The Press. — London, England, 1855-01-13 00:00:00

40 Nittraturt. I(- The Englishwoman in Russia. By a Lady, Ten Years Resident in that Country. London : Murray. Russian Life in the Interior. By Ivan Tourghe nieff, of Moscow. Edinburgh: Black. [Second Notice.] OUR previous notice of these books last week closed with some remarks on the deplorable condition to which Russian peasants are re duced, tvhen the estates to which they belong are committed to the mercy of agents or middle-men. In the little volume of "Rus sian Life in the Interior," from a Russian pen, a graphic description is given of a village thus managed. The whole place is in excellent order, the buildings well upheld, the fields well farmed, but two peasants in the last stage of misery throw themselves at their lord's feet, when he visits the place, to com plain of the extortion of his bourmister : My lord, he has taken everything away from us, and utterly ruined us ; he has sent two of my sons to the army against the law, and now he is going to take away the third. No later than yesterday he took away my last cow, and his worship, the starosta, who is a true son of his, beat my baba. Ah ! my good lord I do not allow him to put au end to us altogether.—Bassian L,fe, 197, 198. The old man is repulsed, and accused of being rude and unmannerly:— - - - " MT good lord," said the old man in an accent of fright ful despair, "in the name of God, help us ! And he calls me rude, too ! Ah ! I tell you before God I have no longer any means of living. . . . Sophron Jakovliteh bAs taken a hatred to me. Why, God knows, but he has ruined me, crushed me. . . This is my last child. . . ah ! . ." A tear coursed down the yellow shrivelled cheeks of the old man. "In the name of God, my good lord, help ns, help us! "—lb. 198, 199. But the lord to whom they appeal is little likely to render them justice. Ile character is drawn with a masterly pen; and in the sketch of his interior life we discern the harsh treatment to which domestic serfs are often exposed : Arcadi Pavlytch is, according to his own account, severe, but just; he watches over the wellbeing of his vassals, and if he chastises them, it is the best proof that he loves them. " You must treat them like children," he says on such occasions, "for they are really nothing but grown children, my dear sir, and one must take that into con sideration." When he finds himself under what he calls the sad necessity of having recourse to rigorous measures, he does not show the least sign of anger, and does not even raise his voice: he merely puts out his forefinger, and says quite coldly to the culprit: I requested you, my friend," or, " What is the matter with you, my friend? recal your scattered senses." He quietly bites his lips, his mouth contracts imperceptibly, and that is all.—lb. 181, 182. When a servant is ordered to be whipped he is sent to be " put to rights." The author of this clever volume, Ivan Tourghenieff, repre sents himself as pressed during one of his sporting excursions to breakfast with his en tei tainer Besides tea, there were cutlets, eggs, butter, honey, Gruyere cheese, and some other things. Two valets, in white trousers, silently and with great activity anticipated our least wishes. We were seated on a divan of chintz. Arcadi revived' had on a very wide silk charovar, a waist coat of black velvet, an elegant fez with a blue tassel, and yellow slippers dla Chil)oise, without gnartet•piecea. He drank some tea, nibbled a bit of dry toast, smiled, looked his nails, began to smoke, put a cushion under las elbow, and, in general, showed that he was in an eicellNit humour. Soon after, he attacked the cutlets and cheese seriously, and after acquitting himself manfully in this re spect, he poured out a glass of red wine, carried it to his lips . . . and frowned. " How does it happen that the wine has not been heated ? " he said in a dry voice to one of his valets. The roan trembled, grew pale, and stood as if he were petrified. " I have asked you a question, my dear friend," resumed the young lord, with a studied calm, his large eyes turned fall on the poor man, who twisted convulsively the napkin he had In his hand, and under the fascination of his master's serpent-look was quite unable to articulate a syllable. Arcadi Pavlytch drooped his head, and continued to look in a pensive way at the unfortunate culprit, but from be neath his eyebrows. " Pardon me, my dear sir," he said, addressing me, with an amiable smile, and laying his hand in a confidential way on my knees; and he looked again in silence at the valet. "Go! " he said at last, raising his eyebrows. lie touched the button of a little spring -bell, and a stout dark man with a low forehead and streaky eyes entered. " See Fedor put to rights," said, but in still fewer words, Arcadi Pavlytch, with perfect self-possession. The little thick man bowed, and left the room. " One of the little inconveniences of the country, my dear sir," said Arcadi, smiling. . . " But where THE PRESS. are you going? Stay, stay ; do be so good as to sit down."— /b. 184 , 183. The peasants, instead of the statute work which can be claimed from them by their pro prietor, often pay a tribute, and this tribute is fixed according to their supposed ability to pay. The serfs who have been reared to trades often yield a considerable revenue to their pro prietors, and sometimes are mulcted of their last copeck to satisfy their rapacious lords. M. Tourghenicff represents a poor peasant, who had been to see his barin, or master, to petition for a reduction of his tribute, or to be put on statute work, as, through the death of his son, who had assisted him, he had no longer the means of paying the yearly sum he had been accustomed to do:— " The master? the master?—ha drove me away, and said—' How dare you come to me? Why have I a steward on my estates down there ? Your duty is to address your self first to him. You speak of statute work : pay me first what you owe me.' He was in a great rage." • • a • • • The peasant told us all this with as much coolness as if he had been speaking of a stranger, but the water stood in his little bloodshot eyes, and his lip quivered. "You are going home now ?" said Tolman. " Where should I go to? my wife's there at home gnaw ing her hand for hunger—dying of hunger. " Will you go to the steward?" said Touman, observing with some astonishment the calmness and composure of the peasant. " What ! go to him ? lam in debt, and have not paid. My boy, before he died, was a long time ill, and did not even pay his own tribute. Bah ! that's no great matter; one can't get water out of a stone."—lb. i 3. Even girls, who are expert at an occupation, yield a considerable revenue to their pro prietors : Fedocia lived in Moscow by her needle, and bravely paid an annual tribute of one hundred and eightytwo roubles, fifteen kopecks. She is clever at her work ; she had a great deal to do, and was st!ry happy at Moscow. M. Garpentchenko made her come to the village, and keeps her there without giving her any employment. She wishes to redeem herself, and has spoken to her master about it; but he will not give her an answer.—lb. 103. In another of these sketches, a small pro prietor, answering to our yeoman, relates his experience of the past, when things were much worse than they are now. But he says the young nobles of the present day treat the peasant very much as they treated their toys fifteen years ago; they turn them round and round, break them, and throw them away. The overseer, himself a serf, and the German steward, do what they please with the peasants. We live in a strange epoch; what was is no more, and what will be is not yet."—lb. 08, 09. Some proprietors have whims which the peasants, whatever their disposition, must con form to : Tatiana Vacilievna—may the Lord open the gates of heaven to her !—onr late mistress, did not permit any one here to marry. She once said in the presence of the priest, " God keep me from allowing that. I am a maid, and yet I live; I shall remain a maid. . . . What then? My people are well taken care of, what on earth do they wish ?"—lb. 118. Before parting with these sketches, let us notice one Muscovite peculiarity, which has received abundant illustration in the fearful struggles before Sebastopol—the calmness with which a Russian dies:— The Russian peasant has a way of dying quite peculiar to him; although one can by no means say that the state of mind which he exhibits before expiring is that of in• difference or stupidity. He dies, and I have invariably observed, dies with calmness and simplicity, and as if he were performing a piece of business—an inevitable and quite natural formality.—lb. 285. • A good old country lady died in my presence ; the priest stood by her pillow, uttering the prayers for the dying. The standers by listened thoughtfully, the woman lay motionless; all at once, a change was perceptible ; the offici ating priest, thinking she was just expiring, hastily put the cross on her lips. The woman turned round with an ex. pression of displeasure. " Why in such a hurry, father? " she muttered, with a tongue already paralysed. "Stop, you will get. . ." She turned her left cheek on the pillow, made an effort to push her hand under it, and in this position expired. Under the pillow was found a crown; her wish had been, even in her dying moments, to pay for the last prayer with her own hand. Yes, the Russians have a way of their own when they die. —/b. 297, 298. The best of these sketches is " Karataeff, or the Slave Mistress." A proprietor, of the warm-hearted, extravagant kind, answering to our Irish squire in days past, falls in love with a beautiful girl, the property of a neighbouring lady, who refuses to part with her on any terms, and to punish her for her presumption in wishing to be free sends her to work on a distant farm. Her lover persuades her to run off with him ; he secretes her in his house, SATURDAY, and for a time they are perfectly happy, as b.; grows more and more attached to her. Bu; at length the police are sent to make search for her. Bought off from time to time, they co n . tinually return, and the girl, seeing her pro tector's peril, returns to her mistress to save, him from prosecution. Lost after that, h e goes to Moscow, takes to play and drink, and sinks to beggary. There is great pathos in this story, and, like the other sketches, it gives a strong impression of reality, from the dis tinctness with which the characters are drawn, and from its marked peculiarity of style. It has the disadvantage of coming to us through a double translation, as this book is from the French version, but we have read no descrip tions of the home life of Russia comparable to these for clearness and force, though from their very sketchy style they require attentive perusal to Le appreciated. We return to the volume of the English woman. In some of the preceding extracts it will be noticed that the proprietors com monly treat their serfs as children, and of this treatment amusing instances are given by the Lady. A lacquey, who had an awkward habit of letting everything he touched fall through his fingers, was told the next time he committed the fault he should be punished : The very next day, as he was handing the dish of fish to madame, down went the elegant silver slice ; after having picked it up with a very red face, he cast a terrified look on his master, expecting some awful retribution on his head for the sin he had committed; when the lady, turning to him, ordered him immediately to go and stand in the corner for the rest of the time we should be at dinner. He obeyed with the most contrite face, and stood there like one of Madame Tassand's waxwork figures, without changing countenance or moving in the least. It was wonderful how the other servants could keep a serious expression. We were all nearly choked with suppressed laughter, it was so perfectly ridiculous.—The Englishwoman in Russia, pp. 150, 151. Another story is told of a lady who had a review of her twelve footmen in their new liveries, to see the effect of front, side front, and back, as they stood in order ; and another, of a lady in the country who beat her gardener, a tall athletic young fellow, while he blubbered, confessed his fault, and implored forgiveness. Generally, the peasants seem extremely simple and kind-hearted, but when oppressed beyond endurance, they are known to take terrible revenge. A man who had been flogged, when he next met his master raised his axe and clove his skull from the forehead to the chin. A lady in the country missed her husband, and went into the neighbouring wood to seek him. The body was found with the head severed from the trunk by its side. He had ill-treated the daughter of one of his peasants, and this was the revenge taken. A Swiss governess in the interior of Russia, finding that the gentleman and lady did not come down to breakfast as usual, went to their room, and found them both beheaded in their bed. They had been oppressive to their serfs. The Lady says : I heard of many more examples, hut these will show that even the serfs of Russia, ground down to the dust as they are, will not always writhe like a trodden worm, bat will turn and seek revenge.—lb. 145. _ But there are other instances in which the serfs, who are often so in name rather than reality, from having accumulated considerable property, have voluntarily come forward to re lease their proprietor from debt and difficulty. The natural disposition of the people is un questionably docile, industrious, and humane, and it requires the greatest provocation to induce them even to think of turning against their proprietors. As a rule, all classes of officials are corrupt, and a most amusing ac count is given by the Lady of a drama she wit nessed, the whole plot and fun of which con sisted in a scamp representing himself as a Government inspector, and thus receiving all kinds of bribes and presents to induce him to report favourably. Nothing is more remarkable in the English woman's book than her anticipation of some fearful and irresistible outbreak in Russia as soon as by accident, or by the natural progress of events, the power of the despotism which now rules the country shall be weakened : "Le ndtre est le siecle de Lonis Qninze," sa id a gen tleman one day, in speaking of the society at St. Peters• burg. Alas ! with too much truth. Yet, if we take his as a true comparison, we shall find that all claws in France, even under the reign of such a king, at the head of such a Court, were not equally corrupted.-16. 110. (31 ti , b(