A RUSSIAN NOVEL.*
THERE is no better way, short of actual residence amongst them, of getting to understand a people than the study of their popular literature ; and this being the case, it is a pity that a genuine Russian story should be such a rarity amongst us. The difficulty of a language in which so few persons are proficients is, doubtless, the cause why the works of Turgenief and Count Leo Tolstoy, both of them great favourites in their own country, have so long failed to put in an appearance in an English dress; and the present American edition of The Cossacks seems to have been translated by one who, however well he may know Russian, is by no means familiar with our own idiom. Mr. Schuyler's work reads rather like the literal performance of a school-boy, who thinks of nothing but the first meaning that comes to hand, and does not wait to turn his phrases ; neverthe- less, we are grateful to him for what he has done, and by no means certain that the simplicity and quaintness of his diction do not add a certain piquancy to the narrative, although the tale has of itself sufficient originality to make it decidedly attractive. The principal figure in the piece, the one around whom the whole of its action is concentrated, is the young Russian noble, Olenin, who is "as free as only rich young Russians who had been left without parents from boy- hood could be, thirty years ago," and who having lived for himself up to the age of twenty-four, having squandered half his fortune, and never done anything useful, finding him- self considerably in debt, forms the resolution of going to the Caucasus as a yanker (that is to say, a cadet serving with the army), and of living a life of economy until such time as he shall be free from every liability. The author represents this young man to us as one who feels in himself the presence of the god of youth, the power of transforming himself into whatever he may please ; and looking back upon his past, which he considers a merely accidental thing, he acknowledges that he has not desired to live well, but determines that his future life shall be very different, and that he will have no more mistakes, no more re- morse,—in fact, nothing but happiness. His meditations, as he is driven rapidly over the frozen snow, are sufficiently amusing ; there is one thing he has not experienced, he has never been in love, and does not believe in the tender passion ; and yet he con- jures up a vision of a fair Circassian, charming in her innocence and beauty, whose teacher he is to be, who will yield her- self up submissively to her conqueror, and will afterwards grate the salons of the highest society. The stern reality, however, turns out to be that the irresistible Dimitri Andreivitch Olenin becomes captive to the charms of a Cossack maiden, by whom he is ruthlessly rejected ; and giving up all his ideas of Arcadian felicity, demands to be placed on the Staff, in order to return to civilised life, having gained at least a little experience. The plot is simple enough, and the interest of the book does not, of course, lie in the story, but in the insight which is afforded us into the manners, customs, and ways of thought of the Cossacks, a portion of the Russian people of whom we know so little, and who are, according to Mr. Schuyler, greatly misunderstood and maligned. On the banks of the Terek, with its venerable plane-trees and century-old oaks, in a narrow belt of fertile land which stretches towards the sandy hillocks of the Nogai and Mozdok steppes, behind which rise magnificent snowy ranges, we find the peaceful villages of the Grebna Cossacks, the houses being raised upon posts some two or three feet above the ground, and thatched with reeds, having steep gables and high porches, and being separated from each other by gardens and orchards. In these we see the tall and stately maiden, her hair hidden by a kerchief, draped for sole garment in a pink or blue shirt, occupied in her multifarious household or agricultural tasks ; and when returned from his expeditions, • The Cossacks: a Tate of the Caucasus in 1832. By Count Leo Tolstoy. Trans- lated from the Russian by Eugene Schuyler. New York; Charles Scribner's Sons. the jigit or bravo, who is so certain of his value because he is a Cossack, and therefore, of course, superior to the men of any other country, more particularly to the little Russian colonists, whom he designates "hat-wearers."
The jigit has a fine contempt for apparel. On him, every- thing is broad, torn, and careless, and nothing of value except his arms, although he prides himself upon a certain way of putting on these ragged garments, which can be imitated by no one else. It is the Cossack woman who performs all the labour. Upon her depends the house, the property, the whole fortune of her lord; and accordingly we are told that masculine and heavy work have given to her an independent and masculine character, and "have developed in her in an astonishing way physical force, sound sense, decision, and firmness of character," so that the women are, in every way, of a higher type than the men, while "elegance, neatness, and beauty in their attire, and in the arrangement of their cottages, form a habit and a necessity of their life." Except the young girls, whose every-day dress con- sists, as we have said, solely in a shirt, the Cossack women wear the costume, as they inherit much of the beauty, of the Circas- sians, with whom their forefathers intermarried, and to whom they still consider themselves related, although they retain their Russian language and old faith. The Russian soldier, who is supposed to protect the Cossack villages, is, however, looked upon as a foreigner, and heartily despised ; so that Olenin is made to pay heavily for his accommodation, and by no means treated" with flattering deference. Indeed, the people of Novomlinsk seem quite unable to understand the position of a wealthy noble, and the young Russian's generosity in bestowing a horse upon Lukashka, supposed to be the result of some occult and inter- ested motive, is far from eliciting the slightest amount of grati- tude. The description of the Cossack village in the peculiar light of evening, when all is astir with the return from labour—cattle being brought home and milked, the fires lighted for the preparation of curds, the women chatting with each other, the children playing, and strange customs being incidentally brought out—is very good, although too long for extract. The whole male population, except the aged and infirm, live on
campaign, or at the outposts, where they spend their time in watching for the approach of Abreks or hostile Circassians, who live in flat-roofed mud huts on the Tartar side of the cinnamon- coloured Terek. It is at one of these outposts that we meet with Lukashka, the bravo, who will wed the fair Marianka; and with Uncle Eroshka, the old hunter, one of the best and most
telling characters in the book. This is his appearance, as he walks up to Lower Protosk, preceded by his dog Lam,' and saluting the Cossack guard, asks for the news of the day :—
"Uncle Eroshka was a Cossack of gigantic stature, with a heavy beard as white as a swan, and with such broad shoulders and breast, that in the woods, where there was no one to compare with him, he did not look tall, all his strong members were so well proportioned- He had a torn blouse thrown over him, and on his feet were sandals of deer-skin, tied on by a rag, which was wrapped about his legs, and on his head a ragged white-fur cap. Over one shoulder he carried a bag with smoked meat, for attracting the falcons ; over- the other he had on a strap a dead wild-cat ; behind him were fastened to his belt a bag with bullets, powder, and bread, a horse- tail for keeping off the gnats, a large dagger in a torn sheath, spotted with blood, and two dead pheasants."
This is the worthy who makes friends with Olenin over the tea- table in the porch, not omitting the addition of plenty of new wine, and offers to initiate him into the mysteries of the
life of the woods. But first he tells him of the olden time, when Cossacks were indeed men ; of his father, "the broad
one," who carried on his back a boar weighing 350 lb. ; of his friend Girtchik ; of his own prowess and good-fortune. Eroshka, is a man of the world, he prides himself on having got beyond "the circle of superstition." With a Tartar he is a Tartar, with an Armenian an Armenian. No need for him to be pro-
vided with his special glass at an entertainment, for he has not the slightest objection to drink out of a worldly one, i.e., one
that is common property, and may be used by the stranger.. "Do you want to know the kind of man I am P" says the giant :—
"I will find the scent for you. I know the beast ; and I know where he lies down, and where he goes to drink or lie down. I will make a hunting-hut, and I will sit there all night, and keep watch for you. What is the use of sitting at home ? One only gets warm, and gets drunk. And then the women come and make a row, and the boys cry at you ; and one gets angry. While there, at dawn you go out, and you choose a place, and you smooth down the reeds, and you sit there and watch like a brave young fellow, and wait for them. In any case, you know what goes on in the woods. Do you look up at the sky ? The stars come out ; you look at them; you
look a long time. You look around ? The wood crackles, and you wait for a little noise ; and a boar comes out to cover himself with mud. You hear how the young eagles cry, and how the cocks or the geese at the village answer them."
Then he goes on to give Olenin a bit of primitive philosophy, as he describes a herd of pigs, and the old sow snorting to them Take case, my children ; there is a man sitting there !" upon which they all scramble off :—
" You think," he continues, "that an animal is a fool ? No, he is far more cunning than a man ; it is great folly to call him a swine. Ile knows everything. Just take an example. A man goes slow=' a track without noticing it. As soon as a pig comes on your track, he immediately smells it out, and runs off. That means he has got sense in ; that you do not know your own track, and he does. Yes ; and that is the same as to say that you want to kill him, and he wants to walk alive in the woods. You have such a law, and he has another. He is a pig; and for all that, he is no worse than you ; he is also a divine creation. 'Eh! man's a fool ; man's a fool repeated the old man several times, and letting his head sink down, lost him- self in thought."
The vintage scene is also very good, with Marianka and the other girls busy at their labour under the fierce August sun, or resting under the carts, protected from observation by a few green branches stuck into the wheels, and a garment stretched out over them ; but indeed the whole book is exceedingly amus- ing and most refreshing, in its originality, and its complete con- trast with the worn-out sentimentality and used-up situations of the ordinary novel.
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