Pan Stanislav looked around. In the room there were at least a dozen and a half of buntings, titmice, finches. Sparrows, accustomed evidently to be fed, looked in in flocks through the window. The professor kept in his room only birds purchased of dealers; sparrows he did not admit, saying that if he did there would be no end to their numbers, and that it would be unjust to receive some and reject others. The chamber birds had cages fastened to the walls and the inner sash of the window, but went into them only at night; during daylight they flew through the chamber freely, filling it with twitter, and leaving traces on books and manuscripts, with which all the corners and the tables were filled.
Some of the birds which had become very tame sat on Vaskovski’s head even. On the floor husks of hemp-seed cracked under one’s feet. Pan Stanislav, who knew that chamber thoroughly, still shrugged his shoulders, and said,—
“All this is very good, but that the professor lets them light and sing on his head; that, God knows, is too much. Besides, it is stifling here.”
“That is the fault of Saint Francis of Assisi,” answered Vaskovski, “for I learned from him to love these little birds. I have even a pair of doves, but they are home-stayers.”
“Thou wilt see Bukatski, of course; I received a letter from him,—here it is.”
“May I read it?”
“I give it to thee for that very purpose.”
Vaskovski read the letter, and said when he had finished, “I have always liked this Bukatski; he is a good soul, but—he has a little something here!” Vaskovski began, to tap his forehead with his fingers.
“This is beginning to amuse me,” exclaimed Pan Stanislav. “Imagine to thyself, Professor, for a certain number of days some one taps himself on the forehead and says of some one of our acquaintance, ‘He has something here!’ A charming society!”
“If it is a little so, it is a little so!” answered Vaskovski, with a smile. “and knowest thou what this is? It is the usual Aryan trouble of soul; and in us, as Slavs, there is more of that than in the west, for we are the youngest Aryans, and therefore neither reason nor heart have settled yet into a balance. We are the youngest Aryans: we feel with more vividness; we take everything to heart more feverishly; and we arrange ourselves to the practice of life with more passion. I have seen much; I have noticed this for a long time. What wonderful natures! Just look, for example, the German students can carouse,—that doesn’t hinder them from either working or fashioning themselves into practical people; but let a Slav take this habit, and he is lost, he will do himself to death! And so with everything. A German will become a pessimist and write volumes on this,—that life is despair; but he will drink beer meanwhile, rear children, make money, cultivate his garden, and sleep under a feather tick. A Slav will hang himself, or ruin himself with mad life, with excess, smother himself in a swamp into which he will wade purposely. My dear, I remember men who Byronized themselves to death. I have seen much; I have seen men who, for example, took a fancy to peasants, and ended with drinking vodka in peasant dramshops. There is no measure with us, and there cannot be, for in us, to the excessive acceptance of every idea, are joined frivolousness and knowest what vanity. O my God, how vain we are! how we wish to push ourselves forward always, so that we may be admired and gazed at! Take this Bukatski: he has sunk in scepticism up to his ears in fact; in pessimism, Buddhism, decadency, and in what else besides—do I know?—and in these too there is a chaos at present. He has sunk so deeply that those miasmas are really poisoning him; but dost thou think that with this he is not posing? What wonderful natures! those who are most sincere, who have the most vivid feelings, taking all things to heart most powerfully,—are at the same time comedians. When a man thinks of this, he loves them, but he wants to laugh and to weep.”