Part 20

Again, any day on the Brühl Terrace, in Dresden, you may meet, between two and four o'clock in the afternoon (the fashionable hour for a promenade), a man of about fifty. Grey-headed, and afflicted with gout, yet still handsome, he is elegantly dressed, and stamped with that air of good breeding which comes only of long association with elevated strata of society. That man is Paul Petrovitch. Having left Moscow for foreign parts for his health's sake, he has settled in Dresden for the reason that there he possesses the largest number of English and nomad-Russian acquaintances. Towards the former he bears himself with simplicity, and almost with modesty, but with a touch of _hauteur_; and, in return, the English look upon him as a trifle tedious, but respect him on the score of his being "quite a gentleman." In the presence of the Russian element, however, Paul Petrovitch is more free and easy--he gives rein unstintedly to his sarcasm, and rallies both his compatriots and himself. Yet from _him_ such things come pleasantly, and with a gay _insouciance,_ and in a becoming manner; while, in addition, he holds Slavophil views--views which (as we all know) invariably induce the great world to rate their holder a person _très distingué_. True, never by any chance does Paul read a Russian book; yet by way of compensation, there stands on his writing-table a silver ash-tray shaped like a _muzhik's_ clog. Moreover, from some of our Russian tourists he receives considerable attention when they happen to be passing through the town; and even our old friend Matvei Ilyitch Koliazin, on finding himself "in temporary opposition," has paid him a visit while _en route_ to Bohemia for a course of the waters. In fact, the only persons who show Paul no deference at all are the native Germans, whose society he does not greatly cultivate. Yet even they agree that, in the matter of obtaining tickets for the Court Chapel or the theatre and so forth, none is so clever, so dexterous, as "der Herr Baron von Kirsanov." In fact, always does he do "the right thing" so far as he is able; and even yet he can create some stir, owing to the fact that he has once, and to good purpose, been a social lion. Yet life presses upon him not a little heavily--more heavily than he himself is aware. Merely need one look at him as, huddled against the aisle wall of the Russian church, he sits plunged in thought, with his lips bitterly compressed, and continues sitting there until, remembering his surroundings, he makes, almost imperceptibly, the sign of the cross. In similar fashion, Madame Kukshin has gone abroad--in her case, to Heidelberg, where she is engaged in studying, not natural science, but architecture--a branch wherein she has, according to herself, "discovered several new laws." Also, still she is hail-fellow-well-met with students, more especially with some of those Russian physicists and chemists who swarm in Heidelberg, and who, though at first flabbergasting the simple-minded German professors with the moderation of their views, subsequently proceed to flabbergast those professors with the wholeheartedness of their sloth. In fact, it is of two or three of those chemistry students who, though unable to distinguish even oxygen from azote, are yet charged to the brim with conceit and the spirit of "denial," that Madame Kukshin's circle is chiefly composed.

Similarly, friend Sitnikov is preparing to become a great man. For which purpose he is flaunting it in St. Petersburg, and (to quote his own expression) "carrying on the work of the late Bazarov." True, rumour declares that some one has recently given him a second thrashing; as also that he (Sitnikov) has declined to face the music--rather, that he has preferred to hint in an obscure article in an equally obscure newspaper that his assailant is the coward; but to this report Sitnikov merely attaches the epithet "ironical." For the rest, his father continues to send him remittances, while his wife accounts him equally a _littérateur_ and a fool.

Lastly, in a remote corner of Russia there lies a little country cemetery. Like most cemeteries of the kind, it is depressing of aspect. Over its fences dense masses of weed have grown, its drab wooden crosses are rickety and turning mouldy under their blistered, painted canopies, its stone paths have lost their alignment, and look as though some one has displaced them from below, its two or three ragged trees diffuse only the scantiest of shade, and sheep wander unhindered over its tombs. But among those tombs there lies a grave which no man molests and no animal tramples upon: only the birds perch upon it and sing as evening falls. For around that grave stands an iron railing, and at its head and foot are planted two young fir trees. It is the grave of Evgenii Vasilitch Bazarov. Occasionally from the neighbouring manor-house there come two aged and decrepit folk, a man and his wife. Supporting one another with a step which ever grows heavier, they approach the railing, sink upon their knees, and weep long, bitter tears as they gaze at the dumb headstone where their son lies sleeping. Then they exchange a word or two, dust the stone with assiduous care, lay upon it a sprig of fir, and offer a last petition. Yet even then they can scarce bear to tear themselves from the spot where they can draw nearest to their son, and to their memories of him.

But are those tears, those prayers, all fruitless? Is that love, that hallowed, selfless love, of theirs to be wholly unavailing? No, no, and a thousand times no! For, though the heart which lies within that tomb may have been passionate and wild and erring, the flowers which bloom in that spot contemplate us with eyes of naught but peace and innocence, and speak to us of naught but the eternal, mighty calm of "unheeding" nature, as an image of the Eternal Reconciliation, and of the Life which shall have no End.

[1] In the text this word is given in English.

[2] _i.e._ the emancipation of the serfs, which was carried out in 1861.

End of Project Gutenberg's Fathers and Sons, by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev