[17]The frogs in the Caucasus make a sound entirely different from theKvakan'yéof the Russian frogs.
[17]The frogs in the Caucasus make a sound entirely different from theKvakan'yéof the Russian frogs.
[18]German mispronunciation forAntichrist,the accent of which in Russian falls on the penult.
[18]German mispronunciation forAntichrist,the accent of which in Russian falls on the penult.
VII.
We had now been marching more than two hours. I began to feel chilly, and to be overcome with drowsiness. In the darkness the same indistinct objects dimly appeared: at a little distance, the same black shadow, the same moving spots. Beside me was the crupper of a white horse, which switched his tail and swung his hind-legs in wide curves. I could see a back in a white Circassian shirt, against which was outlined a carbine in its black case, and the handle of a pistol in an embroidered holster: the glow of a cigarette casting a gleam on a reddish mustache, a fur collar, and a hand in a chamois-skin glove.
I leaned over my horse's neck, closed my eyes, and lost myself for a few minutes: then suddenly the regular hoof-beat[19]and rustling came into my consciousness again. I looked around, and it seemed to me as though I were standing still in one spot, and that the black shadow in front of me was moving down upon me; or else that the shadow stood still, and I was rapidly riding down upon it.
At one such moment I was more strongly than ever impressed by that incessantly approaching sound, the cause of which I could not fathom: it was the roar of water. We were passing though a deep gulch, and coming close to a mountain river, which at that season was in full flood.[20]The roaring became louder, thedamp grass grew taller and thicker, bushes were encountered in denser clumps, and the horizon narrowed itself down to closer limits. Now and then, in different places in the dark hollows of the mountains, bright fires flashed out and were immediately extinguished.
"Tell me, please, what are those fires," I asked in a whisper of the Tatar riding at my side.
"Don't you really know?" was his reply.
"No," said I.
"That is mountain straw tied to a pole,[21]and the light is waved."
"What for?"
"So that every man may know the Russian is coming. Now in the Auls," he added with a smile, "aï, aïthetomásha[22]are flying about; every sort ofkhurda-murda[23]will be hurried into the ravines."
"How do they know so soon in the mountains that the expedition is coming?" I asked.
"Eï!How can they help knowing? It's known everywhere: that's the kind of people we are."
"And so Shamyl is now getting ready to march out?" I asked.
"Yok(no)," he replied, shaking his head as a sign of negation, "Shamyl will not march out. Shamyl will send hisnaïbs[24]and he himself will look down from up yonder through his glass."
"But doesn't he live a long way off?"
"Not a long way off. Here, at your left, about tenverstshe will be."
"How do you know that?" I inquired. "Have you been there?"
"I've been there. All of us in the mountains have."
"And you have seen Shamyl?"
"Pikh!Shamyl is not to be seen by us. A hundred, three hundred, a thousandmurids[25]surround him. Shamyl will be in the midst of them," he said with an expression of fawning servility.
Looking up in the air, it was possible to make out that the sky which had become clear again was lighter in the east, and the Pleiades were sinking down into the horizon. But in the gulch through which we were passing, it was humid and dark.
Suddenly, a little in advance of us, from out the darkness flashed a number of lights; at the same instant, with a ping some bullets whizzed by, and from out the silence that surrounded us from afar arose the heavy, overmastering roar of the guns. This was the vanguard of the enemy's pickets. The Tatars, of which it was composed, set up their war-cry, shot at random, and fled in all directions.
Every thing became silent again. The general summoned his interpreter. The Tatar in a white Circassian dress hastened up to him, and the two held a rather long conversation in a sort of whisper and with many gestures.
"Colonel Khasánof! give orders to scatter the enemy," said the general in a low, deliberate, but distinct tone of voice.
The division went down to the river. The black mountains stood back from the pass; it was beginning to grow light. The arch of heaven, in which the pale, lustreless stars were barely visible, seemed to come closer; the dawn began to glow brightly in the east; a cool, penetrating breeze sprang up from the west, and a bright mist like steam arose from the foaming river.
[19]topot.
[19]topot.
[20]In the Caucasus the freshets take place in the mouth of July.
[20]In the Caucasus the freshets take place in the mouth of July.
[21]tayakin the Caucasian dialect.
[21]tayakin the Caucasian dialect.
[22]tomáshameans slaves in the ordinary dialect invented for intercourse between Russians and Tatars. There are many words in this strange dialect, the roots of which are not to be found either in Russian or Tatar.—AUTHOR'S NOTE.
[22]tomáshameans slaves in the ordinary dialect invented for intercourse between Russians and Tatars. There are many words in this strange dialect, the roots of which are not to be found either in Russian or Tatar.—AUTHOR'S NOTE.
[23]Goods and chattels in the same dialect.
[23]Goods and chattels in the same dialect.
[24]naïbordinarily means a Mohammedan judge or high religious officer, in Turkey and the Caucasus; hero it means an officer whom the great Circassian chieftain Shamyl endowed with special authority.
[24]naïbordinarily means a Mohammedan judge or high religious officer, in Turkey and the Caucasus; hero it means an officer whom the great Circassian chieftain Shamyl endowed with special authority.
[25]The wordmuridhas many significations, but in the sense here employed it means something between adjutant and body-guard.—AUTHOR'S NOTE.
[25]The wordmuridhas many significations, but in the sense here employed it means something between adjutant and body-guard.—AUTHOR'S NOTE.
VIII.
The guide pointed out the ford; and the vanguard of cavalry, with the general and his suite immediately in its rear, began to cross the river. The water, which reached the horses' breasts, rushed with extraordinary violence among the white bowlders which in some places came to the top, and formed foaming, gurgling whirlpools around the horses' legs. The horses were frightened at the roar of the water, lifted their heads, pricked up their ears, but slowly and carefully picked their way against the stream along the uneven bottom. The riders held up their legs and fire-arms. The foot-soldiers, literally in their shirts alone, lifting above the water their muskets to which were fastened their bundles of clothing, struggled against the force of the stream by clinging together, a score of men at a time, showing noticeable determination on their excited faces. The artillery-men on horseback, with a loud shout, put their horses into the water at full trot. The cannon and green-painted caissons, over which now and then, the water came pouring, plunged with a clang over the rocky bottom; but the noble Cossack horses pulled with united effort, made the water foam, and with dripping tails and manes emerged on the farther shore.
As soon as the crossing was effected, the general's face suddenly took on an expression of deliberation and seriousness; he wheeled his horse around, and atfull gallop rode across the wide forest-surrounded field which spread before us. The Cossack horses were scattered along the edge of the forest.
In the forest appeal's a man in Circassian dress and round cap; then a second and a third ... one of the officers shouts, "Those are Tatars!" At this instant a puff of smoke came from behind a tree ... a report—another. The quick volleys of our men drown out those of the enemy. Only occasionally a bullet, with long-drawn ping like the hum of a bee, flies by, and is the only proof that not all the shots are ours.
Here the infantry at double quick, and with fixed bayonets, dash against the chain; one can hear the heavy reports of the guns, the metallic clash of grape-shot, the whiz of rockets, the crackling of musketry. The cavalry, the infantry, converge from all sides on the wide field. The smoke from the guns, rockets, and fire-arms, unites with the early mist arising from the dew-covered grass.
Colonel Khasánof gallops up to the general, and reins in his horse while at full tilt.
"Your Excellency," says he, lifting his hand to his cap, "give orders for the cavalry to advance. The standards are coming,"[26]and he points with his whip to mounted Tatars, at the head of whom rode two men on white horses with red and blue streamers on their lances.
"All right,[27]Iván Mikháïlovitch," says the general. The colonel wheels his horse round on the spot, draws his sabre, and shouts "Hurrah!"
"Hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!" echoes from the ranks, and the cavalry dash after him.
All look on with excitement: there is a standard;[28]another; a third; a fourth!...
The enemy, not waiting the assault, fly into the forest, and open a musket fire from behind the trees. The bullets fly more and more thickly.
"Quel charmant coup d'œil!" exclaimed the general as he easily rose in English fashion on his coal-black, slender-limbed little steed.
"Charmant," replies the major, who rolls his r's like a Frenchman, and whipping up his horse dashes after the general. "It's a genuine pleasure to carry on war in such a fine country," says he.[29]
"And above all in good company," adds the general still in French, with a pleasant smile.
The major bowed.
At this time a cannon-ball from the enemy comes flying by with a swift, disagreeable whiz, and strikes something; immediately is heard the groan of a wounded man. This groan impresses me so painfully that the martial picture instantly loses for me all its fascination: but no one beside myself seems to be affected in the same way; the major smiles apparently with the greatest satisfaction; another officer with perfect equanimity repeats the opening words of a speech; the general looks in the opposite direction, and with the most tranquil smile says something in French.
"Will you give orders to reply to their heavy guns?" asks the commander of the artillery, galloping up. "Yes, scare them a little," says the general carelessly, lighting a cigar.
The battery is unlimbered, and the cannonade begins. The ground shakes under the report; the firing continues without cessation; and the smoke in which it is scarcely possible to distinguish those attending the guns, blinds the eyes.
The aul is battered down. Again Colonel Khasánof dashes up, and at the general's command darts off to the aul. The war-cry is heard again, and the cavalry disappears in the cloud of its own dust.
The spectacle was truly grandiose. One thing only spoiled the general impression for me as a man who had no part in the affair, and was wholly unwonted to it; and this was that there was too much of it,—the motion and the animation and the shouts. Involuntarily the comparison occurred to me of a man who in his haste would cut the air with a hatchet.
[26]znatchki.This word among the mountaineers has almost the signification of banner, with this single distinction, that each jigit can make a standard for himself and carry it.—AUTHOR'S NOTE.
[26]znatchki.This word among the mountaineers has almost the signification of banner, with this single distinction, that each jigit can make a standard for himself and carry it.—AUTHOR'S NOTE.
[27]S Bógom,literally "with God," but a mere phrase.
[27]S Bógom,literally "with God," but a mere phrase.
[28]znatchók.
[28]znatchók.
[29]C'est un vrai plaisir, que la guerre dans un aussi beau pays.
[29]C'est un vrai plaisir, que la guerre dans un aussi beau pays.
IX.
The aul was already in the possession of our men, and not a soul of the enemy remained in it when the general with his suite, to which I had joined myself, entered it.
The long neat huts orsaklí,with their flat earthen roofs and red chimneys, were situated on rough, rocky hills, between which ran a small river. On one side were seen the green gardens, shining in the clear sun-light, with monstrous pear-trees, and the plum-trees, calledluitcha.The other side bristled with strange shadows, where stood the high perpendicular stones of a cemetery, and the tall wooden poles adorned at the ends with balls and variegated banners. These were the tombs of jigits.
The army stood drawn up within the gates.
After a moment the dragoons, the Cossacks, the infantry, with evident joy were let loose through the crooked streets, and the empty aul suddenly teemed with life. Here a roof is crushed in; the axe rings on the tough trees, and the plank door is broken down; there hay-ricks, fences, and huts are burning, and the dense smoke arises like a tower in the clear air. Here a Cossack is carrying off sacks of flour, and carpets; a soldier with a gay face lugs from a hut a tin basin and a dish-clout; another with outstretched arms is trying to catch a couple of hens, which cackling furiously fly about the yard; a third is going somewherewith a monstrouskumganor pitcher of milk, and drinking as he goes, and when he has had his fill smashes it on the ground with a loud laugh.
The battalion which I had accompanied from Fort N—— was also in the aul. The captain was sitting on the roof of a hut, and was puffing from his short little pipe clouds of smoke ofsambrotalicheski tabákwith such an indifferent expression of countenance that when I saw him I forgot that I was in a hostile aul, and it seemed to me that I was actually at home with him.
"Ah! and here you are?" he said as he caught sight of me.
The tall form of Lieutenant Rosenkranz flashed here and there through the aul. Without a moment's pause he was engaged in carrying out orders, and he had the appearance of a man who had all he could do. I saw him coming out of a hut, his face full of triumph; behind him two soldiers were dragging an old Tatar with his arms tied. The old man, whose garb consisted merely of a many-coloredbeshméttorn in tatters, and ragged drawers, was so feeble that it seemed as if his bony arms, tightly tied behind his misshapen back, were almost falling from his shoulders; and his crooked bare legs moved with difficulty. His face, and even a part of his shaven head, were covered with deep wrinkles; his distorted toothless mouth, encircled by gray clipped mustache and beard, incessantly mumbled as though whispering something; but his handsome eyes, from which the lashes were gone, still gleamed with fire, and clearly expressed an old man's indifference to life.
Rosenkranz through an interpreter asked him why he had not gone with the others.
"Where should I go?" he replied, calmly looking away.
"Where the rest have gone," suggested some one.
"The jigits have gone to fight with the Russians, and I am an old man."
"Aren't you afraid of the Russians?"
"What will the Russians do to me? I am an old man," he repeated, carelessly glancing at the circle surrounding him.
On the way back, I saw this old man without a hat, with his hands still tied, jolting behind a mounted Cossack, and he was looking about him with the same expression of unconcern. He was necessary in an exchange of prisoners.
I went to the staircase, and crept up to where the captain was.
"Not many of the enemy, it seems," I said to him, wishing to obtain his opinion about the affair.
"The enemy," he repeated with surprise, "there weren't any at all. Do you call these enemies?... Here when evening comes, you will see how we shall retreat; you will see how they will go with us! Won't they show themselves there?" he added, pointing with his pipe to the forest which we had passed in the morning.
"What is that?" I asked anxiously, interrupting the captain, and drawing his attention to some Don Cossacks who were grouped around some one not far from us.
Among them was heard something like the weeping of a child, and the words,—
"Eh! don't cut—hold on—you will be seen—here's a knife—give him the knife."
"They are up to some mischief, the brutes," said the captain indifferently.
But at this very instant, suddenly from around the corner came the handsome ensign with burning, horror-stricken face, and waving his hands rushed among the Cossacks.
"Don't you move! don't kill him!" he cried in his boyish treble.
When the Cossacks saw the officer they started back, and allowed a little white goat to escape from their hands. The young ensign was wholly taken aback, began to mutter something, and stood before them full of confusion. When he caught sight of the captain and me on the roof, he grew still redder in the face, and springing up the steps joined us.
"I thought they were going to kill a child," he said with a timid smile.
X.
The general had gone on ahead with the cavalry.
The battalion with which I had come from Fort N—— remained in the rear-guard. The companies under command of Captain Khlopof and Lieutenant Rosenkranz were retreating together.
The captain's prediction was fully justified: as soon as we had reached the narrow forest of which he had spoken, from both sides the mountaineers, mounted and on foot, began to show themselves incessantly, and so near that I could very distinctly see many crouching down, with muskets in their hands, and running from tree to tree.
The captain took off his hat, and piously made the sign of the cross; a few old soldiers did the same. In the forest were heard shouts, the words, "iáï! Giaur! Urús! iáï!"
Dry, short musket reports followed in quick succession, and bullets whizzed from both sides. Our men silently replied with rapid fire; only occasionally in the ranks were heard exclamations in the guise of directions: "He[30]has stopped shooting there;" "Hehas a good chance behind the trees;" "We ought to have cannon," and such expressions.
The cannon were brought to bear on the range, and after a few discharges of grape the enemy apparently gave way; but after a little their fire became more andmore violent with each step that the army took, and the shouts and war-cries increased.
We were scarcely three hundredsazhens[31]from the aul when the enemy's shot began to hail down upon us. I saw a ball with a thud strike one soldier dead ... but why relate details of this terrible spectacle, when I myself would give much to forget it?
Lieutenant Rosenkranz was firing his musket without a moment's cessation; with animating voice he was shouting to the soldiers, and galloping at full speed from one end of the line to the other. He was slightly pale, and this was decidedly becoming to his martial countenance.
The handsome ensign was in his element: his beautiful eyes gleamed with resolution, his mouth was slightly parted with a smile; he was constantly riding up to the captain, and asking permission to charge.[32]
"We'll drive them back," he said impulsively,—"we'll drive them back surely."
"No need of it," replied the captain gently: "we must get out of here."
The captain's company occupied the edge of the forest, and was fully exposed to the enemy's fire. The captain in his well-worn coat and tattered cap, slackening the reins for his white trotter and clinging by his short stirrups, silently staid in one place. (The soldiers were so well trained, and did their work so accurately, that there was no need of giving commands to them.) Only now and then he raised his voice, and shouted to those who exposed their heads. The captain's face was very far from martial; but such truth and simplicity were manifest in it, that it impressed me profoundly.
"There is some one who is truly brave," I said to myself involuntarily.
He was almost exactly the same as I had always seen him; the same tranquil motions, the same even voice, the same expression of frankness on his homely but honest face; but by his more than ordinarily keen glance it was possible to recognize him as a man who infallibly knew his business. It is easy to saythe same as always; but how different were the traits brought out in others! one tried to seem calmer, another rougher, a third gayer, than usual; but by the captain's face it was manifest that he did not even understandhow to seem.
The Frenchman who at Waterloo said,La garde meurt, mais ne se rend pas,and other heroes, especially among the French, who have uttered notable sayings, were brave, and really uttered notable sayings; but between their bravery, and the bravery of the captain, is this difference, that if a great saying in regard to any subject came into my hero's mind, I believe that he would not have uttered it; in the first place, because he would have feared that in saying something great he might spoil a great deed, and, secondly, because when a man is conscious within himself of the power to do a great deed, there is no need of saying any thing at all. This, in my opinion, is the especial and lofty character of Russian bravery; and how, henceforth, can it fail to wound the Russian heart when among our young warriors one hears French platitudes which have their vogue because they were the stock phrases of the old French nobility?...
Suddenly, from the direction in which the handsome ensign with his division was stationed, was heard a faint hurrah from the enemy. Turning round at thisshouting I saw thirty soldiers who with muskets in their hands and knapsacks on their shoulders were going at double-quick across the ploughed field. They stumbled, but still pushed ahead and shouted. Leading them galloped the young ensign, waving his sabre.
All were lost to sight in the forest.
At the end of a few moments of shouting and clash of arms, a frightened horse came dashing out of the woods, and just at the edge soldiers were seen bearing the killed and wounded. Among the latter was the young ensign. Two soldiers carried him in their arms. He was pale as a sheet, and his graceful head, where could be now detected only the shadow of that martial enthusiasm which inspired him but a moment before, was strangely drawn down between his shoulders and rested on his breast. On his white shirt under his coat, which was torn open, could be seen a small blood-stain.
"Akh! what a pity!" I said in spite of myself, as I turned away from this heart-rending spectacle.
"Indeed it's too bad," said an old soldier who with gloomy face stood beside me leaning on his musket. "He wasn't afraid of any thing! How is this possible?" he added, looking steadily at the wounded lad. "Always foolish! and now he has to pay for it!"
"And aren't you afraid?" I asked.
"No, indeed!"
[30]On—he—the collective expression by which the soldiers in the Caucasus indicate the enemy.—AUTHOR'S NOTE.
[30]On—he—the collective expression by which the soldiers in the Caucasus indicate the enemy.—AUTHOR'S NOTE.
[31]2,100 feet.
[31]2,100 feet.
[32]brosítsa na urá—to rush with a hurrah!
[32]brosítsa na urá—to rush with a hurrah!
XI.
Four soldiers bore the ensign on a litter; behind them followed a soldier from the suburb, leading a lean, foundered horse laden with two green chests in which were the surgeon's implements. They were expecting the doctor. The officers hurried up to the litter, and tried to encourage and comfort the wounded lad.
"Well, brother Alánin, it'll be some time before you dance and make merry again," said Lieutenant Rosenkranz coming up with a smile.
He probably intended these words to sustain the handsome ensign's courage; but as could be easily seen from the coldly mournful expression in the eyes of the latter, these words did not produce the wished-for effect.
The captain also came up. He gazed earnestly at the wounded young fellow, and his always cold, calm face expressed heartfelt pity.
"How is it, my dear Anatoli Ivánuitch?" said he in a tone which rang with a deeper sympathy than I had expected from him: "we see it's as God wills."
The wounded lad looked up; his pale face was lighted with a mournful smile.
"Yes, I disobeyed you."
"Say rather, it was God's will," replied the captain.
The doctor, who had now arrived, took from his chest, bandages, probes, and other instruments, and,rolling up his sleeves with a re-assuring smile, approached the sufferer.
"So it seems they have been making a little hole through you," he said in a tone of jesting unconcern. "Let us have a look at the place."
The ensign listened, but in the gaze which he fixed on the jolly doctor were expressed surprise and reproachfulness which the latter did not expect. He began to probe the wound and examine it from all sides; but at last the sufferer, losing his patience, pushed away his hand with a heavy groan.
"Let me be," he said in an almost inaudible voice: "it makes no difference; I am dying." With these words he fell on his back; and five minutes later when I joined the group gathered about him, and asked a soldier, "How is the ensign?" I was told, "He has gone."
XII.
It was late when the expedition, deploying in a broad column, entered the fortress with songs. The sun had set behind the snow-covered mountain crest, and was throwing its last rosy rays on the long delicate clouds which stretched across the bright pellucid western sky. The snow-capped mountains began to clothe themselves in purple mist; only their upper outlines were marked with extraordinary distinctness against the violet light of the sunset. The clear moon, which had long been up, began to shed its light through the dark blue sky. The green of the grass and of the trees changed to black, and grew wet with dew. The dark masses of the army, with gradually increasing tumult, advanced across the field; from different sides were heard the sounds of cymbals, drums, and merry songs. The leader of the sixth company sang out with full strength, and full of feeling and power the clear chest-notes of the tenor were borne afar through the translucent evening air.
(Rúbka L'ýesa.)
THE STORY OF A YUNKER'S[1]ADVENTURE.
I.
In midwinter, in the year 185-, a division of our batteries was engaged in an expedition on the Great Chetchen River. On the evening of Feb. 26, having been informed that the platoon which I commanded in the absence of its regular officer was detailed for the following day to help cut down the forest, and having that evening obtained and given the necessary directions, I betook myself to my tent earlier than usual; and as I had not got into the bad habit of warming it with burning coals, I threw myself, without undressing, down on my bed made of sticks, and, drawing my Circassian cap over my eyes, I rolled myself up in myshuba,and fell into that peculiarly deep and heavy sleep which one obtains at the moment of tumult and disquietude on the eve of a great peril. The anticipation of the morrow's action brought me to such a state.
At three o'clock in the morning, while it was still perfectly dark, my warm sheep-skin was pulled offfrom me, and the red light of a candle was unpleasantly flashed upon my sleepy eyes.
"It's time to get up," said some one's voice. I shut my eyes involuntarily, wrapped my sheep-skin around me again, and dropped off into slumber.
"It's time to get up," repeated Dmitri relentlessly, shaking me by the shoulder. "The infantry are starting." I suddenly came to a sense of the reality of things, started up, and sprang to my feet.
Hastily swallowing a glass of tea, and taking a bath in ice-water, I crept out from my tent, and went to the park (where the guns were placed). It was dark, misty, and cold. The night fires, lighted here and there throughout the camp, lighted up the forms of drowsy soldiers scattered around them, and seemed to make the darkness deeper by their ruddy flickering flames. Near at hand one could hear monotonous, tranquil snoring; in the distance, movement, the babble of voices, and the jangle of arms, as the foot-soldiers got in readiness for the expedition. There was an odor of smoke, manure, wicks, and fog. The morning frost crept down my back, and my teeth chattered in spite of all my efforts to prevent it.
Only by the snorting and occasional stamping of horses could one make out in the impenetrable darkness where the harnessed limbers and caissons were drawn up, and, by the flashing points of the lintstocks, where the cannon were. With the wordss Bógom,—God speed it,—the first gun moved off with a clang, followed by the rumbling caisson, and the platoon got under way.
We all took off our caps, and made the sign of the cross. Taking its place in the interval between the infantry, our platoon halted, and waited from fouro'clock until the muster of the whole force was made, and the commander came.
"There's one of our men missing, Nikolaï Petróvitch," said a black form coming to me. I recognized him by his voice only as the platoon-artillerist Maksímof.
"Who?"
"Velenchúk is missing. When we hitched up he was here, I saw him; but now he's gone."
As it was entirely unlikely that the column would move immediately, we resolved to send Corporal Antónof to find Velenchúk. Shortly after this, the sound of several horses riding by us in the darkness was heard; this was the commander and his suite. In a few moments the head of the column started and turned,—finally we also moved,—but Antónof and Velenchúk had not appeared. However, we had not gone a hundred paces when the two soldiers overtook us.
"Where was he?" I asked of Antónof.
"He was asleep in the park."
"What! he was drunk, wasn't he?"
"No, not at all."
"What made him go to sleep, then?"
"I don't know."
During three hours of darkness we slowly defiled in monotonous silence across uncultivated, snowless fields and low bushes which crackled under the wheels of the ordnance.
At last, after we had crossed a shallow but phenomenally rapid brook, a halt was called, and from the vanguard were heard desultory musket-shots. These sounds, as always, created the most extraordinary excitement in us all. The division had been almostasleep; now the ranks became alive with conversation, repartees, and laughter. Some of the soldiers wrestled with their mates; others played hop, skip and jump; others chewed on their hard-tack, or, to pass away the time, engaged in drumming the different roll-calls. Meantime the fog slowly began to lift in the east, the dampness became more palpable, and the surrounding objects gradually made themselves manifest emerging from the darkness.
I already began to make out the green caissons and gun-carriages, the brass cannon wet with mist, the familiar forms of my soldiers whom I knew even to the least details, the sorrel horses, and the files of infantry, with their bright bayonets, their knapsacks, ramrods, and canteens on their backs.
We were quickly in motion again, and, after going a few hundred paces where there was no road, were shown the appointed place. On the right were seen the steep banks of a winding river and the high posts of a Tatar burying-ground. At the left and in front of us, through the fog, appeared the black belt. The platoon got under way with the limbers. The eighth company, which was protecting us, stacked their arms, and a battalion of soldiers with muskets and axes started for the forest.
Not five minutes had elapsed when on all sides piles of wood began to crackle and smoke; the soldiers swarmed about, fanning the fires with their hands and feet, lugging brush-wood and logs; and in the forest were heard the incessant strokes of a hundred axes and the crash of falling trees.
The artillery, with not a little spirit of rivalry with the infantry, heaped up their piles; and soon the fire was already so well under way that it was impossibleto get within a couple of paces of it. The dense black smoke arose through the icy branches, from which the water dropped hissing into the flames, as the soldiers heaped them upon the fire; and the glowing coals dropped down upon the dead white grass exposed by the heat. It was all mere boy's play to the soldiers; they dragged great logs, threw on the tall steppe grass, and fanned the fire more and more.
As I came near a bonfire to light a cigarette, Velenchúk, always officious, but, now that he had been found napping, showing himself more actively engaged about the fire than any one else, in an excess of zeal seized a coal with his naked hand from the very middle of the fire, tossed it from one palm to the other, two or three times, and flung it on the ground. "Light a match and give it to him," said another. "Bring a lintstock, fellows," said still a third.
When I at last lighted my cigarette without the aid of Velenchúk, who tried to bring another coal from the fire, he rubbed his burnt fingers on the back of his sheepskin coat, and, doubtless for the sake of exercising himself, seized a great plane-tree stump, and with a mighty swing flung it on the fire. When at last it seemed to him that he might rest, he went close to the fire, spread out his cloak, which he wore like a mantle fastened at the back by a single button, stretched his legs, folded his great black hands in his lap, and opening his mouth a little, closed his eyes.
"Alas![2]I forgot my pipe! What a shame, fellows!" he said after a short silence, and not addressing anybody in particular.
[1]Yunker (GermanJunker) is a non-commissioned officer belonging to the nobility. Count Tolstoi himself began his military service in the Caucasus as a Yunker.
[1]Yunker (GermanJunker) is a non-commissioned officer belonging to the nobility. Count Tolstoi himself began his military service in the Caucasus as a Yunker.
[2]Ekh-ma.
[2]Ekh-ma.
II.
In Russia there are three predominating types of soldiers, which embrace the soldiers of all arms,—those of the Caucasus, of the line, the guards, the infantry, the cavalry, the artillery, and the others.
These three types, with many subdivisions and combinations, are as follows:—
(1) The obedient,
(2) The domineering or dictatorial, and
(3) The desperate.
The obedient are subdivided into the apathetic obedient and the energetic obedient.
The domineering are subdivided into the gruffly domineering and the diplomatically domineering.
The desperate are subdivided into the desperate jesters and the simply desperate.
The type more frequently encountered than the rest—the type most gentle, most sympathetic, and for the most part endowed with the Christian virtues of meekness, devotion, patience, and submission to the will of God—is that of the obedient.
The distinctive character of the apathetic obedient is a certain invincible indifference and disdain of all the turns of fortune which may overtake him.
The characteristic trait of the drunken obedient is a mild poetical tendency and sensitiveness.
The characteristic trait of the energetic obedient is his limitation in intellectual faculties, united with an endless assiduity and fervor.
The type of the domineering is to be found more especially in the higher spheres of the army: corporals, non-commissioned officers, sergeants and others. In the first division of the gruffly domineering are the high-born, the energetic, and especially the martial type, not excepting those who are stern in a lofty poetic way (to this category belonged Corporal Antónof, with whom I intend to make the reader acquainted).
The second division is composed of the diplomatically domineering, and this class has for some time been making rapid advances. The diplomatically domineering is always eloquent, knows how to read, goes about in a pink shirt, does not eat from the common kettle, often smokes cheap Muscat tobacco, considers himself immeasurably higher than the simple soldier, and is himself rarely as good a soldier as the gruffly domineering of the first class.
The type of the desperate is almost the same as that of the domineering, that is, it is good in the first division,—the desperate jesters, the characteristic features of whom are invariably jollity, a huge unconcern in regard to every thing, a wealth of nature and boldness.
The second division is in the same way detestable: the criminally desperate, who, however, it must be said for the honor of the Russian soldier, are very rarely met with, and, if they are met with, then they are quickly drummed out of comradeship with the true soldier. Atheism, and a certain audacity in crime, are the chief traits of this character.
Velenchúk came under the head of the energetically obedient. He was a Little Russian by birth, had been fifteen years in the service; and while he was not a fine-looking nor a very skilful soldier, still he wassimple-hearted, kind, and extraordinarily full of zeal, though for the most part misdirected zeal, and he was extraordinarily honest. I say extraordinarily honest, because the year before there had been an occurrence in which he had given a remarkable exhibition of this characteristic. You must know that almost every soldier has his own trade. The greater number are tailors and shoemakers. Velenchúk himself practised the trade of tailoring; and, judging from the fact that Sergeant Mikháil Doroféïtch gave him his custom, it is safe to say that he had reached a famous degree of accomplishment. The year before, it happened that while in camp, Velenchúk took a fine cloak to make for Mikháil Doroféïtch. But that very night, after he had cut the cloth, and stitched on the trimmings, and put it under his pillow in his tent, a misfortune befell him: the cloth, which was worth seven rubles, disappeared during the night. Velenchúk with tears in his eyes, with pale quivering lips and with stifled lamentations, confessed the circumstance to the sergeant.
Mikháil Doroféïtch fell into a passion. In the first moment of his indignation he threatened the tailor; but afterwards, like a kindly man with plenty of means, he waved his hand, and did not exact from Velenchúk the value of the cloak. In spite of the fussy tailor's endeavors, and the tears that he shed while telling about his misfortune, the thief was not detected. Although strong suspicions were attached to a corruptly desperate soldier named Chernof, who slept in the same tent with him, still there was no decisive proof. The diplomatically dictatorial Mikháil Doroféïtch, as a man of means, having various arrangements with the inspector of arms and steward of the mess, the aristocrats of the battery, quickly forgot allabout the loss of this particular cloak. Velenchúk, on the contrary, did not forget his unhappiness. The soldiers declared that at this time they were apprehensive about him, lest he should make way with himself, or flee to the mountains, so heavily did his misfortune weigh upon him. He did not eat, he did not drink, was not able to work, and wept all the time. At the end of three days he appeared before Mikháil Doroféïtch, and without any color in his face, and with a trembling hand, drew out of his sleeve a piece of gold, and gave it to him.
"Faith,[3]and here's all that I have, Mikháil Doroféïtch; and this I got from Zhdánof," he said, beginning to sob again. "I will giveyoutwo more rubles, truly I will, when I have earned them. He (who thehewas, Velenchúk himself did not know) made me seem like a rascal in your eyes. He, the beastly viper, stole from a brother soldier his hard earnings; and here I have been in the service fifteen years." ...
To the honor of Mikháil Doroféïtch, it must be said that he did not require of Velenchúk the last two rubles, though Velenchúk brought them to him at the end of two months.