Childhood, Boyhood, Youth

  Yet, for all that, her animated movements, small hands, and peculiarly

  dry features communicated something aristocratic and energetic to her

  general appearance. She talked a great deal, and, to judge from her

  eloquence, belonged to that class of persons who always speak as though

  some one were contradicting them, even though no one else may be saying

  a word. First she would raise her voice, then lower it and then take on

  a fresh access of vivacity as she looked at the persons present, but not

  participating in the conversation, with an air of endeavouring to draw

  them into it.

  Although the Princess kissed Grandmamma's hand and repeatedly called her

  "my good Aunt," I could see that Grandmamma did not care much about her,

  for she kept raising her eyebrows in a peculiar way while listening

  to the Princess's excuses why Prince Michael had been prevented from

  calling, and congratulating Grandmamma "as he would like so-much to

  have done." At length, however, she answered the Princess's French with

  Russian, and with a sharp accentuation of certain words.

  "I am much obliged to you for your kindness," she said. "As for Prince

  Michael's absence, pray do not mention it. He has so much else to do.

  Besides, what pleasure could he find in coming to see an old woman like

  me?" Then, without allowing the Princess time to reply, she went on:

  "How are your children my dear?"

  "Well, thank God, Aunt, they grow and do their lessons and

  play--particularly my eldest one, Etienne, who is so wild that it

  is almost impossible to keep him in order. Still, he is a clever and

  promising boy. Would you believe it, cousin," (this last to Papa, since

  Grandmamma altogether uninterested in the Princess's children, had

  turned to us, taken my verses out from beneath the presentation box, and

  unfolded them again), "would you believe it, but one day not long ago--"

  and leaning over towards Papa, the Princess related something or other

  with great vivacity. Then, her tale concluded, she laughed, and, with a

  questioning look at Papa, went on:

  "What a boy, cousin! He ought to have been whipped, but the trick was

  so spirited and amusing that I let him off." Then the Princess looked at

  Grandmamma and laughed again.

  "Ah! So you WHIP your children, do you" said Grandmamma, with a

  significant lift of her eyebrows, and laying a peculiar stress on the

  word "WHIP."

  "Alas, my good Aunt," replied the Princess in a sort of tolerant tone

  and with another glance at Papa, "I know your views on the subject, but

  must beg to be allowed to differ with them. However much I have thought

  over and read and talked about the matter, I have always been forced to

  come to the conclusion that children must be ruled through FEAR. To make

  something of a child, you must make it FEAR something. Is it not so,

  cousin? And what, pray, do children fear so much as a rod?"

  As she spoke she seemed, to look inquiringly at Woloda and myself, and I

  confess that I did not feel altogether comfortable.

  "Whatever you may say," she went on, "a boy of twelve, or even of

  fourteen, is still a child and should be whipped as such; but with

  girls, perhaps, it is another matter."

  "How lucky it is that I am not her son!" I thought to myself.

  "Oh, very well," said Grandmamma, folding up my verses and replacing

  them beneath the box (as though, after that exposition of views, the

  Princess was unworthy of the honour of listening to such a production).

  "Very well, my dear," she repeated "But please tell me how, in return,

  you can look for any delicate sensibility from your children?"

  Evidently Grandmamma thought this argument unanswerable, for she cut the

  subject short by adding:

  "However, it is a point on which people must follow their own opinions."

  The Princess did not choose to reply, but smiled condescendingly, and as

  though out of indulgence to the strange prejudices of a person whom she

  only PRETENDED to revere.

  "Oh, by the way, pray introduce me to your young people," she went on

  presently as she threw us another gracious smile.

  Thereupon we rose and stood looking at the Princess, without in the

  least knowing what we ought to do to show that we were being introduced.

  "Kiss the Princess's hand," said Papa.

  "Well, I hope you will love your old aunt," she said to Woloda, kissing

  his hair, "even though we are not near relatives. But I value friendship

  far more than I do degrees of relationship," she added to Grandmamma,

  who nevertheless, remained hostile, and replied:

  "Eh, my dear? Is that what they think of relationships nowadays?"

  "Here is my man of the world," put in Papa, indicating Woloda; "and here

  is my poet," he added as I kissed the small, dry hand of the Princess,

  with a vivid picture in my mind of that same hand holding a rod and

  applying it vigorously.

  "WHICH one is the poet?" asked the Princess.

  "This little one," replied Papa, smiling; "the one with the tuft of hair

  on his top-knot."

  "Why need he bother about my tuft?" I thought to myself as I retired

  into a corner. "Is there nothing else for him to talk about?"

  I had strange ideas on manly beauty. I considered Karl Ivanitch one of

  the handsomest men in the world, and myself so ugly that I had no need

  to deceive myself on that point. Therefore any remark on the subject of

  my exterior offended me extremely. I well remember how, one day after

  luncheon (I was then six years of age), the talk fell upon my personal

  appearance, and how Mamma tried to find good features in my face, and

  said that I had clever eyes and a charming smile; how, nevertheless,

  when Papa had examined me, and proved the contrary, she was obliged to

  confess that I was ugly; and how, when the meal was over and I went

  to pay her my respects, she said as she patted my cheek; "You know,

  Nicolinka, nobody will ever love you for your face alone, so you must

  try all the more to be a good and clever boy."

  Although these words of hers confirmed in me my conviction that I was

  not handsome, they also confirmed in me an ambition to be just such

  a boy as she had indicated. Yet I had my moments of despair at my

  ugliness, for I thought that no human being with such a large nose, such

  thick lips, and such small grey eyes as mine could ever hope to attain

  happiness on this earth. I used to ask God to perform a miracle by

  changing me into a beauty, and would have given all that I possessed, or

  ever hoped to possess, to have a handsome face.

  XVIII -- PRINCE IVAN IVANOVITCH

  When the Princess had heard my verses and overwhelmed the writer of them

  with praise, Grandmamma softened to her a little. She began to address

  her in French and to cease calling her "my dear." Likewise she invited

  her to return that evening with her children. This invitation having

  been accepted, the Princess took her leave. After that, so many other

  callers came to congratulate Grandmamma that the courtyard was crowded

  all day long with carriages.

  "Good morning, my dear cousin," was the greeting of one guest in
/>
  particular as he entered the room and kissed Grandmamma's hand. He was

  a man of seventy, with a stately figure clad in a military uniform and

  adorned with large epaulettes, an embroidered collar, and a white cross

  round the neck. His face, with its quiet and open expression, as well

  as the simplicity and ease of his manners, greatly pleased me, for, in

  spite of the thin half-circle of hair which was all that was now left

  to him, and the want of teeth disclosed by the set of his upper lip, his

  face was a remarkably handsome one.

  Thanks to his fine character, handsome exterior, remarkable valour,

  influential relatives, and, above all, good fortune, Prince, Ivan

  Ivanovitch had early made himself a career. As that career progressed,

  his ambition had met with a success which left nothing more to be sought

  for in that direction. From his earliest youth upward he had prepared

  himself to fill the exalted station in the world to which fate actually

  called him later; wherefore, although in his prosperous life (as in the

  lives of all) there had been failures, misfortunes, and cares, he had

  never lost his quietness of character, his elevated tone of thought, or

  his peculiarly moral, religious bent of mind. Consequently, though he

  had won the universal esteem of his fellows, he had done so less through

  his important position than through his perseverance and integrity.

  While not of specially distinguished intellect, the eminence of his

  station (whence he could afford to look down upon all petty questions)

  had caused him to adopt high points of view. Though in reality he was

  kind and sympathetic, in manner he appeared cold and haughty--probably

  for the reason that he had forever to be on his guard against the

  endless claims and petitions of people who wished to profit through

  his influence. Yet even then his coldness was mitigated by the polite

  condescension of a man well accustomed to move in the highest circles

  of society. Well-educated, his culture was that of a youth of the end of

  the last century. He had read everything, whether philosophy or belles

  lettres, which that age had produced in France, and loved to quote from

  Racine, Corneille, Boileau, Moliere, Montaigne, and Fenelon. Likewise he

  had gleaned much history from Segur, and much of the old classics from

  French translations of them; but for mathematics, natural philosophy, or

  contemporary literature he cared nothing whatever. However, he knew how

  to be silent in conversation, as well as when to make general remarks

  on authors whom he had never read--such as Goethe, Schiller, and Byron.

  Moreover, despite his exclusively French education, he was simple in

  speech and hated originality (which he called the mark of an untutored

  nature). Wherever he lived, society was a necessity to him, and, both in

  Moscow and the country he had his reception days, on which practically

  "all the town" called upon him. An introduction from him was a passport

  to every drawing-room; few young and pretty ladies in society objected

  to offering him their rosy cheeks for a paternal salute; and people even

  in the highest positions felt flattered by invitations to his parties.

  The Prince had few friends left now like Grandmamma--that is to say, few

  friends who were of the same standing as himself, who had had the same

  sort of education, and who saw things from the same point of view:

  wherefore he greatly valued his intimate, long-standing friendship with

  her, and always showed her the highest respect.

  I hardly dared to look at the Prince, since the honour paid him on all

  sides, the huge epaulettes, the peculiar pleasure with which Grandmamma

  received him, and the fact that he alone, seemed in no way afraid of

  her, but addressed her with perfect freedom (even being so daring as to

  call her "cousin"), awakened in me a feeling of reverence for his person

  almost equal to that which I felt for Grandmamma herself.

  On being shown my verses, he called me to his side, and said:

  "Who knows, my cousin, but that he may prove to be a second Derzhavin?"

  Nevertheless he pinched my cheek so hard that I was only prevented from

  crying by the thought that it must be meant for a caress.

  Gradually the other guests dispersed, and with them Papa and Woloda.

  Thus only Grandmamma, the Prince, and myself were left in the

  drawing-room.

  "Why has our dear Natalia Nicolaevna not come to-day" asked the Prince

  after a silence.

  "Ah, my friend," replied Grandmamma, lowering her voice and laying a

  hand upon the sleeve of his uniform, "she would certainly have come if

  she had been at liberty to do what she likes. She wrote to me that Peter

  had proposed bringing her with him to town, but that she had refused,

  since their income had not been good this year, and she could see

  no real reason why the whole family need come to Moscow, seeing that

  Lubotshka was as yet very young and that the boys were living with me--a

  fact, she said, which made her feel as safe about them as though she had

  been living with them herself."

  "True, it is good for the boys to be here," went on Grandmamma, yet in

  a tone which showed clearly that she did not think it was so very good,

  "since it was more than time that they should be sent to Moscow to

  study, as well as to learn how to comport themselves in society. What

  sort of an education could they have got in the country? The eldest boy

  will soon be thirteen, and the second one eleven. As yet, my cousin,

  they are quite untaught, and do not know even how to enter a room."

  "Nevertheless" said the Prince, "I cannot understand these complaints

  of ruined fortunes. He has a very handsome income, and Natalia has

  Chabarovska, where we used to act plays, and which I know as well as

  I do my own hand. It is a splendid property, and ought to bring in an

  excellent return."

  "Well," said Grandmamma with a sad expression on her face, "I do not

  mind telling you, as my most intimate friend, that all this seems to me

  a mere pretext on his part for living alone, for strolling about from

  club to club, for attending dinner-parties, and for resorting to--well,

  who knows what? She suspects nothing; you know her angelic sweetness and

  her implicit trust of him in everything. He had only to tell her that

  the children must go to Moscow and that she must be left behind in the

  country with a stupid governess for company, for her to believe him! I

  almost think that if he were to say that the children must be whipped

  just as the Princess Barbara whips hers, she would believe even that!"

  and Grandmamma leant back in her arm-chair with an expression of

  contempt. Then, after a moment of silence, during which she took her

  handkerchief out of her pocket to wipe away a few tears which had stolen

  down her cheeks, she went, on:

  "Yes, my friend, I often think that he cannot value and understand

  her properly, and that, for all her goodness and love of him and her

  endeavours to conceal her grief (which, however as I know only too well,

  exists). She cannot really be happy with him. Mark my words if he does

  not--"
Here Grandmamma buried her face in the handkerchief.

  "Ah, my dear old friend," said the Prince reproachfully. "I think you

  are unreasonable. Why grieve and weep over imagined evils? That is

  not right. I have known him a long time, and feel sure that he is an

  attentive, kind, and excellent husband, as well as (which is the chief

  thing of all) a perfectly honourable man."

  At this point, having been an involuntary auditor of a conversation

  not meant for my ears, I stole on tiptoe out of the room, in a state of

  great distress.

  XIX -- THE IWINS

  "Woloda, Woloda! The Iwins are just coming." I shouted on seeing from

  the window three boys in blue overcoats, and followed by a young tutor,

  advancing along the pavement opposite our house.

  The Iwins were related to us, and of about the same age as ourselves. We

  had made their acquaintance soon after our arrival in Moscow. The second

  brother, Seriosha, had dark curly hair, a turned-up, strongly pronounced

  nose, very bright red lips (which, never being quite shut, showed a

  row of white teeth), beautiful dark-blue eyes, and an uncommonly bold

  expression of face. He never smiled but was either wholly serious or

  laughing a clear, merry, agreeable laugh. His striking good looks had

  captivated me from the first, and I felt an irresistible attraction

  towards him. Only to see him filled me with pleasure, and at one time my

  whole mental faculties used to be concentrated in the wish that I

  might do so. If three or four days passed without my seeing him I felt

  listless and ready to cry. Awake or asleep, I was forever dreaming of

  him. On going to bed I used to see him in my dreams, and when I had

  shut my eyes and called up a picture of him I hugged the vision as