Part 4

And to think that these things are at the present moment being done to tens of thousands of men all over Russia, and have been done, and will long continue to be done, to the meek, wise, and saintly Russian people, who are so cruelly and treacherously deceived!

TRAVELLER AND PEASANT

[_The interior of a peasant hut. An old Traveller is sitting on a bench, reading a book. A Peasant, the master of the hut, just home from his work, sits down to supper and asks the Traveller to share it. The Traveller declines. The Peasant eats, and when he has finished, rises, says grace, and sits down beside the old man._]

PEASANT. What brings you?...

TRAVELLER [_taking off his spectacles and putting down his book_]. There is no train till to-morrow. The station is crowded, so I asked your missis to let me stay the night with you, and she allowed it.

PEASANT. That's all right, you can stay.

TRAVELLER. Thank you!... Well, and how are you living nowadays?

PEASANT. Living? What's our life like?... As bad as can be!

TRAVELLER. How's that?

PEASANT. Why, because we've nothing to live on! Our life is so hard that if we wanted a worse one, we couldn't get it.... You see, there are nine of us in family; all want to eat, and I have only got in four bushels of corn. Try and live on that! Whether one likes it or not, one has to go and work for wages ... and when you look for a job, wages are down!... The rich do what they like with us. The people increase, but the land doesn't, and taxes keep piling up! There's rent, and the district tax, and the land tax, and the tax for bridges, and insurance, and police, and for the corn store ... too many to count! And there are the priests and the landlords.... They all ride on our backs, except those who are too lazy!

TRAVELLER. I thought the peasants were doing well nowadays.

PEASANT. So well, that we go hungry for days at a time!

TRAVELLER. The reason I thought so, was that they have taken to squandering so much money.

PEASANT. Squandering what money? How strange you talk!... Here are people starving to death, and you talk of squandering money!

TRAVELLER. But how is it? The papers say that 700 million roubles (and a million is a thousand thousands)--700 million were spent by the peasants on vódka last year.

PEASANT. Are we the only ones that drink? Just look at the priests.... Don't they swill first-rate? And the gentlefolk aren't behind-hand!

TRAVELLER. Still, that's only a small part. The greater part stills falls to the peasants.

PEASANT. What of that? Are we not to drink at all?

TRAVELLER. No; what I mean is that if 700 millions were squandered on vódka in one year it shows that life can't be so very hard.... 700 millions! It's no joke ... one can hardly imagine it!

PEASANT. But how can one do without it? We didn't start the custom, and it's not for us to stop it.... There are the Church feasts, and weddings, and memorial feasts, and bargains to be wetted with a drink.... Whether one likes it or not, one can't get on without it. It's the custom!

TRAVELLER. But there are people who never drink, and yet they manage to live! After all, there's not much good in it.

PEASANT. No good at all! Only evil!

TRAVELLER. Then one ought not to drink.

PEASANT. Well, anyhow, drink or no drink, we've nothing to live on! We've not enough land. If we had land we could at least live ... but there's none to be had.

TRAVELLER. No land to be had? Why, isn't there plenty of land? Wherever one looks, one sees land!

PEASANT. There's land, right enough, but it's not ours. Your elbow's not far from your mouth, but just you try to bite it!

TRAVELLER. Not yours! Whose is it, then?

PEASANT. Whose?... Whose, indeed! There's that fat-bellied devil over there ... he's seized 5000 acres. He has no family, but he's never satisfied, while we've had to give up keeping fowls--there's nowhere for them to run about! It's nearly time for us to stop keeping cattle, too ... we've no fodder for them; and if a calf, or maybe a horse, happens to stray into his field, we have to pay fines and give him our last farthing.

TRAVELLER. What does he want all that land for?

PEASANT. What does he want the land for? Why, of course, he sows and reaps and sells, and puts the money in the bank.

TRAVELLER. How can he plough a stretch like that, and get his harvest in?

PEASANT. You talk as if you were a child!... What's he got money for, if not to hire labourers?... It's they that do the ploughing and reaping.

TRAVELLER. These labourers are some of you peasants, I expect?

PEASANT. Some are from these parts, and some from elsewhere.

TRAVELLER. Anyway, they are peasants?

PEASANT. Of course they are!... the same as ourselves. Who but a peasant ever works? Of course they are peasants.

TRAVELLER. And if the peasants did not go and work for him...?

PEASANT. Go or stay, he wouldn't let us have it. If the land were to lie idle, he'd not part with it! Like the dog in the manger, that doesn't eat the hay himself and won't let others eat it!

TRAVELLER. But how can he keep his land? I suppose it stretches over some three or four miles? How can he watch it all?

PEASANT. How queer you talk! He himself lies on his back, and fattens his paunch; but he keeps watchmen!

TRAVELLER. And those watchmen, I dare say, are also peasants?

PEASANT. What else could they be? Of course they are!

TRAVELLER. So that the peasants work the rich man's land for him, and guard it for him from themselves?

PEASANT. But how can one help it?

TRAVELLER. Simply by not going to work for him, and not being his watchmen! Then the land would be free. The land is God's, and the people are God's; let him who needs it, plough and sow and gather in the harvest!

PEASANT. That is to say, you think we ought to strike? To meet that, my friend, they have the soldiers. They'd send their soldiers ... one, two, fire!... some would get shot, and others taken up. Soldiers give short shrift!

TRAVELLER. But is it not also the likes of you that are soldiers? Why should they shoot at their own fellows?

PEASANT. How can they help it? That's what the oath is for.

TRAVELLER. The oath? What oath?

PEASANT. Don't you understand? Aren't you a Russian?... The oath is--well, it's the oath!

TRAVELLER. It means swearing, doesn't it?

PEASANT. Well, of course! They swear by the Cross and by the Gospels, to lay down their life for their country.

TRAVELLER. Well, I think that should not be done.

PEASANT. What should not be done?

TRAVELLER. Taking the oath.

PEASANT. Not done? Why, the law demands it!

TRAVELLER. No, it is not in the Law. In the Law of Christ, it is plainly forbidden. He said: "Swear not at all."

PEASANT. Come now! What about the priests?

TRAVELLER [_takes a book, looks for the place, and reads_]: "It was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not forswear thyself, _but I say unto you, Swear not at all_.... But let your speech be, Yea, yea; nay, nay: and whatsoever is more than these is of the evil one" (Matthew v. 33). So, according to Christ's Law, you must not swear.

PEASANT. If there were no oath, there would be no soldiers.

TRAVELLER. Well, and what good are the soldiers?

PEASANT. What good?... But supposing other Tsars were to come and attack our Tsar ... what then?

TRAVELLER. If the Tsars quarrel, let them fight it out themselves.

PEASANT. Come! How could that be possible?

TRAVELLER. It's very simple. He that believes in God, no matter what you may tell him, will never kill a man.

PEASANT. Then why did the priest read out in church that war was declared, and the Reserves were to be ready?

TRAVELLER. I know nothing about that; but I know that in the Commandments, in the Sixth, it says quite plainly: "Thou shalt do no murder." You see, it is forbidden for a man to kill a man.

PEASANT. That means, at home! At the wars, how could you help it? They're enemies!

TRAVELLER. According to Christ's Gospel, there is no such thing as an enemy. You are told to love everybody.

[_Opens the Bible and looks for place._

PEASANT. Well, read it!

TRAVELLER. "Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment.... Ye have heard that it was said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy: but I say unto you, Love your enemies, and pray for them that persecute you" (Matthew v. 21, 43-44).

[_A long pause._

PEASANT. Well, but what about taxes? Ought we to refuse to pay them too?

TRAVELLER. That's as you think best. If your own children are hungry, naturally you should first feed them.

PEASANT. So you think soldiers are not wanted at all?

TRAVELLER. What good do they do? Millions and millions are collected from you and your folk for them--it's no joke to clothe and feed such a host! There are nearly a million of those idlers, and they're only useful to keep the land from you; and it is on you they will fire.

[_The_ PEASANT _sighs, and shakes his head_.

PEASANT. That's true enough! If everybody were to do it at once ... but if one or two make a stand, they'll be shot or sent to Siberia, and that will be the end of the matter.

TRAVELLER. And yet there are men, even now--young men--who by themselves stand up for the Law of God, and refuse to serve. They say: "According to Christ's Law, I dare not be a murderer! Do as you please, but I won't take a rifle in my hands!"

PEASANT. Well, and what happens?

TRAVELLER. They are put in prison; they remain there, poor fellows, three years, or four.... But I've heard that it's not so bad for them, for the authorities themselves respect them. And some are even let out as unfit for service--bad health! Though he is sometimes a strapping, broad-shouldered fellow, he's "not fit," because they're afraid of taking a man of that kind, for fear he should tell others that soldiering is against God's Law. So they let him go.

PEASANT. Really?

TRAVELLER. Yes, sometimes it happens that they are let off; but it also happens that they die there. Still, soldiers die too, and even get maimed in service--lose a leg, or an arm....

PEASANT. Oh, you're a clever fellow! It would be a good thing, only it won't work out like that.

TRAVELLER. Why not?

PEASANT. _That's_ why.

TRAVELLER. What's _that_?

PEASANT. That the authorities have power given them.

TRAVELLER. They only have power, because you obey them. Do not obey the authorities, and they won't have any power!

PEASANT. [_shakes his head_]. You do talk queer! How can one do without the authorities? It is quite impossible to do without some authority.

TRAVELLER. Of course it is! Only whom will you take for authority--the policeman, or God? Whom will you obey--the policeman, or God?

PEASANT. That goes without saying! No one is greater than God. To live for God is the chief thing.

TRAVELLER. Well, if you mean to live for God, you must obey God and not man. And if you live according to God, you will not drive people off the land: you will not be a policeman, a village elder, a tax-collector, a watchman, or above all, a soldier.... You will not promise to kill men.

PEASANT. And how about those long-maned fellows--the priests? They must see that things are being done not according to God's Law. Then why don't they teach how it ought to be?

TRAVELLER. I don't know anything about that. Let them go their way, and you go yours.

PEASANT. They are long-maned devils!

TRAVELLER. It's not right to judge others like that! We must each remember our own faults.

PEASANT. Yes, that's right enough. [_Long pause. The_ PEASANT _shakes his head, and smiles_.] What it comes to is this: that if we all were to tackle it at once, the land would be ours at one go, and there would be no more taxes.

TRAVELLER. No, friend, that's not what I mean. I don't mean that if we live according to God's will, the land will be ours, and there will be no more taxes. I mean that our life is evil, only because we ourselves do evil. If one lived according to God's will, life would not be evil. What our life would be like if we lived according to God's will, God alone knows; but certainly life would not be evil. We drink, scold, fight, go to law, envy, and hate men; we do not accept God's Law; we judge others; call one fat-paunched and another long-maned; but if any one offers us money, we are ready to do anything for it: go as watchmen, policemen, or soldiers, to help ruin others, and to kill our own brothers. We ourselves live like devils, and yet we complain of others!

PEASANT. That's so! But it is hard, oh, how hard! Sometimes it's more than one can bear.

TRAVELLER. But, for our souls' sakes, we must bear it.

PEASANT. That's quite right.... We live badly, because we forget God.

TRAVELLER. Yes, that's it! That's why life is evil. Take the Revolutionaries; they say: "Let's kill this or that squire, or these fat-paunched rich folk (it's all because of them); and then our life will be happy." So they kill, and go on killing, and it profits them nothing. It's the same with the authorities: "Give us time!" they say, "and we'll hang, and do to death in the prisons, a thousand or a couple of thousand people, and then life will become good...." But it only gets worse and worse!

PEASANT. Yes, that's just it! How can judging and punishing do any good? It must be done according to God's Law.

TRAVELLER. Yes, that is just it. You must serve either God or the devil. If it's to be the devil, go and drink, scold, fight, hate, covet, don't obey God's Law, but man's laws, and life will be evil. If it is God, obey Him alone. Don't rob or kill, and don't even condemn, and do not hate any one. Do not plunge into evil actions, and then there will be no evil life.

PEASANT [_sighs_]. You speak well, daddy, very well--only we are taught so little! Oh, if we were taught more like that, things would be quite different! But people come from the town, and chatter about their way of bettering things: they chatter fine, but there's nothing in it.... Thank you, daddy, your words are good!... Well, where will you sleep? On the oven, yes?... The missis will make up a bed for you.

A TALK WITH A WAYFARER

I have come out early. My soul feels light and joyful. It is a wonderful morning. The sun is only just appearing from behind the trees. The dew glitters on them and on the grass. Everything is lovely; everyone is lovable. It is so beautiful that, as the saying has it, "One does not want to die." And, really, I do not want to die. I would willingly live a little longer in this world with such beauty around me and such joy in my heart. That, however, is not my affair, but the Master's....

I approach the village. Before the first house I see a man standing, motionless, sideways to me. He is evidently waiting for somebody or something, and waiting as only working people know how to wait, without impatience or vexation. I draw nearer: he is a bearded, strong, healthy peasant, with shaggy, slightly grey hair, and a simple, worker's face. He is smoking not a "cigar" twisted out of paper, but a short pipe. We greet one another.

"Where does old Alexéy live?" I ask.

"I don't know, friend; we are strangers here."

Not "_I_ am a stranger," but "_we_ are strangers." A Russian is hardly ever alone. If he is doing something wrong, he may perhaps say "I"; otherwise it is always "we" the family, "we" the _artél_, "we" the Commune.

"Strangers? Where do you come from?"

"We are from Kaloúga."

I point to his pipe. "And how much do you spend a year on smoking? Three or more roubles, I daresay!"

"Three? That would hardly be enough."

"Why not give it up?"

"How can one give it up when one's accustomed to it?"

"I also used to smoke, but have given it up ... and I feel so well--so free!"

"Well of course ... but it's dull without it."

"Give it up, and the dulness will go! Smoking is no good, you know!"

"No good at all."

"If it's no good, you should not do it. Seeing you smoke, others will do the same ... especially the young folk. They'll say, 'If the old folk smoke, God himself bids us do it!'"

"That's true enough."

"And your son, seeing you smoke, will do it too."

"Of course, my son too...."

"Well then, give it up!"

"I would, only it's so dull without it.... It's chiefly from dulness. When one feels dull, one has a smoke. That's where the mischief lies.... It's dull! At times it's so dull ... so dull ... so dull!" drawled he.

"The best remedy for that is to think of one's soul."

He threw a glance at me, and at once the expression of his face quite changed: instead of his former kindly, humorous, lively and talkative expression, he became attentive and serious.

"'Think of the soul ... of the soul,' you say?" he asked, gazing questioningly into my eyes.

"Yes! When you think of the soul, you give up all foolish things."

His face lit up affectionately.

"You are right, daddy! You say truly. To think of the soul is the great thing. The soul's the chief thing...." He paused. "Thank you, daddy, it is quite true"; and he pointed to his pipe. "What is it?... Good-for-nothing rubbish! The soul's the chief thing!" repeated he. "What you say is true," and his face grew still kindlier and more serious.

I wished to continue the conversation, but a lump rose in my throat (I have grown very weak in the matter of tears), and I could not speak. With a joyful, tender feeling I took leave of him, swallowing my tears, and I went away.

Yes, how can one help being joyful, living amid such people? How can one help expecting from such people all that is most excellent?

FROM THE DIARY

I am again staying with my friend, Tchertkóff, in the Moscow Government, and am visiting him now for the same reason that once caused us to meet on the border of the Orlóf Government, and that brought me to the Moscow Government a year ago. The reason is that Tchertkóff is allowed to live anywhere in the whole world, except in Toúla Government. So I travel to different ends of it to see him.

Before eight o'clock I go out for my usual walk. It is a hot day. At first I go along the hard clay road, past the acacia bushes already preparing to crack their pods and shed their seeds; then past the yellowing rye-field, with its still fresh and lovely cornflowers, and come out into a black fallow field, now almost all ploughed up. To the right an old man, in rough peasant-boots, ploughs with a _sohá_[4] and a poor, skinny horse; and I hear an angry old voice shout: "Gee-up!" and, from time to time, "Now, you devil!" and again, "Gee-up, devil!" I want to speak with him; but when I pass his furrow, he is at the other end of the field. I go on. There is another ploughman further on. This one I shall probably meet when he reaches the road. If so, I'll speak to him, if there is a chance. And we do meet just as he reaches the road.

[4] A primitive plough used by the peasants.

He ploughs with a proper plough, harnessed to a big roan horse, and is a well-built young lad, well clad, and wearing good boots; and he answers my greeting of "God aid you!" pleasantly.

The plough does not cut into the hard, beaten track that crosses the field, and he lifts it over and halts.

"You find the plough better than a _sohá_?"

"Why, certainly ... much easier!"

"Have you had it long?"

"Not long--and it nearly got stolen...."

"But you got it back?"

"Yes! One of our own villagers had it."

"Well, and did you have the law of him?"

"Why, naturally!"

"But why prosecute, if you got the plough back?"

"Why, you see, he's a thief!"

"What then? The man will go to prison, and learn to steal worse!"

He looks at me seriously and attentively, evidently neither agreeing nor contradicting this, to him, new idea.

He has a fresh, healthy, intelligent face, with hair just appearing on his chin and upper lip, and with intelligent grey eyes.

He leaves the plough, evidently wishing to have a rest, and inclined for a talk. I take the plough-handles, and touch the perspiring, well-fed, full-grown mare. She presses her weight into her collar, and I take a few steps. But I do not manage the plough, the share jumps out of the furrow, and I stop the horse.

"No, you can't do it."

"I have only spoilt your furrow."

"That doesn't matter--I'll put it right!"

He backs his horse, to plough the part I have missed, but does not go on ploughing.

"It is hot in the sun.... Let's go and sit under the bushes," says he, pointing to a little wood just across the field.

We go into the shade of the young birches. He sits down on the ground, and I stop in front of him.

"What village are you from?"

"From Botvínino."

"Is that far?"

"There it is, shimmering on the hill," says he, pointing.

"Why are you ploughing so far from home?"

"This is not my land: it belongs to a peasant here. I have hired myself out to him."

"Hired yourself out for the whole summer?"

"No--to plough this ground twice, and sow it, all properly."

"Has he much land, then?"

"Yes, he sows about fifteen bushels of seed."

"Does he! And is that horse your own? It's a good horse."

"Yes, it's not a bad mare," he answers, with quiet pride.

The mare really is, in build, size, and condition, such as a peasant rarely possesses.

"I expect you are in service somewhere, and do carting?"

"No, I live at home. I'm my own master!"

"What, so young?"

"Yes! I was left fatherless at seven. My brother works at a Moscow factory. At first my sister helped; she also worked at a factory. But since I was fourteen I've had no help in all my affairs, and have worked and earned," says he, with calm consciousness of his dignity.

"Are you married?"

"No."

"Then, who does your housework?"

"Why, mother!"

"And you have a cow?"

"Two cows."

"Have you, really?... And how old are you?" I ask.

"Eighteen," he replies, with a slight smile, understanding that it interests me to see that so young a fellow has been able to manage so well. This, evidently, pleases him.

"How young you still are!" I say. "And will you have to go as a soldier?"

"Of course ... be conscripted!" says he, with the calm expression with which people speak of old age, death, and in general of things it is useless to argue about, because they are unavoidable.

As always happens now when one speaks to peasants, our talk touches on the land, and, describing his life, he says he has not enough land, and that if he did not do wage-labour, sometimes with and sometimes without his horse, he would not have anything to live on. But he says this with merry, pleased and proud self-satisfaction; and again remarks that he was left alone, master of the house, when he was fourteen, and has earned everything himself.

"And do you drink vódka?"

He evidently does not like to say that he does, and still does not wish to tell a lie.

"I do," he says, softly, shrugging his shoulders.

"And can you read and write?"

"Very well."

"And haven't you read books about strong drink?"

"No, I haven't."

"Well, but wouldn't it be better not to drink at all?"

"Of course. Little good comes of it."

"Then why not give it up?"

He is silent, evidently understanding, and thinking it over.

"It can be done, you know," say I, "and what a good thing it would be!... The day before yesterday I went to Ívino. When I reached one of the houses, the master came out to greet me, calling me by name. It turned out that we had met twelve years before.... It was Koúzin--do you know him?"

"Of course I do! Sergéy Timoféevitch, you mean?"

I tell him how we started a Temperance Society twelve years ago with Koúzin, who, though he used to drink, has quite given it up, and now tells me he is very glad to be rid of so nasty a habit; and, one sees, is living well, with his house and everything well managed, and who, had he not given up drinking, would have had none of these things.

"Yes, that is so!"