. While, my young Venus, thou and I To the voluptuous cadence die ! Then waking from our languid trance, Again we'll sport, again we'll dance. " It's plain from the verses," remarked Peter, " that Anacreon was a lordly drunkard and took life mighty easily." After the customary toasts for the welfare of the fleet, the Tsar and the Tsaritsa, the Archimandrite Theodosius Janov- ski stood up with solemn air, glass in hand. Notwithstanding the Polish expression of self-esteem on his face — he belonged to the minor Polish nobility — notwithstanding the blue decoration ribbon, and the diamond panagia with the Emperor's likeness on one side and the crucifix on the other, with the diamonds more in number and larger on the fonner than the latter, notwithstanding all this, Theodosius, to quote Avramoff's account, " had the appear- ance of some monstrosity," of a starvehng or an abor- tion. He was small, thin and angular ; in his tall mitre with its long folds of black crepe, his very wide pall with wide open sleeves, he greatly resembled a bat. Yet when he joked and especially when he scoffed at sacred things, which usually happened when he was drunk, his sly eyes would sparkle with such wit, such impudent mirth, that the miserable face of the batlike abortion became almost attractive. " This will not be a flattering oration," said Theodosius, turning to the Tsar," but I speak the truth from my heart : by your Majesty's actions we have been led from the dark- ness of ignorance into the lighted theatre of fame, from death into life, and have even joined the throng of civihsed nations. Monarch ! you have renewed and revived every- thing, and more yet, given new life to your subjects. What was Russia in olden times ? What is she to-day ? Let us consider the houses : old rough huts have been replaced by bright palaces ; withered twigs by blooming gardens. Let us consider the fortifications : here have we things which prior to this we have not even beheld on charts I " 40 PETER AND ALEXIS He went on talking for a long time " about laws, free learning, arts," the fleet, these armed arks, the reformation and the new birth of the Church, " And thou," he exclaimed in conclusion, brandishing his arms in the heat of rhetoric, so that the wide sleeves, like black wings, made him still more like a bat, " And thou, City of Peter ! young in thy supremacy ! How great is the renown of thy founder ! In a place where nobody even as much as dreamt of human habitation, in a short time a city has been erected worthy to hold the monarch's throne ' Urbs ubi sylva fuit.' A city in place of a wood. And who will not praise the position of this city ? The district not only excels in beauty the rest of Russia, but even in other countries the like cannot be found ! On a cheerful site art thou erected ! Verily a metamorphosis, a change in Russia hast thou accomplished, O Majesty ! " Alexis listened, and looked at Theodosius attentively. "When the later mentioned the " cheerful site " their eyes met for an instant, and the Tsarevitch seemed to discern a spark of mockery in the orator's eyes. He remembered how Theodosius had often in his hearing, during his father's absence, reviled this " cheerful site " and termed it a " devil's bog," " a devil's haunt ; " for some time already it seemed to the Tsarevitch that Theodosius was laughing at his father, almost in his very face, only disguised so cleverly and adroitly that no one save he, Alexis, noticed it ; and every time on a similar occasion, Theodosius would exchange quick cunning looks with him, as if he saw in him an accomplice. Peter, according to his custom, replied simply and con- cisely to the ceremonious oration : " I am eager that the people should know how the Lord hath helped us hitherto. Yet we must not slacken our efforts ; but taking up whatever burden God lays before us, work for the good and advantage of the community." And returning to ordinary conversation he gave in Dutch (so that the foreigners present could follow him) an exposition of the thought he had lately heard from the philosopher Leibnitz, and which had greatly struck him, " the rotation of sciences : " all science and art were born in the East and in Greece, thence they travelled to Italy, THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG 41 France, Germany, and lastly through Poland they came into Russia. " Now our turn has come ; from us they will again return to Greece and to the East, their birthp)]ace, completing a perfect circle in their wanderings. This Venus," concluded Peter, lapsing into Russian, with a naive declamatory eloquence, natural to him, " this Venus has come to us from there, from Greece. Our soil has been ploughed with the plough of Mars, and the seed has been scattered. We now await a good return which Thou, O Lord, vouchsafe unto us ! May our harvest come soon and not like that of the date palm, whose fruit is never seen by those who plant it. May Venus the goddess of all that is loveable, domestic felicity, and national concord, ally herself to-day with Mars. May the union be for the glory of Russia." " Vivat, vivat, vivat, Peter the Great, the father of his country, the Emperor of all Russia ! " shouted the guests raising their glasses of Hungarian wine. The Imperial title, announced publicly neither to Europe nor even to Russia, was accepted here in the circle of " Peter's Eaglets." In the left wing of the gallery, the ladies' pavilion, the tables had been pushed aside and dancing begun. The music of war trumpets, hautboys, and kettledrums of the Simeon and Preobrazhensky regiments, coming from behind the trees of the Summer Garden, softened by distance and perhaps by the charm of the goddess, sounded here at her feet, like the delicate flutes and violes d' amour of Cupid's kingdom, where lambs graze on soft meadows and shep- herds loosen the girdles of shepherdesses. Peter Tolstoi, who was dancing in the minuet with Princess Tsherkassky, hummed in his mellow voice to the strains of the music : 'Tis time to cast thy bow away, We all are, Cupid, in thy sway. Thy golden love-awak ng dart Hath reached and wounded every heart. And affectedl}^ curtsying to the cavaUer, as the rule of a minuet demanded, the pretty princess responded with the languid smile of a Chloe to the aged Daphrtis. Meanwhile in the dark alleys, bowers, in all the secluded nooks of the 42 PETER AND ALEXIS Summer Garden, whispers, rustlings, kisses, sighs of love were heard ; the goddess Venus had begun her reign in the Hyperborean Scythia. In an oak grove, apart from the rest, so that none could overhear them, a group of servants and pages, belonging to the Tsar's household, were discussing the love exploits of their friends, the court ladies or maidens, after the manner of true Scythians and Barbarians. In the presence of women they were shy and bashful, but when by themselves they spoke about " women " with brutal shamelessness. " The wench Hamilton spent a night with the master," calmly announced one of them. It was Mary Hamilton, the Tsaritsa's lady in waiting. " The master is gallant, he can't Uve without mis- tresses," remarked another. " It is not her first either," retorted a page, a boy of about fifteen, deliberately spitting and again puffing the pipe which made him sick : " Before the master's time she had a child by Golitsin." " And how do they manage to get rid of the brats ? " the first one queried in amazement. " And the husband does not know what his wife is after ! " giggled the lad. " I saw with my own eyes just now, from behind the shrubs, how Billy Mons made love to our mis- tress ! " Wilhelm ]\Ions was the Tsaritsa's Kammer junker, a foreigner of low origin, yet very adroit and handsome. Huddling closer together, they began to speak about the strange rumour, which said that, quite lately, when cleaning a stopped up pipe of one of the fountains in the royal garden, the body of an infant was found, wrapped in a palace napkin. The Summer Garden possessed the inevitable " grotto," met with in all French gardens ; it was a square edifice on the banks of the river Fontanna, rather awkward from the outside, suggesting a Dutch church, while the inside resem- bled a cave, laid out with large shells, mother of pearl, corals and ])orous stones ; numerous fountains and water jets flowed into marble basins with that abundance of water, too great for the damp city of Petersburg, yet so dear to the heart of Peter. THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG 43 Here staid old men, senators, and dignitaries, were also conversing about love and women. *' In olden days true wedlock was sacred, whereas nowa- days, lust is considered gallantry, even by the husbands themselves, who with a calm heart watch their wives make love to others and call us fools for staking our honour on so weak a spot. They have given women their freedom ; just wait a bit, they will soon master every one of us," grumbled the oldest among them. A younger one remarked that " free intercourse between the sexes is agreeable natural to all men, not fossilised by ancient customs. The real love passion, unknown in bar- barous ages, had begun to possess sensitive hearts ; " that " nowadays marriage boorishly reaps in one day all the flowers love tenderly rears for years ; and jealousy is the pest of love." " Fair women have always been facile," decided a middle-aged man, " but no doubt the devils themselves have set up their abode inside the ribs of the present giddy generation. They will hear of nothing but love-making." " And httle girls, stirred by this example, begin to flirt, and only can't do it, poor things, because they are too inno- cent. Oh ! how the desire to please dominates women ! " Here entered her Majesty Catherine, attended by the Kammerjunker Mons and Mary Hamilton, her lady in wait- ing, a proud Scotchwoman with the face of Diana. The least elderly of the two old men, aware that Catherine was listening to their conversation, began amiably to defend the ladies. " Truth herself proves the dignified nature of womankind by the fact, that God, at the end of His work, on the last day created Adam's wife, as if without her the world were incomplete. Woman's body alone is composed of all that is most charming in the universe. Add to these advantages her beauty of mind, and how can we help wondering at her perfection, and what excuses can be given by him who does not show due deference to her ? Should there be some weakness about v/omen, it is right to remem- ber, how delicately they are made." The oldest of the speakers only shook his head. His face clearly expressed that he was not convinced, that in his opinion " woman was 44 PETER AND ALEXIS as far removed from a human being, as a crab was from a fish ; a woman and the devil make a fine match." In the opening, between the cloven clouds, on the trans- parent melancholy sky bathed in golden-emerald, appeared the narrow sickle of the newborn moon ; it cast a gentle beam into the depths of a dark alley, where near a fountain surrounded by the semicircle of a tall clipped hedge, on a wooden bench, at the foot of a marble Pomona, there sat a solitary girl of seventeen. She wore a wide dress of pink taffeta embroidered with small yellow florets ; she had a slender waist and a fashionable headdress ; yet so Russian and simple was her face, that it was evident she had only recently left a calm country life, where she had grown up surrounded by nurses, under the thatched roof of an old house. Casting a timid look around her, she undid two or three buttons of her frock and swiftly pulled out a roll of paper, hid in her bosom and warm from the contact. It was a love missive from her nineteen year old cousin, who by the Tsar's command had first been torn from the same peaceful spot, sent to Petersburg, then placed in the navy school connected with the admiralty, and a few days ago had been sent on a man-of-war with other gardes-marines, either to Cadiz or Lisbon — to quote his own expression " to the world's end." By the light of the white night and the moon the young girl read the note, written on ruled lines in large round childish characters : " My heart's treasure, my angel Nastia. I would like to know why you did not send me the last kiss. Cupid the thief has wounded my heart with his arrow. I suffer greatly, my heart's blood is frozen." A heart was drawn with blood instead of ink between the lines, the same was pierced by two arrows ; red spots stood for drops of blood. Then followed verses probably copied from somewhere — Remember Joy, our merry talk, Sweet words during every walk. How long is it since last I saw thee ? Come my fair dove, come fly to me. Should my wish be not in vain, Mad with joy I'd be agaia. Having read the love letter, Nastia carefully rolled it up, THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG 45 hid it again in her bosom, hung her head and covered her face with a handkerchief, scented with " Cupid's sighs." When she looked up again, a black cloud resembling a monster with gaping mouth had almost swallowed the narrow moon. His last beam reflected itself in the tear which hung on the young girl's eye-lash. She watched the moon disappearing and hummed to herself the only love-song she knew — how it became known to her no one could say : — Wherever I roam, and wherever I go, My heart it feels heavy, my spirits are low. And I, like a dove without wings, must make moan, For what is in life when my dearest is gone ? Young am I and yet shedding tear after tear For the sweetheart who left me in loneliness here Everything about her was strange and artificial, " after the manner of Versailles," the fountain, Pomona, the espaliers, her dress of pink taffeta strewn with yellow florets, her hair arrangement " Budding pleasure," and the scent " Cupid's sighs." Only she herself with her quiet grief and gentle song had remained simple, Russian, just as she had been under the thatched roof of her father's country house. Close to her, from the dark alleys, bowers and every possible nook of the Summer Garden, there continued to come whispers, rustles, kisses and love-sick sighs. The sound of the minuet, wafted across like shepherds' flutes and violes d'amour from Venus' kingdom, with the languid melody : — 'Tis time to cast thy bow away, Cupid, we all are in thy swav. Thy gol 'en love-awaking dart Has reached and wounded every heart ! In the pavilion, round the Tsar's table the conversation continued. Peter was talking with the monks about the origin of Hellenic Polytheism ; he could not conceive how the ancient Greeks, who had di-^played sufficient knowledge about natural laws and mathematical principles, could at the same time call their soulless idols gods, and believe in them. Here Michael Avramoff could no longer contain himself, 46 PETER AND ALEXIS he mounted his hobby and began to prove that the gods exist, that they are in reahty evil spirits. " You talk about them as if you yourself had seen them," said Peter. " Not I, but others have really seen them, your Majesty, — beheld them with their own eyes," exclaimed Avramoff triumphantly. He took out of his pocket a fat leather pocket book, found in it two old cuttings from the Dutch newspapers and began to read, translating them into Russian : — " We are informed from Spain that a stranger has brought with him to Barcelona a Satyr, a man covered with wool as with bark, and having goat's horns and hoofs. He eats bread and milk, does not speak, but only bleats like a goat. This deformity attracts many visitors." The second : " In Jutland fishermen have caught a siren or mermaid. The monster has a human body with a fish's tail. The skin is pale yellow, the eyes are closed, the hair on the head is black. A membrane connects the fingers just like a goose's foot. The fishermen pulled their net to the shore with great difficulty, breaking it in many places. Then the people made a huge tub, filled it with salt water and put the mer- maid into it ; they did this in the hope of preserving her from putrefying. This is reported on account of the many rumours current concerning maritime wonders, not all trustworthy, but this one may be believed, because the astonishing sea-monster has been caught." — Rotterdam, April 27, 1714." Printed matter was as a rule believed in, especially foreign news, for if foreigners lie, where could truth be found at all ? Many of the people present not only be- lieved in ghosts, nymphs, were-wolfs, water, house, and wood spirits, but had also seen the like with their own eyes. If wood spirits exist, why should not Satyrs also exist, if nymphs exist why should not mermaids with fish tails also ? And why should not other gods, even this very Venus, also have true being ? The company were hushed, silenced ; something strange and terrifying seemed to pass through the air ; all suddenly became conscious of doing something they ought not to do. Lower and lower sank the sky shrouded in black clouds. THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG 47 Brighter and brighter grew the bluish flashes of thunderless hghtning. And these sudden flashes of hght in the dark vault seemed to reflect the bluish flame on the altar which continued to glow at the feet of the statue ; or else in the vault, as in an overturned bowl of a gigantic altar, hid by a bank of clouds, black as charcoals, there glowed the Bac- chantic flames, sallying forth from time to time in the shape of lightning. The fire of the sky and the flame on the altar, responding to one another, seemed to hold converse about some terrible mystery unrevealed to mankind, yet already enacting itself in earth and sky. The Tsarevitch, who was sitting not very far from the statue, gazed intently at her, for the first time after the reading of the newspaper cuttings. The nude white body of the goddess seemed so familiar to him, he was almost sure he had seen it before now, and even more than seen it — these very dimples on the shoulders, this virginal curve of the back appeared to him in his most passionate, secret visions, visions he felt ashamed to confess even to himself. Suddenly he remembered to have seen this same curve, these same dimples on the shoulder of his mistress, the serf girl Afrossinia. He felt dizzy, probably from the wine, the heat, the close atmosphere, and all this monstrous festival, so like a nightmare. He glanced again at the statue, and suddenly the white nude body, in the double light of the red smoky illumination vessels and the bluish flame of the tripod, appeared so real, terrible and enticing to him, that he was obliged to cast down his eyes. Was it indeed possible that the goddess Venus should appear to him also, as she did to Avramoff, in the guise of a were-wolf — the serf girl Afrossinia ? He crossed himself in thought. " Not the Hellenes are to be wondered at, who, ignorant of the Christian law, bowed before lifeless idols," rejoined Theodosius, continuing the conversation internipted by the reading, " but, rather we Christians, who, ignorant of true reverence for icons, worship them as idols ! " This started one of those conversations which Peter specially delighted in, about all sorts of false wonders and signs, the deceitfulness of monks, the possessed, nervous epileptic women, saintly madmen, old wives' tales, and the 48 PETER AND ALEXIS superstition of Russian priests. Again Alexis had to listen to all these oft-repeated oJious tales : about the shift of the Queen of heaven, which the monks had broutjht from Jerusalem, as a gift to Catherine, and which was supposed could neither burn nor rot. When the material was experi- mented on it turned out to be woven of a special fireproof fibre — amianth : about the incorruptible body of the Fin- nish girl von Grot, whose skin " was Uke prepared pigshide and when pressed returned like a ball to its shape" ; and about other false relics made of ivory which Peter had or- dered to be sent in to the Petersburg Kunstkammer as a memento of " superstition now being exterminated b}^ the zeal of the clergy." " Yes, there is much deception in the Russian Church con- cerning miracles," concluded Theodosius, in his tone of plaintive malignity. He mentioned the last false wonder on record. In a small church near Petersburg an image of the Virgin had appeared, which shed tears, prophesying as it were great mishaps, even the final destruction of the new city. Peter, informed of it by Theodosius, went himself to the church, examined the icon, and exposed the deception. This had happened quite recently. The icon had not yet been sent into the Kunstkammer, and it had meanwhile been kept in the Tsar's Summer Palace, a small Dutch house, here in the garden, only at a distance of about two yards from the gallery, on the corner between the Fontanna and the Neva. The Tsar, desirous showing it to his guests, ordered one of his servants to fetch the icon. When the man returned Peter left the table and coming out in front of the statue, where there was more room, he, leaning with his back against the marble pedestal and holding the image in his hand, began to give a careful and elaborate explana- tion of the deceptive mechanism. The guests again thronged round him, crowding, rising on tiptoe, striving to catch a glimpse across one another's shoulders and heads, just as at the beginning of the festival, when the case con- taining the statue was being opened. Theodosius was holding the candle. The icon was an old one. The face was dark, almost black ; only the large sorrowful eyes, swollen as with tears, seemed alive. Alexis had always loved and honoured this THE VENUS OF PETERSBURG 49 image of " God's mother, the Joy of all the sorrowing." Peter removed the silver trimming set v^^ith priceless gems ; it came off easily, having been already loosened during the first examination. He then unscrewed the brass screws, which fastened a small piece of new hmewood to the back of the icon. In its centre was fixed a smaller piece ; it moved easily on a spring, a pressure of the hand was sufficient to work it. Removing both boards Peter pointed to two little cavities hollowed out in the wood just against the eyes of the image. Two tiny sponges soaked with water were placed in them, the water oozed through the almost imperceptible holes bored in the eyes, forming drops which looked like tears. Peter proved it by an experiment ; he moistened the sponges, put them into their cavities, pressed the board and the tears began to ffow. " This is the source of these miraculous tears," said Peter. His face was as calm as if he had just been describ- ing a curious trick of nature, or some unusual object in the Kunstkammer. " Yes, there is much deception," repeated Theodosius with a quiet smile. All were hushed. Somebody moaned in a low voice, probably a drunkard in his sleep. Someone else tittered so curiously and unexpectedly, that everybody turned round almost in terror. Alexis longed to go away. But some strange torpor held him, as in a nightmare, when the legs refuse to carry one or the voice to cry out. In this lethargy he stood and watched Theodosius holding the light, Peter nimbly and adroitly fingering the wood of the image, the tears trickling down the sorrowful face, and over all there towered the white, terrible alluring body of Venus. He looked on, and an anguish like mortal sickness seized his heart and almost choked him. And it seemed to him that this tortuie would never end, — that it always had been, and would be. Suddenly there was a blinding flash of lightning ; as if a fiery abyss had yawned above their heads. And through the glass cupola a burning light, painfully white, whiter than the sun, bathed the marble statue. Almost at the same instant a short, deafening peal of thunder was heard, D 50 PETER AND ALEXIS as though heaven's vault had been cloven and fallen into ruin. A darkness, black and impenetrable, followed the lightning- Suddenly a storm broke out, and moaned, and hissed, and rolled in the darkness ; high wind together with pouring rain and hail ; in the pavilion a general confusion ensued. The piercing shrieks of women were heard — one of them was laughing and crying in hysterics. The terrified people fled, from what, they knew not, knocking, falling and crushing one another. Somebody moaned in despair, " St. Nicho- las ! Holy Mother, have mercy upon us." Peter, letting the icon drop, hurried away in search of Catherine. The flame from the overturned tripod, going out, flared up for the last time like the forked sting of a serpent, in the shape of an azure tongue, lighting up the face of the goddess. It alone had remained calm amid the storm, darkness and terror. Someone stepped on the icon. Alexis, stooping to lift it, heard the wood crack. The image had broken in two. Book II ANTICHRIST CHAPTER I A coffin of pinewood tree Stands ready prepared for me ; Within its narrow wall I'll await the trumpet call. THIS was the song of certain heretics, the raskolniks called — " The Coffin-liers ." " Seven thousand years after the creation of the world," said they, " the second coming of Christ will take place ; and should it not happen we will burn the Gospels themselves ; as for the other books it is not worth beli ving them." And they left their houses, lands, goods, and cattle, and every night went out into the fields and woods, put on clean shirts and sh ouds, laid themselves in coffins hollowed out of tree trunks, and saying mass waited, expecti \g at every moment the trumpet call of the Judgment. Such was their idea of " meeting Christ." Opposite the headland formed by the Neva and the lesser Neva, in the widest part of the river, close to Gagarin's hemp warehouse, among the rafts, barges, and cargo boats, stood the oak-rafts belonging to Tsarevitch Alexis. They had come from Nishigorod to Petersburg for the Admiralty dockyard. On the night of the Venus festival in the Summer Garden an old bourlak was sitting at the rudder of one of these rafts ; though it was summer he still wore a torn sheepskin coat and bast shoes. They called him " foolish John," and he passed for a simpleton. For thirty years, day by day, month by month, year by year, he would sit 61 "^ 52 PETER AND ALEXIS every night till dawn waiting to " meet Christ," always chanting the same song of the coffin-hers. Sitting quite close to the water on the very edge of the raft, bending over and with both hands clasped round his knees, he looked in expectation on the bits of golden-emerald sky which gleamed through the black torn clouds. His fixed eyes looking from under matted grey hair and his im- movable face were filled with terror and hope ; slowly swaying from side to side, he sang in a long drawn melan- choly voice : — A coffin of pinewood tree Stands ready prepared for me ; Within its narrow wall I'll await the trumpet call. When the angels blow, From the graves will go Those who in them lie, To God's throne on high. Two roads are there to take, Beware which choice you make ! One lea Is to heaven fair. One to old Satan's lair! " Ivan ! come to supper ! " they called from the other side of the raft. A fire was burning there on stones which had been put together in imitation of a stove, and over it hung on three sticks an iron kettle boiling fish-soup. Ivan did not heed, but went on singing. The group which sat talking round the fire comprised, beside the boatmen and bourlaks, the aged schismatic Cornelius, who preached of self-burning and was now on his way to the Kershen forests beyond the Volga ; his disciple, a runaway Moscow scholar named Tichon Zapolsky ; Alexis Furlong, a gunner, deserter from Astrachan ; the caulker Ivan Boudloff, a sailor under the Admiralty, also a dese-ter ; the clerk Larion Dokoukin, an old woman Vitalia belonging to the " runners," who to quote her own words " led the life of a bird," always on the move, soaring everywhere, staying nowhere ; her companion Kilikeya the Barefooted, an epileptic woman, who had a " satanic suggestion " in her abdomen ; and many other "people in hiding" who had fled 'o save themselves from the heavy taxation, soldiering, the cat-o'- nine tails, forced labour, tearing of nostrils, beard shaving. ANTICHRIST 53 crossing with two fingers, or some of the other terrors of Antichrist. " I feel sick at heart," said Vitaha, an alert old woman, wearing a dark loose neckerchief who, though wrinkled, was red-cheeked as an autumn apple. " And, I know not why, the days seem so dark ; the sun does not seem to shine as it used to." " The times are sad, the fear of Antichrist is invad- ing the world, hence this sorrow and heaviness," ex- plained Cornelius, a haggard old man with a broad pleasant face, pock-marked and, apparently, mole-eyed. In reality he had piercingly sharp sight ; he wore a " heretic " cape, in shape somewhat monkish, a black under-cassock which had turned brown, and a leather belt with a thong. And whenever he moved, his iron chain, weighing a hundred weight and made of crosses which deeply scored into his flesh, would clang its links together. " I too, father Cor- nelius, begin to see that these are the last days," groaned the woman. " The world's sands are running short; they say the end will come about the middle of the eighth thousand years." " No," retorted the old man with decision, " it won't even last as long as that." " Lord be merciful unto us," sighed one of the company, " God knows His own time ; all we can do is to say — God have mercy upon us." And they all lapsed into silence. Clouds had again covered up the opening of the sky which had become as dark as the Neva. The distant lightning grew brighter and brighter ; with each flash the thin taper pinnacle of the Peter and Paul fortress shone forth like a streak of pale gold, and was reflected in the Neva ; the flat stone battlements which seem3d to be sunken into the banks, and the group of stucco buildings clustering around : mercantile and garrison depots, hemp sheds and magazines, stood out in black relief. In the distance, on the opposite shore, the lights of the Summer Garden glittered through the trees. As a last breath of the late Northern spring a smell of pine, birch, and aspen was wafted across from the Lake of Keivousary. The small group of people on the flat and scarcely visible raft, lit up by a red fire, between the black 54 PETER AND ALEXIS thunder clouds and the dark surface of the river seemed lonely and forsaken, as if hanging in the air midway between two skies and two abysses. When all had stopped talking such silence ensued, that only the monotonous rippling of the stream under the logs was audible, while from the other end of the raft came along the water the same old melancholy song : — A coffin of pinewood tree Stands ready prepared for me ; Within its narrow wall I'll await the trumpet call. " Friends, is it true," began Kilikeya, a young woman with a delicately transparent, almost waxen face, and feet terri- ble to look at, being black as the roots of an old tree (she always went about barefoot even in the keenest frost), " is it true what I heard to-day in the market, that there is no Tsar in Russia ; that the present Tsar is not the right one, neither a Russian nor of royal blood, but either a foreigner or foreigner's son, or a Swedish changeling ? " " Neither Swede nor foreigner, but a damned Jew of the tribe of Dan," declared Cornelius. " O Lord, Lord," again somebody sighed heavily, " see how the royal race has degenerated ! " They began to discuss who Peter was : whether a Swede, a foreigner, or Jew. " The devil knows who he is. Whether a witch has hatched or the damp bred him, one thing is certain : he is a were- wolf," declared the sailor, a young man of about thirty years old, with a wide-awake, intelligent expression on his face, once probably handsome, now disfigured by the branded forehead and torn nostrils. " Ay ! My friends, I know, I know positively every- thing concerning the Tsar," replied Vitalia ; " I learnt from an old wandering beggar woman, and the choristers of the Ascension told me just the same. When our Tsar, the pious Peter, was abroad visiting foreign countries he came across the Glass Kingdom ; this Glass Kingdom is ruled by a maiden, who, making sport of him forced him to sit on a red hot tin, and then, having shut him up in a barrel with nails, cast him into the sea." ANTICHRIST 55 " No, not in a barrel, but he was laid in a trunk," some one corrected. " Well, it does not matter whether it was a barrel or a trunk, but the fact remains that he has been lost ever since, neither seen nor heard of. And in his stead the sea vomited up a Jew of the tribe of Dan, born of an ill-conditioned wench, and nobody knew him. And on his coming to Moscow he began to do as a Jew would ; he declined the Patriarch's blessing, would not go to the holy relics in Moscow, aware that the holy place would refuse his approach. Neither did he do honour to the tombs of former pious Tsars, for the simple reason that they were strangers to him and hateful in consequence. He saw no one of the royal family, neither the Tsaritsa nor the Tsarevitch nor the Tsarevenas, fearing they would detect him and say : " You don't belong to us, you are not the Tsar, but a cursed Jew." He did not show himself to the people on New Year's Day, fearing detection, just as Gregory had been detected by the people ; he does not keep fast days nor go to church, nor does he wash in the bath-house on Saturdays, but lives dissolutely in a house with the foreigners. Nowadays a foreigner is an important personage in Muscovy ; the sorriest foreigner stands higher than a boyar, higher even than the Patriarch himself. He himself, the cursed Jew, publicly dances with foreign courtesans ; drinks wine not to the glory of God, but in an indecent ugly way, like a common toper, reeling on the ground and using bad language when drunk. For the amusement of foreigners, or, more likely, for the outraging of all Christian customs, he pub- licly calls his drink-companions by holy names, one, the most holy Patriarch, others again. Bishop and Arch- bishop, himself Archdeacon, thus defiling sacred names by applying them to shameful things." " The abomination of desolation, predicted by Daniel, has come to pass," concluded Cornelius. Other voices from the crowd chimed in : " And the Tsaritsa Eudoxia, who is shut up in the Sousdal nunnery, tells "us : " Have patience, keep to the Christian faith, this is not my Tsar — he is a stranger." " He is trying his best to make the Tsarevitch imitate him, but he can't succeed ; and that is why the Tsar 56 PETER AND ALEXIS wants to rid himself of him, and prevent his coming to the throne." " O Lord, Lord ! what a trouble God has sent — the father rises against the son, the son against his father." " What father is he to him ! The Tsarevitch himself says this man is neither father nor Tsar to me." " The Tsar loves the foreigners ; the Tsarevitch does not love foreigners : ' Give me time,' says he, ' and I will soon get rid of them.' A foreigner once came to him and began to talk in an unknown language. The Tsarevitch burnt his clothes and scorched him ; the foreigner complained to the Tsar ; ' Why do you go to him ? ' was the answer, 'while I live you will be unhurt.' " " This is so ! they all say when our Tsarevitch comes to the throne then the Tsar and his company will have to do their best to save themselves." " Truly, truly, it is so," affirmed several voices cheerfully, " the Tsarevitch dearly loves the ancient ways." " A righteous man ! " " Russia's Hope ! " " Many old women's tales pass current among our folk nowadays ; they cannot all be believed or trusted," began Ivan Boudloff, and at once his calm matter of fact words riveted the attention of the whole group. " But I must say, be he Swede or foreigner or Jew — the devil knows best — one thing is certain, ever since God sent him to rule over us we have seen no happy days ; life has become hard ; there is no peace. Take us mariners and soldiers. It is fifteen years since we began fighting the Swede, we have not disgraced ourselves anywhere, but have shed our blood freely ; and yet to this day we see no peace. Summer and autumn we are sent to roam on The seas, the winter is spent among rocks, we are dying of sheer hunger. And the country is ruined to such an extent that in some places not even a sheep remains to the peasant. They say : ' A clever head, a clever head.' If he were clever, he would be able to understand his people's needs. Where does he show his cleverness ? He gave us a proof in his civic laws, the institution of the Senate. Yet what good comes of it ? Not only more wages are wanted ; but ask the people with law-suits if any one of them has been ANTICHRIST 57 promptly attended to Ah ! what is the use of talking ? The whole nation is outraged. He so arranges matters as to drag the last bit of Christianity from our souls, the last bit of life from our bodies. How is it that God tolerates so much cruelty ? But this is not happening in vain ; a change will come, sooner or later, the blood will come over them." Suddenly one of the audience who had remained silent all this while, a woman named Elena with a simple, kind face, started defending the Tsar. " We don't know how to express it," she said, in a low voice, as if to herself, " but we continually pray — O Lord, bring the Tsar back to our Christian faith ! " Her timid attempt was silenced however, by indignant voices crying : — " He is no Tsar ! only a mock-Tsar ; he has squandered himself, goes about as if beside himself." " He has become quite a Jew, he can no longer live with- out a sip of blood from time to time. The day he drinks blood, that day he is content and merry, but the day he gets none he can neither eat nor drink." " Glutton ! he will have eaten everybody soon, for him- self there is no extermination." " May the earth engulph him ! " " Fools ! Curs ! " interposed with fury the gunner Alexis Furlong, a red-haired man of huge height, with a face now suggesting a beast, now a child, " fools, for not knowing how to defend yourselves ! All of you are doomed soul and body ; you will be mashed up like worms in a cabbage. As for me nothing would please me better than to cut him up into little bits.' Elena weakly sighed and made the sign of the cross ; these words, she confessed afterwards, made her feel hot all over. The others looked with terror at Alexis, while he, fixing his blood-shot eyes on one spot, and clenching his fist, added slowly as if lost in thought, — and there was something yet more terrible in this measured tone than in his fury : — " I am surprised that no one has finished him off before now. He is always about alone. There are plenty of chances to cut him up half a dozen times over." 58 PETER AND ALEXIS Elena grew pale, she wanted to say something, but her moving lips could not articulate a sound. " Thrice have there been attempts to kill the Tsar," said Cornelius, " but every time has failed : evil spirits attend and protect him." A fair, puny soldier, with an idiotic, haggard, sickly face, quite a boy, a deserter named Petka Jisla, began to talk hurriedly, stuttering and sobbing like an infant. He told them that three ships had brought branding-irons from abroad to brand people with. Strict watch was kept over them, nobody was allowed near ; sentinels being stationed by them on the Cotline island. These were the new recruit marks introduced by Peter, about which the Tsar wrote in 17 12 to the general pleni- potentiary Prince James Dolgoruki : — " to mark recruits, prick a cross with the needle on the left hand and rub in powder." " The marked men receive bread, those who have no marks go without, no matter if they starve. Ah ! brethren, brethren, it is a sorry business." " Famine will bring us all unto the son of perdition to worship him," affirmed Cornelius. " Some have been already marked," continued Petka, " I among them, lost man that I am." With evident difficulty he lifted with his right hand the left which hung powerless at his side, brought it to the light, and showed the recruiting mark, stamped with the government stamp. " When stamped, the hand at once began to wither, first the left only, now the right has began ; try as I may to raise and bless myself with it, I cannot." His companions looked terror-stricken at the dark spot, which seemed like a number of pock marks on the pale yellow, withered, lifeless hand. This was the human brand, the black cross of the crown. " That is it, quite right," declared Cornelius, " the sign of Antichrist. It is written : ' he will mark them on the hand, he, who receives this mark, will lose the power to bless himself with the sign of the cross ; yet his hand will be paralyzed not by chains, but by an oath, and no repent- ance shall be granted unto such.' " ANTICHRIST 59 " Brethren ! brethren ! what have they done unto me ? Had I but known in time they should never have had me ahve. They have spoilt a human body ; marked a man like cattle." Petka sobbed convulsively, and large tears rolled down his childish pathetic face. " Friends," ejaculated Kilikaya, as if struck by a sudden thought, " all this seems to point to one fact, that our Tsar Peter is himself the " She did not finish, the terrible word seemed to die on her lips. " And what did you think ? " Cornelius looked at her with his little sharp piercing eyes. "He is that very one Himself." " No, never fear, the veritable one has not yet appeared. He might be his forerunner," tried to put in Dokoukin. But Cornelius stood up, the chain of iron crosses clanking ; he lifted his hand, raised his two fingers in the " schismatic " way, and triumphantly announced : — " Listen ye Orthodox, this is He who reigns, who has had dominion over you since the year 1666, the year of the Beast. In the beginning, the Tsar Alexis together with the Patriarch Nikon renounced the faith, and in so doing became the forerunner of the Beast. Now following in their footsteps Tsar Peter has finally uprooted all piety ; he has annihilated the Patriarchate ; claimed the Church and divine power, and, against our Lord Jesus Christ, has declared himself supreme head of the Church, the absolute pastor. And vieing with the supremacy of Christ, about whom it is written : — ' I am the first and the last,' he called himself Peter the First. In the year 1700, on the first day of January, the new year's day of the ancient Roman god Janus, at a firework entertainment he pro- claimed on a screen — ' My time has now come.' And he assumed unto himself the name of Christ, in the hymn sung at church in memory of the Poltava victory over the Swedes. And on his return to Moscow, he had young children in white robes placed on triumphal arches and taking part in the procession, to glorify him and sing, " Blessed is he who cometh in the name of the Lord, Hosanna in the highest. Lord God appear to us ! " — as by God's will, the Jewish children had praised our Lord Jesus Christ on 6o PETER AND ALEXIS his entry into Jerusalem. Thus by his title he had elevated himself above every Name of God. For it has been said : under the name of Simon Peter there will appear in Rome the proud prince of this world, Antichrist, and in Russia, which is the third Rome, that Peter has appeared who is the son of darkness, the blasphemer and enemy of God, that is Antichrist. And as it is written : in all things will the false prophet strive to resemble the Son of God, so also does the aforesaid Peter, glorifying himself, say : ' I am a father to the fatherless, a shelter for the wandering, a helper to those in trouble, a defence to the oppressed ' ; he has built hospitals for the sick and the aged ; schools for the young ; the simple and ignorant Russian people he has in a short time made shrewd and clever, and in all knowledge equal to other European nations. He has ex- panded the Empire, he has reinstated what was stolen, restored what had fallen to ruins, glorified what had been humbled, renewed the old ; he has roused those sleeping in ignorance ; and has created what was not. ' I am gra- cious, meek, and merciful. Come unto me, and worship me, the living and Almighty God, for I am God, there is none other God but me.' Thus the Beast feigns goodness ; he about whom it is written, ' That Beast is terrible and is like unto none.' Thus a cruel wolf, masked under a sheep-skin, will one day spring forth and swallow everyone. Listen then, ye Orthodox, to the word of the prophet : Go, go forth, go forth from Babylon, oh ! my people and save yourselves, for there is no salvation in cities for the living ; flee, persecuted faithful ones, who have no present abode, but are seeking the Coming. Flee into the woods, the deserts, hide your heads under the earth, in hills and caverns, in the earth's abysses ; for brethren you yourselves see, that we have reached the utmost evil. Antichrist himself has come, and with him the world is ending. Amen." He finished. A blinding flash of lightning suddenly lit up the man from head to foot, and to those who were looking at him, the small man seemed almost a giant in this glare, and the roll of the dull, as if subterranean thunder, seemed to be the echo of his words, which had filled heaven and earth. He finished, and all around him remained silent. Again ANTICHRIST 6i was heard the dreamy ripple of the stream under the logs, and the languid melancholy song of Ivan wafted across from the other end of the raft : — Ye hoUowe 1 oak trunks, ye will prove Fit hoase for us who on earth did move. Night approacheth, endeth day. And Death his scythe doth lay To the root of all tuat live. . . . The song made the silence only more intense, more awful- Suddenly, with a rumbling and a hiss, up soared a rocket, dissolving in the dark vault into a rain of irridescent stars. The Neva reflecting them doubled their number in her black mirror. Fireworks flared, screens with transparent pictures were lit, fiery wheels began to whirl, fountains of fire surged forth, and halls appeared, resembling a temple of white sunlike flame. And from the ^ avilion over- looking the Neva, where the Goddess already stood, along the smooth surface of the waters, came the cry of the revellers — " Vivat ! Vivat ! Vivat ! Peter the Great ! Father of his country ! Emperor of all the Russians ! " and music rang forth in the air. " This, brethren, is the last of the signs," exclaimed Cornelius, pointing with his outstretched arm to the rocket. " As St. Hippolitus testifies : ' Antichrist will be glorified, praised by sundry songs and many voices and loud crying. And a light greater than all lights will surround him, the master of darkness. Night will be changed into day, and day into night ; the sun and the moon will become red as blood, and he will take the fire away from the heavens." In the centre of the luminous hall appeared the statue of Peter the Sculptor of Russia, in the image of the Titan Prometheus. " And all will fall down before him," concluded Cornelius, " and exclaim ' Vivat ! Vivat ! Vivat ! who is like unto the Beast ? who is able to make war with him ; he has brought us fire from the heavens ! ' " Nearly all on the raft watched the fireworks terror- stricken. And when, shrouded in clouds of smoke, illu- mined by many coloured bengal-lights, there appeared the sea monster, with prickly fins and wings and tail covered with scales, floating along the Neva from the fortress 62 PETER AND ALEXIS towards the Summer Garden, they deemed this to be the Beast, coming up out of the depths, as predicted in the book of Revelation. Every moment they expected to see Antichrist coming towards them on the water, or flying through the air on wings of fire, amidst thunder and hght- ning, and armies of evil spirits with him. " Friends, friends," sobbed Petka, trembling like a leaf, and his teeth chattering, " I feel frightened ; we speak about him, but is he himself not somewhere close by ? See how we are all troubled ! " " I don't know where you get all this old woman's fear. Ram a pike down his throat, and that'll finish him," boast- ingly began Furlong ; but he too grew pale, and began to quake when Kilikeya, who was sitting next to him, suddenly called out in a piercing voice, fell on the ground, twisting her body in convulsions, and began to shriek. Kilikeya had been injured in her childhood. Once, so she herself was wont to relate, her stepmother had poured out some soup in a wooden bowl, and passed it to her to eat — reviling her at the same time, saying, " there, sup it up, the devil be with you," and three weeks later she fell ill, and it seemed to her that something had begun to growl audibly within her, like a dog, so that everybody could hear it. And really an evil spirit did seem to growl with human and animal voices within her. She had been im- prisoned according to the Tsar's law, concerning such ner- vous women ; she had been questioned, judged, even whipped. She had signed promises, not to call out again under pain of punishment with the lash or of being convicted to life- long labour in the weaving mill. Yet lashes could not cast out demons, and she continued to have fits. Kilikeya moaned : " I feel sick, so sick," and then she would laugh, and cry, and bark like a dog and bleat like a sheep, and croak like a frog, grunt like a pig, and many other animals did she imitate. The watch dog, which lived on the raft, roused by these unwonted sounds came out of its kennel : a hungry, lean cur, with sunken flanks and prominent ribs ; it walked up to the edge of the raft, and paused at the side of Ivan, who continued to chant, neither seeing nor hearing anything around him, and the dog lifting its muzzle into the air. ANTICHRIST 63 its tail between its legs, howled piteously at the fireworks. The howl of the dog and the howl of the sick woman blended into one. They poured water on Kil'keya. Cornelius bending over her, was reciting incantations for the driving out of demons, blowing and spitting on her face, and lashing it with his leather thong. At last she grew calmer, and fell into a heavy swoonlike slumber. The fireworks had died away. The embers of the fire were faintly glowing ; darkness reigned once more. Nothing had happened ; Antichrist had not appeared ; the fear had passed away. Yet the distress they all felt was more terrible than any fear. They sat as before on the low raft, whose black outlines scarcely stood out against the dark water and the black heavens ; their little group, lonely and forlorn, suspended as it were, somewhere in space twixt the two skies. All was quiet, the raft motionless, and yet it seemed to them, they were being precipitated into and were sinking down, engulphed in this gloom, as in some yawning black abyss, the jaws of the Beast itself, the inevitable end of all things. And into this black oppressive darkness, luminous with the blue tremulous heat-lightning, floated from the Summer Garden the music of the minuet, tender as the languid sighs of the kingdom of Venus, where the shepherd Daphnis loosens the girdle of Chloe, 'Tis time to cast thy bow away, Cupid, we all are, in thy sway. Thy golden love-awaking dart Hath reached and wounded every heart ! CHAPTER II ON the Neva, near the rafts of the Tsarevitch, stood a large barge, which had come from Archangel, laden with Holmogorian pottery. Her owner, the rich merchant Pooshnikoff, belonging to the heretics of the sea coast, gave shelter in his barge to deserters of the old faith, who were obliged to be in hiding. The space between the decks and the poop was divided up into little cells. In one of these Elena had found shelter. Elena was a peasant woman, the wife of a foreman in the Moscow Mint, Maxim Yeremeyeff, a secret iconoclast. When the leader of the iconoclasts, the barber Thomas, was burnt, Maxim fled to the southern towns, leaving his wife behind. It was difficult to decide whether she her- self was a heretic or an Orthodox, for she crossed herself with two fingers after the advice of some old man who used to visit her, saying : " thou canst not move God with three fingers," while yet frequenting Orthodox Churches and confessing to Orthodox priests. Notwithstanding the ter- rible rumours about Peter, Elena believed he was the true Russian Tsar and loved him. She prayed that she might be allowed to behold his Majesty, and for this reason she had come to Petersburg. One thought only possessed her : that God might grant the Tsar repentance, bring him back to his father's faith, make him cease from persecuting the people of the old faith, and thus give them, in their turn, a chance of joining the Orthodox church. Elena had com- posed a special prayer for the unification of the church, which she meant to have shown to her confessor, but could not find the courage, as it seemed so badly written. She ANTICHRIST 65 visited monasteries, she engaged an old woman for six weeks to read the acathistus for the Tsar at the Ascension church and at another deaicated to the Virgin of Kazan. She herself would kneel two or three thousand timies a day for him. But all this did not seem sufficient for her, and she resolved on a last desperate remedy. She made her nephew Vassia, a lad of fourteen, write out the prayer she had composed for the Tsar and the uniting of the church, sewed a cover for an icon, and putting the prayer in the lining, gave it to a priest in the Church of the Assumption, making no mention of the hidden letter. After the conversation on the raft, Elena returned to her cell on the barge, and when she recalled all she had heard that night about the Tsar, she for the first time asked her- self whether after all it was not true, that God could not be moved for such a Tsar. For a long time she lay motionless in the oppressive darkness of her cabin cell, her eyes wide open, bathed in cold sweat. At last she got up, lit a remnant of a wax church taper and placed it in the corner of the closet before the icon of the Virgin, hung on the wooden partition. It was the same Virgin whom Peter had been exhibiting at the foot of Venus. She knelt, bowed to the ground three hundred times and began to recite with tears and sighs that same forlorn prayer, now sewn into the cover of the icon, at the church of the Assumption. " Hear me, thou Holy Church, with all the hosts of Cheru- bim and Seraphim, with all the companies of prophets, patriarchs, saints and martyrs, the Gospels, and all the sacred words that compose the Gospel, remember ye our Tsar Peter ! Hear me, Holy Apostolic Church, together with all local images and little icons, with all apostolic books and holy lamps, the censers and candles, the sacred coverings and goodly palls, the stone walls and iron slabs, all fruitful trees and flowers ! I implore thee, bea tiful sun, pray thou the Lord for our Tsar Peter, and thou young moon with thy stars ! O sky and thy mists ! O terrible clouds and stormy winds and breezes ! O fowls of the air ! blue sea, great rivers, small brooks and lakes ! pray ye the heavenly King for our Tsar Peter ! Fish of the sea, cattle in the fields, beasts of the wood, meadows, forests, moun- E 66 PETER AND ALEXIS tains all the earth's increase, pray ye the heavenly King for our Tsar Peter ! " * * * * A thin partition separated Elena's closet from a more spacious cell occupied by Cornelius and his disciple Tichon. Not a word did Tichon say during the conversation on the raft, yet he had followed it with greater interest than any one else. When the group had dispersed, Cornelius went ashore to confer with some other heretics about the ap- proaching great self-burning, " the Red Death," of thou- sands of persecuted people belonging to the old faith ; a rite which was to take place in the woods beyond the Volga. Tichon had returned to his floating cell alone, and had gone to bed. Yet like Elena in the adjacent compartment, he could not sleep, but kept thinking over what he had heard that night about the Tsar. He felt that his future hung on these thoughts, that the moment was approaching which, like a sword, would cleave his life in twain. " It seems now as though I were on a knife's edge." he said to himself, " on whichever side I fall, in that direction will I go." Together with thoughts about the future rose memories of the past. Who W£LS this Tichon ? Tichon was the only son, the last offspring of the once noble family of the princes Zapolsky, long since fallen into disgrace and poverty. His mother died at his birth, his father, a leader of the Streltsy, took part in the mutiny against Peter, supporting the Miloslavskis, ancient Russia and the old faith. During the terrible trial of 1698 he was sentenced, tortured in Preobrazhensky torture cham- ber, and then executed on the Red Square in the Kremhn. All his other relatives and friends were also executed or banished. The orphaned Tichon, but eight years old, remained in the charge of his attendant, Yemelian Paho- mitcb. The child was weak and puny, and suffered from fits like one " possessed." He loved his father with passion- ate tenderness. Anxious for the boy's health, Pahomitch kept from him the knowledge of his father's death, by telling Tichon that his father had gone away on business to his distant patrimony in the Saratoff government. But the child cried and pined, and glided like a shadow about the large empty house, his heart foreboding some calamity. ANTICHRIST 67 At last he could bear it no longer. One day, having again vainly sought to learn the truth, he ran out of the house by himself, hoping to reach the Kremlin where an uncle of his lived, and to ask him about his father. The uncle was, however, no longer alive ; he had been executed at the same time as Tichon's father. At the Spasski gate the boy met large carts laden with corpses of the executed Streltsy, thrown together anyhow, half naked. Like slaughtered cattle, fresh from the slaugh- terhouse, they were taken to a common grave, the refuse pit, and there buried together with filth and carrion, by the express order of the Tsar. Beams stuck out from the walls of the Kremlin, on which numerous bodies hung like " Polti," a salt Astrachan fish which is hung in bundles to dry in the sun. The people all day long silently crowded the Red Square, not daring to come near the place of execution, but looking on from afar. Making his way through the crowd, Tichon perceived near the Lobnoye place some long thick logs surrounded by pools of congealed blood. These served for the executioners' blocks. The victims crowding against one another, as many as thirty men at once, would lay their heads on the logs in rows. While the Tsar was drink- ing in a hall with windows overlooking the ' quare, his boyars, fools and favourites were chopping off heads. Once the Tsar, dissatisfied with the way they did their work — the hands of the inexperienced headsmen were trembling — • ordered twenty of the victims to be brought to his ban- queting table, and there slew them with his own hands to the accompaniment of jeers and music. He drank a glass of wine, chopped off a head ; glass after glass, head ^fter head. Wine and blood flowed together. Tichon saw the gallows erected in the shape of a cros? for the mutinous Streltsy priests. The hangman was Nikita Zotoff, the mock patriarch. A great number of wheels with the mutilated bodies still hanging to them ; iron spikes and stakes with half putrefied heads. The Tsar's command forbade their being taken off till they had completely rotted. The air was one awful stench. Crows hovered over the place in large flocks. The boy fixed his eyes on one of the heads. It stood out 68 PETER AND ALEXIS black against the transparent azure of the sky, all strewn with cloudlets of delicate rose and golden hue ; while further off, the domes of the Kremlin churches glowed like living embers. The evening bell rang out in the still air. Suddenly Tichon felt the sky, the domes, the very earth go from under his feet, while he himself was falling into some bottomless abyss : he had recognized his father's face in that head with black sockets for eyes. The drum rolled, a division of the Preobrazhensky regi- ment came round the corner ; it accompanied carts with fresh victims. The condemned sat in white shirts with calm faces, holding lighted tapers in their hands. A tall man on horseback rode in front of them. His face too was calm, yet terrible. This was Peter. Tichon had never seen him before, but he at once recognized him, and it seemed to the child that the dead head of his father with its blank eye-sock ts was looking straight into the Tsar's eyes. The next moment he swooned. The crowd falling back in terror would have crushed the boy, had not an old man noticed him. This man, an old friend of Paho- mitch, a certain Gregory of Tahtsa, hfted him and up carried him home. In the night Tichon had a fit such as he never had before. It was a wonder he survived. This Gregory of Talitsa. a poor unknown scribe, who lived by copying books and manuscripts, was one of the first to prove that Tsar Peter was the Antichrist. This was the charge brought against him at his trial, " that prompted by too great a zeal against Antichrist, and a doubt- ful heretic fear, he began to spread among the people evil words of blame and slander against the Tsar." Having compiled booklets about the " coming of Antichrist," and "the end of the world," he thought of printing and freely distril)uting them among the people, in order to rouse them against the Tsar. Gregory often used to visit Pahomitch and talk with him about the Tsar, the Antichrist, and the last days. The monk Cornelius, who was living in Moscow at that time, took part in these conversations. Young Tichon used to listen to these old men, who, Hke three illboding crows, would collect at dusk in the empty house and caw : " the end of the world is drawing nigh ; hard times, evil years have come ; true faith, the stone wall, the ANTICHRIST 69 strong pillar of Christ, has disappeared — Christianity has perished. Antichrist will come at the comsummation of time ; the whole world will be set on fire and burn sixty ells deep into its crust, because of our great transgres- sions." And then they would relate a vision of " some vile serpent, which creeps and wriggles about, hanging down from the archdeacon's shoulder instead of the holy stole during the service in a Niconian church ; or at night, coil- ing round the walls of the Tsar's dwelling, slips its head inside, and whispers into the Tsar's ear." These melan- choly conversations would pass into still more melancholy songs : Chxist, the heaven's eternal King, Whose glory through the world doth ring. Bids us, his beloved people. In lone deserts, shady caves. Darksome forests, refuge take ; Bury deep ourselves in sand, Strewn with ashes walk the land. Die in hope and never fear, For God's kingdom draweth near ! Tichon listened with special eagerness to tales about the secret settlements, amid dark forests and bogs beyond the Volga, and about the legendary and invisible city — Kitesh on the Lake of Light. The site of the city appeared to be a lonely wood ; yet there were churches, houses, monasteries, and numbers of people. In summer church bells are heard at night ringing on the lake's surface and the clear waters reflect the golden domes of the churches. There the true kingdom on earth is, in peace, quiet and eternal joy ; holy fathers have flourished there, like lilies, cypresses and da^e palms, like pearls and heavenly stars. From their hps unceasing prayer to God rises Hke the breath of sweet-scented thyme and choice incense, and at night their prayer is visible like fiery sparkling pillars, and the Hght is so strong that it is possible to read and write without a candle. God loves and cherishes them as the apple of His eye, and His invisible hand is ever over them. And they shall experience neither sorrow nor affliction from the Beast ; only for us sinners do they grieve da}' and night for our apostasy and Russia's, and 70 PETER AND ALEXIS for the dominion of Antichrist over us. One road only leads to this invisible city. It is narrow, surrounded by all sorts of wonders and terrors, and winds among thickets, through woody dales, and no one can find it, except those whom God Himself leads to this serenely quiet refuge. Listening to the tales, Tichon longed to be in these dark forests and lone deserts. With inexpressibly sweet melan- choly would he repeat after Pahomitch the poem about prince Joseph, the young hermit : — Fair solitude ! my heart's desire. Through forest and mire, Over hill, dale, and peak, Will I wander and seek A place for my hut. Thou emerald vault, Under thee will I roam To full heart's delight. Thy cuckoo's call Shall teach me all, Dry roots will be Eden's food for me. Thy sparkling springs Mine only drink. From earliest childhood Tichon was subject to a strange sensation, quite unlike anything else ; a feeling of almost painful anguish, coupled with a delicious sweetness : it seemed ever new, yet ever familiar, and generally inti- mated the approach of a fit. Terror and surprise mingled with a reminiscence as from some other world, but the prevalent elements were curiosity and expectation, and a desire, that what was about to happen should happen quickly. He never mentioned this to any one, and even if he would, he could not have found words to express it. Later on, when his consciousness and thinking power in- creased, this sensation became tinged with thoughts about the end of the world and the second coming. At times the most sinister croaking of the old men would leave him unmoved, while something unexpected, a colour, a sound, a scent could rouse in him the same feeling with sudden force. His house stood on the slope of the Sparrow hills, beyond the river Moscow. The garden abruptly terminated in a steep cliff. From this spot the whole of ANTICHRIST 71 Moscow could be seen : a mass of black log structures — very much like a village — and towering above them, the white stone walls of the Kremlin and the countless golden domes of churches. Hence, too, the boy would often watch those grand and terrible sunsets, which sometimes occur in a late, stormy autumn. In the clouds, which appeared now hvid blue, purple, black or flaming red, now as it were bloody, he fancied he could discern at one time a giant serpent which had coiled round Moscow, at another a Beast with seven heads with a woman sitting on it, having a cup in her hand full of abominations : now he saw the host of angels pursuing demons, wounding them with arrows of fire and causing streams of blood to flow over the heavens, or again the radiant Zion, the invisible city, which descend- ing out of heaven, was resplendent with the glory of the com- ing Lord. It seemed as though the mystery, destined to be revealed on earth, was already being enacted in the heavens. And the familiar presentiment of the final end of all things entranced the boy. This same presentiment was also roused by everyday occurrences, even by the merest trifles ; by the smell of tobacco ; by the first sight of a Russian book printed in Amsterdam by order of Peter, in the new civil characters ; by the signs over the new shops in the German quarter ; by a special form of wig, which had long, curious locks like Jew's ringlets or dog's ears ; or by the peculiar expression on Russian faces, recently bearded, now clean-shaven. One day, Yeremeich, the beekeeper, an old man of eighty years, who lodged in their garden, was captured by the royal commissioners at the town gate ; they forcibly shaved off his beard and cut short the lappets of his coat according to the regulation measure. The old man returned sobbing like a child, fell ill and shortly died of grief. Tichon loved the old man and was sorry for him, yet when he first caught sight of him, clean-shaven, with his coat shortened, sobbing most piteously, the boy burst into a laugh, but one so strange and unnatural that Pahomitch dreaded another fit. In this laugh, too, there was the fear of the end of the world. Once in winter a comet appeared, " a star with a tail," so Pahomitch called it The boy all the time longed to see 72 PETER AND ALEXIS it, yet did not dare to look ; he used to purposely turn away his head, and close his eyes. But one night he saw it quite unexpectedly, when Pahomitch was carrying him across a snowdrifted lane to the bath-house. At the end of this lane between the black loghouses, rising just above the white snow, at the very edge of the dark blue sky, sparkled a large, delicately transparent star ; it seemed to be gliding away, as it were, into infinite space. It was not terrible, on the contrary so familiar, so welcome, so fair, that he gazed and could not gaze enough. The old feeling, stronger than ever, clutched his heart with unendurable terror and delight. He stretched himself towards the star, as if now only awakening, with a tender, dreamy smile. At the same time Pahomitch felt terrible convulsions shake the little body. A cry escaped the boy ; he had his second epileptic fit. At the age of sixteen, he was compelled, together with other children belonging to the nobility, to attend the school of " Mathematical, Nautical, that is Maritime, and cunning Arts." The school was located in the Suchareva tower, where James Bruce was engaged on astronomical observations. The astronomer was considered to be a sorcerer and magician : a squinting woman, who sold soaked apples in a street close by, had seen Bruce one winter's night flying from the tower straight to the moon, astride of a telescope. Nothing in this world would have induced Pahomitch to send the child to this cursed place, but the boys were taken there by force. Minors,* who had been in hiding on their estates, some even married, babes of thirty or forty years of age, had been brought hither by compulsion, and now sat next to children on the same bench. They learnt from the same book, which had a picture representing a teacher beating with rods a schoolboy laid across a bench. Below ran the inscription, " Let every boy learn in quiet." All the primers were well supplied with verses about the rod : 1 Minors are descendants of noble families who had not yet acquired the r ght of alienation over their immovable property until they had served seven years in the army or ten years in a civil capacity. — See p. 98, "A History of Russia." W. R IMorfill. ANTICHRIST 73 God bless the woods for evermore, Of useful rods the living store ; Birch is for youth the needful kind, Nought but stiff oak brings age to mind. It was prescribed by a royal ukase that a number of strong soldiers should be chosen from the Guards Regiment, one of whom, lash in hand, should be present in each room during the lessons ; and should one of the pupils misbehave, he was to be lashed, irrespective of his rank or family. But neither rods nor lashes could knock learning into their heads ; both young and old learnt badly. Sometimes in moments of despair they would sing, " the Song of Baby- lon." The older ones, their voices hoarse with excessive drink, would start : We with school life can't agree. The use of rods is far too free. The shriller young voices chimed in : — Sorry and sad Is every lad. then both high and low would join in the chorus. Tichon would have learnt little in the school had he not attracted the attention of one of his teachers, the Pastor Gliick, a native of Konigsberg. Gliick, who had acquired a kind of Russian from a runaway Polish monk, came to Russia " to teach," quoting his own words, " the Muscovy youths, who were soft and impressionable as clay." He was soon disillusioned however, not so much by the youths themselves, as by the Russian method employed in train- ing them, " like horses," knocking knowledge into their heads with whips. Gliick was kind and clever in spite of being a drunkard ; sorrow drove him to drink, because not only Russians but even Germans considered him mad. He was engaged upon an enormous task, the writing of com- mentaries on ''Newton's Commeniarv to the Apocalypse" ; a book in which all Christian revelations concerning the end of the world were proved by minute astronomical calculations, based on the laws of gravitation, l.-^id down in Newton's recently published " Philosophce Naturalis Principia Mathematica." 74 PETER AND ALEXIS He discovered in his pupil Tichon an extraordinary gift for mathematics ; he loved him dearly, as his own kin. After a glass or two, he would converse with Tichon as with his dearest friend, forgetful of his age. He used to tell him about the new teachings in philosophy; about Bacon's " Magna Instauratio," Spinoza's " Geometrical Ethics," Descartes' " Vortices," " The Monads of Leibnitz " ; but the greatest inspiration kindled in him when talking about the great discoveries in astronomy, made by Copernicus, Kepler and Newton. The boy could not follow all he heard, yet he listened to these accounts of scientific wonders as eagerly as he did to the talks of the three old men about the legen- dary town. As to Pahomitch, he considered all foreign science, espe- cially astrology and astronomy, blasphemous. "The damned Copernicus rivals God Himself," he used to say, " he has lifted the heavy globe into the air ; it is nothing but a dream, all this nonsense about the sun and the stars being fixed while the earth alone goes round ; it is clean contrary to Holy Writ. Theologians laugh at him." " True philosophy," Pastor Gliick was wont to say, " is not only useful, but even necessary to faith. Many of the Holy Fathers excelled in philosophy. Knowledge of nature does not impede Christianity, and God honours him who strives to explore nature. To reason about the created tends to the glory of the Creator, for it is written ; ' the heavens declare the glory of God.' " A vague instinct, however, told Tichon that this recon- ciliation between knowledge and faith was not quite as simple and easy even to Gliick, as the latter believed, or tried to believe. It was not without reason, that sometimes, after a learned debate with himself about the plurality of worlds and the incomprehensibility of cosmic space, the drunken old man, oblivious of his pupil's presence, would in exhaustion lay his bald head on the table-edge, his wig awry, dazed not so much with wine, as by the confusing metaphysical thoughts, and groan, repeating Newton's celebrated words : — " O Physica — save me from Metaphysica ! " One day Tichon found on his teacher's table a manuscript collection of Spinoza's letters, which had been brought from ANTICHRIST 75 Holland. Tichon, nineteen at that time and about to leave school, could read Latin fluently. He opened the book, the first lines' he chanced to see were these : " There is much in common between man's nature and God's, as between the constellation of the Dog and the dog, the barking animal. For I believe that a triangle, if it could speak, would in like manner say that God is eminently triangular, and a circle, that the Divine nature is in an eminent manner circular. And in another letter concerning the Eucharist : " Oh, fool- ish youth ! Who has so bewitched you as to make you believe in the possibility of swallowing something holy and eternal ? as if holy and eternal things could remain in your bowels ! Stupendous are the sacraments of your church, they are contrary to reason ! " Tichon closed the book, he read no further. For the first time in his life thought had roused in him the old feeling of terror at the end of all things, which so far had only been called forth by external impres- sions. In the Siikharev tower, James Bruce had a well-stocked library, a cabinet of mathematical, mechanical and other instruments, also a collection of natural objects : animals, insects, plants, various ores and minerals, antiquities, old coins, medals, cut stones, larvae, and foreign, as well as Rus- sian curiosities. Bruce had commissioned Gliick to cata- logue all the books and objects. Tichon helped him, and spent whole days in the library. One bright summer evening he was sitting on the top of a folding library ladder, which moved on wheels, before a wall ranged with books from top to bottom ; he was sticking numbers on the backs of books, comparing the new cata- logue with the old illiterate one, in which the names of foreign books were copied out in Russian characters. Through the high windows, glazed after the manner of old Dutch houses with little round pieces of glass fixed in a net- work of lead, the slanting rays of sunshine fell like sheaves of luminous dust upon the sparkling brass instruments ; on the heavenly spheres, astrolabes, compasses, bevels, draught compasses, measurement scales, levels, telescopes, microscopes ; the various stuffed birds and animals, the huge bone from a mammoth's head, monstrous Chinese idols and marble statues of beautiful Hellenic gods ; the 76 PETER AND ALEXIS interminable rows of books uniformly bound in leather and parchment. Tichon enjoyed his work, here among the books. There reigned the calm, soothing peace of a wood, or ot some old cemetery, which, forsaken by men, is lovingly visited only by sunshine. No sound interrupted the stillness save the evening chimes, which suggested the bells of the legendary town Kitesh, and the voices which came through the open door of the adjoining room where Bruce and Pastor Gliick, having finished their supper, now sat talking and smoking over their wine. Tichon had just fastened new numbers on some quarto and octavo volumes which were described in the old cata- logue under No. 473 as The Philosophy of Francis Bacon in English, 3 vols. ; under No. 308, Meditationes de Prima Philosophia, by Descartes, in Dutch " ; under No. 532, Philosophiae Natiiralis Principia Mathemaiica, by Isaac Newton. Returning the books to their places, Tichon found at the back of the shelf an old mouse-eaten octavo, No. 461, Leonardo da Vinci, a treatise on painting, in Ger- man. This was the first German translation of Trattato della Pittnra, issued at Amsterdam, in the year 1582 ; a leaflet with a wood-cut portrait of Leonardo had been placed in the book. Tichon gazed intently at this face, strange, unknown, and yet so familiar, as if he had once seen it in a dream. He thought that Simon the magician, who could fly in the air, must surely have had a similar face. The voices in the neighbouring room seemed to grow louder and louder, Bruce was disputing some matter with Pastor Gliick. They spoke in German. Tichon had learnt the language from the pastor ; a few stray words struck him ; his curiosity was aroused and he remained, with Leonardo's book still in his hand, trying to catch the drift of their con- versation. " How is it you don't see it. Reverend Sir, that Newton was no longer in his right senses when he wrote his Commen- taries on the Apocalypse ? " said Bruce. " Later on he him- self confesses it, in a letter addressed to Bentlcy, on Septem- ber 13, i6q3, ' I have lost my coherency of thought and no longer feel the old vigour of reason,' in other words, he simply went into his dotage." " Your Excellency, I would rather be mad with Newton ANTICHRIST ^>j than reasonable with the rest of us bipeds ! " exclaimed Gliick, tossing off another glass of wine. " There is no accounting for taste, my good sir," continued Bruce, with a dry, short, wooden laugh, " but here's some- thing more curious still. At the time Newton wrote his Commentaries, in Moscovy, the other extremity of the world, barbarians called 'Raskolniks,' have in their turn com- piled Commentaries on the Apocalypse, and come to very much the same conclusions as Newton. Daily expecting the Day of Doom, and the Second Coming, some lay themselves in coffins and say their own funeral service ; others burn themselves. They are hunted and persecuted ; for my part I would say of these unfortunate people, in the words of Leibnitz, ' I do not like savageries, and would prefer to let everybody live in peace.' As for those who are calmly awaiting the end of the world, their error seems to me quite innocent. Another thing strikes me as most curious, that the extreme West and the extreme East, the greatest enlightenment and the greatest ignorance, meet in these Apocalyptic deliriums. It is enough to suggest that the end of the world is drawing nigh and that we shall all go to the devil very soon ! " Again he laughed his sharp, wooden laugh and then added something Tichon could not hear, but it was evidently something very heterodox, for Pastor Gliick, whose wig had, as usual at the end of his supper, slipped to one side of his drowsy head, suddenly jumped up in a fury, pushed back his chair and was going to run out of the room. Bruce kept him back, however, and a few kind words reassured him : he was the only patron Gliick had. He loved and esteemed him for his disinterested pursuit of knowledge ; yet, being himself a sceptic, or as many asserted a thorough atheist, he could not see the poor Pastor, the Don Quixote of astro- nomy, without being tempted to tease him and scoff at the unlucky commentaries on the Apocalypse — the reconcilia- tion of science and religion. Bruce was of opinion that one or the other had to be chosen — either faith without knowledge, or knowledge without faith. He filled Gliick's glass and. in order to console him, began to inquire about the details of Newton's Apocalypse. At 78 PETER AND ALEXIS first the old man answered reluctantly, but after a while he related with enthusiasm Newton's conversation with his friend concerning the comet of 1680. " One day, when asked about it, instead of giving a direct answer he opened his Principia and pointed to a place where it was said ' Stellae fixae refieri possunt. Fixed stars can be renewed by comets falling upon them.' ' Why did you not write about the sun as plainly as you did about the stars ? ' ' Because the sun concerns us more,' replied Newton, and then added with a laugh, ' For the rest, I have said sufficient for those who desire to understand.' " As a moth attracted by the light, so will the comet fall into the sun and increase the solar heat to such an extent, that everything on earth will be consumed by fire. As it is written in the Holy Scriptures : ' The heavens will pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat ; the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burnt up.' Then the prophecies will be accomplished both of him who believed, and of him who knew. " ' Hypotheses non fingo ! ' " he concluded with an in- spired air, repeating Newton's great saying. Tichon was still listening, and the ancient prophetic caw- ings of the three old men seemed to fit in with the most exact deductions of science. Closing his eyes,- he saw a lonely lane, banked up with snowdrifts, and at its end, rising just above the white snow, between the black houses, on the very edge of the dark blue sky, a large, delicately-transparent star. And again, just in as childhood's days, the familiar sensation clutched his heart with unbearable fear and joy. He dropped Leonardo's book, which in its fall caught the tube of the astrolabe, and with a loud crash they both fell to the ground. In hurried Gliick. He knew Tichon was subject to fits, and perceiving him at the top of the ladder, pale and trembling, hastened to him, caught him in his arms, and helped him down. This tim.e the fit did not come on. Bruce too had come in. They sympathetically tried to make Tichon talk ; but he remained silent, he felt that it was impossible to discuss this with anybody. " Poor lad ! " said Bruce apart to Gliick, " I feel almost convinced that our talk has frightened him, they are all alike here, one idea seems to possess them — the thought about ANTICHRIST 79 the end of the world. I have noticed of late that the mad- ness seems to spread among them like an epidemic. God alone knows where this unhappy people will end ! " On leaving the school, Tichon was expected to enter the ranks of the army, like other young men belonging to the nobility. Pahomitch had died. Gliick was preparing for a journey to Sweden and England, commissioned by Bruce to buy new mathematical instruments. He invited Tichon to accompany him. Tichon, forgetting all his childish superstitions and Pahomitch's warnings, gave himself with ever increasing love to the study of mathematics. His health had improved and his fits did not recur. A long- cherished curiosity drew him to foreign lands, almost as mys- terious to him as the invisible legendary town. Thus, owing to Bruce's intervention, Tichon Zapolski, scholar of the Navigation School, was by the Tsar's decree ordered, along with other Russian youths, to finish his studies abroad. They arrived with Gliick in Petersburg in the beginning of June, 1715. Tichon was twenty-five years old, the same age as the Tsarevitch Alexis, yet he looked a mere boy. The trading vessel, which was to take them to Stockholm, was due to leave Kronslot in a few days. Suddenly all inTichon'slife had changed ! Petersburg, in its general aspect so unlike Moscow, had startled Tichon. For days he would wander about the streets looking in amaze- ment at the endless canals, prospects, houses erected on piles, driven into the yielding mud of the marshes, all in a row, along a straight line, according to a law, which forbade any new building either to go beyond or fall short of the pre- scribed line, modest whitewashed huts amidst woods and waste lands, often roofed in the Finnish manner with turf and birch-bark, palaces of elaborate structure, after the Prussian fashion, melancholy garrison depots, ammunition stores, sheds, churches with Dutch spires, and striking clocks — everything was flat, ordinary, colourless, very much like a dream- vision. At times, on dull mornings, it seemed to him that the city, shrouded in a muddy yellow mist, would lift with the fog and vanish like a dream. In the legendary city that which is, remains invisible, while here in Peters- burg on the contrary, the visible is that which is not ; yet both cities were equally visionary. And again there arose 8o PETER AND ALEXIS within him that strange feeling, which he had not experi- ienced for a long time — the presentiment of the end. Only it no longer resolved itself into ecstasy and fear, but oppressed him with a more definite anguish. One day, on the Troit^a Square near the Four Frigates coffee house, he met a tall man wearing the leather jacket of a Dutch skipper. And just as in Moscow, on the Red Square near the Lobnoye Palace, where his father's head on the spike had looked with its empty eye-socket straight into that tall man's very eyes, Tichon again recognized him — the Tsar Peter. The terrible face suddenly explained to him the terrible town — they both bore the same impress. That same day he met the monk Cornelius ; he was delighted to see him and did not leave him again. He slept the night in the old man's cell and s})ent his days on the rafts and barges among the " hidden runaway folk." He listened to their tales about the hves of great hermits, who lived in the north, in the woods along the sea coast, the Onega and Olonitz where Cornelius, on leaving Moscow, had spent many years ; about terrible burnings, where many thou- sands had sought a fiery death. From the barge Cornelius was now going to preach the Red Death in the woods beyond the Volga. Tichon had not studied in vain ; much of what these people believed he no longer could believe ; he thought differently, but felt the same as they, and what was more important still — common to them all was the presentiment of the end. That about which he never could speak, which none of the learned would have comprehended, these people understood and by it alone they lived. All he remembered Pahomitch telling him in his earliest childhood now sud- denly had revived in his soul with new force. Again he fel<. drawn to the woods, the deserts, the secret settlements and peaceful refuges. Again through the air of the white night he seemed to hear over the Neva the bells of that visionary city, in the chimes of the Dutch clocks, again with languid melancholy and yearning he would repeat the ballad about Prince Joseph : — Fair solitude ! my heart's desire Through forest and mire Over hill, dale, and peak. . . , , ANTICHRIST 8i He had to decide, to choose one or the other course : either to return to the world and hve there hke all men, serve a man who had destroyed his father and was likely to destroy the whole of Russia ; or once for all turn his back upon the world, become a beggar, a wanderer, one of those " hidden, runaway folk," who have here no continuing city, but seek one to come ; to the West with Pastor Gliick, or to the East, the legendary city, with Cornelius the monk. Which should he choose ? whither should he go ? he had not yet made up his mind ; he wavered, tarried with the final decision. He seemed to wait for something. But this night, after the conversation on the raft about Peter, the Antichrist, he felt that it was impossible to delay any longer. The ship was sailing for Stockholm in the morning, and on the morrow Cornelius, threatened with arrest, was obliged to flee from Petersburg. He urged Tichon to come with him. " I am just upon the sword-edge," he again thought, " and whichever side I happen to fall on, in that will I abide. There is but one life, one death; a second blunder won't mend the first." Yet at the same time Tichon felt powerless to decide, and that two destinies, like the two ends of a deadly noose, joined and tightening, seemed to press and strangle him. He got up, took from the shelf a manuscript — " The Medita- tions of St. Hyppolitus concerning the second comwg," and in order to escape from thought, began looking at the title pictures by light of the oil-lamp burning before the image. One of them represented Antichrist, sitting on a throne, wearing the green uniform of the Preobrazhensky regiment with red facings and brass buttons ; on his head, a three- cornered hat and a sword by his side : his face resembled that of Tsar Peter, and he was pointing forward with his hand. In front of him, to the right, columns of the Preobrazhensky and Simeon Guards were marching towards a monastery among dark woods. Far above, on a hill with three caves, some monks were praying. The soldiers, guided by quaint blue demons, were climbing up the mountain slope. Below ran the legend : " Then will he send into the hills and caves and holes of the earth his armies of evil spirits to seek out those who hide from his sight and bring them to worship him." On another picture soldiers were shooting F 82 PETER AND ALEXIS at monks who were bound : " These are falHng by Satan's hand." Behind the wooden partition Elena continued to sigh and weep, praying to the heavenly King for the Tsar Peter. Tichon laid down the book and fell on his knees before the icon. Yet he could not pray. Anguish seized him, such as he had never felt before. The flame of the burnt-out lamp flared up a last time and then went out ; gloom surrounded him, and something seemed to creep up and clutch his throat with a dark, soft, warm hairy paw. He grew short of breath. His body was bathed in a cold sweat. And again it seemed to him he was flying headlong, sinking down into some black gloom, into an abyss — the jaws of the Beast itself. " It does not really matter," thought Tichon,the thought flashed on his mind with unbear- able clearness, it did not really matter which of the two paths he chose, go east or go west, here or there, at either extremity of the earth there ruled the one foreboding — " The end is approaching." For as the lightning comes from the east and shineth even unto the west, so should also the coming of the Son of man be. And it seemed to him that he — Tichon — had already beheld this encircling lightning. " Even so, come Lord Jesus ! " he exclaimed. At that very instant the cell window was lit up with a terrible white light. A deafening crash followed. It seemed as though the sky was rent and falling. It was the same lightning which had so startled the Tsar Peter that he let the icon droji at the foot of Venus. Elena heard, through the howling, hiss and rum- bling of the storm, a terrible unearthly scream. Tichon for the third time in his life was seized with an epileptic swoon. He recovered consciousness on the deck of the barge, where he had been brought from the close cell to revi'/e. It was early morning, blue sky above, white mist below. A star was glistening in the east through the mist, it was the star of Venus. On the isle of Keivoussary, crowning the dome of the house of Boutourlin, the Metropolitan of the Thrice-Drunken Conclave, stood the gilt statue of Bacchus. Lit up by the first ray of the rising sun, it glowed like a red star through the mist. The earthly star exchanged myste- rious glances with the heavenly one. The mist became roseate, as if blood were entering the pale bodies of phan- ANTICHRIST 83 toms. The marble body of the goddess, in the middle pavilion over-looking the Neva, glowed as if alive. She smiled her eternal smile at the sun, rejoicing that he rose even here amid the hyperborean night. The body of the goddess shone ethereal and roseate in the shroud of mist, the mist glowing like the body of the goddess. The mist was her body. In her all existed, and she in all. Tichon remembered the thoughts that had thronged his mind during the night, and he felt in his soul a calm deter- mination not to return to Pastor Gliick, but to escape with Cornelius. * * * * The storm had shifted the barge and its bow was now touching the raft where the conversation about Antichrist had taken place last night. Ivan had found time to get his sleep and he was again sitting in the same place as last night singing the same song. And music, (or was it only phantom music ?) the sounds of the minuet subdued by the mist : — 'Tis time to cast thy bow away, CupiJ, we all are in thy sway. mingled with Ivan's melancholy, drawling song, as, his face turned to the east and the dawn, he sang of the eternal setting, the end of all days : Hollowed oak trunks, ye will prove Fit house for us, who on earth did move. Night approacheth, endeth Day, And cruel Death his scythe doth lay To the root of all that live ! CHAPTER III ON the banks of the Neva, near the Church of Mary the Mother of all the Sorrowing, next to the house be- longing to the Tsarevitch Alexis, stood that of Tsaritsa Martha, the widow of Tsar Peter's stepbrother Fedor. Fedor died when Peter was ten years old. The Tsaritsa, eighteen at the time of her wedding, had been married only four weeks. The death of her husband sent her out of her mind and she spent thirty-three years in seclusion. She never left her apartments, and neither knew nor saw any- body. At foreign courts she was believed to be dead long since. Petersburg she had only caught sight of through her windows : its whitewashed huts, built after the Dutch and Prussian manner, its church spires, the Neva with its barges and rafts seemed to her an absurd nightmare. Dreams were her reality. She imagined herself to be living in the Moscow Kremlin, in the old Terems, and that looking through the window, she would see the high Ivan Tower and the Church of the Annunciation. Yet she never did look out of her window, alraid to dispel her dream, afraid of the daylight. Con- tinual darkness reigned in her apartments ; the windows were draped. She lived by candle-light. The curtains and screens of ancient tradition hid the last Russian Tsaritsa from the people's sight. The solemn, p()mj)ous ceremony of a Tsar's Court was strictly observ^ed here. The servants were not allowed to enter further than the hall. Here time stood still, here nothing had changed since the days of the gentle Tsar Alexis. Her crazy mind was pos- sessed of one idea : she believed her husband, the Tsar Fedor, was alive ; that he was now at the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem praying for Russia, which was being invaded ANTICHRIST 85 by Antichrist, accompanied by countless armies of Poles and pagan foreigners. There is, she thinks, no Tsar in Russia ; he, who calls himself Tsar, not being the true one. He is a pre- tender, a were-wolf, a Gregory Otriopieff, a runaway artil- lery man, an alien. But the Lord has not finally forsaken his faithful Orthodox. At the consummation of time, he, Fedor, the only true Tsar of Russia, " the fair sun," will return with a terrible luminous host, and the foreign troops will flee before him as night fleeth ; he will sit with his Tsaritsa on the ancestral throne and re-establish truth and justice. All the people will come and bow before him, and Antichrist, together with all his foreigners, will be over- thrown. Soon thereafter will be the second coming of Christ, the end of the world. All this is drawing nigh, is at the door. About two weeks after the Venus festival in the Summer Garden, Tsarevna Maria invited Alexis to Tsaritsa Martha's house. This was not the first time they had arranged to meet there. The aunt used to supply him with news and letters from his mother, the Tsaritsa Eudoxia, the first wife of Peter, who had been banished to the Sousdal nunnery under the name of Elena. On entering the house of Tsaritsa Martha, Alexis was obliged to grope his way for some time along dark wood corridors, halls, chambers, ground floors and staircases. There was a smell of wood oil, old mouldering furniture, dust and the rot of age in the air. The house teemed with small cells, chambers, secret rooms, side rooms and closets. They sheltered the old wives and daughters of Boyars, chambermaids, nurses, housekeepers, laundresses, furriers, saintly madmen, mendicants, wanderers, pilgrims, fools and idiots, orphaned girls, old story tellers and musicians, who were skilled to accompany their ancient legends by melan- choly string music. Decrepit servants in faded coats, grizzled and shaggy, well nigh moss-grown, caught hold of Alexis' lappets, kissing his hand and his shoulder. Blind, dumb, lame, grey with age, almost featureless, they all followed him, gliding along the walls like phantoms ; they thronged, swarmed, and crept about in the dark passages like woodlice in damp cracks. He met the fool Shamira, who was always pinching and grinning with the fool Polly. 86 PETER AND ALEXIS The oldest of the boyars' wives, Soundouleya Vahrameyevna, the favourite of the Tsaritsa, now in her second childhood, like her mistress, and fat, yellow, trembling like a jelly, fell at his feet ; and for some reason or other began to bewail him, as though he were dead. Alexis felt uncomfortable. He remembered his father saying : " Tsaritsa Martha's house has been transformed by piety into a hospital for the maimed and mad, for hypocrites and rascals." He sighed with relief on entering the light, airy corner room where his Aunt Marya Alexeyevna was expecting him. The windows looked out upon the blue sunny space of the Neva with its vessels and barges. The walls were bare and the logs of which they were built showed as in a village hut. The sole ornaments were the icons and the lamps which glimmered before them. Wooden seats ran along the walls. His aunt rose from the table at which she was sitting, and tenderly embraced the Tsarevitch. She was dressed after the old fashion in a head-dress and a jerkin of dark, quiet colour with brown spots. Her face was ugly, pale, slightly bloated, like that of an old nun. Yet in the ill-tempered lips, the clever, sharp, piercing eyes, there was something which suggested the Tsarevna Sophia — the evil brood of the Miloslavskis. Like Sophia, she too hated her brother and all he did ; she loved the old times. Peter had spared her ; he called her " old crow, " because she was always cawing evil to him. Maria gave Alexis a letter from his mother. It was an answer to the son's recent note, all too short and laconic : " Mother, farewell ! Please do not forget me in your pray- ers." Alexis' heart throbbed, as he began to decipher the lines of the familiar writing, scrawled in awkward, childish characters. " Tsarevitch Alexis, God be with thee ! I, poor woman, am grieved to death, that thou hast forsaken me in my sor- row, forgotten me who bore thee. I tended thee, yet thou hast so soon forgotten me ! But for thee, I should not live in such tribulation and poverty. Sad, very sad, is my life, I would I had never been born. I know not why so much suffering has fallen to my lot. Yet I have not forgotten thee ; but am always praying the Holy Virgin to keep thee pure and well in body and soul. There is an image here ANTICHRIST ^y of the Kazan Virgin for which a church has been built. For thy sake I had this image brought to my house, and at night I have myself taken it back, carrying it on my shoulders. And on May 23, I had a vision. The heavenly Queen appeared to me, pure and radiant, and promised to petition her Son, our Lord, to turn my sorrow into joy. And I heard, unworthy though I be, the radiant Virgin speak these words ; ' Thou hast honoured my image and carried it back to my church, I will exalt thee and protect thy son.' And thou, my joy, my own child, let the fear of God dwell in thine heart. Write me, darling Aliosha, if only one line to still my sobs ; let me rest from my sor- row, have mercy upon me, thy mother and slave. I pray thee write. I greet thee devoutly." When Alexis had finished reading the letter, his aunt gave him presents, sent by his mother — a small image ; a hand- kerchief which the lowly sister Elena had embroidered with her own hand ; and two small lime-wood cups, for drinking vodka. These humble presents touched him even more than the letter. " You have quite forgotten her," said Maria, looking him straight in the face. " You neither write nor send her anything." " I dare not write, " replied the Tsarevitch. " Why not ? " she retorted with vivacity, and her sharp eyes seemed to sting him, " And even if it did mean a little suffering, what matter ? It's for your mother, and no one else." He remained silent. Then she began telling him in a low voice all she had learnt from Michael, a half-witted saint, who had come from Sousdal, " Their joy is ever buoy- ant : visions, signs, prophecies and voices from the images do not cease. Job of Novgorod says : ' Some ill is await- ing thee in Petersburg. Yet I feel that God will deliver thee ; thou shalt see what will happen.' It was revealed unto Vissarion, the old man who lives immured in the Jaroslav wall, that we are on the eve of a change. Either the Tsar will die, or Petersburg fall" And St. Demetrius appeared to the Bishop of Rostov, Dositheus, prophesying that there should be tribulations and that the fulfilment will soon come. 88 PETER AND ALEXIS " Soon, soon," concluded Marya, " for many are they who cry : ' Revenge, O Lord! and speed Thy fulfilment.' " Alexis knew' that the fulfilment meant his father's death. " Remember my words," she cried with prophetic voice. " Not for long will Petersburg exist ! it will soon perish." And looking out of the window upon the small white houses among the green marshes, she repeated malignantly : " Sink it ! Woe to it ! Let it sink back thither whence it came, the devil's bog. Sprung up like a toadstool, it will rot like one. Not even its site will be known, the damned place ! " The old crow was started on her cawing. " Old woman's tales," said Alexis, waving his hand hope- lessly ; "we have heard not a few of such prophecies and they have all turned out to be rubbish." She was going to reply, but glancing at him with her sharp piercing eye, she said : — " What's the matter with you Tsarevitch ? Are you ill ? have you been drinking ? " " I am forced to it. The day before yesterday at a formal launching, they carried me out senseless. I would much rather have been a convict in exile or ill in bed than there ! " " You should take medicine or feign illness to escape such launchings ? seeing you know your father's ways." Alexis remained silent, then he sighed heavily : " Ah Marya ! Marya ! I am much troubled. I hardly know what to do with myself, so troubled am L No man could stand this without God's help. I would be glad to hide myself somewhere, run away from all this." " Where can you escape from your father ? his arm is long. You will be found out anywhere." " I am sorry," continued Alexis, " that I did not follow Kikin's advice and go to France or to the Emperor. There my life would be more peaceful, till God wills otherwise. Many in my position have found refuge in flight ; only there is no pretext for going away. I really don't know what will become of me, auntie dear ; I want nothing, only give me freedom and let me live quietly. Or that they should give me leave to become a monk. I would abdi- cate the throne, and would live in retirement away from ANTICHRIST 89 everything. I would choose some quiet, plain country seat, and there end my days." " Enough, enough, Alexis ! the Tsar is not immortal after all. He too will die in God's good time. They say he suffers from epileptic fits ; such people never live long. God will grant the end. I feel sure it won't tarry much longer. Wait, I say — the time of our rejoicing will also come. You are beloved by the people, they drink your health, calling you Russia's Hope. The crown will not pass you by." " What is the good of it, Marya ? I believe it is my fate in any case to be a monk. Nothing awaits me but the cowl, either in my father's life, or later after his death, when they will treat me as they did Basil Shuisky, who was forced to become a monk, and then imprisoned. My life is likely to be a gloomy business." " How can we help it ? One hour's suffering and the issue is a whole life. Be patient, Alexis." " I have borne it patiently for a long while, I can no more," he burst out, unable to contain himself any longer. His face had grown pale and convulsed. " Would it had an end ! This weariness is worse than death ; my head seems to be always on the edge of the block. And why all this, Lord ? What have I done to him ? Did I not try my very best to please my father ? When quite a child I was dragged about on campaigns, half killed with work, made to do sentry duty in the frost, drink vodka till my head swam, I wonder I came out of it alive. I bore it all pati- ently. I spared neither health nor life. And he never even pitied, not even so much as addressed a kind word to me. He is always angry, and looks as fierce as a beast. It makes no difference what you do for him. If you tore yourself in two, all he would say would be, ' Why not in four ? ' Well, never mind, put it down to my fault, let it be granted that 1 disappoint him. Who is responsible for it that I was born such as I am ? I am not a fool by nature, and he knows it. Were I a fool, I would have a little better life. But I live according to my own lights, not his He cares nothing for the people, I sympathize with the people. That is the reason why I am in disgrace. 'Do not do the good you would, but the evil I will.' Two men in the world are go PETER AND ALEXIS like unto God : The Muscovy Tsar and the Pope of Rome — their will is their law. I would not mind if this were all ; in old days he used to scold and beat me, yet it always seemed that he considered me ; that I was not quite a stranger to him. But do you know what he has devised of late ? He neither scolds, nor beats me, not even touches me ; all he does, is to remain silent. I talk to him ; he neither heeds nor sees, but looks past me, as if I did not exist. And this lasts for months, years ! I am no longer a human being in his eyes, but some creature worse than a dog. Now, is this fair ? After all I am his son, his flesh and blood. Even the serpent does not eat its young. He has no fear of God. I know what it is he wants — my death. To me he is not a father, but a monster, a blood-sucker, a torturer. Ay, it would have been better if he had killed me at once. And what does all this mean ? O Lord ! what is he trying to do with me ? What ? " He was going to add something, but his voice broke ; all he could do was to falter faintly " O Lord ! Lord ! " He dropped his arms on the table, covered his face and pressed his head between the palms of his hand ; he did not weep, only seemed to sink down, shrink and contract, as from some severe inward pain, and a convulsive tearless sob shook his whole frame. Tsarevna Marya bent over him ; on his shoulder she laid her small white, firm, powerful hand ; the Tsarevna Sophia had hands just like these. " Don't be fainthearted, Tsarevitch," said she, with gentle severity in her kind voice. " Do not murmur against God. Remember Job ! It is good to trust in the Lord, for our life and going forth are in His hand. He can turn evil into good. When God is with me what can men do unto me ? Though an host should encamp against me, my heart shall not fear, for the Lord will not forsake me ! Trust in Christ, my darling Aliosha ! He will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able to bear." She stopped ; and he too had grown quiet under the touch of this fond, firm hand, and the sound of these old, familiar pious words. Somebody knocked at the door. In came Soundouleya Vahrameyevna sent by the Tsaritsa Martha to fetch them. ANTICHRIST 91 Alexis raised his head ; his face though very pale was almost calm. He glanced at the image and the faintly glimmering lamp, crossed himself piously, and said : — " You are right, aunt ; God's will worketh in all things. Moved by the prayers of the Holy Virgin and all the Saints, God will judge between us according to His righteous will. This was, and is, my hope." "Amen! " said Marya. They got up and together went into the Tsaritsa Martha's private apartments. CHAPTER IV NOTWITHSTANDING the sunny day, it was quite dark in the room, and the candles were burning. Not a ray could find its way through the windows, blocked up with felt, hung with tapestries. The close air was satu- rated with calamite, yarrow brandy, rose water, and perfumes added to the fuel for scent. The room was crowded with seats, dressers, cupboards, boxes, hampers, chests, coffers, treasure chests bound with strips of iron, cypress-wood trunks filled with various furs, dresses and linen : " the white treasury." In the middle of the room towered the Tsaritsa's bed, overhung by a canopy, the bed-curtain made of red satin, interwoven with a pale green and gold design, with a quilt of gold embossed tissue, lined with sable and surrounded by a border of ermine. Every- thing was sumptuous, but old, worn and dilapidated, and looked as though it would crumble into dust at the first breath of fresh air. Through the open door a glimpse of the private chapel could be caught ; it was flooded by the light of lamps, which burned before the images, trimmed with gold and silver, and studded with priceless gems. Here numerous reUcs were kept : crosses, panagias, triptychs, little boxes, shrines with relics, myrrh, leaven, miracle-working ointments, holy water in waxed cloths, saucers of cassia ; holy chrism in lead vessels, blessed by Patriarchs ; tapers lit with fire from heaven ; sand from the Jordan ; bits of the burning bush, and the oak of Mamre ; some of the Holy Virgin's milk ; an azure stone — part of the sky on which Christ had stood ; a stone in a cloth case " diffusing a perfume, but what sort of stone is un- known." Other treasures were the leg wrappers of Paph- nuti Borovsky ; a tooth of Antipas the Great, a charm ANTICHRIST 93 against toothache which Ivan the Terrible had appropri- ated from the reliquary of his murdered son. Tsaritsa Martha was sitting near the bed, in a gilt arm- chair, which resembled a throne, with a double-crested eagle and crown carved on the back. Although the green glazed stove, richly ornamented with festoons and mould- ings, had been well heated, the sickly, shivering old woman wrapped herself in a warm jacket, lined with Arctic fox. A pearl fringe and strings hung over her forehead, from under the golden headgear. Her face was not old, but it seemed lifeless as stone. According to the old custom of Muscovy's Tsaritsas, white and rouge were thickly laid on her face, and made it yet more lifeless. Only the eyes seemed aHve ; they were transparently lucid, but with a curious blind look resembling that of night birds in dav- light. A monk sat at her feet on the floor relating something to her. When the Tsarevitch and his aunt came in, the Tsaritsa Martha greeted them kindly, and invited them to listen to this pilgrim of God. He was of small stature, and had a childlike, cheerful face ; his voice, too, was cheerful, melodious and pleasant. He was describing his pilgrim- ages, the settlements of monks on Athos and Solovki ; he compared the Russian monastery with the Greek and gave the preference to the Greek. "The monastery on Mount Athos is called the garden of the Holy Virgin, and the Holy Mother herself is ever behold- ing it from the heavens, she provides for, and keeps it from destruction. And with her help the settlement flourishes, and brings forth visible and invisible fruit ; the visible fruit is fair, the invisible is that of souls saved. And any one, who has once penetrated within the garden, the fore- court of Paradise, and has beheld its nature and beauty, will not, I believe, have any desire to leave it. The air is pure, and the high hills and mountains, the warmth and light of the sun, the variety of trees and fruits, and the nearness of the longed-for land, Jerusalem, maintain a perpetual joy. " The Solovetzky Isle on the contrary inspires fear and exasperation ; it is melancholy, dark, and cold as Tartarus. 94 PETER AND ALEXIS "There are features about that island which harm the soul. Sea-gulls, white birds, live there in great num- bers ; all the summer long they multiply, breed and build their nests on the ground near the paths, along which the monks go to church. And great is the mischief caused by these birds to the monks. First they lose their tranquillity. Secondly, watching the birds play and flutter and pair, they delight in it, and their passions are aroused. Thirdly, women, maidens, and nuns often visit the monastery. " Mount Athos is free from any such temptations ; neither seagulls nor women come near it. One woman only float- ing on the wings of an eagle, the holy Church, soars over that delightful desert, until the fulness of time appointed by the Lord shall be reached ; and to Him be glory for ever and ever — Amen." When he had finished, the Tsaritsa begged all to leave the room, even Marya ; and remained alone with Alexis. She scarcely knew him, and could not remember what relationship existed between them ; even his name she repeatedly forgot, and simply called him grandson. Yet she loved and pitied him with a strange prophetic pity, as if his fate, unknown to himself, were revealed to her. She looked at him for a long time in silence, with her lucid motionless gaze, which seemed to be dimmed by a film, like the eyes of nightbirds. Then she sadly smiled, and began to gently stroke his face and hair with her hand. " My poor orphan ! neither father nor mother to protect thee ! The cruel wolves will devour the lamb ; the black crows will peck the white dove to death. I am sorry for thee, my loved one ; thou wilt not live long." These wandering words of the last Tsaritsa, who seemed here in Petersburg a pathetic phantom of ancient Muscovy, this decaying splendour, this quiet warm room, where time seemed at a standstill, all filled Alexis' soul with the chill of death, and memories of his fair distant childhood. He felt a sweet melancholy pain gnawing at his heart. He kissed the pale meagre hand, with its thin fingers, from which the ancient, heavy royal rings kept dropping off. She bent her head, as if musing, turning over her coral beads ; beads which ward off evil spirits, for coral grows in the shape of j» cross. ANTICHRIST 95 " Everything, everything is troubled ; times are grow- ing evil ! " she again began with increasing alarm. " Have you read, grandson, in the Scriptures : ' Children, these are the last days ? Have you heard he is coming and is already in the world ' ? This has been said about him, the son of Perdition. He is already at the threshold, soon will he come in ! I can't tell whether I shall live to see my beloved, my fair sun, the pious Tsar Fedor. Could I but just look at him, if only a glance when he comes in power and glory to wage war with the unfaithful, and having conquered them will sit on the throne of glory, and all the people will bow before him saying : ' Hosanna ! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord ! ' " Her eyes brightened up, but in the next moment a dull film seemed to come over them, like ashes over live charcoal. " Ah ! No, I shall not live to see him. I have provoked God's wrath. My heart has a presentiment that trouble is coming. I am sick at heart, grandson. And my dreams have been ill-omened of late." She furtively glanced round, then bringing her lips to his ear, she whispered. " Do you know, grandson, what I dreamt quite recently ? Whether it was a dream or a vision, I can't tell for certain, but he, he, himself, none other than himself, came to me." " Who, Tsaritsa ? " asked Alexis. " Don't you understand ? Don't you see it ? Listen then, grandson, how it was I dreamt that dream. Perhaps you will then understand. It seemed to me, as if I were lying on this very bed, as it were expecting something. Suddenly the door was thrown open, and he appeared. I at once recognized him. Tall, stout, a short foreign coat, in his mouth a pipe ; his face clean shaven, with whiskers like a cat. He came up, looked at me and remained silent. I also kept silent, waiting for what would happen next ; I felt so sick at heart, so weary 1 tried to cross myself ; but could not lift my hand ; I tried to recite a prayer, my tongue would not move. I lay there, as if dead. He took m.y hand, arid felt it ; I shuddered. I glanced at the holy image, the image too seemed to have taken a new shape : it was no longer the blessed Saviour, but an unclean 96 PETER AND ALEXIS German, with bloated blue face, like that of a drowned man. And meanwhile I heard him sa^'ing to me : — " ' You are sorely ill, Martha. Would you like me to send you my doctor ? Why are you staring at me like this ? Do you not recognize me ? ' I answered, ' How could I fail to recognise you ? I know you — I have seen many like you.' ' Well, if you know me tell me who I am,' said he. ' There is no mistaking who you are : a foreigner, a foreigner's son, a drummer.' Upon this he grinned and chuckled like a mad tom cat. ' You are completely gone mad, old woman, that is quite evident. I am neither a for- eigner, nor a drummer, but the divinely anointed Tsar of all the Russias, your own dead husband's, the Tsar Fedor's, step-brother.' Now I was roused, I could hardly restrain myself from spitting in his face, and calling : ' Thou dog ! cur's pup ; pretender, Gregory Otriopieff, anathema, this is who thou art!' But then, ' it isn't worth while,' thought I, ' why shouldT rail at him ? He is not even worth spitting on. It is but a dream, an evil apparition, which by God's will, I am now enduring. I'll just blow with my lips and it will all disappear and disperse.' ' And if you are the Tsar,' said I, ' What is your name ? ' " ' Peter is my name,' he answered. When I heard the name ' Peter,' it was as though a light had flashed upon me. ' Ah ! ' thought I, ' is this who you are ? well, just wait.' And seeing my tongue would not move, I, not being a fool, began in my mind to recite the holy adjuration. " ' Satan ! thou fiend, get thee away from me, into empty space, thick forests, deep precipices, into bottomless seas, upon prodigious, uninhat)ited hills, on which the glory of God's face never shines. Cursed ! disappear from me into Tartarus, bottomless hell, the infernal regions of Gehenna. Amen ! Amen ! Amen ! I blow at thee, I spit on thee.' When I had finished my imprecation, he had disappeared : the earth seemed to have engulfed him, not a trace of him was left, only a smell of tobacco. I awoke, cried out. In hurried Soundouleya Vahrameyevna, sprinkled me with holy water, burnt some incense ; I got up, walked into the chapel, fell down before the holy Queen, only then having remembered and thought it over, I reahzed who he had been." ANTICHRIST 97 While she was speaking the Tsarevitch gradually realised that it was his father who had been to see her, not in a dream, but in reahty. At the same time the maun- dering of the woman seemed to catch hold of and infect him. " Well, and who was it, Tsaritsa?" he repeated with a trembling yet eager curiosity. " Don't you see ? Have you forgotten what is said in Ephraim's book, about the second coming, ' there shall come a proud prince of this world, under the name of Simon Peter, who shall be the Antichrist.' Do you hear, his name is Peter? It is he Himself, no doubt." She fixed on him her e\-es dilated with fear, and repeated in a choking whisper: " It is he, himself, Peter! the Anti- christ, the Antichrist!" Book III THE PRIVATE JOURNAL OF THE TSAREVITCH ALEXIS CHAPTER I THE DIARY OF FRAULEIN ARNHEIM, MAID OF HONOUR May I, 1714. A CURSED country, a cursed people ! Brandy, blood, and dirt ! It is difficult to say which is the ruling characteristic. Dirt, perhaps. The Danish King had good reason to say : " The next time ambassadors from Muscovy come to me, I will have pig-sheds erected for them, for any place they occupy, even a short time, is rendered uninhabitable for at least six months by the stench. A Frenchman describes the Muscovite as a human being according to Plato ; a featherless biped possessing all human qualities except cleanliness and common sense. And these stinking savages, these baptized bears, more pitiable still when changed into apes of Europeans, con- sider themselves the only human beings, the rest of man- kind beasts. Especially for us Germans they feel an inborn and invincible hatred ; our touch alone defiles them. Lutherans are little better than Satan himself in their eyes. I would not remain another moment in Russia were it not for my duty of loyalty, and devotion to her Highness, my most gracious mistress and dear friend, the Crown Princess Sophia Charlotte. Whatever may happen, I will not forsake her ! I will write this diary in the languages I usually speak, German and French. But some of the jokes, proverbs, 100 PETER AND ALEXIS songs, text of ukases and bits of conversation, I will give in Russian and afterwards translate them. My father, a pure German, belongs to an ancient family of Saxon Knights. My mother was a Pole. With her first husband, a Polish nobleman, she had lived for a long time in Russia, not far from Smolensk, and knew the Russian language well. I was brought up in Torgau, at the court of the Queen of Poland, which was frequented by many Muscovites. I have been familiar with the sound of Rus- sian speech since my childhood. I speak badly ; I don't like the language, but understand it well. I have decided to keep a diary in order to ease my heart, when it is too heavy : imitating the talker of old, who, not daring to confide his secret to people, whispered it to the marsh-reeds. I should not like these notes ever to become public, but I rejoice to think that they will one day be read by a man whose opinion I value more than anything else in the world — that of my great teacher, Gottfried Leibnitz. 4c 4: 4c :4c * His letter came just as I was thinking about him. He asks me to find out about the salary which he claims on the strength of his position in the Russian service, as Geheimer Justiz-Rath. I fear he will never see the money. Reading his letter I almost wept for joy and sadness, when I remem- bered our quiet walks and talks in the galleries of the Salzdallen Castle, along the lime avenues of Herrenhausen, where the gentle breezes among the trees and the murmur of fountains seemed to be ever singing our favourite song from " The Mercure Galant." " Chantons, danQons, tout est tranquille Dans cet agrcable sejour. Ah ! le charmant asile ! N'y parlons que de jeux, de plaisirs et d'amours." I remembered the teacher's words which at that time I almost believed : " I am a Slav as you are ; we ought to rejoice that we have Slavonic blood in our veins. A great destiny awaits the race. Russia will link Europe to Asia and reconcile the East and the West. This country is PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH loi like a new stewpot which has not yet absorbed any foreign flavour ; a sheet of white paper, whereon you can write anything you Hke ; virgin soil which will be broken up, and ploughed to receive new seed. Russia might in time even lead Europe, since she may avoid those errors which are too deeply rooted in us." An inspired look lit uj) his face as he concluded, " I seem called by Providence to be a Russian Solon — the lawgiver of a new world. To gain supremacy over the mind of such a man as the Tsar, and direct it for the good of the people is of more worth than the gaining of a hundred battles." Alas ! My poor great dreamer ! Could you but know and see all I have learnt and seen in Russia ! Even now as I am writing, sad and stark reality reminds me that I am no longer in the delightful refuge at Herren- hausen, that German Versailles, but in the depth of Mus- covite Tartary. Through the window, screams, shouts, and quarrellings reach me from below ; the servants of our neighbour. Princess Natalia, are fighting ours ; Russians fighting Germans. I see, alas ! the union between Asia and Europe, the East and the West, as it really is. In ran our secretary, pale and trembling, his dress in tatters, his face bleeding. On seeing him the Crown Princess almost swooned. The Tsarevitch was sent for, but he was suffering from his habitual complaint — drunken- ness. May 2. We occupy the palace of the Crown Prince Alexis, situated on the banks of the Neva, a whitewashed, two-storied house with a red-tiled roof. The accommodation is so limited that nearly the whole of her Highness's retinue had to be lodged in the neighbouring houses, hired by the Senate for that purpose. One of them had neither doors, windows, stoves, nor furniture of any sort. Her Highness was obliged to finish it at her own expense, and add stables to it. Yesterday, the proprietor of the house, a certain Gedeo- noff, returned ; he is in Tsarevna Natalia's service : he ordered our servants to be turned out, and our things to be thrown into the yard. Then he began to lead her High- ness's horses out of the stables and put in his own instead. 102 PETER AND ALEXIS The Crown Princess ordered the stables to be taken down so as to remove them to another place. But when the Stallmeister brought the workmen, Gedeonoff sent some of his, who beat ours and chased them away. When the Stallmeister threatened to report this to the Tsar, Gedeonoff answered laughingly : " Report as much as you like ; I will forestall you ! " But worst of all is the fact that he assures us, he does everything by order of the Tsarevna. This Tsarevna is an old maid, and the vilest tempered creature in the world. She is very amiable to our face, but when our back is turned, every time her Highness's name is mentioned she spits, saying : " The German minx ! what airs she gives herself ! The time will come when she will have to culti- vate a little modesty ! " Thus our grooms are obliged to sleep in the open. So limited is the accommodation in the whole town that the men could not be lodged elsewhere, even for a hundred pieces of gold. When this is mentioned to the Tsar, all he replies is, that in a few years time there will be houses enough. But they won't be needed then, at least not for our people, who, for the most part, will probably have died. They would not believe in Europe if they knew what poverty is ours. The money for the maintenance of the Crown Princess is paid so irregularly and scantily that it never suffices. At the same time everything is frightfully dear here ; we have to pay for things four times as much as in Germany. We are in debt to all our tradesmen ; they will soon stop supplying us. To say nothing of servants, we ourselves are sometimes short of candles, firewood, even food. Nothing can be got out of the Tsar, he is always busy. The Tsarevitch is always drunk. " The world is full of misery," her Highness said to me to-day, " ever since the age of six I have known no happiness, and no doubt Providence has still greater misfortunes in store for me." With an absent look, as if she already beheld this future, she rej^eated : " I shall not escape it," and with such calm resignation that I found no words to comfort her and could only silently kiss her hand. PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 103 Suddenly a cannon shot was heard. We were obhged to make haste and get ready for a pleasure party on the Neva, a " Water Assembly." It is the custom here, on hearing the gun signal or seeing the flags hung out at different parts of the town, for all barges, 5'achts, wherries, boyers, to assemble at the fortress, A fine is imposed for non-appearance. We set out at once in our boyer with ten oarsmen. Together with other boats we kept rowing for a long time up and down the Neva, always following the Admiral, daring neither to lag behind nor overtake, for fear of being fined. Fines are imposed here for everything. There was music ; a band of trumpets and cornets. The bastions of the fortress re-echoed the sounds of the music. We were sad as the music was, and the cold, pale blue river with its flat banks, the pale blue sky, transparent as ice, the gleam of the golden pinnacle on the Church of St. Peter and Paul, (built of wood, but painted yellow to suggest marble,) the melancholy chiming of the striking clocks, all intensified our dejection, which was of quite a different nature from anything I had hitherto experienced, except in this city. And yet the view is pleasing enough. Along the low quay, paved with black tarred piles, runs a line of pale pink brick houses of elaborate design, resembling Dutch churches with pointed turrets, garret windows on the high roofs, and spacious latticed vestibules. You might fancy a real town lay behind them. But next behind them stand poor huts roofed with birch-bark and turf, and, further back, a wilderness inhabited by wolves and deer. On the sea front, windmills just as in Holland. Every- thing is bright, almost dazzling, and, at the same time, pale and cheerless. It seems to be run up, made iust for the time being. It is a phantom town, a dream. The Tsar with all his family were in a special boyer ; he stood at the rudder and steered. The Tsaritsa and Prin- cesses wore dimity jackets, red skirts, round oil-skin caps, everything after the Dutch fashion — they looked like real sailors' wives from Saardam. " I am inuring my family to the water ; those who want to live with me must 104 PETER AND ALEXIS not be afraid of water," said Peter. He generally takes them with him ; especially in cold weather. He locks them in a cabin and steers the whole time against the wind, until he has well rocked them, and " salvo honore," made them sea sick ; then only is he content ! We were afraid lest it might be decided to go to Kronslot. Those who took part in one such excursion last year (they think of it with terror even to this day), were overtaken by a storm, and narrowly escaped drowning ; then they went aground fast on a sand bank, and remained there for several hours up to the waist in water. At last they succeeded in reaching an island, a fire was made, and, quite naked (they had been obliged to take their wet clothes off), wrapped themselves in coarse sledge covers obtained from the peasants, and in this way they spent a whole night, warming themselves at the fire, without drink or food — new Robinson Crusoes. But this time Providence favoured us ; the red standard on the Admiral's boyer was lowered,- a sign that the excur- sion was over. We returned along the canals, viewing the town. Canals are very numerous here. " God grant me a long life, and Petersburg will become a second Amsterdam ! " boasts the Tsar. " Arrange everything as it is done in Holland," these are common words in the Tsar's ukases, in reference to the building of the town. The Tsar has a pas- sion for straight lines, everything that is straight and regular seems beautiful to him. If it were possible he would have had the whole town built according to rule and compass. The inhabitants are urged to build in lines, no building either to exceed or fall short of a fixed line, so that the streets and lanes may all be regular and straight. Houses which go beyond the line are ruthlessly pulled down. The Tsar's pride is the interminably long, straight Nevsky Prospect, which cuts through the town. The street is still quite waste amid solitary marshes, yet it is already planted with three or four rows of lime-trees, like an avenue. It is kept very clean, being swept every Saturday by captive Swedes. Many of these geometrical lines of imaginary streets PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 105 are alrnost without houses. Waymarks alone stand there ; others, already built on, bear traces of the plough and furrows of recent cultivation. Though the houses are erected of brick, according to Vitruvius' directions, yet so hurried and precarious has been the work that they threaten to fall. When a carriage passes they tremble. The swampy soil has no resistance. The Tsar's enemies predict that some time the whole town will be engulphed. One of our companions, the old Baron Loewenwold, the High Commissioner of Livonia, an amiable and clever man, told us a number of curious incidents about the beginning of the town. In order to raise the first earth rampart of the Peter and Paul fortress, dry earth was needed ; none was to be had anywhere near, all being marsh, mud and moss. Then they devised the plan of carrying the soil for the bastions from distant places in old bast sacks and mats, or even simply in the skirts of their tunics. At this Sisyphean labour two-thirds of the poor wretches perished ; more especially in consequence of the godless peculation and faithlessness of those in whose keeping they were. For months they never saw any bread, which is often difficult to procure even for money in this forlorn place. They lived on cabbage and turnips, suffered from dia'-hoea and scurvy, s\\^elled with hunger, froze in their earth ^a hibitats, whi h resembled the holes of ani- mals, and died like flies. The erection of the fortress on the Plea^.ure Island (appropriate name !) cost the lives of hundreds of thousands who were driven here by force like cattle from all parts of Russia. In fact this unna- tural city, this pleasant " Paradise," as the Tsar called it, is built on human bones ! They pay no ceremonies here either to the living or the dead. I myself have seen in various parts of the town the body of a workman wrapped in a mat, carried on a pole by men. or, bare as it was, simply laid on a sledge and taken to lh^ cemetery, where it was buried without any rite. Su'h a number of Ih? poor folk die here daily that there is no time to give 'hem all Christian burial. One hot summer day, rowing on the Neva, we noticed grey patches on the azure surface ; they turned out to be masses of dead midges — which abound in the neighbouring io6 PETER AND ALEXIS marshes. These came from Lake Ladoga. One of the oarsmen scooped up a hatful of them. While listening to Loewenwold's tales about the building of Petersburg I closed my eyes, and before me rose a vision of countless human bodies, very grey and small, like these masses of dead midges floating on the Neva, a mass without beginning or end, of persons whom nobody knows and nobody remembers. On my return home I sat down to write this diary in my small room, a veritable bird's cage, in the attic, just below the roof. It felt close, I opened the window, in rushed the smell of spring, also of tar and pine shavings. On the banks of the Neva two carpenters, a young man and an old one, were repairing a boat. Nothing but the hammering was heard, and the monotonous melancholy song which the younger man was singing over and over again. Here are the few words I was able to catch : In the town Saint Petersburg On the river Neva, On the glorious Basil Isle, A sailor rigged his ship, O ! Gazing up towards the evening sky, pale green, trans- parent and cold as ice, I listened to this melancholy song, so like a wail, and myself was moved almost to tears. May 3. To-day hsr Hi dmess went to see the Tsaritsa ; she com- plained about Gedeonoff, and also asked for a more regular payment of th^ money. I was present at the interview. The Tsarit a was amiable as usual. " Czaaris h2 Majestat Euch sehr lieb," she said to the Crown Princess in her broken German, during the conversa- tion. " Believe me, his Majesty is very fond of you. ' Truly Catherine,' said he, ' your daughter-in-law is exceedingly pleasing both in appearance and temperament.' ' Your Majesty,' said I, ' you love your daughter more than me.' ' No,' he answered and laughed, ' not more, but very soon I will love her as much. My son,' said he, ' is really not worthy of so good a wife.' " PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 107 We concluded from thsse words that the Tsar was not over fond of his son. When her Highness almost tearfully interceded for her husband, the Tsaritsa promised to be his advocate, always with the same amiability, assuring her that she loved her as her own child, and had she carried her under her heart, she could not have loved her better. I don't like this Russian sentimentality : it is honey on the knife's point. Yet it appears that her Highness does not deceive herself ; she once said in my presence that the Tsaritsa was worse than the rest : " pire que tout le reste." To-day, coming home from the interview, she remarked, " she will never forgive me if I bear a son." One day when our conversation had turned on the Tsaritsa, an old peasant woman whispered into my ear, " She has no business to reign ; she was neither born to it, nor is she a Russian. And we know how she was taken prisoner, brought into the camp with only a chemise on, and given into custody. The man on duty, our officer, gave her a coat. The Lord alone knows of what rank she is ; they say she used to wash shirts in Finland." I could not help remembering this to-day when her Highness, in greeting the Tsaritsa, was going to stoop and kiss her dress, according to court etiquette. It is true the Tsaritsa did not allow it to come to that, but herself embraced and kissed her. Yet, what an irony of fate, that a Princess of Wolfenbiittel, heiress of the great Guelphs, who contested the German Imperial Crown in days when the houses of Hohenzollern and Hapsburg had never yet been heard of, should kiss the dress of this woman who once was a laundress ! May 4. After warm sunny days it has suddenly turned wintry again, with cold wind, wet, snow and rain. Ice from the Ladoga is floating down the Neva. We are told, however, that snow falls here even as late as June. Our palace has been so neglected that even its roof has proved unsound ; to-night, during a severe rainfall, water came through the ceiling in her Highness's bedchamber ; a io8 PETER AND ALEXIS good thing it did not come on the bed ; but there was a pool on the floor. The ceiHng is decorated with a painted allegory ; a burn- ing altar entwined with roses ; on both sides Cupids bearing two coats of arms ; the Russian Eagle and the Brunswick Steed. Between them, two clasped hands and the inscrip- tion, " Non unquam junxit nobiliora fides." " Never did fidelity join two nobler beings." The damp has formed a black spot just over the altar, and cold dirty water kept dripping from Hymen's flame. I remembered the wedding speech made by the archeolo- gist Eckhardt, in which he tried to prove that both bride and bridegroom descended from the Byzantine Emperor, Con- stantine Porphyrogenitus. A fine country, where rain falls on the nuptial couch of the descendant of the Porphyro- gene ! May 5. At last the Crown Prince has appeared. He lives in the other half of the house, quite separate from us, and often weeks pass by without our ever seeing him. The pair have had a 'scene.' I heard it all from the adjacent room where her Highness had expressly wished me to remain. To all her prayers and complaints in regard to the Gedeo- noff affair and the keeping back of money, he answered, shrugging his shoulders " Mich nichts angehn. Bekijmmere mich nicht an Sie. This matter is no business of mine. I do not trouble my- self about your money affairs." Then he burst out reproaching her for complaining to his father about him. " Are you not ashamed of yourself ? " sobbed her High- ness. " Spare at least your own honour ! In Germany you would not find a cobbler or tailor, who would allow himself thus to treat his wife." " You are no longer in Germany but in Russia." " 1 am only too well aware of this. Yet if only every- thing were carried out that was promised." " Who promised ? ' " Did not \ou with the Tsar sign the marriage contract ? " " Halten Maul ! Ich habe sie nichts versprochen. Hold PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 109 your tongue ! I promised you nothing. You very \vell know that you were forced upon me ! " He jumped up; the chair he had sat on fell to the ground. I almost rushed to her rescue, I was afraid he would strike her. I hated him to such an extent at that moment, that I believe I could have killed him. " Das danke ihnen der Henker ! May the headsman reward you for this !" exclaimed the Crown Princess, beside herself with anger and sorrow. Swearing at her in an odious manner, he left the room, slamming the door. It seems all that is wild and base in thiscountr\^ is in- carnate in this man. Only one thing I find hard to decide. Which is he, a fool or a scoundrel ? Poor Charlotte ! Her Highness, who daily shows me greater friendship, quite beyond my deserts, has herself desired that T should so call her. Poor Charlotte, when 1 came to her, she threw herself into my arms, and remained silent for a long while, trembling all over. At last she said sobbing : " If only I were not wich child and could, without hin- drance return to Germany, I would gladly agree to live there on dry bread and water. I am well nigh losing my reason. I pray God to give me strength, so that I may not be tempted to do something desperate ! " And after awhile she gently added, weeping in her wonted submissiveness, which frightens me more than oil her despair : — " I am the unhappy victim of my family. They have profited nothing from my sacrifice, while I myself am slowly dying of grief." * * * We were both crying when they came to tell us it was time to go to the masquerade. Suppressing our tears we bcjan to dress. Such is the custom here : willy nilly, be merry thou must. The masquerade took place in the open air in the Troitsky Square, near the " hotellerie." The square is very low, marshv, and covered with mud, which never dries ; part of it had been covered with beams, and wooden planks on the top of these. On the platform thus formed the masque- no PETER AND ALEXIS raders crowded. Happily the weather had again suddenly changed ; it was a calm, warm evening. But towards night a thick mist, white as milk, rose from the river and enveloped the square. Many, and especially those ladies who had on extremely thin costumes, were catching cold from the damp, and began to sneeze and cough. Instead of medicine they were given brandy; grenadiers as usual carried it round in buckets. In the white shroud of mist, illumined by the greenish light of the slowly fading twilight — later on in July twilight lasts the whole night through — all these masque- raders, harlequins, pagliazzi, shepherdesses, nymphs, Chinese, Arabs, bears, cranes, and dragons, seemed grotes- que and terrible phantoms. Here also, close to the platform on which we were danc- ing, black posts with iron points were visible, and on them remained the almost putrefied heads of decapitated criminals. The stench from these heads mingled with the resinous perfimie of young pine shoots and birch buds, which now fills the city. And again it seemed, as it always does in this place, all was but a mirage ! May 6. An unexpected reconciliation ! When I .approached the half open door, leading to her Highness's apartment, I saw by chance in the mirror that she was sitting in an armchair, while the Crown Prince, stooping over her and holding her head with both his hands, was kissing her upon the brow with deferential tenderness. I was going to retire, but she too caught sight of me in the mirror and signed to me with her hand. I understood that she wished me to stay, as I did last time, in the next room. The poor girl probably wantsd to parade her happiness. " Der Mensch, der sagen, ich sie nicht lieb habe, liigt wie Teufel " ! ', He who says, I don't love you lies like the devil ! " said the Tsarevitch ; I divined that they were talking of one of those slanders about her Highness, which circulate here so freely, (she is even accused of unfaithful- ness to her husband). "I believe in you. I know you are good ; and those who speak evil about you are not worth your little finger." He enquired after her affairs, her troubles, her health, her condition, with such sympathy, and his words and PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH iii features were so full of intelligence and kindness that he seemed to me quite another being. I could scarcely believe my eyes and ears, remembering what had passed in the same room only yesterday. When he left and we were alone, Charlotte said to me : '' What a strange man he is, not in the least what he seems. Nobody knows him. How he loves me ! Ah, my dear Juhana, give me love, and all will be well, I can endure everything ! And when a child will be born unto me, I pray God it may be a son, I shall be quite happy ! " I did not answer ; I had not the courage to undeceive her ; she was already so happy, but for how long ? poor, poor woman ! Perhaps I am unfair to the Tsarevitch ? May be, he is really different from what he seems. He is the most reserved of men. When he is not drunk, he sits buried among his old books : he is supposed to be studying Universal History, and Theology, not only Russian, but also the Catholic and Protestant ; he is said to have read through the German Bible eight times : or else he holds converse with monks, pilgrims, friars, and people of the lowest class. One of his servants, a certain Fedor Yevarlakoff, an intelligent young fellow, a great lover of literature — he borrows from me various books, even Latin ones — told me one day something concerning the Crown Prince, which I at once set down in my note book, a gift from dear Leibnitz, which I always carry with me. " The Tsarevitch is warmly attached to the priests and the priests to him. He reveres them like God, and they call him a saint ; they always beatify him to the people." I remember Leibnitz telling me, that on being introduced to him in the summer of 1711, at the ducal castle of Wolfen- biittel, he had a long conversation with the Tsarevitch on his favourite subject : the union of the East with the West, China and Russia with Europe, and that later on he had sent him, through his tutor Baron Huissen, an abstract of the letters about Chinese affairs, Liebnitz asserted that, contrary to all rumours spread about the Tsarevitch, he is very clever, only his intelligence is of a chfferent kind to his 112 PETER AND ALEXIS father's. "He probably takes after his grandfather," re- marked Leibnitz. Her Highness had shown me a copy of the letter received by the Duke Ludwig Rudolf of Wolfenbuttel,her father, from the Berlin Royal Academy of Science. This letter mentions the possibility of spreading real Christian enlightenment throughout Russia in the near future, thanks to the special and marked incHnation of the Crown Prince to all science and books. I have also seen the report of meetings held by the same Academy, in 171 1, when one of its members, the Co-Rector Frish, had declared : " The Tsar's heir loves the sciences even mo:e than the Tsar himself, and in his time he will patronise them no less." It seems strange ! But I was looking at them both to- day in the mirror, as it were the mysterious mirror of fate, I seemed to distinguish in both faces, so unlike in appear- ance, one common trait— the shadow of some impending grief, as if they were victims, and great suffering were in store for them both. Or was this only fancy roused by that dark mirror ? May 8. To-day we were present at the launching of a large seventy-gun man-of-war. The Tsar, dressed as a common shipwright, in a red knitted jerkin daubed with tar, axe in hand, was clambering about the hull props, seeing that all was in order, and paying no heed to danger:— only lately two men were killed at a launching. I remembered the Tsar's words : "I toil like Noah at the Ark of Russia ! " Taking his hat off before the chief Admiral, like a subordinate to his chief, he asked whether it was time to begin, and having received the order, he was the first to strike with his axe. A hundred more axes began to cut the props, at the same time the beams were drawn back which had suppotted the vessel on both sides in the stays. She ghded along the greased cradle foot, first slowly, then like a dart, smashing the cradle foot into shivers, and floated out on the water, rolling and cutting the waves for the first time to the sound of music, cannon salutes, and shouting of the people. A small boat took us to the new vessel. The Tsar was on board already ; he had changed into the uniform of a naval PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 113 officer, and decorated with a star and the pale blue ribbon of St. Andrew, he received the guests. All standing on the deck, " the newly born " ship was baptized with a first cup of wine. The Tsar made a speech. Here are some stray words I have remembered : — " Our people resemble children, who never will learn their ABC unless they are made to ; they grumble''at the time, but once having mastered it, they are grateful. The occurrences of to-day prove this. Has not everything been done under compulsion ? And yet words of gratitude are already heard for those undertakings which have borne fruit. If you disdain the bitter, neither shall you enjoy the sweet ! " Standing behind me, I overheard one of the fools, an old boyar, who was probably drunk, whisper to his neighbour, " We would rather not have your blessings when they have to be purchased by so many aches ani pains." " We have," continued the Tsar, " the precedents of the civilised nations in Europe, who also began in a small way. It is time for us also to make a start, fiist in Httle things, and later will come men who will not recoil before the greater tasks. I know I shall neither do it, nor see it done, for the number of our days is but short, yet will I make a beginning, then those who come after me will find it easier. As for us, we must content ourselves with the glory of having begun ! " I admired the Tsar, he looked so noble. We went down into the cabins, the ladies sat part from the men in an adjacent saloon, where, during the banquet, no man except the Tsar was allowed to enter. There was a small round window, hung with red damask, in the partition between the two saloons. I sat next to it ; raising the curtain a httle I could see and partly hear what went on in the men's apartment. Some of the things I have put down in my note book. Long narrow tables, arranged in the shape of a horse shoe, were laden with cold dishes ; pickles and fumados, anything that would create intense thirst. The food is coarse, the wines are good. For the furnishing of these banquets the Tsar allows the Admiralty from his private purse one thousand roubles, a vast sum for this country. The guests sat down anyhow, without any distinction of H 114 PETER AND ALEXIS rank, common seamen next to the highest dignitaries. At one of the tables presided the Kniaz-Pope, the mock Prince- pope, surrounded by his cardinals. He solemnly pronounced " Grace and peace be unto you, noble assembly ! In the name of Bacchus, and Ivaska Khmelnitsky, and the Spirit of wine. The drunkenness of Bacchus be with you ! " " Amen," responded the Tsar, who fills the position of Archdeacon to the Pope. All guests approached in their turn his Holiness, bowed low before him, kissed his hand, and accepting a ladle of pepper-brandy drank it ; this is pure spirit of wine — spiritus vini— poured over red Indian pepper. I should have thought that the mere threat of this brandy would be sufficient to extract confessions from the most hardened malefactor, — here they compel even ladies to drink it. The health of all the members of the royal household was proposed ; only the Tsarevitch and his wife were omitted, although they were present. Every toast was accompanied by the firing of cannon, and the shock of the firing was so great that the glass in one of the windows cracked. The guests grew speedily intoxicated, especially as brandy was being secretly added to the wine. The air became close in the low cabins, crowded with people. The guests threw off their waistcoats, and pulled ofl one another's wigs. Some huddled together and kissed one another, others quarrelled, especially the ministers and senators, who accused one another of bribe-taking, cheating and swindhng. " Your mistress costs you twice your salarj- ! " screamed one. "Have you forgotten the pickled cibarins?«" retorted the other. Cibarins were pieces of gold, which a cunning petitioner had offered in a small barrel under the guise of mushrooms. " And how much hemp supplied to the Admiralty did you take off at a gulp, eh ? " " Ah, friends, what is the use of blaming one another ? everybody longs for what is good ; whether honourable or swindlers, all men are sinners." " Bribes are mere accidents ! " "To accept nothing from the petitioners isagainst nature." " Yet by law " PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 115 " What is law but a carriage pole ? you can swing it whichever way you like " The Tsar listened attentively. It is his custom, when all are drunk, to double the guards and let no one pass out of the door. At the same time, the Tsar, who is never drunk, much as he may take, tries purposely to provoke quarrels among them. He then learns what he could never have known otherwise. There is a proverb to this effect — " When rogues fall out honest men come by their own." The banquet develops into a public inquiry into character. The Most Serene Prince Menshikoff quarrelled with the Vice-Chancellor Shafiroff ; the Prince had called the latter a Jew. " I am a Jew, but you are a pieman," retorted Shafiroff, " Your father had not even a spoon to eat his soup with. You have been dragged up, ' taken from the mire you have been made a sire ' " — " You dirty Jew, I'll crack you on my nail like a flea, and nothing but a little moisture will remain." They went on railing at one another for a long time. Russians are as a rule very versatile in ribaldry ; I think it is impossible to hear more obscene language anywhere else ; the air is full of it. In one of the vilest expressions used by young and old, the term mother is coupled with the most obscene of terms : it is known as the ' mother- word.' Having exhausted their resources of abuse, the dignitaries began to spit into one another's faces, while the guests stood round looking on and laughing. Here such scuffles are quite common, and involve no further consequences. Prince James Dolgoruki had a tussle with the Prince Caesar Romadanofiski. These two venerable old men, both white with age, abused one another in most insulting terms, then tore one another's hair, and began strangling and beating one another with their fists. When some of the onlookers tried to separate them, they drew out their swords. " Ei ! dat ist nitt permittet," exclaimed the Tsar in Dutch, coming up and standing between them. The Archdeacon Peter Mihailoff is commanded by the Pope " to pacify the guests by word and act during the uproar." ii6 PETER AND ALEXIS " I want satisfaction ! " moaned Prince James, " I have been sorely affronted." " Comrade," remonstrated the Tsar, " Where can you seek judgment against Caesar but from God ? I myself am but a subject, and belong to his Majesty's service. What is the affront after all ? None of the assembly has remained untouched by Bacchus. Sauffen-rauffen, we drink, light, sleep, and make friends." For punish Tient each of them was made to drink another bumper of pepper-brandy. Soon they both were rolling under the table. Buffoons were shouting, grinning, spitting, not only at one another but also at decent people. A special chorus, called the Spring chorus, imitated the singing of all birds from the nightingale to the warbler, in such piercing, shrill notes that the walls resounded with a deafening noise. A wild dance-song was heard ; its words almost meaningless recalled the screams of a witches' sabbath — Shinshau ! Shevergen ! Beat the pace, beat ! Don't spare your feet ! In our ladies' apartment the old drunken fool, the Princess Abbess Rjevskaya, a veritable witch, whirled away in a dance, lifting her skirts above her head and singing in a voice hoarse with drink : — Tune up ! tune up ! my music sweet Work on, work on my staff. My father-in-law from the stove Has fallen into a trough ! Had I but known this would occur I would have placed him at the top. And falling, he'd have broken his head. . . . The Tsaritsa, with her hair in disorder, covered with sweat, red and flown with wine, was watching her, and beat the time with her hands and foot, and laughed like mad. At the beginning of the orgie she tried to persuade her Highness to drink, using some curious sayings, which api:)ear to be numerous on the subject in Russian. " Bumper on bumper is better than stroke upon stroke! " Even cabbages flag PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 117 without water!" "Even a hen must drink!" Yet, noticing that the Crown Princess was almost fainting, she left off, and even secretly added water to her v/ine and ours at the same time. To water wine is counted a great crime at such banquets. Towards the end of the night — we had remained at table from six in the evening till four in the morning — the Tsaritasa several times went to the door and beckoned to the Tsar, saying : " Isn't it time to go home ? " "Never mind, Katinka, to-morrow is a holiday," answered the Tsar. Each time I lifted the curtain I saw something new in the men's apartment. Somebody walking across the table had stepped with his boot into a dish of fish brawn. Ths Tsar had only a mo- ment before forced some of this fieh down th^ Chancellor Golovkin's throat. Golovkin could not bear fish ; ser- vants held his arms and legs ; he struggled, choked, and grew very red. Having done with Golovkin, the Tsar turned to Ihe Hanoverian Resident, Weber ; he fondled and kissed him. with one hand he supported his head, with the other he held a bumper to his lips, begging him to 'rink it. Then taking off his wig, he kissed now the front, v.ow the back of his head. He lifted his lips and kissed his teeth. They say the reason of this tenderness was the Tsar's desire to get out of the Resident a diplomatic secret, Moussin Pushkin, who was being tickled below the neck, squealed like a young pig brought to the knife. He is very ticklish. The Tsar is trying to accustom him to it. The great Admiral Apraksin burst into a flood of tears. The privy councillor Tolstoi crept about on all fours ; it turned out afterwards that he was not so drunk as he pre- tended ; he did it to escape more drink. A bottle had cut open the Vice Admiral Cruis' head. Prince Menchikoff had fallen to the ground ; he seemed comatose ; his face had grown livid. People busied themselves round him and tried by rubbing to revive him, lest he should die — death is not an unusual ending to such orgies. The Tsar's chaplain, the Archimandrite Theodosius, was sick ; " I shall die, holy Mother ! " he piteously moaned. The Kniaz-Pope Ii8 PETER AND ALEXIS was snoring ; his head lay on the table in a pool ol wine Hissing, roaring, the noise of breaking china, bad language, boxes on the ear, which no longer called forth any attention, seemed to fill th2 air. A stench prevailed as in the vilest tavern. Had anyone come down from the outside he could not have helped vomiting. My head swam. I seemed at times to lose consciousness. The human faces all looked beastlike ; the Tsar's the most terrible of all. Large and round, with staring eyes, slightly oblong and prominent, with pointed moustaches standing out, it was the face of a tiger or a huge wild cat. Calm and disdainful, his look was clear and piercing. He alone had remained sober ; and was now with curiosity peering into the vilest mysteries, into the bared soul of human beings, which lay turned inside out before him in this inquisition chamber, where the instrument of torture was wine. The Kniaz-Pope was roused and lifted from the table. The Kniaz-Caesar had also had time to sleep off his worst. They were made to dance together ; incapable of standing on their feet they had to be propped up on both sides. The pope wore a mock tiara crowned by a nude Bacchus, in his hands he held a cross made of pipes. The Caesar, wearing a mock crown, held a sceptre in his hand. The Tsarevitch lay on the ground dead drunk, between these two fools, these phantoms of ancient dignity — the Russian Tsar and the Russian Patriarch. What happened next I don't remember, and will not even try to recall, it was too disgusting. On the neighbouring ships reveille was sounded. On ours too the roll of the drum was heard. The Tsar himself, who is an excellent drummer, was sounding retreat. This signified that a great battle had been waged with Bacchus, and he had remained victor. Grenadiers were bearing away drunken nobles, like bodies from a battle field. When we saw the sky at last, it seemed to us we had escaped — to be grandiose — from hell ; speaking vulgarly — from a cesspool. May 9 To-day the Tsar left Petersburg with a large fleet, he has gone to meet the Swedes. PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 119 May 20. It is a long time since I wrote in this diary. Her High- ness has been ill after the entertainment. I have not left her. And besides there is nothing worth writing about. Everything is so sad, that one feels inclined neither to talk nor think ; let come what will ! May 25. I was not far wrong, the truce did not last long. Again a black cloud has come between the Tsarevitch and her Highness. Again they do not meet for whole weeks. He too is ill. The doctors say it is consumption ; I think it is brandy. June 4. The Tsarevitch came in dressed for a journey in a Ger- man travelling coat ; he talked about things in general, and all at once said : " Adieu, ich gehe nach Karlsbad." The Crown Princess was so taken aback that she could say nothing. She did not even ask for how long. I thought he was joking, but afterwards it appeared that almost immediately on leaving us, he had taken his seat in the coach and was gone. It is said he has really gone to Karlsbad for a cure. And now we are left alone without Tsar or Tsarevitch. Her Highness does not receive any letters from her parents ; they probably believe the slanders circulated about her and are displeased with her. We are forsaken by all. July 7. A letter from the Tsar to her Highness. " I do not wish to trouble you, nor act against my conscience, but the absence of your husband, my son, compels me to do so, in order to prevent the idle talk of loose tongues, which are wont to convert truth into lies. The fact of your pregnancy has been spread abroad ; and therefore a certain arrange- ment must be made for the time when by God's will you will be delivered. The Chancellor Golovkin will acquaint you with the details of what you will be expected to con- form to, and then the mouths of all slanderers will be closed." The arrangement was made. Her Highness was sur- rounded by three women : the Vice Chancellor's wife, 120 PETER AND ALEXIS General Bruce's wife, and the old fool Rjevskaya, the same who danced at the banquet. Her Highness was only slightly acquainted with th^m. These three shrews are continuously about her, ostensibly to take care of her, really to act as simple spies. And what does all this mean ? what are they frightened at ? what deception is possible ? surely not an exchange ; a boy for a girl, by those who would like to see the inheri- tance assured to the offspring of the Tsarevitch. Or is it only an excess of amenity on the Tsaritsa's part ? Only now we realize how much we are hated and sus- pected. Charlotte's whole crime consists in being her husband's wife. The father is against his son, and we stand between them as between two fires. " I will obediently submit to your Majesty's wish with regard to the appointment of these three women for my protection," Charlotte replied, to the Tsar, " all the more as the thought of deceiving you or the Crown Prince had never entered my head. I am hurt by this strange and unmerited treatment. I thought the love and clemency so often promised me by your Majesty were sufficient safe- guard against slander, and a warrant that the gTiilty ones should meet with due punishment. It is grievous that my enemies should be strong enough to incite such intrigues. God is my only refuge in this foreign land, and when aban- doned by everybody else. He will hearken unto the sighs of my heart and put an end to my sufferings. " July 12. This morning at 7 o'clock her Highness was success- fully delivered of a daughter. No news whatever from the Tsarevitch. August I. The news of a Russian victory over the Swedes on July 27, has arrived ; it is said an entire squadron under the command of Ehrenshild has been captured. The whole day long the bells are ringing and cannon firing. It is true they are not economical of their powder here ; the most insignificant victory, the taking of three or four rotten galleys is sufficient excuse for firing off cannon, and at such a rate as though the world had been conquered. PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 121 Septeirher 9. The Tsar has returned to Petersburg. Again a cannon- ade as though it were a besieged city. We are almost deaf. Endless triumphal processions, fireworks with boastful allegories : the Tsar is glorified as if he were a conqueror of worlds, a Caesar or an Alexander. Again an orgie ; we thanked the Lord we were spared this time. Again, it is said, they drank like swine. Rain and mud. A low, dark and, as it were, impenetrable sky looks in through the win- dows. Wet crows perch cawing on the bare branches. Dreariness ! Dreariness ! September ig. I found the Crown Princess weeping over old letters the Tsarevitch had written her during their engagement. Crooked, broken characters on pencil lines, empty com- pliments, diplomatic amiabilities. And she, poor thing, shed tears in looking over them ! We learnt by chance that the Tsarevitch lives incognito in Karlsbad and will not return here before the winter. September 20. In order to forget myself, and not to think about our affairs, I have decided to write down everything I see or hear about the Tsar. Leibnitz is right — " quanto magis hujus Principis indolem prospicio tanto earn magis admiror" — The longer I watch this sovereign's character the more I marvel at it. October i. I have seen the Tsar forge iron in the dock-yard smithy. The courtiers ministered to him, made the fire up, blew the bellows, carried the coal, soiling the silk and velvet of their gold-embroidered coats thereby. " That's right ; that is as a Tsar ought to be ! He does not eat his bread unearned. He works better than a * bourlak, ' " said one of the bystanders, a common working man. The Tsar was wearing a leather apron ; his hair was tied up with a string ; his sleeves were turned up and showed his bare sinewy arms : his face was smeared with soot. The tall smith, lit up by the red blaze of the furnace, resembled a Titan. His hammer hit the white, hot iron so hard that 122 PETER AND ALEXIS the sparks showered around, the anvil trembled and rang as if on the point of being smashed into shivers. I remembered the words spoken by an old boyar : " Sovereign, thou would'st forge a new Russia out of Vulcan's iron. Hard work for the hammer ! hard, too, for the anvil ! " " Time, too, is like hot iron ; forge it at white heat ! " So runs one of the Tsar's sayings. And he indeed forges Russia at white heat. He never rests ; he is always hurrying somewhither. It seems as though he could not stop to rest even if he would. He is killing himself with feverish activity, an incredible tension of strenuousness, a ceaseless convulsiveness. The doctors say that his strength is undermined ; that he won't live long. He is always taking the Olonetz iron waters, yet at the same time he drinks brandy ; thus the remedy does more harm than good. The first impression he leaves on the observer is rapidity. He is all motion ; does not walk, but runs. The Imperial Ambassador, Count Kinski — a pretty solid man — assures us that he would rather take part in battles, than have a two hours' audience with the Tsar, because is is forced, in spite of his stoutness, to run after him all the time, so that he is bathed in sweat even in the severest Russian frost. " Time is like life," repeats the Tsar. " Loss of time is death." t^ :k ilfi ilfi ilfi Fire and water are his elements, he loves them like one born in them. — water like a lish, fire like a salamander. He has a passion for cannonades, and for various experi- ments with fire and fireworks. He always lights the fire- works himself, rushing into the flames ; I was present once when he singed his hair. He says he is inuring his people to the smell of powder ; but this is only an excuse, fire itself he simply loves. His passion is as great for water. Although the off- spring of Muscovy's Tsars who never saw the sea, he yet began longing for it, when, but a child, he was secluded in the close terems of the Kremlin Palace, like a wild gosling in a hen-house. He used to float in toy boats on artificial lakes. When he last he got to the sea he could not tear himself away from PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 123 it again. He spends most of his time on water, he sleeps every day after dinner on his frigate ; when ill he lives on board altogether, and sea-air generally cures him. Dur- ing the summer he feels the lack of air, even among the large gardens of Peterhof, so he fitted himself up a bed- room in Monplaisir, a small house, washed by the Finnish Gulf ; the windows of the bedroom look straight upon the sea. In Petersburg the Observatory is built on a sandbank in the mouth of the Neva. In the Summer Garden, also, the Palace is surrounded on two sides by water. Steps lead from the door straight down into the water, just as in Amsterdam and Venice. Once, during winter, when the Neva had already put on her ice-chains, and only before the Palace there remained a round, open ice-free space, about a hundred yards in circumference, he sailed on it up and down in a tiny boat, like a duck in a pool. When the whole river was covered with hard ice he ordered a space, about a hundred yards long and thirty yards wide, to be daily cleared and swept of the snow : I myself have seen him sliding along this surface in small pretty boyers, fitted with steel skates and bulge-ways. " We sail on the ice," said he, "so as not to forget our nautical exercises during the winter." Another time, at Moscow, in the Christmas holi- days, he went along the streets in a huge sleigh — rigged in imitation of a real sailing vessel. He loves letting young geese and ducks, which the Tsaritsa gives him, go into the water. He delights in their glee , as though he himself were a water bird. :(: :^ :f: :{: :{: He says his first thoughts about the sea date from his read- ing the narrative of the maritime expedition of Prince Oleg of Kieff to Constantinople, recorded by the Chronicler Nestor. If this be true he is only resuscitating the old in the new, the native in the foreign. From the sea, across the land to the sea — this is Russia's course ! Sometimes it seems to me that the contradictions of his two beloved elements, water and fire, have merged in him into one being, strange and curious. I know not whether kind or cruel, divine or diabolic — but certainly inhuman. 124 PETER AND ALEXIS A strange timidity occasionally besets him. I myself have seen him at a pompous reception of Ambassadors sitting on the throne, confused, blushing, perspiring, trying to gain courage by repeatedly taking snuff ; he did not know what to do with his eyes, and even avoided his wife's glances. When the ceremony was over and he was no longer obliged to stay on the throne, he was as merry as a school-boy. The Markgravine of Brandenburg told me that at her first inter\'iew with the Tsar — who it is true was quite young at that time — he turned away, covered his face with his hands like a shy debutante, and did nothing but repeat, " Je ne sais pas m'exprimer " — " I cannot talk." He soon recovered, however, and became almost too free. He expressed the desire to convince him- self that the German ladies' hard waists, which so surprised the Russians, were not caused by their bony nature, but by the whalebones in the stays. " II pourrait etre plus poli " — " He might have been a little more polite," observed the Markgravine. Baron Manteuffel related to me the Tsar's interview with th^ Queen of Prussia : " He was so amiable that before offering her his hand he put on a rather dirty glove. At ths supper he surpassed himself. He neither picked his teeth, nor belched, nor uttered any other unbecoming noises (il n'a ni rote ni pete)." When travelling about Europe he insisted that nobody should look at him, and that the roads and streets he had to pass should be quite empty. He entered houses and went out of them by secret ways ; visiting museums by night. One day, in Holland, when he was obliged to pass through a hall where the members of the States-General were sitting, he asked the president to make the whole assembly turn their backs to him as he passed ; and when respect for the Tsar would not allow them to do so, he pulled his wig down to his nose, hurried through the room and antechamber, and ran down the stair. One day, rowing on the canal at Amsterdam, and notic- ing a boat with inquisitive spectators attempting to ap- proach him, he fell into such a fury that he flung two empty bottles at the steersman's head, and nearly brained him. A real savage ! A Russian demon in a civilized Europe ! A savage and a child ! All Russians in general are children. PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 125 The Tsar only pretends to be grown up when among them. I shall never forget how, at the village fair near Wolfen- biittel, the hero of Poltava rode on the wooden horses of a second-rate roundabout, tried to catch brass hoops on a stick, and enjoyed himself like a small schoolboy. Children are cruel. The Tsar's favourite diversion is to force people into doing something for which they have an instinctive aversion. Those who cannot stand wine, butter, cheese, oysters, or vinegar, are on every possible occasion stuffed with them by the Tsar. Those who are ticklish are tickled by him. Many, to please him, pretend that they are unable to endure what he specially delights in administering. Sometimes these jokes are fearful, especially during the festi- vities in the Christmas holidays, the so-called Slavleniya. This amusement, an old boyar told me, is so terrible, that many prepare for it as for death. People are dragged by ropes from one ice hole to another ; others are compelled to sit on the ice bare-buttocked ; others again are killed by excessive drink. This is the way a creature alien to man, a faun or a centaur would play with men, maiming them and killing them unawares. In the anatomical theatre at Leyden he was one day watching how the exposed muscles of a body w^ere being saturated with turpentine. Noticing a look of extreme repulsion. on the lace of one of his Russian companions, the Tsar took him by the collar, bent him over the table, and insisted on his tearing the muscles off the body with his teeth. At times it is almost impossible to say where childish frolic ends and the cruelty of a beast begins. ***** Coupled with strange awkwardness and timidity he displays savage shamelessness, especially towards women. " II faut que SaMajeste ait dans le corps une legion de de- mons de luxure." " His Majesty must incorporate a legion of sensual devils," says the court physician Blumentrost. He presumes that the Tsar's scurvy is the outcome of an older ailment which had troubled him in early youth. To quote the expression of one of the" new Russians" — " The Tsar displays a political leniency with regard to sexual immorality" — the more sinners, the more recruits, and he needs recruits. He himself considers love to be 126 PETER AND ALEXIS only a natural instinct. Once during his stay in England, when a courtezan was not satisfied with her present of five hundred guineas, he said to Menshikoff : " You think I am as great a spendthrift as yourself. For five hundred guineas old men serve me with zeal and brains, and this jade has served me damnably badly, you yourself know in what way." The Tsaritsa is not in the least degree jealous. He re- lates to her all his affairs of the heart, but always ends with the compliment, " and still you are better than the whole pack of them, Catherine!" Strange rumours are circulated and voiced abroad with regard to the Tsar's Denshiks. One of them, General Yagou- shinsky, is supposed to have gained his master's favours in ways which cannot be well talked about. The handsome Le- fort, so says an amiable old gentleman about the Court, was so intimate with the Tsar that they had one mistress between them. It is rumoured that the Tsaritsa, before living with the Tsar, had been the the mistress of Menshikoff. Men- shikoff, in his turn, had taken in Catharine's affections the place of Lefort. This man Menshikoff, " risen from the mire," who, in the Tsar's own words, was conceived in law- lessness, born to sin, and is ending his life in rascality, has an almost inexplicable power over Peter. The Tsar will some- times beat him like a dog, throw him to the ground, trample upon him ; one would think it was all over, and yet, the next moment, they have again made peace, and are even kissing one another. I have myself heard the Tsar calling him his dear Alexasha, his own darling, and Menshikoff returned the compliment. This ci-devant street pieman has become so insolent that he said one day to the Tsarevitch (true, he was drunk at the time), " You will see as Uttle of the Crown as of vour own ears. The crown is my property." October 8. To-day, a Dutch merchant's wife, who died of dropsy, was buried. The Tsar himself peformed the operation of tap- ping her. They say her death was caused less by illness than by the operation. The Tsar was present at both funeral and commemoration banquet. He drank and en- joyed himself vastly. He considers himself a great sur- PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 127 geon. Persons about him unlucky enough to have a swel- hng or gathering do their best to conceal it, for fear the Tsar should begin cutting it. He has a strange liking for anatomy. He cannot see a body without having it dis- sected, and examines post mortem all the bodies of his rela- tives. He delights in drawing teeth, having learnt the art in Hol- land from a travelling dentist. There is a bagful of rotten teeth extracted by the imperial forceps preserved in the Kunst-Kammer here. In the face of suffering he displays cynical curiosity and a cynical kindheartedness. He has himself performed an intestinal operation on his page, an Arab. His whole nature is a combination of strength and weak- ness. This is apparent at once even in his face : terrible eyes from which nothing escapes, one look of which suffices to make people swoon ; lips, thin, delicate, almost feminine, with a cunning smile ; a chin, soft, round, plump, with a dimple. We are positively sick of hearing about the hat pierced with bullets at Poltava : I have no doubt that he can be brave, especially when victorious. All victors are brave. But has he always been as brave as it is believed ? The Saxon Engineer Hallart, who took part in the Narva campaign of 1700, tells me, that when the Tsar knew of the approach of Charles XII, he made over the command of the army to the Due de Croy, with instructions hurriedly written, bearing neither date, nor seal, quite unintelligible, confused, and himself in great perturbation quitted the scene of action. The Swedish prisoner. Count Pipper, has shown me a medal struck by the Swedes ; on one side the Tsar is warm- ing his hands at the fire of his cannons which are sending shells into the besieged Narva. The inscription is — " And Peter stood at the fire and warmed himself," an allusion to the Apostle Peter in the court of the high priest ! On the other side Russians are represented retreating from Narva ; Peter in front, his crown tumbling from his head, his sword thrown away, wipes his tears with a handkerchief ; and 128 PETER AND ALEXIS the inscription runs — "And going out, he wept bitterly." All this may be slander ; yet why has no one even dared to invent slanders about Alexander or Caesar ? Some- thing similarly strange happened during the Pruth cam- paign. At the most dangerous moment, just before the battle, the Tsar was about to leave the army for the rear, under pretext of bringing up fresh forces. That he did not leave was only due to the retreat being cut off. He wrote to the Senate — that never, since he had been in service, had he been in such despair. Does not this again almost justify the legend that " going out, he wept bitterly ? " Blumentrost says that doctors know more about heroes than ever will go down to posterity ; — it appears the Tsar cannot endure the slightest physical pain. During a seri- ous illness which was expected to result in death, he was anything but heroic. "It is hardly credible," exclaimed a Russian who had been praising the Tsar in my presence, " that a great and fearless hero should be afraid of so insigni- ficant an insect as a cockroach." When the Tsar travels about Russia, new huts are erected for him to sleep in, as it is difficult to find in Russian villages a dwelling without cockroaches. He is also afraid of spiders and other insects. I myself once observed how at the sight of a cockroach he trembled, his face became pale and contorted, as at a ghost or some supernatural monster ; another moment and he would have swooned or fallen into a fit, like a tremulous woman. O to play a trick upon him, like those he plays on others ! He would probably die of fright if he were stripped and half a dozen spiders and cockroaches were let loose on him. No doubt historians would never believe that the conqueror of Charles XII died from the touch of a cockroach's legs. This dread in the presence of a small harmless creature is astonishing in a great Tsar before whom everybody trembles. I remembered the teaching about monads by Leibnitz ; it almost would seem that it was not their physical, but their metaphysical pre-existent nature, which is alien to the Tsar's nature. His fear was not only ludicrous but awful to me : it seemed as though I had sud- denly penetrated some mystery. One day a learned German, while making experiments before the Tsaritsa with an air pump, had placed a swallow PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 129 under the glass dome. When the Tsar saw the Httle bird gasp, totter, and feebly flap its wings, he said : — "Enough! Enough! don't take away innocent life, the bird has done no harm." " I think her young ones are mourning for her in the nest," added the Tsaritsa, and taking the swallow to the window she released and let it fly away. Sentimental Peter ! how strangely this sounds ! And yet I saw something closely akin to sentiment flit across those delicate almost feminine lips, the plump and dimpled chin, when the Tsaritsa said in that simpering voice with mincing smile, " her young ones are mourning for her in the nest." Was it not on that very day that this terrible ukase was published ? " His Imperial Majesty has deigned to ob- serve that the nostrils of convicts sentenced to labour for life are only incompletely torn. His Majesty orders the nostrils to be taken off to the bone, so that in case the con- victs should desert they could not hide themselves, but may easily be recognized and brought back." And this among the Admiralty Regulations : " The body of him who commits suicide must be publicly hanged by the feet." "Is he cruel ? That is a question. " He who is cruel ceases to be a hero." This is one of those saj-ings ascribed to the Tsar, which I do not quite believe ; they seem to be uttered rather for posterity. Yet posterity will know that he, while sparing a swallow, tortured a sister to death, tor- ments his wife, and it seems will, by degrees, murder his son. Is he as artless as he seems ? this too is doubtful. I know there are a number of stories in circulation with regard to the Tsar carpenter in Saardam. I must confess I never could listen to them without annoyance ; they are too instructive, too much like pictures with explanations. " Verstellte Einfalt ; " — " Sham naivete," said a witty German about him. The Russians too have a proverb, " The simpleton beats the knave." In future all pedants and schoolchildren will certainly I 130 PETER AND ALEXIS know that Tsar Peter darned his own stockings, mended his boots for economy's sake. But it is doubtful whether they will ever be acquainted with a fact told me lately by a Rus- sian timber merchant. He said that a huge amount of unused oak timber was lying near Lake Ladoga, covered over with sand and rot- ting disused. And meanwhile men are lashed and hung for the offence of cutting down and stealing oak. Human life and blood are cheaper than oak wood. I might add, cheaper than torn stockings. "C'estun grand poseur" — some one had said about him. One ought to watch him kiss the Prince Caesar's hand when he has broken some buffoon's regulation, — " Forgive, sovereign, forgive ! We rough sailors are not well versed in ceremony." One can hardly trust one's eyes ; it is impossible to distin- guish where the Tsar ends and the fool begins. He has surrounded himself with masks. The Tsar Car- penter ! 'tis a masquerade after the Dutch fashion ? And is not this new Tsar in his simplesse, in his carpenter's disguise, really further removed from the common people, than were the ancient Tsars of Muscovy in their cloth of gold ? " Nowadays life is very hard," complained the same merchant to me, " nobody is allowed to say anything ; the truth never reaches the Tsar. It used to be much simpler in the old days." I once heard the chaplain Theodosius praise him to his face for the dissimulation which, it appears, political teachers are supposed to lay down as the first duty of sovereigns. I do not judge him; I only repeat what I hear and see. All see the hero, few the man. And even if I gossip it will be forgiven me, for I am a woman. Some one has said : " This man is very good and very bad ; " as for me, I must once more repeat : " I know not whether he is better or worse than other men, but it sometimes seems to me that he is not quite human." The Tsar is pious. He reads the Acts, and sings with as much confidence as the priests themselves, seeing he knows the lauds and liturgies by heart. He composes prayers for the soldiers. PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 131 Sometimes during a conversation about military or state affairs he suddenly lifts his eyes to heaven, crosses himself and says a short prayer with evident devotion : " O God take not Thy grace from us in the days to come ! " or, " Lord grant us Thy mercy, for in Thee have we put our trust ! " This is not hypocrisy. No doubt he believes in God, as he says he puts his trust in the " Lord, strong in battle." Yet it would seem as if his God were not the God of the Christians, but of the pagans. Mars, or Nemesis — Fate herself. Never breathed a human being less like a Christian than Peter. What connection is there between the sword of Mars and the lilies of the Gospels ? I have just read a curious new book published in Ger- many under the title — Curieuse Nachricht von der itzigen Religion I. K. M. in Russland Petri Alezieviz und seines grossen Reiches, dass dieselbe itzo fast nach Evangelisch- Lutherischen Grundsdtzen eingerichtet sei. Here are a few extracts from it. " We are not far wrong in stating that his Majesty's conception of true religion takes the form of the Lutheran faith." " The Tsar has abolished the Patriarchate, and, follow- ing the example of Protestant Princes, he has declared him- self the chief Bishop, that is Patriarch of the Russian church. On his return from a journey to foreign countries he at once entered into discussions with his priests, and being con- vinced of their ignorance on questions of faith — indeed they could hardly read — he instituted schools where they might apply themselves more diligently to study. " Now that the Russians are reasonably taught and educa- ted in schools, all the superstitious beliefs and customs must of themselves disappear, for no one, except the most ignorant and simple-minded, can believe in such things. In these schools the system of teaching is quite Lutheran, and the young people are brought up according to the rules of true Christian religion. The monasteries are reduced in number, and therefore can no longer, as in olden times, shelter great numbers of idle folk, who are a burden to the state and a danger in times of revolt. Now, the monks are obliged to learn what is useful, and everything is ordered in a praiseworthy manner. Miracles and relics no longer command the reverence they formerly did ; in 132 PETER AND ALEXIS Russia, as in Germany, people have begun to believe that there is much swindling in connection with religious ceremonial." I know the Tsarevitch has read this book. What must his feelings have been during Ih^ perusal ! ***** I was present one day when, whle at their wine in the oakgrove of the Summer Garden, where the Tsar likes to converse with the clergy, the Administrator of Spiritual Affairs, the Archimandrite Theodosius, was elaborating reasons : " Why and in what sense 1h3 Roman Emperors, both pagan and Thristian, termed themselves Pontifex and high priests of the polytheistic faith." It appeared that the Tsar was the head prelate. High Priest, and Patiiarch. This Russian monk very skilfully and adroitly proved that, according to " Leviathan " by the English Atheist Hobbes, the maxim " Civitatem et ecclesiam eandem rem esse " — " the state and the church are one and the same " — certainly did not advocate converting the state into a church, but on the contrary, the conversion of the church into the state. The monstrous animal — Leviathan, fabric of the state — was swallowing up the Church of God, so that there would remain no trace of it. These discussions might serve as an interesting monument of monkish cringing and flattery before the sovereign. * * * « * It is said that already at the end of last year, 1714, the Tsar called together the spiritual and lay dignitaries, to whom he solemnly declared that he wishes to be the sole head of the Russian Church, and leaves it to them to establish a spiritual association under the name of the " Holy Synod." ***** The Tsar is planning a campaign against India, in the footsteps of Alexander the Great. To imitate Alexander and Caesar, to unite the East with the West, to found a new world -wide monarchy, these are the Russian Tsar's deepest and dearest desires. PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 133 Theodosius tells tha Tsar, " You are the God of the Earth, For this is the meaning of Di\ais Caesar. ***** At the Poltava celebrations the Russian Tsar was repre- sented on one of the allegorical pictures as Apollo, the ancient Sun-God. I learn that th3 dead heads which are still on the poles near Trinity Church, opposite to the Senate-house, were the heads of Raskolniks who have been beheaded for call- ing the Tsar " Antichrist." October 20. An old invalid, an army captam, comes sometimes into our kitchen. He is a pathetic-looking moth-eaten creature ; his head trembles, his nose is red, and he has a wooden leg ; he terms himself a " granary rat." I treat him to brandy and tobacco, and we talk about Russian military affairs. He is very cheerful and sprinkles his speech with quaint sayings, such as " A soldier serves a hundred years yet does not earn a hundred sous ; " Grain is satisfying, water intox- icating ; " " Shave with an awl, warm thyself with smoke." He has three doctors — brandy, garlic and Death. When almost a child he became a drummer boy ; he has taken part in all the campaigns from Asoff to Poltava, and has been rewarded by the Father Tsar with a handful of nuts and a kiss on the head. When speaking of the Tsar he seems to become transfigured ; and to-day he told me about the battle near the Red Farm. " We stood firm for the House of the Holy Virgin, the Serene Majesty our Tsar, and the Christian Faith ; we died for one another. We all cried with a great voice : ' Lord God ! Help us ! ' Then we beat the Swedish regiments, both infantry and artillery, by the help of the prayers of the saints of Holy Moscow." He also attempted to repeat the Tsar's speech to his army. " ' Children I have begotten you in the sweat of my toil. The state cannot exist without you, any more than the body without a soul. You have shown your love to God, to me, and your country ; you have not spared your lives.' " The old man suddenly started up on his wooden leg, his nose grew redder yet, a tear hung on its tip like a dew- 134 PETER AND ALEXIS drop on a ripe plum, and waving his old hat he exclaimed : " Vivat ! vivat ! vivat ! Peter the Great ! Emperor of all the Russias ! " Up till now I had heard no one call the Tsar " Emperor." yet I was not surprised. Such fire lit up the dim eyes of the "granary rat" that a cold shiver ran through me ; a vision of ancient Rome seemed to flash before me ; I heard the rustle of victorious standards, the trampling of brazen cohorts, the cries of soldiers, the acclamations of divine Caesar, ' Divus Caesar Imperator ! ' October 23. We have been to the People's market on the Trinity square, a long whitewashed building erected by the Italian architect Tresina ; it is roofed with tiles and has arcades, such as are seen in Verona or Padua. We went into the bookshop, the first and only one in Petersburg, which has been opened by order of the Tsar ; Basil Evdokimoff, a printer, is the manager. Besides books, Slavonic and translated, thsre are sold here calendars, decrees, primers, plans of battles, and "royal persons"; that is, portraits, and pictures of triumphant entries. The books sell badly. In the course of two or three years not a single copy of some publications has been sold. Calendars and decrees in rela- tion to bribes sell better than anything else. The director of the first prhiting press in Petersburg, a certain Avramoff, a strange but rather clever man, whom we chanced to meet in the shop, told us how difficult it is to get the foreign books translated into Russian. The Tsar is always in a great hurry, and demands, under threat of severe lashing, that the book should be translated in an impossibly short time, intelligibly and in good style. The translators weepingly complain that it is impossible to hurry with the involved German style, which is incompre- hsnsible, confused and heavy. Sometimes it has happened that despite incredible labour ten lines a day could not be rendered successfully. Boris Wolkoff, the translator to the foreign department, despaired of translating Le Jardinage de Quintiny, and, fearing the Tsar's wrath, killed himself by ojiening his veins. Knowledge does not come easily to Russians. These translations which cost so much sweat, and even PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 135 blood, are neither read nor needed by any one. Not long ago a number of books which did not sell, and which were taking up too much room in the shop, were piled up in the shed of the Armoury court. During the flood they were covered with water, and they are now spoilt, partly by damp, partly by hemp oil, which, for some inexplicable reason, has found its way among them, while many are mouse-eaten. November 14. We have been to the theatre. The large wooden struc- ture, the " Comedy House," is not far off the Foundry. The performance begins at six p.m., for which tickets, printed on stout paper, can be obtained in a separate office ; the poorest seat costs forty kopecks. The audi- ences are scanty, and, but for the court, the actors would die of starvation. The felt on the walls does not prevent the building being cold, damp and draughty ; the tallow can- dles smoke ; the poor music is always out of tune, and, to crown all, the people in the pit noisily crack their nuts and rail at one another the whole time. The comedy of " Don Juan and Don Pedro " was the piece, a Russian translation from the German, which itself was an adaptation from the French "Don Juan." After every act the curtain went down, leaving us in utter darkness during the scene shifting. My neighbour, chamberlain Brandenstein, was very much put out by this. He whispered to me : Welch ?-in Hund von Komodie istdas? " — "What devil of a comedy is this ? " I could hardly restrain my laughter. Don Juan was in the garden talking with the woman he had seduced. " Come my love, let us recall that pleasant time when undisturbed we enjoyed the delights of spring, the green buds of love. Let our rapture be completed by the sight of these flowers and their delicious smell." I liked the song : He who knows not love Know not what deceit is. They call a God, this love Who torments more than death does. Each act was followed by an intermezzo which generally ended in a scuffle. Bibernstein, who had dropped asleep, had a silk hand- T36 PETER AND ALEXIS kerchief stolen from his pocket ; young Loewenwald a sil- ver snuff-box. Another piece followed, entitled " Daphne, pursued by the love sick Apollo, is transformed into a Laurel tree." Apollo threatens the nymph : I will force thee to submit, I really cannot suffer it. She answers : Yoii so rudely do behave, That to love you I don't crave. At this moment some drunken grooms began fighting together at the entrance. People hurried to separate them ; they were whipped, and the dialogue of the God and the Nymph was drowned amid groans and ribald shouting. At last the morning star Phosphoros announced : "The play is over, our best thanks to you, 'tis time for bed." We were given a manuscript programme announcing a performance in another tent : " For fifty kopecks each per- son will be entitled to witness the performance of ' Doctor Faustus ' by Italian Marionettes or Dolls, two yards high, who will walk about the stage, and act almost as adroitly as living actors. The Trained Horse will perform as be- fore." I must confess, I never expected to see Faustus in Peters- burg, much less in the company of a learned horse ! Not long ago, at this same theatre, Moliere's " Precieuses ridicules " was performed. I procured the translation and read it. The Tsar had ordered one of his fools, the " King of the Samoyeds," to make the translation ; the translator was jnobably drunk when he did it, for some of the passages were quite unintelligible. Poor Moliere ! the monstrous galanteries of a Samoyed are as graceful as those of a white dancing bear. Novernher 23. A hard frost with a piercing wind, a real ice-storm. The noses and ears of pedestrians are frostbitten before they know it. It is said that in one night 700 working men have been frozen to death between Petersburg and Kronslot. Wolves have appeared in the streets, even in the centre of the town ; a few days ago wolves fell on the sentinel at PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 137 night near the foundry, which is close to the theatre where " Daphne and Apollo " had been performed. Another soldier came to his rescue, but he too was almost instantly torn to pieces and devoured. A woman and her child have been eaten by wolves in broad daylight, not far from Prince Menshikoff's palace on the Basil Island. Not less terrible than the wolves are the robbers. Sen- try huts, barriers, hunting poles, sentinels with large clubs and night watches, "like those in Hamburg." do not suffice to intimidate the robbers. Every night, either some house is broken into, or some stealthy burglary or murder takes place. November 30. A moist wind — and the snow and ice have melted. The mud is impassable. There is a stench of marsh, dung, and rotten fish. Epidemics abound. December 4. Again frost — frost without snow. It is so slippery that one runs the risk of breaking one's neck at every step. And these changes of temperature continue throughout the winter. Nature seems not only cruel, but positively mad. An unnatural city ! How can art and knowledge flour- ish ? They have a saying here : " No time for luxuries — • we can only just manage to live." December 10. Went to an Assembly — a rout at Tolstoi's : Mirrors, glass, powder, beauty spots, hoop-petticoats, and curtesies and bows — just as we have in Europe, in Paris and in London. The host himself is an amiable, learned man. He trans- lates Ovid's Metamorphoses, and the political advice of Niccolo Machiavelli, the noble citizen of Florence. He took me through the minuet, addressing me with compli- ments from Ovid. He compared me to Galatea, because of my skin, " white as marble." and my black hair, " the colour of hyacinth " — an entertaining old gentleman ! clever, yet a thorough paced knave. I will note down a few sayings of this modern Machiavelli : " When good luck comes it is not enough to grasp it with both hands, try also to catch hold of it with your teeth and swallow it." 138 PETER AND ALEXIS " To live in high favour is hke walking on a glass floor." " A lemon which is too much squeezed will give bitter- ness instead of flavour." " To know the human mind and character is the highest philosophy. It is more difficult to understand men than to know many books by heart," Listening to Tolstoi's witty remarks — he spoke to me, now in Russian, now in Italian — to the delicate strainaof the French minuet, I looked at the poHte gathering of ladies and gentlemen where everything was almost the same as " in Paris or London," 3'et I could not forget what I had just seen on my way thither. Before the Senate on the Trinity Square rose those gaunt poles, bearing the same heads as in May at the time of the masquerade. They dried, grew wet, froze, melted, froze again, and stifl they had not disappeared. A huge moon was rising from behind Trinity Church, and the black heads stood out sharply against the red glow. A crow perched on one of them, cawing and pecking at the skin. This vision was before me all the evening. Asia was casting a shadow over Europe. The Tsar arrived ; he was not in a good humour. He shook his head and shrugged his shoulders in such a way as to make every one present tremble. On entering the danc- ing room he found it too hot, and wanted a window opened. The windows were nailed up on the oustide. The Tsar ordered an axe to be brought, and together with two order- lies he set to work upon it. He ran out into the street to see how the window had been nailed up. At last he suc- ceeded in getting the frame out. The window remained open only for a short time, and it was not cold outside ; snow was again melting, and a west wind was blowing. Yet, nevertheless, it caused a strong draught in the rooms, and the lightly dressed ladies and shivery old men did not know what to do with themselves. This performance had tired Peter and had made him perspire, but he seemed in better spirits. " Your Majesty," said the Austrian Resident Pleyer, a very courteous gentleman, " you have broken a window into Europe." PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 139 The seal which was used for seahng the Tsar's letters addressed to Russia during his first journey abroad, repre- sented a young carpenter surrounded by a shipwright's tools and the arms of war, with the inscription : — " I am a scholar, and what I ask for is teachers." Another emblem of the Tsar's is Prometheus bringing a burning torch to men from the gods. The Tsar says : "I will create a new race of men." ***** The following story was related to me by the " granary rat." The Tsar desires that oaks should be grown every- where, and was himself planting some acorns near Peters- burg, along the Peterhof road. Noticing that one of the bystanders, a dignitary, was smihng at his work, the Tsar angrily remarked : " I understand ; you think I shall not live to see the full- grown oaks ; you are right. Nevertheless you are a fool : I set an example for others to follow, so that our descendants may one day use these trees for building ships. It is not for myself I toil ; the welfare of the state comes first." ***** Another story from the same source. A decree of his Majesty commanded that all children of the nobility should matriculate in Moscow at the Sou- khareva Tower for the learning of Navigation. The nobility, however, instead, enrolled their children at the Spassky monastery in Moscow to learn Latin. On hearing this the monarch was sorely angered and ordered the Governor ot Moscow, Prince Romodanovsky, to take all the children from the monastery and bring them to Petersburg, where they were made to drive in piles along the Moika for the foundation of hemp sheds. The Admiral, Count Fedor Apraksin, Prince Menshikoff, Prince James Dolgoruki, and other senators, not daring to trouble his Majesty, petitioned his Majesty's helpmate, the Tsaritsa Catherine, on their knees, with tears in their eyes ; yet it was impossible to appease his Majesty's wrath. Then Admiral Apraksin 140 PETER AND ALEXIS conceived this plan : he set watchmen to let him know when the Emperor should drive past the working chil- dren. Directly they informed him that the Tsar was coming, Apraksin hurried up to the young toiling boys, took off his decoration and kaftan, hung them on a pole, and began to drive in piles with the children. The Tsar noticing the Admiral thus employed stopped and said to him : — . " Fedor Matvievitch ! you are an Admiral and a Knight. Why do you drive in piles ? " To which the Admiral replied : — " My nephews and grandsons are driving in piles, and who am T specially to enjoy the prerogatives of rank ? As for the decoration granted to me by your Majesty, it hangs on the post, I have not dishonoured it." On hearing this the Tsar continued on his way to the palace, and twenty-four hours later he published a decree liberating the young nobles ; yet at the same time he enrolled them to learn divers practical crafts and arts abroad. He was angered ; and so even after driving in piles they did not escape technical instruction. One of the few Russians, who are in sympathy with the new order of things, said to me in reference to the Tsar : — " Whatever you look at in Russia has been started by him ; and anything done in the future will be traced back to this origin. He has renewed all things, has caused Russia to be born anew. December 28. The Tsarevitch has returned as unexpectedly as he went. Januray 26, 1715. We had visitors ; Baron Loewenwold. the Austrian Resident Pleyer, the Hanoverian Secretary Weber, and the court physician Blumentrost. After supper, over the wine, conversation turned on the new ways introduced by the Tsar. They spoke freely, being among themselves, with no strangers or Russians present. " The Muscovites," said Pleyer " do everything because they are com):)elled to do it. Should the Tsar die. farewell to all knowledge. Russia is a country where everything PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 141 is begun and nothing finished. The Tsar acts upon his people like strong brandy on iron ; he drives knowledge into his subjects with the lash and the rod, believing in the Russian proverb : ' the stick though dumb can teach.' Puffendorf was right in describing this people as • ' a servile people who humble themselves like slaves, and love to be kept in obedience by the cruelty of their rulers.' To them would also apply the words of Aristotle, as to barbarians in general : ' quod in libertate mali, in servitute boni sunt.' True enlightenment inspires hatred of slavery. And the Russian Tsar is by the nature of his power a despot ; what he needs are slaves. That is why he zealously introduces arithmetic, navigation, fortification, and other elementary and useful knowledge to his people ; yet he will never let his subjects gain that true enlighten- ment which requires freedom. And, after all, he himself neither understands nor likes it ; all he seeks in knowledge is utility. He prefers Perpetuum mobile, the absurd invention of Orphireus, to all the philosophy of Leibnitz, ^sop he considers to be the greatest philosopher. He has prohibited the translation of Juvenal, declaring that the composer of a single satire will be liable to the severest torture. Enlightenment stands in the same relation to the power of Russia's Tsars as sunshine to the snow. When feeble the snow shimmers and dazzles ; when strong the snow melts." " Who can tell," remarked Weber with a meaning smile, " the Russians in taking Europe for their pattern may have honoured her above her deserts. Imitation is always dangerous. Vices are more easily imitated than virtues, as a Russian well expressed it. The foreign infectious corruption eats out the ancient health of Russian souls and bodies ; roughness of character has lessened, but only flattery and servility have taken its place ; we have outlived our old common-sense, but we have not acquired any new sense ; we shall all die fools ! ' " " The Tsar," rejoined Baron Loewenwold," is far from being the humble pupil of Europe for which many take him One day, when French customs and temperament were highly praised in his presence, he said : ' It is well to imitate their arts and science — as for the rest, Paris is rotten,' and 142 PETER AND ALEXIS then he added with a prophetic air, ' I am sorry that the inhabitants of that town will perish from its corruption.' I have not heard it myself, but I was told another saying of his which friends of Russia in Europe would do well to remember, ' L'Europe nous est necessaire pour quelques dizaines d'annees ; apres quoi nous lui tournerons le dos.' — ' We need Europe for some few decades, after which we will turn our backs upon her.' " Count Pepper gave some extracts from a book which had lately been published, " La crise dii nord," about the war between Russia and Sweden, in which it was proved that the Russian victory was a sign that the end of the world was drawing nigh, and that the insignificance of Russia was necessary for the welfare of Europe. The Count also recalled the words of Leibnitz which were uttered by the great philosopher before Poltava, while he was still the friend of Sweden : " Moscovy will be a second Turkey and will open the way to new barbarisms, which will annihilate all European civilization ! " Blumentrost reassured us, saying that brandy, together with venereal diseases, which had spread with amazing rapidity during late years from Poland across to the White Sea, would depopulate Russia in less than a century. " Brandy and syphilis are, so to speak, two scourges sent by God's providence to save Europe from a new invasion of barbarians." " Russia," concluded Pleyer," is a brazen Colossus on clay feet. It will fall and break, and nothing will remain." I profess no great love for the Russians myself, but I did not expect my compatriots to hate Russia so much. To me there seems behind this hatred a secret fear ; as if we Germans had a presentiment that one will eventually swallow up the other, either we them, or they us. Jcmuayy 17. " Well, Fraulein Juliana, what have you decided about me ? Am I fool or a knave ? " The Tsarevitch stopped me this morning on the staircase with this question. At first I could not understand what he meant, and, thinking he was drunk, I tried to pass without answering him. Yet he detained me, and continued, looking me straight in the face : — PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 143 " It will be interesting to know which of lis will eat up the other, you us, or we you ? " Then only did I perceive that he had read my diary. I had lent it to her Highness for a short time, as she had expressed the desire to read it ; the Tsarevitch had, prob- ably, been in her room in her absence and seeing the diary he had read it. I was so confused, that I was ready to fall through the earth. I blushed up to the very roots of my hair, almost crying Hke a school-girl trapped in a fault. And he continued to scrutinise me in silence, as if delighting in my confusion. At last, making a desperate effort, I tried to escape, but he caught hold of my hand. My heart sank within me for very fear. " Well, you have been caught, Fraulein," he laughed in a merry, kind way. " Be more prudent in the future. It is well that I, and not somebody else, read it. Your Lady- ship has a tongue as sharp as a razor, I must say, though all had their share. But, to be candid, there is much truth in what you say about us ; there really is. And though you don't pat us on the back, yet we ought to be grateful for your frankness." He stopped laughing, and a with bright smile he warmly squeezed my hand like a comrade, as if he were really thank- ing me for the truth. A strange man. These Russians are as a rule strange beings. It is impossible to foretell what they will do or say next. The more I think over it, the more it seems that there is something in them which we Europeans cannot, and never will be able to understand. To us they are the inhabitants of another planet. February 2. When passing along the corridor this evening, the Tsar- evitch hearing my footsteps called, and asked me to come into the dining-room ; he was alone, sitting before the hearth in the dusk. He made me sit down opposite to him, and began to talk to me, first in German, then in Russian ; he spoke affectionately, as if we had been old friends. He told me things of considerable interest, but I will not put all down ; it would be dangerous both for him and myself 144 PETER AND ALEXIS while I am in Russia. Here are just a few stray thoughts. What amazed me most of all was to find that he is in no wise such a zealous partisan of all that is old, and enemy of all that is new, as he is generally believed to be. He repeated me a Russian proverb, " Age always com- mends its own baldness." Wrong is deep seated in Russia, and unless the old edifice is taken to pieces, and every log carefully scrutinized, it will be impossible to get rid of the ancient rot and decay. The Tsar's fault lies in his hurry. " My father will have everything done quickly ; one, two, three, and a ship is built ! He won't see that rapidit}' does not always mean durabihty. A blow, a knock, the wheel is made. Take your seat, away we go, how delightful ! Suddenly a look behind — the loose spokes are all over the ground ! " February i8. The Tsarevitch has a note book wherein he copies passages from The Chronicles of Church and State, by Baronius, which he says aj^ply to himself, his father and others in such a way as to illustrate the difference between what used to be and what exists now. He lent me the notes to look at. They reveal a probing and liberal mind. In reference to several legends in which the miraculous is obviously exagger- ated (it is true they belonged to the Roman Catholic period) I saw annotations of this kind ; " Compare with the Greek." " Doubtful." " This is hardly true." But I was most interested in those notes, in which he compared historical facts and incidents of ancient Russia and foreign nations with the Russia of to-day. A.D. 305. — " The Emperor Arcadius ordered all those who in the least degree deviated from orthodoxy to be called heretics." (An allusion to the non-orthodoxy of the Russian Tsar.) A.D. 455. — " The Emperor Valentinian was slain for interfering with the rights of the Church as to adulter3^ (An allusion to the abolition of the Patriarchate, and the Tsar's marriage with Catherine during the lifetime of his first wife, Eudoxia Lopoukhin.) A.D. 514. — " Long coats were worn in France. Charles the Great ordered short coats. Praised be the long coats, PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 145 shame upon the short ones." (This was noted with reference the present ghange of Russian dress.) A.D. 814. — " A monk induced the Emperor Leo to reject the worship of ikons." (An allusion to the monk Theo- dosius, the Tsar's chaplain, who, it is said, advises the Tsar to abolish the reverence of ikons.) A.D. 854. — " The Emperor Michael played with the Church sacraments." (An allusion to the institution of the conclave of drunkards, the wedding of the mock Patriarch, and many other diversions of the Tsar.) Here are a few more thoughts. " In relation to the Papal power : Christ pronounced all His disciples equal. To say that it is impossible to be saved without the absolution of the Church is an obvious he, for Christ said, ' he who believes on Me shall have life ever- lasting, not on the Roman Church, which did not exist at that time. Many people were saved long before the Apostles' preaching had even reached Rome." " The Mohammedan irreligion spread owing to women. Women have a liking for false prophets," These few words, worthy of the great sceptic Beyle, reveal more about Mohammed than any of the learned researches. Tolstoi said to me one day, with his sly foxy smile, in reference to the Tsarevitch : " The best way to gain popu- larity is this, in case of necessity to be able to don the skin of the stupidest of beasts." I did not comprehend his meaning at the time, only now am I beginning to understand. In a work by an antique English writer — I forget his name — entitled : " The Tragedy of Hamlet the Dane," this unhappy prince, persecuted by his enemies, pretends to be either a fool or a madman. Is the Russian prince following Hamlet's example ? Has he not donned the hide of the simplest of the beasts ? It is rumoured that the Tsarevitch once had the courage to be candid with his father, and pleaded before him the people's intense suffering. He has been in disgrace ever since. 146 PETER AND ALEXIS February 23. He tenderly loves his little daughter Natasha. To-day he spent the whole of the morning sitting with her on the floor, building houses and huts out of small wooden logs. He crawled about on all fours, making believe to be a dog, a horse, a wolf. He played at ball, and when it rolled under the bed or cupboard he fetched it out again, covering himself with dust and cobwebs. He took her to his room, dandling her and showing her to everybody saying : — " Is she not a fine girl ? Where can you find another hke her ? " He himself played with her like a httle boy. Natasha is clever beyond her age. When she wants to seize something forbidden and you threaten to tell her mother, she at once becomes quiet, but if you simply tell her to stop, she will begin to laugh and continue all the more. When she sees that her father is in an ill -humour she is very quiet and only gazes at him ; if he tarns to her she laughs loudly and waves hsr hands. She fondles him like a grown up person. I have a queer feeling when I watch her doing this. The child not only seems to love him, but also to pity him, as if she knew and saw something about him which no one else is yet aware of. It is an uncanny feeling, like that which I felt when I saw the father and mother in a dark prophetic mirror. March 2. " I know she loves me; she left everything for my sake," he said once in reference to his wife. Now that I understand the Tsarevitch better, I no longer can attach all the blame to him only for their hard life together. Both are innocent and both at fault. They are too different, too melancholy, each in their own way. Small common griefs unite, but grief great and intense divides. They are like two persons seriously ill — wounded — lying on a bed together. They cannot help each other : and the least movement of either causes pain to both. There are people to whom suffering has become second nature ; without it they feel out of their natural element. With such persons thoughts and sentiments once having PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 147 drooped will droop perpetually, like the branches of a weeping willow. Her Highness is one of these beings. The Tsarevitch has much grief of his own, and every time he sees his wife, he sees another grief, a grief which cannot be alla^/ed, so he pities her. But love and pity are not one and the same ; he who wants to be loved must eschew pity. I know from personal experience what torture it is to pity where no help can be given ; at last one begins to dread him for whom pity has so long proved in vain. Yes, both are innocent, both are unhappy, and no one but God can help them. Poor, poor couple ! I dread what all this may lead to ; yet it were better if the end come soon. March 7. Her Highness is again with child. May 12. We are in Roshdestveno, the Crown Prince's country house, seventy versts away from Petersburg, in the Kopor- sky district. I have been ill for a long time. They thought I should die. The thought of dying in Russia was more terrible to me than death itself. Her Highness brought me here to Roshdestveno to give me a rest and chance of recovering my strength in the pure air. Woods surround us ; all is peaceful ; nothing is heard save the rustling of leaves and the warbling of birds. The small river Oredesh hurries along like a torrent ; its murmur- ing rises from beneath the steep slope of red clay, which is now shrouded in a transparent haze of young birch leaves, broken by the dark green of the firs. The wooden country-house is built like the simple village huts. The principal hall, two stories high with a terem hke the Moscow palaces, is not yet finished. Next to it stands a small chapel, with belfry and two bells, which the Tsar- evitch delights in ringing himself. At the gates an old Swedish cannon and a small heap of iron balls which are covered with rust and overgrown with grass and yellow spring flowers. Altogether this is a real monastery — a kind of cloister in the woods. The walls inside the houses are bare and show the beams ; there is a scent of resin, with amber drops trickling like tears everywhere. Holy lamps are glimmering before the 148 PETER AND ALEXIS images. All is bright, fresh, clean, and innocently young. The Tsarevitch is fond of this spot. He says he would like to live here always, and demands nothing better than to be left alone. He reads, writes in the librar}', prays in the chapel, works in the garden and the orchard, fishes and roams about the forest. At this moment I see him from the window of my room. He has just been digging in the beds, planting bulbs of tulips from Haarlem ; now he stands resting on the spade, as still, as if he were trying to catch some sound. Infinite stillness reigns around. Only the axe of a woodcutter is heard somewhere far, far away in the wood, and the call of the cuckoo. His face is calm and joyous. His lips are moving ; he is probably humming one of his favourite prayers or hymns, the akathist of his saint, Alexis the Man of God, or the Psalm : " I will sing unto the Lord all the days of my life. I will sing unto my God while I have my being." May 16. Nowhere have I seen such evening glows as here. To-day the sunset was particularly strange ; the whole of the sky bathed in blood, red clouds were scattered like rags of bloodstained garments ; it seemed as though a murder or some sacrifice had been performed in the skies, and that blood was running down from heaven upon the earth. Amid the jet-black pointed needles of the firwood the patches of red clay showed like blood stains. As I stood looking in amazement I heard a voice from somewhere above me, coming as it were from this terrible sky: " Fraulein Juliana ! " It was the Tsarevitch who called me, standing on the dove house, in his hand a long pole, such as are used here to scare away doves. He is a great lover of doves. I went up the shaky ladder and on reaching the platform the white doves started, like snow flakes to which the evening glow had given a roseate hue, surrounding us with the wind and rustle of their wings. We sat down on the bench, and, little by little, drifted again, as we had repeatedly done of late, into a religious discussion. PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 149 " Your Martin Luther has allowed himself to be guided by the Spirit of the world and by his own personal predi- lections, not by the steadfastness of his soul. And you, poor things, have allowed yourselves to be caught by the allure- ment of an easy life. " You have believed the words of your seducer and you left the narrow difficult path ordained by Christ Himself. Martin has shown himself to be an universal fool ; the great poison of the serpent of hell is hid in his teaching." I have got used to Russian pleasantries and no longer take any notice of them ; reasonable proofs avail as much in arguing with such people, as a rapier against a club. But this time 1 was roused, for some reason or other, and I spoke out all that for a long time I had stored up within my heart. I began by showing that the Russians, while considering themselves superior to all Christian people, lived in reality worse than heathens ; they confess the law of love, and yet practise such cruelties as are met with nowhere else in the world ; they fast, and during the fast they drink like beasts ; they go to church and use the most shocking expressions there ; they are so ignorant that in Germany young children know more about religion than adults and priests in Russia. Hardly one out of a dozen could say the Lord's Prayer. A pious old woman answered my question, who is the third person in the Trinity ? by asserting he was St. Nicholas the wondei"worker. And really this Nicholas is a true Russian God, and one might easily believe that they had none other God but he. Not in vain did the Swedish theologian Botivid in 1620, discuss the question in a thesis at the Upsala Academy, " Are the Muscovites Christians ? " I know not how much more I would have said had not the Tsarevitch stopped me ; he had the whole time listened with perfect calmness, it was this calm that exas- perated me. " I have meant for a long time, to ask you, Fraulein : Do you believe in the Divinity of Christ ? '" " What do you mean ? Does not j'our Highness know that all we Lutherans " " I do not speak generally now, I am asking you in particular. I had once a talk with your teacher Leibnitz : he shifted and shuffled, avoiding a direct answer, but, never- 150 PETER AND ALEXIS theless, I at once saw that he did not truly believe in Christ. And now what about you ? " He steadily looked at me. I cast down my eyes, and for some inexplicable reason suddenly remembered all my doubts, my debates with Leibnitz, the unsolvable contra- dictions of metaphysics and theology. " I think," said I, trying also to shuffle, "that Christ was the best and wisest of the sons of men." " And not God's son ? " " We are all sons of God." " And is He like unto the rest ? " Unwilling to lie I remained silent. " Well, that is the point," he said, with such an expression on his face as I had never seen before. " Your people are wise, learned, strong, honourable, famous. You have everything ; but you don't possess Christ, and you don't need Him, you save yourselves. We, on the other hand, are stupid, poor, naked, drunk, repugnant, we are worse than barbarians, worse than beasts, and are ever on the brink of falling. But we have the Christ, our Lord with us, and with us He will remain from eternity to eternity. It is by Him, our Light, that we are saved." He spoke about Christ as I had noticed the common people, the moujiks, speak here, as if He were their own, one of their family, a moujik just like themselves. I know not whether this is a sign of the highest pride and blas- phemous, or, one of the greatest humility and sanctity. We both remained silent. The doves were returning to their house, and settling dovm thickly between us, their white fluttering wings as it were uniting us. Her Highness sent for me. When I had come down, I turned round to have a last look at the Tsarevitch ; he was feeding the doves. They had surrounded him, perched on his hands, shoulders, head. He stood there high above the black charred wood in the red blood-stained sky, covered with them, as if wrapt in white wings. October 31, 1715. Now that all is over I will end this diary also. We had returned to Petersburg from Roshdestveno to- wards the end of May. About the middle of August- ten weeks before the time of her Highness's delivery, she PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 151 fell on the stairs and hurt her left side. They say she made a false step, because the heel of her slipper was broken, but in reality she fainted. She had seen below in the courtyard the Tsarevitch drunk, embracing and kissing his mistress, the serf-girl Afrossinia. He had been living with her for a long time ; he does it almost publicly ; on his return from Karlsbad he took her into the quarter of Ihe house which he inhabits. I did not mention this in my diary, afraid lest her Highness should read it. Did she know ? Even if she did, she tried not to know, she did not believe it till she saw it. A serf-girl is the rival of the Duchess of Wolfenbiittel — the Emperor's sister-in-law. "Things which never happen, happen in Russia," said a Russian to me. The father with a laun- dress, the son with a serf -girl ! Some say she is a Finnish woman, taken prisoner by soldiers in the same way as the Tsaritsa ; others say she is a serf belonging to the tutor of the Tsarevitch — Nikiphor Viasemski ; the latter statement seems more probable. She is handsome enough, yet her low origin is at once obvious. She is tall, fair-skinned, and has auburn hair, her nose is slightly turned up ; her eyes are large, clear, slanting and almond shape like a Kalmuck's, with the un- tamed gaze of a wild goat. She seems, on the whole, to have something goatlike about her, like the female satyr in Rubens' picture of the Bacchanalia. It is one of those faces which revolt us women, and almost invariably please men. The Tsarevitch is supposed to be madly in love with her. It is said that when they first met she was innocent, shy, tameless, and for a long time resisted him. He did not please her at all. Neither promises nor threats would help. But once, after a drinking bout, he met her in one of those fits of madness which he, like his father, is subject to. He beat her unmercifully and nearly killed her ; then threatening to stab, at last seduced her. Russian man- ners ! And this is the same being who looked so like a saint when in the woods of Roshdestveno, sang the akathist to Alexis the Man of God, and, surrounded by doves, spoke about the Lord Christ ! For the rest, it is a special Russian 152 PETER AND ALEXIS gift to unite such extremes — a gift which, thank the Lord ! has as yet not been revealed to us foohsh foreigners. The Tsarevitch himself once told me : " We Russians can never keep the middle path, but are always roving either on the heights or in the abysses." After the fall her Highness felt a pain in her left side. " I feel as if pins were pricking my body all over," she used to say, yet, on the whole, she was calm, as if she had finally made up her mind, and knew that nothing would alter her decision. She never talked to me about the Tsarevitch again, neither did she complain of her lot. Only once she said : "I know I am irrevocably doomed. I hope my sufferings will soon end ; I long for nothing in the world so eagerly as for death. Death is my sole salva- tion." On October 12th she was safely delivered of a boy, the future heir to the throne, Peter Alexyevitch. The first days after her confinement she felt well, yet when people congratulated her, and wished her good health, she would grow angry and ask everyone to pray God to send her death. " I want to die, and die I will," she said, with that awful, calm determination which never left her again. She obeyed neither doctors nor midwife ; she seemed purposely to do everything which was forbidden her. On the fourth day she sat in an armchair, ordered herself to be carried into another room, and gave the child the breast herself. That same night she felt worse : fever set in, sickness, convulsions and such pains, that she cried out more than at the time of her delivery. When the Tsar, who himself was ill at that time, knew about it, he sent Prince Menshikoff and four court physicians, Areskin, Polikolo, and the two Blumentrosts, to hold a consultation. They found her dying, in mortis limine. When they tried to persuade her to take medicine she tossed the glass to the ground, saying : " Don't torment me, let me go peacefully, I don't want to live." The day before her death she summoned Baron Loewen- wold and communicated to him her last will : none of her people were to speak ill of the Tsarevitch, either here or in Germany ; she was dying young, earlier than she expected, yet she was content with her lot and blamed none. PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 153 Then she took leave of us all. She gave me her blessing like a mother. The Tsarevitch did not leave her. His face was terrible to look at. He fainted three times. She did not talk to h'm ; it almost seemed that she did not recognize him. Unly just before all was over, when he pressed her hand to his lips, she looked at him with a long look, and said something in a low voice. All I could hear was : — " Soon, soon we shall see each other again ! " Sh3 died as if she had fallen asleep. The dead face expressed more happiness than it had ever shown in her lifetime. By the Tsar's order a post mortem examination was made, he himself being present. The funeral was fixed for October 27th. There was a long discussion whether the rank of a Crown Princess demanded cannon to be fired at her funeral ; if so, how many guns to the salute. All the foreign ambassadors were questioned on the subject. The Tsar troubled himself more about this cannonade than he had ever troubled himself about the lot of her Highness when alive. It was decided not to fire. The coffin was borne along a narrow bridge constructed on purpose, from the house to the Neva. The Tsar and Tsarevitch walked behind the coffin. The Tsaritsa was not present — she hourly expected her delivery. A mourning frigate stood waiting on the Neva ; it was draped with black, and black standards were hoisted on it. Slowly to the sounds of funeral music, the ship bore us towards the Peter and Paul Cathedral, not yet completed, where the grave of the Crown Princess had to remain under the open sky until the closing of the vaulted roof. The sky wept over her when alive ; it will rain on her when dead. The evening was dull and calm, the sky seemed like the vault of a grave ; the Neva, a dark gloomy mirror. The town, wrapped in mist appeared like a phantom or night- mare. All I had experienced, seen, and heard in this dreadful city, now, more than ever, seemed to me as a dream From the cathedral we returned at night to the house of the Tsarevitch, for a commemoration banquet. Here 154 PETER AND ALEXIS the Tsar handed a letter to his son ; I learnt later that he threatened to disinherit and curse him unless he reformed. The next day the Tsaritsa was delivered of a son. The fate of Russia wavers between those two children, the son and the grandson of the Tsar. November i. I went in to the Tsarevutch last evening to talk over my departure for Germany. He sat near the lighted stove and was thrusting in burning papers, letters and man- uscripts. He is probably afraid of some search. He was holding in his hand and was just about to throw into the fire a small booklet in a well worn leather binding, when — I am even now amazed at my presumption — I inquired what it was. He handed it to me. I looked in- side. It was his diary and notes. The ruling passion of women in general, and of myself in particular, is curiosity. It made me be guilty of a still greater presumption, I asked if I might borrow it to read. He thought for a minute, then looking at me, and with his sweet childlike smile of which I am so fond : " Quid pro quo — I read your diary, you can read mine." He made me promise that I would never talk to anybody about these notes and would return them to be burnt on the morrow. I have sat up the whole night with them ; the booklet itself is really an old Russian calendar, a church calendar printed at Kiev. It had been given to the Tsare- vitch by the late Metropolitan of Rostov, Demetrius, who is counted a saint by the people. The Tsarevitch had put down his thoughts and the events of his life partly on the margin and the blank spaces on the pages, partly on separ- ate leaflets either simply inserted or pasted in. I decided to make a copy of the diary. I will not break my word, during my lifetime and his. Nobody shall know about his notes. But they must not be irrevocably lost. God Himself will judge between father and son. But men have slandered the Tsarevitch. Let this diary, should it ever reach posterity, accuse or justify him, in any case reveal the truth. c CHAPTER II THE DIARY OF TSAREVITCH ALEXIS ROWN with Thy loving kindness, Lord, this year which now begins ! When on commissariat duties in Pomerania by order of the author of my being, ^ I heard that at Mos- cow, in the church of the Assumption, Stephen, the MetropoHtan of Riazan, denounced the decree relating to delators — informers in civil and church matters— and other laws contrary to the Church, crying unto the people : — " Be not amazed that rebellious Russia is agitated with bloody storms. How great is the gulf between the laws of man and the laws of God ! " The Senators came to the Metropolitan and accused him of spreading revolt among the people and of touching upon the Tsar's honour. The whole incident was reported to the Tsar. I told the Metropolitan to reconcile himself with my father as best he could. What advantage was there in their being at variance with one another ? I was anxious to see a reconciliation, for if Stephen was deposed from his see, it would be difficult to find any one worthy to replace him. Previous to this exhortation he used to write to me and I to him ; not often, however, only on important affairs. But since then I have stopped the correspondence, and broken off all intercourse with him, as my father's anger was kindled against him, and it became therefore danger- ous for me to write any longer. It is rumoured he will be deposed from his see. 1 Note of Frdulein Arnheim : The Tsarevitch always thus designates his father in the diary. 155 156 PETER AND ALEXIS The Metropolitan concluded the above-mentioned ser- mon by praying to Saint Alexis, the Man of God, with special reference to mj'self, a sinner : — " O Saint of God ! remember thy namesake, the chosen keeper of God's laws, thy most faithful follower, Tsarevitch Alexis Petrovitch ! Thou didst abandon thy house ; he too wanders among strangers. Thou wert bereft of slaves, subjects, friends and relatives ; so it is with him. Thou art a man of God ; he, too, is a true servant of Christ. We beseech thee, O Saint of God ! deign to protect thy name- sake, our only hope, shelter him under the cover of thy wing, like a dearly beloved fledgeling, and keep him, who is the very apple of our eyes, safe from all evil." During my stay in foreign parts, where by the will of the author of my being I had to apply myself to the study of navigation, fortification, geometry, and other arts, I greatly feared to die without confession and the last rites of the church. So I have written to my chaplain. Father James, on the subject as follows : — " We have no priest with us, nor is there any possibility of our procuring one. I entreat your hohness to find me a priest in Moscow and send him here secretly. Make him discard all priestly insignia : shave his beard and let hair grow over his tonsure, or else shave his hair too, and wear a wig and foreign dress. Let him come under the guise of an orderly of mine. Please father do it ! Have mercy upon my soul, and let me not die without the conso- lation of the ciiurch. This is all I want him for in case of death, and should I live, he would be my confessor. It would be well if he were a young man. unmarried and unattached. Let his departure from Moscow be kept so secret that even his friends shall not know whither he has gone. As to the shaving of the beard, let him have no misgivings on the point ; necessity alters even such laws ; it is better to transgress in minor things than to let a soul perish without absolution. See to this without delay, and should you refrain from doing as I ask you, God may have to call you to account for my soul." PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 157 On my return to Petersburg from abroad, the author of my days welcomed me graciously and inquired whether I still remembered what I had learnt ? To which I replied "Yes, "as if I really did ; he then ordered me to bring him my drawings. But I, fearing I could not please him, if asked to draw in his presence, decided on injuring my right hand and thus disable it for use. Loading a pistol, I took it in my left hand and fired across my right palm ; though the bullet did not touch my hand, yet the powder badly scorched it. The bullet embedded itself in the wall of my closet where it has remained visible even unto this day. The author of my being, noticing my burnt hand, asked how it happened. I gave a false reason. Chapter 7, Art. 63 of the miUtary regulations : " Who- ever makes himself ill or breaks his limbs and thus unfits himself for service is liable to have his nostrils torn, and be condemned to forced labour." From the laws of Tsar Alexis Michailovitch, Chapter 22, Art. 6 : " And in the case of a son petitioning against his father, no judgment shall be given ; but he, having been flogged for such petition, shall be delivered up to the father." This is unjust, for though children are dependent upon their parents' will, yet they must not be treated like dumb animals. The natural law is not fulfilled by the procreation of children alone ; humaneness forms also part of a father's duty. I hear that the author of my days hates houses being built in Moscow, for it is his will to live in Petersburg. It lies not with one man alone to change national cus- toms. The country which changes its customs cannot endure. The Russian people have forgotten the water in their own cisterns, and have begun to slake their thirst with the turbid waters of strangers. 158 PETER AND ALEXIS Job, the Archimandrite of Novgorod, told me : " Evil awaits thee in Petersburg, yet I feel God will deliver thee. Thou wilt see what will happen." God has so willed it with us sinners that foreigners do with us just as it pleases them. We all suffer from a mania. This fatal illness is a mad passion for foreign things and people, which has infected our whole nation. Truly says the prophet Baruch : " Let a stranger come near thee and he will destroy thee." The Germans boast and have a saying, ' he who wants to eat bread without work, let him go to Russia." They call us barbarians and choose to reckon us among the beasts instead of men. They try to make us out before other nations as worse than dead dogs. It would be as well to stop some of these foreign antics; they don't come natural to us and we only make a muddle in meddling with them. The foreign way becomes with us the fool's way. We degrade ourselves, our language, our nation; and w^e expose ourselves to the ridicule of every one. The intrusion of foreign languages has spoilt the purity of the Slavonic tongue. I know not what need we have to use foreign words. It must be only to make a boast of, there is Httle honour in doing it. Sometimes they speak in a way that neither they themselves nor others can under- stand. Sit not down under a stranger's hedgerow. Rather among nettles if they are thine own. A stranger's wit forsakes thee at the threshold. Keep thine own counsel ; thine own counsellors. Pleasant is the sound of the tambours beyond the hill ; but when brought hither they are but baskets of bast. Foreigners are far be3^ond us, I grant you, in knowledge ; yet in natural quickness of wit our people are, thank God, not worse equipped than they, and they do wrong in railing at us. I am persuaded that God created us Russians not inferior to other human beings. PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 159 I doubt whether it be really true that man's welfare standeth on knowledge or the sciences alone. For folk used to learn much less in the old days, and were happier than we to-day with our much learning. It is possible with much culture to be a rascal. I-earning in a depraved heart is a powerful weapon for evil. ***** We Russians can do without bread. We devour each other, and are satisfied. * * * * * . The boyars are great withered trees ; their massive trunks hide the people from the Tsar. My father is exceedingly intelligent ; yet Menshikoff is always hoodwinking him. ***** All administrators, whether young or old, are greedy of gain. The ancient laws have fallen into desuetude : the new ones also count for nothing. What a number are decreed ! and to what purpose ? Nothing is really changed. I don't see that much good will come of these reforms in the future. ***** A sovereign's duties : Not to trust in one's brilliancy of mind, but to be zealous to protect the people, the land and the villages, and to love, be zealous for, interested in the lesser brethren of Christ and to know their needs. Severe shall 'oe His judgment upon the great and mighty ones ! The little shall be for- given, but torment awaits the mighty ill-doers. This I should do well to remember, should God grant me to become Tsar. ***** On St. Eustace the martyr's day we held high fete and got grievously drunk. Our faces were well pummelled ; Jibanda had a blow in the eye the Lasher lost a tooth. I don't remember anything, and I hardly know how I got away. I was exceedingly filled with the gifts of Bacchus. ***** In Roshdestveno I remained at home alone. The days flowed by like water ; nothing save utter stillness. ***** i6o PETER AND ALEXIS Time passes and brings us nearer death ; the end of our days approaches ; I recognise the frailty of my hfe. I await death, but without fear or desire. A little drunk. My wife is pregnant. Eros, Eros, heathen god ! Passions have harassed me from my youth up. I accuse others of godlessness. and am myself the most godless of all. Afrossinia ! I know my iniquity and have not redeemed myself from shame. Thy hand weighs heavily upon me, O I-ord ! When shall I come and appear before Gc^d ? my tears have been my meat, day and night ; and my soul fainteth for the courts of the Lord. 4: ^ :): 3): 4c I am amazed at my father. Wh}^ does he love Theodo- sius ? Is it because the latter introduces Lutheran cus- toms among the people and authorises everything ? He really is an atheist, and a deep enemy of the cross of the Lord. I have seldom seen so subtle a rogue. He is very adroit, he will never do wrong openly. We must be on our guard with him and be careful and stealthy in thwarting him, since we are obliged to live under his orders. :|c i|c 4c 4c :tc The zeal of thine house hath eaten me up, O Lord. I am sore afraid and troubled lest Christianity perish entirely in Russia. Theodosius, the heresiarch, and his crew have openly begun to wage war against the Church ; they abolish fasts, they treat confession and self-immolation as nonsense ; they ridicule celibacy, self-imposed poverty, and change other strait and narrow ways of the Christian life into the smooth broad ways which lead to eternal damnation. They fearlessly teach a debauched self-indulgent life ; they recognise no sin, everything is holy, and by their teaching they have brought the children of the world into such PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH i6i fearless voluptuousness, that many take up the mere Epi- curean attitude : " Eat, drink, and be merry. There is no account to render after death." They call the holy icons idols, the church singing bulls' roaring. They destroy chapels, and where the walls have remained, they allow tobacco and barbers' shops to be opened. They take miracle-working icons away on stinking dung carts under dirty mats, thus insolently defiling them before the people. In this way they attack the Orthodox faith, under the pretext that it is not Christianity, but only useless and harmful superstitions which the}- are trying to uproot. What a number of clergy have been destroyed, unfrocked and tortured under this pretext ! If you ask for a reason, the only answer you get is : they were super- stitious, bigots, sanctimonious humbugs ! He who keeps fast is a bigot ; he who prays, sanctimonious ; he who adores the icons, invariably (they say) a hypocrite. All this is done with such cunning, and the intention both to exterminate the Orthodox clergy in Russia, and to intro- duce their newly invented Lutheran and Calvinistic, priest- less sects. He is truly mad who does not detect in them the atheistic spirit. The church bells have been altered, they no longer chime, but tinkle as if sounding an alarm. And everything else is changed, the icons are painted, not on wood but on can- vas, after foreign models ; for instance, the image of Emmanuel the Saviour is quite like a German, fat, as if conceived in the flesh ; the fleshy type is preferred, the celestial nature is ignored. The churches are no longer built after the ancient style, but with pointed towers Hke those in Germany, and the chimes even imitate Lutheran organs. Poor Russia ! \Miy dost thou set thy heart on German ways and actions ? * * * * * There are to be no more monasteries ; a decree is being prepared which will prohibit the taking of fresh vows ; retired soldiers will fill the vacancies in the monasteries. i62 PETER AND ALEXIS It is written " He who comes to me I will in no wise cast out ; " but they consider the scriptures as nothing. * * * * * As there is a military code, so now there exists a code of faith. What sort of prayer can that be, which is enforced by a decree, under pain of punishment ? Beggars are to taken be up, ruthlessly beaten with rods, and sent to hard labour, so that they may not eat their bread unearned. This is the Tsar's decree, while Christ says, " For I was an hungered and ye gave me no meat. I was thirsty and ye gave me no drink, I was a stranger and ye took me not in, naked and ye clothed me not. Verily I say unto you, inasmuch as ye did it not unto one of the least of these, ye did it not to me." it: * * * * The whole of Russia is dying of spiritual famine. The sower does not scatter the seed, the earth does not receive it. The priests do not keep watch over the people who go astray. The village priest cannot be distinguished from a moujik. The moujik ploughs, the priest ploughs. And meanwhile Christians die like cattle. Drunken priests use obscene language and rail at one another within the sanc- tuary ; they wear a pall of gold, while their bast shoes are dirty ; the holy loaves are made of black rye flour ; the Lord's holy host is kept in exceedingly vile vessels swarm- ing with bugs, cockroaches, and grassho|i]iers. Monks have fallen into habits of tippling and stealing. The whole monastic and priestly system calls for tho- rough reform, as there hardly remains a trace of the true priest and monk. We are guilty of neither keeping our religion, such as it is, nor maintaining our clergy in decency, but of living almost like brutes. I doubt whether in Moscow one in a hundred knows what the Orthodox behef is, or who God is, or how to pray to Him, or how to fulfil His holy will. There is no sign of Christianity left to us except the name. PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 163 We have all lost our senses, we tremble in our faith, like a leaf on a tree ; we have gone astray in strange and diverse ways, some incline towards the Roman faith, others towards the Lutheran ; we, baptized idol-worshippers, are maimed in both legs. We have forsaken the paps of our mother Church ; we are seeking nourishment instead from all kinds of foreign and heretical sources. We are like blind puppies which have been thrown away, we err in all directions ; but where we shall finally arrive, no one knows, :): :): :): 4= ^ Fomka the barber, an iconoclast, has split up the image of St. Alexis the Metropolitan with his iron axe, because he did not revere the holy icons, the life- bringing cross, nor holy relics ; the holy icons, said he, and the holy cross are merely the work of man ; and he did not believe that relics brought pardon for his own transgressions. Neither did he accept the Church dogma and traditions, nor did he believe the Eucharist to be the true body of Christ, but simply bread and wine. Stephen, the Metropolitan of Riazan, handed Fomka over to the church anathema. He was burnt at the stake in the Red Square. Then the gentlemen of the Senate, having summoned the Metropohtan to Petersburg to account for his action, gave satisfaction to the heretics ; the iconoclast, Dmitri Tvere- tinoff, a physician, whose disciple Fomka had been, they pronounced innocent, while driving Stephen, the saintly bishop, with great contumely from the Judgment hall. He went out weeping and saying : — " O Lord Christ, our Saviour ! Thou hast said : ' They will persecute you, even as they persecuted me.' Now I am driven out, but not L it is Thou whom they are perse- cuting. Thou, who beholdest all things, wilt see that their judgment is unjust ; judge them Thyself ! " And when the prelate came out of the senate into the square, all the people were moved with compassion towards him and wept. The anger of the author of my being against Stephen has grown more intense. ***** The Church is more powerful than the Tsardom ; but nowadays the Tsar rules the Church. i64 PETER AND ALEXIS The ancient Tsars bowed to the ground before the patriarch ; now the occupant of the Patriarchal throne signs himself in his letters to the Tsar, thus : " Your Majesty's slave and footstool, your humble Stephen, the little Shepherd of Riazan ! " The head of the Church the Tsar's footstool ! * * * * if Demetrius, the Metropolitan of Rostov, was a very saintly man ; when the author of my being made him drink Hungarian wine, and began questioning him on clerical affairs, the saintly old man did not answer at all, but silently and repeatedly blessed the Tsar with the sign of the holy cross, and thus he succeeded in escaping. The priests say, "It is impossible to swim against the stream ; the whip cannot break the axe." But the martyrs for the sake of the faith did not spare their lives ! :): 9): * * * 'The Tsar keeps his table for the bishops. " He whose bread I eat, his man I am." * * * * * The ancient Russian prelates stood up for their country, but the prelates of to-day do not seek to obtain justice from the Tsar, but aim rather at flattering and corrupting his pious rank and power. ***** If the people sin, the Tsar can divert God's wrath ; if the Tsar sins, the people are helpless. God visits the sin of the monarch upon the whole country. ***** Tately at a drinking feast, the " little Shepherd of Riazan " said to my father : " You Tsars — gods on earth — are like unto the Heavenly Tsar," and the Kniaz-Pope, a drunken fool, reviled the prelate : " Though I," said he, " am but a mock patriarch, yet even I would not have spoken such words to the Tsar ! God is greater than the Tsar," and the Tsar })raised the buffoon for saying this. ***** When in the course of the same feast, the bishops began to talk about the widowed state of the Church and the PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 165 need of a Patriarch, the author of my being in great wrath unsheathed his short sword ; all were terror stricken, thinking he was going to kill them ; he struck the table with the fiat of the blade, and shouted : "I am the Patriarch ; Tsar and Patriarch in one ! " Theodosius is trying to persuade the author of my being to assume the title of Emperor, after the example of the ancient Roman Caesars. ***** In the year 1709, during the celebrations of the Poltava victory, the clergy erected on the Red Square in Moscow an imitation of a Roman temple with an altar, consecrating it to the virtues of the Russian god Apollo and Mars, that is in honour of the author of m}' being, and over the ancient temple ran the inscription: — "Basis et fundamentum reipublicae, religio." But what religion ? Faith in what God, or gods ? There was also represented an " Apotheosis of the Russian Hercules," that is, the author of my days slaying many animals and peoples, and, at the end of these feats, being borne up to heaven in Jove's chariot, drawn by eagles along the Milky Way, with the inscription : — " Viamque affectat Olympo." In the pamphlet, wTitten by the archmonk Joseph, the Prefect of the Academy, the Apotheosis is described in the following words : " It should be known that this is neither a church, nor a sanctuary built to a saint, but a political or civil ceremony." Theodosius is trying to persuade my father to insert in the decree, which ordained the holy Synod, or in the Russian oath of allegiance itself, words declaring that, " The people should honour their ruler's name as head and father of their country equally with the name of Jesus Christ." ***** Men want to usurp God's glory and the honour due to Christ, the Eternal and only King of kings. It is in the Roman Laws that these impious sacrilegious words are i66 PETER AND ALEXIS found : " The Roman autocrat is the Lord of the Uni- verse." ***** We confess and beheve that Christ alone is the King of kings and the Lord of lords, and there is no man Lord beside him. Jesus Christ, the wondrous Rock, struck and destroyed the Roman Empire and smashed its feet of clay. And we create and build up what God has shattered. Does not this mean that we defy God ? Look at Roman History. The Emperor Caligula saith : Everything is allowed to Caesar, " Omnia licent." Not only to Roman Emperors, hut nowadays to all knaves and servile creatures and quadrupeds, is everything permitted ! ***** Nebuchadnezzar the King of Babylon saith, " I am God," and he became a beast. ***** On Basil Island, in the house of the Tsaritsa Prascovie, there lives an old monk, Timothy Arkhipich, he is the refuge of the desperate, the hope of the hopeless, a mad man in the eyes of the world, yet he is intimately acquainted with the griefs and hearts of men. I went over to see him a few nights ago and had a talk with him. Arkhipich says Antichrist is a pretender — a veritable cursed one — and that he is on his way. I read the Metropolitan of Riazan's Signs of the Coming of A ntichrist, and a great fear thereupon possessed me. In Moscow, Gregory of Talitsa was burnt because he spoke to the people about the coming of Antichrist. Talitsa was a man of great intelligence. Basil Levin, a captain of the Dragoons who was with me on my way from l.voff to Kiev in 171 1, the priest Lebedka, chaplain to Prince Menshikoff the clerk Larion Dokoukin, and many others think in the same way about Antichrist. ***** A Raskolnik spilt Christ's sacrament and trampled it under foot. ***** PRIVATE JOURNAL OF TSAREVITCH 167 Near Lubetch a flight of locusts appeared ; from midday to midnight it was passing — " God's Wrath," the super- scription on their wings. ***** The days are short and gloomy ; old people say the sun shines no longer as it used to. I was drunk ; we drank a large quantity of vodka. The Lord knows it is fear which makes us drink, in order to forget ourselves. The fear of death has come upon me. The end is at hand, the axe is at the root, death's scythe is over our heads. ***** Lord, help Russia ! Thrice-pure Mother of God protect and intercede for us ! ***** O martvrs of these latter days, Christ is about to rise again ! Christ is. and will dwell within you, and you will say, Amen ! to His Kingdom. CHAPTER III THE DIARY OF FRAULEIN ARNHEIM WITH these words the diary of Tsarevitch Alexis closed. I was present when he threw it into the fire. December 31. To-day died the last Russian Tsaritsa. Marfa Matveevna, the widow of Peter's step-brother, Fedor Alexeitch. At foreign courts she had been considered dead long ago ; ever since her husband's death, during thirty-two years, she had lived half mad, a prisoner in her rooms, and never showed herself to anybody. She was buried at dusk with great pomp. The funeral procession moved between two rows of torches planted in the ice all the way along from her house, (she lived next to us near the Church of All the Sorrowing) up to the Peter and Paul Cathedral, across the Neva on the ice. It was the same way along which her Highness's body had been borne two months or more ago in the frigate of death. Then the first foreign Princess was buried, now the last Russian Tsaritsa. First came the clergy in gorgeous palls, carrying candles and incense burners, chanting funeral songs. The coffin was drawn on sleighs. Behind it walked the Privy Coun- cillor Tolstoi carrying a crown set with priceless gems. The Tsar had for the first time at this funeral prohibited the ancient Russian custom of wailing ; it was strictly ordered that none should cr}' aloud. All moved along in silence, the night was still, nothing was heard but the crackling of the burning resin, the crunching of steps on the snow, and the funeral chanting. DIARY OF FRAULEIN ARNHEIM 169 This silent procession aroused a shudder of terror. It seemed as though we were gHding along the ice after the dead, ourselves also dead, into the black eternal gloom. With this old Tsaritsa New Russia seemed to be burying Old Russia, and Petersburg burying Moscow. The Tsarevitch, who had loved the deceased as his own mother, was terribly upset by this death. He sees in it a bad omen for himself, his own fate. Several times during the ceremony he whispered to me, " The end has come, the end of everything!" January i. To-morrow morning I leave Petersburg, together with the two Barons Loewenwold for Riga, and then travel through Danzig into Germany. This is my last night in the Tsarevitch's house. This evening I went to bid him good-bj-e ; the way we parted made me feel how much I love him, and that I will never forget him. " Who knows," said he, " we may meet again. I would like to pay another visit to Germany and other foreign countries ; I liked those parts, you live in gaiety and light and freedom." " What holds your Highness back ? " He sighed heavily. " I would like to go to heaven; it is my sins which keep me back." And then he added with his genuine childlike smile, " The Lord keep you, Fraulein JuHana, do not remember my worst ; greet the European countries for me, and your old friend Leibnitz. May be he will prove to be in the right, and that we shall, with God's help, not eat, but serve one another." He embraced and kissed m}^ forehead with brotherly tenderness. I could not help crying. Once more I turned round and had a last look at him, and again my heart sank with a presentiment, just as on that day when I saw in the dark, and as it were prophetic mirror, the face of Charlotte and Alexis, when both had seemed to me to be victims doomed to some great suffering. She had perished, now his turn had come. And then I recalled him as he stood the last day in Roshdestveno, on the dove-cote, high up over the 170 PETER AND ALEXIS sullen wood against the blood-red sky, as it were wrapt in the white doves' wings. So he will ever remain in my memory. :); :)c :): :): :)i I hear that prisoners set free sometimes regret their prison. I experience a kindred feeling at the present moment with regard to Russia. I began this diary with curses. I cannot close it with blessings. I will only say, what probably many in Europe would say, were they better acquainted with Russia — " A mysterious country — a mysterious people." Book IV THE FLOOD CHAPTER I THE Tsar had been warned, when he contemplated building Petersburg, that the site was not suitable for habitation, on account of the floods ; twelv^e years pre- viously the whole country up to Nienshantz had been under water, and similar disasters recurred about every five years. The original inhabitants of the Neva Delta did not erect permanent houses, but only small huts. Whenever a great flood, by one sign or another, seemed to be threatened, they were taken to pieces, the logs and planks were tied together in a raft and fastened to trees, while the people themselves sought refuge on the hill Dooderhof. But to Peter, the new city seemed a " Paradise " just because of the abundance of water which, like a waterfowl, he loved ; and he hoped that in this place, quicker than anywhere else, he could accustom his subjects to a sea- faring life. At the end of October 1715, the Neva began to freeze, snow fell, the sleighs were brought out and everybody was expecting an early, settled winter. But quite unexpectedly the weather changed ; it became warm again. In one night all the snow and ice had melted. The wind brought a fog from the sea, a putrid, yellow, suffocating mist, which caused much sickness among the people. " I pray God to deliver me from this place of perdition," wrote an old boyar to Moscow. " I am seriously afraid of falling ill ; since the thaw began we have been enveloped in such a balmy scent and such gloom, that it is impossible 172 PETER AND ALEXIS to go out. Many die because of the infectious air in this ' Paradise.' " The south-west wind continued to blow for nine days ; the water in the Neva rose ; several times it began to over- flow. Peter issued decrees by which the inhabitants were bidden to empty their cellars of all goods, to keep boats in readiness and to drive the cattle on to the higher ground. But the water after mounting, receded every time. The Tsar, noticing that his decrees only troubled the people, and having come to the conclusion, by signs known only to himself, that there would be no great flood, resolved to trouble himself no more about the rise of the water. The first fashionable winter " Assembly " was fixed on November 6, in the house of Fedor Apraksin, President of the Admiralty. The house was situated on the quay opposite to the Admiralty buildings, and next to the Winter Palace. On the eve of the Assembly the water rose again. People of experience predicted that this time the calamity could not be escaped, and various signs were quoted in sup- port of this belief ; the cockroaches in the palace had begun to creep from the cellars up to the garret ; the mice had left the flour stores ; the Tsaritsa had dreamt that Peters- burg had become a prey to the flames, and fire in a dream means flood. Not quite recovered from her confinement, she could not accompany Peter to the " Assembly, " and entreated him to stay at home. Peter read in the looks of all that ancient dread of water, which all his life he had vainly sought to overcome : " the sea brings sadness and grief — where water is there is grief also — even the Tsar cannot appease a flood." He was warned on all sides. At last he was so annoyed that he forbade even the mentioning of a flood. He all but struck the Chief Constable Deviere with his club. An unknown peasant had terrified the whole town by predicting that the water would rise above the high elm which grew on the quay near the Trinity Church. Peter ordered the elm tree to be felled and the peasant to be flogged on the site ; during the performance a drum was to be beaten and a per- suasive exhortation addressed to the people. Before the " Assembly " commenced, Apraksin came to the Tsar asking permission to have it in the house itself, and THE FLOOD 173 not in the pavilion generally used on such occasions, which stood out in the courtyard and was connected with the main building only by a narrow glazed gallery/, far from safe in case of a sudden rise of water, when the guests might easily be cut off from the staircase which led out to the upper rooms. Peter thought it over, yet decided to have his own way, arid ordered the " Assembly " to be held in its usual quarter, the pavilion. " An Assembly," the decree explained, " is a free gather- ing not only for pleasure but for work, " The host is neither obliged to receive his guests nor to see them to the door when they depart, nor is he expected to press them to eat. " At the ' Assembly ' people are free to sit, walk about, or join in the games and no one has a right to interfere, or check another's actions ; ceremonies, such as rising up to greet, conducting to the door, are forbidden under penalty of the fine of the ' Great Eagle. ' " Both the supper-room and the room for dancing were spacious, but with exceedingly low ceilings ; the walls of the former were covered with blue tiles, after the style of Dutch kitchens, pewter dishes were ranged along the shelves, the brick floor was strewn with sand, the large tiled stove was overheated. One of the three long tables was spread with cojd savoury dishes, Peter's favourite oysters, pickled sprats, lemons ; on another table, chess and draught boards were laid ; on a third packets of tobacco, baskets with clay pipes and piles of wooden splinters for pipe- lighters. Tallow candles were faintly glimmering through the clouds of smoke. The low room, packed with people, re- minded one of a skipper's saloon in Plymouth or Rotterdam. The similarity was accentuated by a number of English and Dutch ship captains. Their wives, fat, smooth, glossy, with red cheeks, their feet tucked in fur warmers, knitted stockings, chatted and evidently felt quite at home. Peter, smoking a short clay pipe, sipping mulled ale mixed with cognac, sugar and lemon juice, was playing chess with the Archimandrite Theodosius. Anton Deviere, the Chief Constable, timidly approached the Tsar Hke a guilty dog. It was difficult to decide whether 174 PETER AND ALEXIS he was a Jew or a Portuguese ; his feminine face expressed that combination of sweetness and weakness found some- times amongst southern faces. " Your Majesty, the water is rising." " How much ? " " Two feet nine inches." " And the wind ? " " West south-west." " Nonsense.. I myself have just registered it, South-west south." " It has changed," rephed Deviere apologetically, as if he were responsible for the direction of the wind. " Never mind," said Peter decidedly, " the water will soon fall. The barometer points to fair; it won't deceive, never fear." He believed in the infallibiUty of the barometer as he did in that of mechanics in general. " Your Majesty, is there no order ? " Deviere asked plaintively. " Otherwise I really don't know what to do. People are getting exceedingly frightened. Intelligent experts say " The Tsar closely eyed him. " One of these intelligent experts I have had flogged near Trinity Church ; and you too won't escape, unless you give up talking nonsense. Go, fool ! " Deviere, shrinking yet more, like the affectionate dog, Lizette, at the sight of a stick, instantly disappeared. " What is your opinion about this extraordinary ringing, Father ? " Peter turned to Theodosius, continuing their conversation about the Novgorod church bells which, according to recent information, were tolling miraculously at night : the rumour spread that this was a foreboding of great calamities. Theodosius stroked his thin beard, played with the double-faced panagia, adorned with the crucifix and the Tsar's portrait, cast a side glance at the Tsarevitch Alexis, who was sitting next to them, blinked with one eye as if taking aim, and suddenly his diminutive face, like the snout of a bat, lit up with rarest subtlety : — " Anybody can understand the meaning of this speech- less droning. It obviously comes from the fiend ; Satan THE FLOOD 175 is sobbing because his reign over the Russian people is coming to an end ; he is cast out from the possessed, the Raskolniks, the monks, the old hypocrites, whom your Majesty has taken great pains to cure." And Theodosius led the conversation to his favourite topic, the uselessness of the monks. " Monks are parasites. They escape taxation in order to eat the bread of idleness. What gain are they to society ? They count their civil position for nothing, describing it as part of the vanities of the world. They have a saying to this effect : — ' He who becomes a monk no longer works for the Tsar of earth, but for the Tsar of heaven. They lead an animal hfe in the deserts, They seem incapable of realizing that the Russian climate makes a real hermit life impossible." Alexis understood that this talk about hypocrites was aimed at him. He rose. Peter looked at him and said, " Stay where you are ! " The Tsarevitch submissively returned to his seat, casting down his eyes, as he felt, with the air of a hypocrite. Theodosius was in his best vein. Stimulated by the atten- tion of the Tsar, who had brought out his notebook and was taking notes for future decrees, he suggested measure after measure, ostensibly for the reform, but to Alexis it seemed for the destruction, of monasticism in Russia. " Establish in the monasteries regulation hospitals for discharged dragoons, also schools for arithmetic, geometry ; in the convents foundling institutions for illegitimate children ; the nuns should be employed in weaving." The Tsarevitch did his best not to hear ; yet stray words would reach him like authoritative com^mands. " The sale of mead and oil in churches must be finally forbidden, the burning of tapers before icons placed outside the churches must be stopped. Chapels must be closed up ; no new relics to be announced. Mendicants to be taken into custody and relentlessly beaten with rods ; no miracles to be invented." The wind rattled at the window shutters ; a draught passed through the room, and the candles flickered. A count- less host of enemies seemed to be besieging and breaking 176 PETER AND ALEXIS into the house ; and in the words of Theodosius, Alexis felt the same inimical force. It was the attack of a storm from the west. The walls of the dancing-room were hung with woven tapestry and pier glasses ; chandeliers with wax candles supplied the light. Musicians with deafening wind in- struments were placed on a small platform. The ceiling, with its allegorical representation of " A journey to the Isle of Love," was so low that the naked Cupids with their fat calves and legs were almost brushed by the wigs of the dancers. The ladies in the intervals between the dances sat as if dumb ; they seemed dull and stupefied ; in dancing, they hopped round like wax figures ; they answered all questions in monosyllables, and were quite scared by compliments. Daughters seemed tied to their mother's skirts ; while the mother's faces clearly expressed : we would rather our daughters were drowned than here. William Mons was repeating a compliment, culled from a German book of savoir-faire, to that same Nastenka, who was in love with a naval officer and had been crying over a tender missive at the \'enus Festival in the Summer Garden. " Through repeatedly meeting you, fair angel, such a desire to know you better has arisen within me, that, unable to conceal it any longer, I am compelled to lay it deferentially before you. I heartily wish that you, my lady, might have found in me a person whose habits and agreeable conversation could satisfy you ; a person whose behaviour and conversation might not displease you ; but since nature has given me no advantages, deign to accept instead my devoted faithfulness and service ! " Nastenka was not listening. The bu''z of mionotonously sounding words had made her sleepy ; later on, she com- plained to her aunt, that though her partner seemed to speak Russian, yet with the best intention she could not make out a single word. The Secretary to the French Ambassador, George Pros- courov, son of a Moscow clerk, who had lived for some time in Paris, and had become there a "Monsieur George," a perfect " petit maitre " and " galant homme," was singing THE FLOOD 177 to the ladies a modem ditty about the coiffeur Prison, and the street-girl, Dodun : La Dodun dit a Prison : Coiffez-moi avec adresse. Je pretends avec raison Inspirer de la tendresse. Tignonnez, tignonnez, bichonnez-moi ! He also recited a Russian poem on the charms of life in Paris. O beautiful city on flowing Seine The gods have chosen thy fair domain. The manners of boors are driven out hence By thy most exquisite influence, And never shall I in my soul forget The town that I leave with such deep regret ! The old Moscow boyars, hostile to the new customs, sat a little way off, warming themselves near the stove, holding converse with one another in allusions and riddles. " What do you think, my lord, of life in Petersburg, eh ? " " To the devil with you and your Petersburg hfe ! These comxpliments and reverences and obeisances of the woman- folk, and the foreign food, make one's head go round! " " What's to be done, friend, but bear it ? One cannot leap into heaven, nor bury oneself in the earth. Patience, patience ! " Mons was whispering into Nastenka's ears a newly com- posed ditty : Without love and passion. All days are dreary. Love sighs acquaint us With all life's sweetness. What, say, is life for, If one loves not ? Suddenly, it seemed to her that the ceiling was shaking and that the naked Cupids were falling upon her head. She cried out ; William Mons reassured her ; it was only the wind bulging out like a sail the canvas of the picture nailed to the ceiling. M 178 PETER AND ALEXIS Again the shutters rattled, this time with such force that everybody looked round in terror. The polonaise began ; the couples set out and music drowned the noise of the storm. Only the shivering old nobles, warming themselves round the stove, listened to the howling of the wind in the chimney, and whispered to one another, sighing and shaking their heads. They seemed to hear in the sounds of the storm, rendered more ill-omened still by the music, the old words : " out of the sea sorrow, out of the water, grief ! " Peter continued his conversation with Theodosius ; he asked him about the heresy of the Moscow iconoclasts, Fomka the barber and Dmitri the physician. Both heretics, in propagating their teaching, had referred to the Tsar's recent decrees : " Thanks be to God, nowadays in Moscovy everybody is free to follow what faith he chooses." " According to their teaching," continued Theodosius, with a smile which made it impossible to infer whether he disagreed or sympathised with the heresy, " the true faith is founded on the Scriptures and good works, and not on miracles and traditions. " People of any creed can be savevd according to the apostle's word : ' In every nation he that fearethGod, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with Him." " Very reasonable," remarked Peter and the monk's smile seemed to be reflected on the Tsar's face ; they under- stood one another without words. " And the icons," continued Theodosius, " being but man's work, according to their teaching are idols. How can painted boards work miracles ? You throw them into the fire, they burn just like ordinary wood. It is not the icons but God, who should be worshipped. And who gave the saints ears so long as to enable them to hear the prayers said on earth ? If, say they, a son is slain by a stick or a knife, how can the slain man's father love that knife or stick ? In the same way how can God love the wood on which His Son had been crucified ? And the Virgin, they ask, why should she be honoured ? She is like a plain bag filled with precious stones and pearls. When the bag is emptied of its treasure what value or honour remain to it ? About the Eucharist, too, they use THE FLOOD 179 sophisms : how can Christ be broken up, distributed and eaten at the services of which such numbers are held all over the world on the same day ? How can the prayers of priests change bread into our Lord's body, especially as there are all sorts of men among priests : drunkards, sybarites and veritable scoundrels. This is highly improb- able and we very much doubt it. The bread smells bread to us, and the blood, so far as our senses can ascertain, is but red wine." "It is not right for us Orthodox even to listen to such heresy," the Tsar checked Theodosius. The latter stopped short, yet his smile seemed to grow only more insolent and more malignant. The Tsarevitch raised his eyes and furtively glanced at his father. He seemed to notice confusion in Peter's look. The Tsar no longer smiled ; his face had grown serious, almost wrathful, 5-et at the same time helpless and per- plexed. Had he not a moment ago recognized the basis of heresy as being reasonable ? Accepting the basis how can he regret the inferences ? It is easy to forbid, but how refute r* The Tsar is clever, yet is not his cleverness ex- ceeded by that of the monk ; was not the latter leading the Tsar, as an evil guide leads a blind man, straight to- wards a precipice ? Thus thought Alexis ; and the subtle smile of Theodosius found reflection no longer on the father's but on the son's face. Now they too understood one another without words. " There is nothing to be wondered at in Fomka and Dmitri," said Avramoff, breaking the awkward silence. " ' The music sways the dance.' The sheep do but follow the shepherd." He steadily eyed Theodosius ; the same took the hint and quivered with rage. At this moment some immeasurable force hurled itself against the shutters, as if a thousand fists were beating at them. This something hissed, howled, wailed, and then died slowly away in the distance. Then the assaiLints seemed to return more and more formidably to the attack, and to be breaking into the house. Deviere ran out every ten minutes to learn about the rise of the water. The news was bad, the Mia and Fontanna were already in flood. The town was panic-stricken. i8o PETER AND ALEXIS Deviere lost his head ; several times he approached the Tsar, trying to catch his eye and attract his notice, but Peter, engrossed in conversation, did not pay any attention to him. At last, no longer able to restrain himself, with desperate resolution he stooped and stuttered in the Tsar's ear : — " Your Majesty ! — the water ! " Peter without a word of warning, with a quick, almost involuntary movement, gave him a slap in the face. Deviere felt neither shame nor insult, nothing except the pain, so used was he to such treatment. " It is a privilege," said Peter's eaglets " to be struck by a monarch whose blows are favours." Peter with a calm countenance, as though nothing what- ever had happened, turned to Avramoff and asked him the reason why the publication of the astronomer Huyghen's work, Contemplation or Description of Heavenly and Earthly Bodies, had been delayed so long. For a moment Avramoff was taken aback, but he in- stantly recovered and looking straight into the Tsar's eyes he said with firmness : — " That book is exceedingly blasphemous ; it has been written, not with ink but with helhsh charcoal, and there- fore it is only fit to be burnt." " What does the blasphemy consist of ? " " The rotation of the earth round the sun is asserted, as well as the existence of a plurality of worlds, and all those worlds are supposed to be like ours, with human beings, meadows, fields, woods, animals, and everj^thing else just as we have it. And in this sly and subtle way the author tries to glorif}^ and establish Nature (which means self- existent life), while a God-Creator is dispensed with." A discussion began : the Tsar began proving that Coper- nicus' Chart of the universe explained in a natural and suitable way all the life of the planets. Under the protection of the Tsar and Copernicus more and more daring thoughts were expressed. " To-day all philosophy can be reduced to mechanics," suddenly declared the naval councillor, Alexander Kikin. " The universe is believed to be a clock on a large scale ; everything acts in it by fixed motions, which depend on a THE FLOOD i8i perfect arrangement of the automaton. The same mechan- ism pervades the whole " " A senseless atheistical philosophy, a corrupt and un- stable basis of reasoning," exclaimed the terrified Avra- moff ; but nobody listened to him. Each tried to outdo the other in learning. " The ancient philosopher Dicaearcbus taught that man's being is in his body, and that the word ' soul ' is only an accidental meaningless term," added the vice-chancellor Shafiroff. " The microscope has revealed in man's seed animals very much like frogs or tadpoles," said Monsieur George with such a mischievous smile, that it was obvious he meant to say there cannot be such a thing as a soul. After the manner of all Parisian dandies, he had his own " Petite Philosophic, " in expounding which he displayed the same polite frivolity as when singing the coiffeur's song : ' Tignon- nez, tignonnez, bichonnez moi.' " According to Leibnitz we are but thinking hydraulic machines : the oyster is far behind us in reasoning capacity." " Not far behind you," somebody remarked ; but Mon- sieur George continued imperturbably : " The oyster is far behind us in reasoning capacity. Its life is, so to speak, limited to its shell, and hence it stands in no need of the five senses. It is possible that creatures in other worlds possessing ten or more senses are infinitely superior to us ; that Newton and Leibnitz excite no more wonder among them than the ape or spider among us." The Tsarevitch was hstening, and it seemed to him, that this conversation acted on his ideas, just as the Peters- burg thaw on the snow in spring ; everything was unravel- ing, drifting, melting, growing rotten ; everything was changing into mud and mire under the influence of the bale- ful western wind. Doubt in all things, negation of all things, without regard, without reservation, rose like the Neva, which, swollen by the wind, was threatening an inun- dation. " Enough of this idle talk," concluded Peter rising. " He who denies God is either mad or a fool. He, who has eyes, ought to discern God in His creations. Deniers of God bring shame to the country and must not be tolerated. i82 PETER AND ALEXIS for they undermine the basis of law upon which rest vows and the oath of allegiance." " The cause of lawlessness," interposed Theodosius, unwilling to miss an opportunity, " is rather to be sought in hypocritical zeal than in atheism ; atheists themselves insist that God should be taught to the masses, else, say they, the people will revolt against authority." The whole building was now continuously shaking under the pressure of the storm. Yet nobody noticed the sounds, they had grown used to them ; the Tsar's face was calm, and his appearance reassured the others. Somebody spread the report that the wind had changed round, and that there was hope that the waters would abate. " You see," said Peter, and his face grew bright, " there was no reason to get frightened. Never fear, the barometer will not he ! " He went into the next room and joined the dancers. When the Tsar was merry, he infected every one else with his merriment. In dancing he stamped, jumped and per- formed various feats with such enthusiasm that the most indolent were eager to join in. In the English country dance the lady of each first pair invented a new figure. The Princess Tsherkasski kissed her partner Peter Tolstoi and pulled his wig over his nose, the rest of the ladies did likewise, while the gentlemen had to stand motionless as logs. A general scramble, laughing, all sorts of nonsense ensued, all were merry as school chil- dren and Peter was the merriest of all. Only the old princes continued to sit in their corner listening to the howling of the wind. They whispered, sighed, and shook their heads. One of them remembered a passage in the Holy Fathers against dancing ; " The twirling dances of women alienate people from God and hurl them into the depths of Hell. Laughter will be turned into mourning ; dancers will be hung up by their navels." The Tsar came up to the old men and invited them to join the dance. Vain were their refusals, the plea of their inability and of various ailments, rheumatism, asthma, gout ; the Tsar would take no excuse. A solemn, quaint " Grossvater " was played ; the spright- THE FLOOD 183 liest young ladies were purposely chosen as partners for the old men, who at first hardly moved, stumbled, and muddled both themselves and others ; yet when the Tsar threatened them with a glass of that terrible pepper brandy,they jumped about as hvely as the younger ones ; they paid for it, how- ever, at the end of the dance, when they fell back on their seats half dead with fatigue, groaning, puffing, and sigh- ing. They had hardly time to recover when the Tsar began a new dance more intricate even than the first, known as the " Chain dance ; " thirty pairs, all tied together with hand- chiefs followed a fiddler, a small hunchback who went skipping along in front of them. The dancers first went round the two rooms of the wing, then across the gallery they entered the main building ; all over the house, from room to room, from staircase to stair- case the saraband swept along, shrieking and laughing. The hunchback led the way, fiddling and leaping frantically, making faces as though some evil spirit possessed him. He was followed by the Tsar and his partner, the rest following after ; as though the Tsar were leading the captives while he himself, the giant, was led and twirled along by the caprices of the little demon. On their way back to the pavilion they saw people running towards them across the gallery waving their hands in terror and crying : — " The water, the water, the water ! " The couples in front stopped short, but they were crushed by those running up from behind ; a general confusion ensued. They were hurled against one another, knocked down, dragging and tearing at the handkerchiefs, which bound them to one another, to undo them. The men swore, the ladies screamed ; the chain was broken. A larger number headed by the Tsar hurried back through the gallery into the main building. A smaller number, those who were in front and in consequence nearer the wing, tried to follow, but before they had time to reach even the middle of the gallery, the shutter at one of the windows cracked, quivered and fell, sending the window pane in shivers ; a stream of turbulent water rushed in after it. At the same time im- i84 PETER AND ALEXIS prisoned air in the cellar below pressing against the floor began raising and bulging, and finally burst the floor up with a crash and rumble like the firing of cannon. Peter called out from the other end of the gallery to those who were cut off : — " Go back to the pavilion ! Don't be afraid, I will send boats." The words did not reach them, yet they understood his signs, and stood still. Only two went on running along the flooded floor of the corridor. Theodosius was one of them. He had nearly reached the end where Peter stood waiting for him, when suddenly a plank gave way. Theodosius the monk fell through and began to sink. The other, a fat woman, the wife of a Dutch captain, picking up her skirts jumped over the monk's head, red stockings flashed above his black hood. The Tsar hurried to the rescue of Theodosius, seized him by the shoulder, pulled him out and carried him in his arms like a little child. Theodosius was shivering and dripping all over. The wide black sleeves of his mantle running with water made him look Hke a wet bat. The hunchback fiddler too, on reaching the middle of the gallery, had dis- appeared in the water ; he came to the surface again, tried to swim, but at that moment the middle of the ceiling gave way, came down with a crash, and buried him. Then the few who were left, numbering about ten, seeing they were entirely cut off by water from the main building, hurried back into the wing, their last refuge. But here, too, the water was fast gaining ground. The waves were beating just below the windows, the shutters creaked, cracked and threatened any moment to be torn off their hinges. The water came in through the broken window panes and the cracks ; it oozed, gushed and gurgled down the walls, forming pools, flooding the floor. All lost their heads, save Tolstoi and Wilim Ivanovitch Mons, who with presence of mind searched for another exit ; they discovered a small door hidden by hangings ; it opened upon a staircase which led to the garret. All rushed towards it. Even the gaflantest cavaliers, now that death stared them in the face, neglected, even jostled, the ladies ; each thought only of himself. THE FLOOD 185 It was dark in the garret. Groping their way among beams, planks, empty barrels and cases, they reached the furthermost corner partly protected from the wind by a prominent chimney, which was still warm ; they huddled close to it and for some time remained in the dark, flurried and stupefied by fear. The ladies in ball-dresses had their teeth chattering with cold. At last Mons decided to go down and find help. Downstairs the grooms, up to their knees in water, were leading into the room their master's horses, which they had just saved from drowning in the stables. The Assembly Room was changed into a stable, the mirrors reflected the heads of horses ; rags of canvas painted with the journey to the " Isle of Love " were hanging down from the ceiling ; the naked Cupids bulged in mortal anguish. Mons gave money to the grooms, and they procured him a lantern, a bottle of brandy and several sheepskins. They told him there was no way out of the wing ; the gallery was shattered, the yard flooded, they themselves were obliged to seek refuge in the garret. The promised boats never arrived ; it turned out afterwards that those sent by the Tsar were unable to get near the wing ; the courtyard was surrounded by a high fence and the only gateway was filled up by the debris of a shattered building. Mons returned to his com- panions in the garret ; the light of the lantern seemed to give them a little courage ; the men drank some of the brandy, the women wrapped themselves in the sheepskins. The night seemed endless ; the whole house was trem- bling under the pressure of the waves, like a rotten vessel on the brink of destruction. Overhead the storm tore off the tiles from the roof ; now rushing past with furious howls and stamping like a herd of wild beasts, now with piercing hiss and rustle Hke a flock of gigantic birds ; at times it seemed as if the wind would tear off the roof itself and blow them all away. In the voice of the storm they seemed to hear the cries of the drowning ; they expected the whole town would disappear at any moment. One of the ladies, the wife of the Danish resident, who was with child, was suddenly seized by violent pains and screamed most piteously ; a premature delivery was feared. i86 PETER AND ALEXIS George Proskoiirov kept pra3ang : " Holy Father Nicho- las, St. Sergius have mercy upon us!" It was diflficult to recognize in him the free-thinker who had been expound- ing the non-existence of the soul. Michael Avramoff was also quaking with fear, yet seemed to rejoice at the mis- fortune which had befallen them. " How argue with God ? His wrath is just. This town will be destroyed from the face of the earth like Sodom and Gomorrah : * And God looked upon the earth and behold it was corrupt, for all flesh had corrupted his way upon earth. And God said : The end of all flesh is come before me. And behold I will bring a flood of water on the earth and destroy all flesh wherein is breath of life from under heaven.' " Listening to these prophecies the refugees felt a new, hitherto unexperienced terror, as if the end of the world, the day of judgment were at hand. A glow of fire flashed in the black sky ; the sound of a clashing bell was heard through the noise of the storm ; it was the alarm bell : the grooms said that in the Admiralty dockyards close by, the workmen's dwellings and the rope and cable stores were on fire. Notwithstanding the abund- ance of water the fire was especially dangerous in this high wind ; burning logs were blown about, and the whole city threatened to blaze up any moment. Petersburg was perishing from these two elements : fire and water ; the prophecies were being fulfilled, Petersburg was doomed. Towards dawn the storm subsided ; in the grey trans- parency of the dim light the gentlemen in wigs, covered with dust and cobwebs, the ladies in " robes-rondes " and hooped skirts after the Versailles fashion, wrapped in sheep- skins, their faces blue with the cold, appeared like spectres to each other. Mons looked out of the garret window and saw in place of a town, a limitless lake. This lake was agitated not only on the surface but seemed to boil, seethe, and bubble up from the very bottom like water in a kettle over a hot fire. This lake was the Neva, variegated like the skin of a serpent's belly, yellow, purple, black, but patched with white foam ; wearied, yet angry, under the terrible, low, leaden sky, grey as the expanse below. Wrecks of barges, overturned boats, logs, planks, roofs, the skeletons of com- THE FLOOD 187 plete houses, carcases of animals — all these were float- ing slowly past on its waves. Melancholy were the traces of human life in the midst of this triumphant element ; here and there above the water peered the towers, spires, domes and roofs of flooded houses. Mons perceived at a distance, opposite to the Peter and Paul fortress, a number of rowing galleys and boyers ; he took up a long pole, one of those used for scaring pigeons, fixed Nastenka's red silk neckerchief to it, pushed it through the window and began to wave, making signs to attract attention. One of the boats left the rest and coming straight across the Neva, approached the Assembly Room pavilion. Peter had worked without a break all the night through, rescuing people from water and flames like a common fire- man ; his hair was singed ; he narrowly escaped being crushed by a beam ; while helping to rescue the chattels of poor people, who lived in cellar dwellings, he stood up to his waist in water and was chilled to the bone ; he suffered with all and cheered all ; wherever the Tsar appeared the work was done so heartily that both water and flames receded. The Tsarevitch was in a boat with his father, but whenever he ventured to offer help, Peter refused as if in disdain. When the fire was quenched and the water began to subside the Tsar remembered it was time to go home to his wife, who had probably spent the night in great anxiety about her husband. On his way back he could not resist the desire to go round by the Summer Garden, and see what damage the flood had done there. The pavilion projecting over the Neva was partially ruined, but the statue of Venus had remained whole. The pedestal was submerged, so that the Goddess, the Foambom, seemed to be again rising from the waves ; not the blue, tender waves of old, but the lurid, dark, waves, heavy as though leaden, of the Styx. At the foot of the statue a black speck was visible. Peter looked through the telescope and found it was a man. By order of the Tsar a sentinel watched night and day at this precious statue. Caught by the waters, not daring to leave i88 PETER AND ALEXIS his post, he had climbed up the pedestal of Venus and hud- dled himself close to her feet, embracing them ; and thus he had probably spent the whole night, starved with cold, half dead with fatigue. The Tsar hastened to his rescue. Standing at the rudder, he steered the boyer against current and wind. Suddenly an enormous wave seized the side of the boat, swept over them showering them with spray and making the craft heel over to such an extent that it threatened to capsize. But Peter was an experienced helmsm?jn. Setting his feet against the stern, leaning with all his weight on the rudder, he overcame the danger, and steered steadily towards his goal. The Tsarevitch glanced at his father and suddenlj", for some reason or other, he remembered what his teacher Viasemsky had once told him when drunk : — " Theodosius is wont to sing with the choristers before your father : where God wills it the order of nature is con- quered, and such like psalm verses. They sing them to flatter your father, and he rejoices to be compared unto God; forgetting that not only God but the devil also has power over the elements ; there are such things as demon miracles." Clad in a plainsailor's jacket, with high leather boots and waving hair — his hat had been carried off by the wind — the gigantic helmsman looked at the flooded city, his face, calm and firm, like sculptured stone, expressed neither confusion, fear, nor pity. There was something super- human in this man. Like fate he held in his power men and elements. Men would bow before him, the wind would abate, the water would subside, and again the city would stand where he ordained it should be. " The order of nature is conquered, when he wills it." " Whose will," the Tsarevitch asked himself, not daring to reply, " God's, or the devil's ? " A few days later, when the usual aspect of Petersburg had well nigh obliterated all traces of the flood, Peter wrote in a jovial letter to one of his eaglets : " Last week, the west-south-west wind beat up such a flood, as, they say, had never happened before. In my THE FLOOD 189 apartments water stood twenty-one inches high, while in the garden and on the opposite shore it was high enough to boat on. It was very amusing to see people, men and women, perched on roofs and trees as on Ararat at the Great Flood. The water though high, didn't do much damage." The letter was dated from " Paradise." CHAPTER II PETER fell ill. He had caught cold during the flood when, in rescuing the poor people's chattels from the cellar dwelHngs, he had stood waist-deep in water. At first he paid no heed to his illness, and tried to get over it by ignoring it, but on November 15, he was obliged to take to his bed and the Court Physician, Blumentrost, declared that the Tsar's hfe was in danger. These days were to decide the fate of Alexis. On October 2S, the day of Alexis' wife's funeral, on their return from the Peter and Paul Cathedral, Peter gave him a letter, " a declaration to my son," which demanded immediate reform on the threat of severe anger and the loss of the crown. " I am at a loss to know what to do," the Tsarevitch kept saying to his friends ; " Am I to become a beggar and hide myself amongst outcasts for the time being, or shall I re- treat to some monastery ; or shall I seek refuge in some country where fugitives are safe ? " " Become a monk," urged Kikin, an old confidant of Alexis. " The monk's hood is not nailed on his head; it will come off again ; and meanwhile you will at least have peace." " I have rescued you from your father's axe," declared Prince Basil Dolgorouki. " Be of good cheer, there is nothing left for you to worry about. Write a thousand letters of resignation — of renunciation of the crown — if necessary. Time is with us. The old proverb says : ' The snail has started on its way, but there's no knowing when it will arrive.' Your decision is not irrevocable." " It is well that you have not set your heart on the inheri- tance," said Prince George Troubetzkoi, trying to console him ; " ' is not gold the source of many tears ? ' " With Kikin the Tsarevitch repeatedly talked over the THE FLOOD 191 possibility of a flight abroad, where he might hve simply, away from everything, in peace. " If it must be," advised Kikin, " go to the Emperor at Vienna. You will be safe there. The Emperor said he would receive you like a son. Or else go to the Pope, or the French Court, even kings find refuge there. It would be easy for them to protect you." The Tsarevitch listened to these counsels, but unable to make up his mind, he lived from day to day waiting tiU the will of God should reveal itself. Suddenly the whole situation changed. Peter's death threatened to disturb not only Russia but the whole world. He, who but yesterday was thinking of hiding himself with beggars, might on the morrow ascend the throne. Unexpected friends surrounded Alexis ; they met, whis- pered, and consulted together, " We must wait and see." " What will be, will be." " Our turn will come ! " " The mice will bury the cat ! " On the night between the first and second of December, the Tsar's condition became so much worse that he ordered his confessor, the Archimandrite Theodosius, t