Whirlpools: A Novel of Modern Poland

by Henryk Sienkiewicz

"You claim, therefore, that in the name of Poland you have joined youth with a powerful idea, through which you have infused into her veins new blood. And I reply that this idea, whatever it may be, has degenerated in your minds to the extent that it ceased to be a social idea and has become a social disease. You have infected Poland with a disease and nothing more. The new Polish edifice must be constructed with bricks and stones and not with bombs and dynamite. And in you there is neither brick nor stone. You are only a shriek of hatred. You have abandoned the old gospels and are incapable of creating a new one; in consequence of which you cannot offer any pledge of life. Your name is Error and for that reason the resultant force of your activities will be contrary to you presuppositions. By pulling the strings of strikes you lead the people to naught else than to debility and wretchedness and from feeble beggars you are not able to build a powerful Poland. That is the actual fact. Besides, on one and the same head you cannot wear two caps unless one is underneath. So I ask which is underneath? Is your socialism only a means of building Poland? Or is your Poland only a bait and catchword to gather the people into your camp? The socialists, who call themselves socialists without any qualifications and do not insist that the same entity can be fish and fowl at the same time, are, I admit, more logical. But you mislead the people. The truth is that even if you wanted to you could not do anything Polish, for there is nothing Polish in you. The schools from which you graduated did not take away the language, for they could not do that, but they molded your minds and souls in such a manner that you are not Poles, but Russians despising Russia. How Poland and Russia will fare by this is another matter, but such is the case. To you it seems that you are making a revolution, but it is an ape of a revolution, and in addition a foreign one. You are the evil flower of a foreign spirit. It is enough to take your periodicals, your writers, poets, and critics! Their whole mental apparatus is foreign. Their real aim is not even socialism nor the proletariat, but annihilation.--Firebrand in hand, and at the bottom of their souls hopelessness and the great nihil! And of course we know where it originated. The Galician socialism likewise is not an Apollo Belvedere, but nevertheless it has different lineaments and less broad cheek-bones. There is not in it this rabidness and also this despair and sorrow which conflicts with the Latin culture. You are like certain fruit: on one side green, on the other rotten. You are sick. That sickness explains the limitless want of logic, based on this; that crying against wars, you create war; decrying courts-martial, you condemn without any trial; and denouncing capital punishment, you thrust revolvers in the hands of the people and say, 'Kill.' This disease also explains your insane outbreaks, your indifference to consequences, and to the fate of those ill-fated men whom you make your tools. Let them assassinate, let them rob the treasuries, but whether later they will hang in the halter is a matter of little consequence to you. Your nihil permits you to spit upon blood and ethics. You open wide the doors to notorious scoundrels and allow them to represent not their own villany, but your idea. You, generally speaking, carry ruin with you and join Poland to that ruin. In your party there are, without doubt, men of conviction and good faith, but blind, who in their blindness are serving a different master than they imagine."

Gronski knew that he was speaking in vain, but whether from habit, or because he wanted to relieve himself of all that had accumulated within him, he talked until the rattle of the wheels on the city pavements drowned his words. They parted rather coldly before the hotel, for Gronski's views touched the young medical student to the quick. He did not admit that Gronski was in the least right, but that such views should be entertained filled him with rage and indignation. He indeed said to himself, "It is not worth while answering, but our minds are not foreign, and our idea is new. Society is like a person who, having for many years lived in a house, is always reluctant to move into another though that other is much better." Nevertheless the words of Gronski stung him so deeply that at that moment he hated him as much as he did Krzycki and would have given a great deal if he could trample upon and crush the charges, so odious to him. Unfortunately for him he lacked time for it, and besides, weariness after a sleepless night began to overpower him more and more.

Gronski went to the post-office, received a package with the saddle, and afterwards drove to the doctor's, but learning that the latter would not be free for an hour, he left the carriage at his door and went to visit the old notary and at the same time deliver to him an invitation from Krzycki to visit Jastrzeb.

The notary was pleased to receive the invitation, as he had decided to visit the Krzyckis without one, in order, as he said, to behold the "eyes of his head" and hear her miracle-working violin. In the meantime he began to speak about the events which had occurred in the city and neighborhood. He was so impressed and affected by them that his customary choler left him, and in his words there was an undertone of bitter sorrow and heavy anxiety for the future of the community, which seemed to have lost its head. Factory strikes and to some extent agricultural strikes were spreading. In the city the lime-kilns had ceased to burn and the cement works were at a standstill. The workingmen, who, not having any savings, formerly lived from hand to mouth, in the first moments lacked bread. After the example of Warsaw, a local committee was organized for the purpose of collecting funds to prevent starvation. But as a result, this peculiar situation was created: the people most opposed to the cessation of work encouraged it by furnishing food to the idle. "A veritable round of errors!" said the worried old gentleman. "Do not give; then starvation follows and despair hurls the workingman into the arms of the socialists; give, and you also are playing into their hands, because they have something with which to support the strike and can convince the people of their omnipotence." He further related that outside of the committee the socialists were collecting money, or rather were extorting it from the timid by threats; that they called upon him but he told them that he would give for bread but not for bombs. They then threatened him with death, for which he had them thrown out of his office.

For a while he remained silent for the inborn choler assumed supremacy over sorrow; he also began to roll his eyes angrily and moved his jaws furiously, as if he wanted to eat all the socialists, together with their red standard.

Afterwards, when his rage had spent itself, he continued:

"Day before yesterday they sent me a sentence of death which they surely will execute, as they have declared war against the government and they butcher their own countrymen. Well, that is a small matter! Three days ago they killed a master tinner and two workingmen in the cement factory. In Wilczodola, a few versts from here, they waylaid and maimed Pan Baezynski and robbed the branch office of the governmental whiskey monopoly besides. Szremski, that doctor for whom you came and whose optimism sticks like a bone in my throat, says that it is but a passing storm! Yes, everything does pass away, individuals as well as whole nations. I fear that ours too is passing away; for we have become a nation of bandits and banditism never can be a permanent institution. Well! The people, after these acts of violence, have in reality become tired of robbing for the benefit of their party and now prefer to rob on their own account. Do I know whether we will arrive alive at Krzyckis to-day? Bah! Krzycki ought to be more on his guard than any one else. He passes for a rich man and for that reason they will keep him in their eye. I will go to Jastrzeb for if I am to be assassinated, before it takes place I want to hear once more our child-wonder. But in truth, Krzycki, instead of inviting more guests, should dismiss those who are staying there now. The doctor, if he had any sense, would find an excuse for dispersing them all to-morrow."

"I heard that he is an excellent man," said Gronski.

"An excellent devil!" answered the notary. "You remember whom you have among you, and it is only about her that I am concerned."

Gronski, though disquieted and distressed by Dzwonkowski's narrative, could not refrain from laughing when he heard the last admonition, for translated into plain words it meant, "May the deuce impale you all, if only no evil befalls the little violinist." But whenever Marynia was involved he himself was always willing to subscribe to similar sentiments; therefore he began to pacify the aged official by telling him that in Jastrzeb there were, counting the guests and manor people, too many hands and too many arms to have any fears of an attack; and that, besides, Pani Krzycki's probable departure would end the visit of the guests. Further conversation was broken by the arrival of Doctor Szremski who, having dashed in like a bomb, announced that he was free for the remainder of the day and could ride with Gronski.