Rebels and Reformers: Biographies for Young People

by Baron Arthur Ponsonby Ponsonby; Dorothea Ponsonby

Tolstoy always lived with his children, and did not banish them to nurseries and schoolrooms, as some people do. Up to the age of ten they were taught by their father and mother; their mother taught them Russian and music, and their father arithmetic and French. Most entertaining French it was, which consisted of reading amusing stories out of illustrated volumes of Jules Verne. If there happened to be a volume without pictures, Tolstoy made the pictures himself. He drew very badly, yet his pictures were so amusing that the children liked them much better than the ordinary ones.

He would discuss and explain interesting things with his children, and they were always eager to be with him, to go walks with him, and be on his side in any game he taught them. Clearing the snow off the ponds in winter under their father’s direction was even more amusing than the skating itself. They rode and hunted with their father, for in the earlier part of his life Tolstoy was an enthusiastic sportsman. He was brave, daring, and an excellent shot, and he enjoyed more than anything being out in the open air.

In the early morning, before breakfast, Tolstoy would usually go for a long walk, or ride down to bathe in the river. At morning coffee, or what we call breakfast, the family all met together, and Tolstoy was always very merry. He would be up to all sorts of jokes, till he got up with the words, “One must get to work,” and off he went to his study to write books, and he would work for many hours on end, though in summer he would often come out and play with the children. This always delighted them, as he brought such spirit and interest into their games, and he would invent new ones himself—which were better than any. If they had secrets, he always guessed them, so that they regarded him as a sort of magician. His son writes of him: “My father hardly ever made us do anything, but it always somehow came about that of our own initiative we did exactly what he wanted us to. My mother often scolded us and punished us, but when my father wanted us to do anything, he merely looked us hard in the eyes, and we understood—the look was far more effective than any command. It was impossible to hide anything from him, as impossible as to hide it from your own conscience. He knew everything, and to deceive him was nearly impossible and quite useless.”

This same son, Ilya, Tolstoy’s second boy, tells many amusing stories of the Tolstoy family life, and of the great part his father played in it. One story is as follows: Ilya, when a little boy, was given a big china cup and saucer by his mother at Christmas-time. He was so excited that he ran very fast to show it to the others, and as he ran from one room to another, he caught his foot on the step in the doorway and fell down and broke his cup to smithereens. When accused by his mother of being careless, he howled and said it was not his fault, but the fault of the beastly architect who had gone and put a step in the doorway. Tolstoy, overhearing him, was much amused, and said, “It is the architect’s fault, it is the architect’s fault!” This phrase became a saying in the family, and Tolstoy was always using it when any one threw the blame on any one else. When one of the children fell off his horse because he stumbled, or when he did his lessons badly because his tutor had not explained them properly, and so on, “Of course, I know,” Tolstoy would say; “it is the architect’s fault.”

Tolstoy had some excellent inventions for making his children cheerful. When they would all be sitting rather cross and bored after the departure of some dull visitors, he would suddenly jump up from his seat, and, lifting one arm in the air with its hand hanging loose from the wrist, run at full speed round the table at a hopping gallop. Every one rose and flew after him, hopping and waving their hands. They went round the room several times, and then sat down again in their chairs, panting, and quite gay and lively once more. This game, which was known as “Numidian Cavalry,” had an excellent effect, and many a time the children’s tears were dried by it and quarrels forgotten.

Tolstoy, amongst other things, enjoyed music, and was fond of playing duets on the piano. After dinner he would settle down to this, usually with his wife’s sister. When he was in difficulties he would say things to make her laugh, so that she had to play slower, and sometimes, if this did not succeed, he would stop and take off one of his boots, saying, “Now it will go all right.”

Tolstoy was as young as anybody in his love of fun and games, the more nonsensical the better; and his laughter was most infectious, beginning on a high note, and his whole body would shake.

People ought to know about this amusing side of Tolstoy’s character, in order to get out of their heads that he was a painfully serious man without a sense of humor, who asked impossibilities of people. He had many sides to his character, as we shall see, and that is what makes him so intensely interesting.

Tolstoy was a deeply affectionate man, loving above all things his home, his wife, and his children. If ever he had to leave them for a time, even if it were only on a hunting expedition, he would always as he approached his home say, “If only all is well at home!” Whatever he did, he did with his whole heart and soul. He was an enthusiastic schoolmaster, a keen sportsman and farmer, and an excellent gardener and beekeeper. He looked into everything on his estate and insisted upon having all his pigs washed, and there were as many as three hundred!

So Tolstoy’s life was as full as it possibly could be. For the first ten years of his married life he was so much occupied with the cares of family life, and the life of a country gentleman, that he had less time for thought and did not worry himself quite so much about the reasons of life. He was also absorbed in his writing, and being a perfect giant for work, was able during this period—in spite of his numberless activities—to write two very great novels, besides many shorter stories and primers for children.