Ivan Vefee.ghen is a Russian Gil Blas, and a very
amusing one. It is thoroughly Russian, when it is not Polish. We should look in vain for any work which presented a more lively or more ge- nuine view of the manners of a large portion of Europe and Asia. The information, moreover, is of a kind not easily derivable from any other source : travellers cannot learn what is here presented with all the familiarity and ease of daily habit. This work has en- joyed great popularity in Russia: the first edition came out in 1829, and was sold off within three weeks after it issued from the press ; it has been translated into French and German, and in Russia its fame has exteudeditself to the lowest ranks of society.
It would be difficult in a brief compass to give a sketch of such Russian manners and motives as are exhibited to us in the pro- gress of this tale of THADDEUS BULGARIN; but, by a striking: extract, a very fair idea of the character of the work may be ob- tained. The following passage contains the thoroughly Russian character of Sava Saveetch.
" Sava Saveetch was reckoned one of the cleverest Sheriffs in the whole province. He was of a full figure, and, from having served some. time in the police-dragoons, still retained his military attitudes and man- ner, kept himself always as straight as a rush, and, in turning, madea rapid. face-about with his whole body. Years and the fumes of his potations• had weakened the roots of his hair, so that he had lost it almost entirely, except some tufts on his whiskers and.chin. His long nose and the ex- tremities of his meagre face were covered with livid carbuncles : from under his bushy, hoary eyebrows, glared a pair of small, grey, cattish eyes. He always went about in his official uniform surtout, and wore in his waist a cossack porte-epie. He never put on his sword but when he went upon any official business; his usual weapon was a cossack whip with a leaden bullet plaited into the end of it. His head was generally covered with a stiff-crowned leathern cap, which added to his military ap- pearance. His voice was like the growling of a bear. His writing de- partment was managed by an old clerk, who spent three-fourths of his time with his leg tethered to a writing-table. In addition to this, by. Sava Saveetch's orders, his boots were taken off, to prevent him from de- camping to the cabaret. But the supple clerk found the road to the bottle- without rising from his chair. Some of his cronies among the under- strappers would fetch him vodky in apothecaries' phials, several doses of which he would dispatch every hour, from the time that Sava Saveetch. had, in quest of his bottles and cans, ransacked the stove, chimney, anti even behind the casks and tubs. On holidays only he had liberty to get: drunk, and then he was usually brought home at night, as stiff as a stock,- laid in the lock-up room, and water poured upon him. In his journies through the district, Phomeetch (this was his name) had also full per- mission to drink a settling bowlful, but only after he had finished his business ; for, after his drinking bouts, his hand shook so as to render him unfit for work. Sava Saveetch called Phomeetch a golden man, and his inclination to drunkenness he attributed to his uncommon talents, which, in the opinion of old-fashioned people, cannot flourish unless they are moistened with spiritual dew. According to this maxim, Sava Saveetch was himself a genius : however, to give him his due, Sava Sa- veetch was thoroughly versed in business, particularly in conducting ex- aminations, following up proofs, and general investigations; only he did not know how to put his thoughts on paper so easily as he could pour ardent spirits down his throat ; could not pick out for himself in both capitals such a pair of spectacles as would enable him to read hasty writ- ten papers even by syllables, the same as if they %Jere printed, and owing to his multiplicity of business, did not recollect the dates of the Ukazes. In this Phomeetch was his Mentor. The inhabitants of the district, as a tribute of justice to Sava Saveetch, called him the gray wolf, and his faithful coadjutor, Phomeetch, was called the trap. The sheriff came to spend the evening with us, and when the tea-urn was brought in, he wetted his throat with punch made with Kizlarsky brandy, and showed a disposition to open his mind to us. He began in his usual way with his favourite exclamation : Bad times ! bad times I Education—legislation !
but no MONEY ! there's the rub I' Have done with your complaints
upon the times, Sava'Saveetch :' returned Vorovaateen. Do you think I don't know that the government-berths pay well : the devil himself could not keep you sitting here, if you did not make a livelihood of it' All very fine, but what would you have me to do with myself ?' said the sheriff with an air of chagrin. We have nothing to live upon but our former savings ; for all the jobs which we have now-a-days will not keep us in pocket-money. Consider that we have to feed the good folks in the government-town as children have to feed their old daddy. What signifies my having nine thousand two hundred and eighteen souls if
these souls are in an empty body 1' How !' exclaimed I : ' you have nine thousand two hundred and eighteen souls, and you complain of your poverty 1' The sheriff smiled and replied : These souls, brother, please to observe, are not mine but the emperor's, lying under my manage- ment ; but he who milks the cow has a right to drink milk, and it can- not be otherwise, but when the emperor has his fill, there must be some scrapings left by accidences, as it is called : but now, bad times ! bad times ! Education—legislation 1 but no MONEY ! there's the rub ! Something, it is true, is to be made if there should be a hue and cry after deserters and vagabonds in our district, but unfortunately that is a rare occur- rence; and it is difficult to trace them on any person's property. It is easy to see that the day of judgment is nigh at hand ! for theft is become rare, and murders are scarcely heard of. It is changed times for our brethren the lawyers, whose purses are now in a galloping consumption ! No business, no livelihood. In the mean time they write us from the higher courts; aye, they write us, that prisons were not made for nightingales; that coats cannot be stitched with com- pliments, and the like. Misery, nothing but misery 1 On all sides we are invaded by what is called the march of intellect : they have got a substi- tute for lawyers in the shape of books which they can carry in their pockets ; decent people like us are now a standing jest and laughing- stock in the two capitals, and that not only on the stage, but in the news- papers, and for what? Why, because forsooth, we, poor devils, want to eat dry bread for our labour. Even our country gentry are grown wise now-a-days. They are not content with the theory, but they must try their hands at the practice of law ; and hardly any mischief happens, but off they post direct to the higher provincial courts, and even to head- quarters. It is better, say they, to feed the wolf, than the wolf's whelps. It is true I tease them properly, and handle them with iron gloves. If I find but one deserter in the district, I make him confess that he has been harboured by all the rich proprietors and even peasants (their masters being answerable), and immediately I turn the whole district upside down. If a dead bodyshouldchance to be found, I toss it about to thirty different places, in order to implicate every body. A stolen horse I trace on paper, in one night, to twenty different stables. But all that is sad fagg- ing, a hard-earned kopeek I drive about, run about, here and there, write, examine, cross-examine, and knock about like a fish among the ice, a hundred times in one place, fifty times in another, and ten times in a third ! Bad times, brother ! Education—legislation !' Sava Saveetch here washed down his grief, and knocking his glass upon the table, ceased to give utterance to his thoughts. Vorovaateen was pleased with his friend's openness, and endeavoured. to renew the conversation. ' But the fairs, Sava Saveetch, and passports, and prosecutions for government debts, and private debts, the registering of property, rich guardianships, and besides that, the repairing of roads, conveying of government- stores, &c. &c. ?" The devil has skimmed off the cream of all this,' angrily replied Sava Saveetch. Few gamesters come to the fairs, and they who do come are as poor as church-mice, and have not the wherewithal to pay the usual fees for permission to fleece the country gentry, with whom it is now the fashion to go one of the two capitals to be ruined. There is little to be got from passports : little work in the capitals : trade goes on badly, and few peasants leave the district in quest of work, either for themselves or their horses. It is true that we are paid well for our trou- ble in prosecuting government defaulters and private debtors; but the orders are very strict now, and the governors and procureurs bear hard on our fraternity if we lose sight of the government interests. Of private business not a word. In my opinion, though debts were as common as dung, they would rather let them stand over, than put the business into our hands. It is an age since we have had a prosecution for debt, or any thing to register or copy ; the provincial and district courts corre- spond with one another in a friendly manner, and let the money-lender read, if he please, the regulations respecting prosecutions for debt, and amuse himself with the fair and legible hands of the clerks of the court. That is an object, thank God, which they leave as it is, without picking any holes. The roads, brother, and conveyance of stores, are mere trifles ! For it is only the post-roads which we repair, and them only when any im- portant personage is about to travel that way ; as for the other roads, though the devil himself break his neck, that is not our business ! The troops are now quartered on the frontiers, so that loads are scarce. With regard to guardianships, you are mistaken, my friend, in assigning us a revenue from that source. To be sure, every body may make something by the property of a ward, if he gets it into his hands ; but now the gentry i keep these sweet morsels to themselves, and can manage the bu- siness in as masterly a style as any of us. If any person is placed under our inspection for bad management, in a case like that, a rat might die of hunger on such an estate. No, brother, bad times, bad times ! Educa- tion—legislation ! but no MONEY ! there's the rub I' No, SavaSaveetch I' said Vorovaateen; 'things are not changed so much as you would make um believe; the difference is only in this that you must now do every -thing under the rose : there was a time when you laid hold of your booty as an experienced marksman does the game which he has brought down; but now—" But now,' said the sheriff, we must -have all our eyes about us: honesty is the order of the day,' added he, and again repeated his favourite expression—' Bad times, bad times I Education—legisla- tion ! but no MONEY ! there's the rub l'
Previous page
