At the head of the democratic branch stood the great writer who constituted the pride and honor of the epoch, as the one who most profoundly and fully reflected it, Mikháil Evgráfovitch Saltykóff (1826-1889). He was the son of landed proprietors, of an ancient family, with a famous name of Tatár descent. He finished his education in the Tzárskoe Seló Lyceum, which, from the time of Púshkin on, graduated so many notable statesmen and distinguished men. The authorities of the Lyceum were endeavoring to exterminate the spirit of Púshkin, who had died only the year before, and severely repressed all scribbling of poetry, which did not in the least prevent almost every boy in the school from trying his hand at it and dreaming of future fame. Thus incited, Saltykóff, from the moment of his entrance, earned the ill-will of the authorities by his passionate love of verse writing and reading, and when he graduated, in 1844, it was in the lower half of his class, and with one rank lower in the civil service than the upper half of the class.
In 1847 he published (under the name of "M. Nepánoff") his first story, "Contradictions," and in 1848 his second, "A Tangled Affair," both in "The Annals of the Fatherland." When the strictness of the censorship was augmented during that same year, after "the Petrashévsky affair," all literary men fell under suspicion. When Saltykóff asked for leave of absence from the service to go home during the holidays, he was commanded to produce his writings. Although these early writings contained hardly a hint of the satirical talents which he afterwards developed, the person to whom was intrusted the task of making a report of them (and who was a sworn enemy to the natural school and "The Annals of the Fatherland") gave such an alarming account of them that the Count Tchérnysheff was frightened at having so dangerous a man in his ministerial department. The result was, that in May, 1848, a posting-tróïka halted in front of Saltykóff's lodgings, and the accompanying gendarme was under orders to escort the offender off to Vyátka on the instant.
In Saltykóff's case, as in the case of many another Russian writer, exile not only removed him from the distracting pleasures of life at the capital, but also laid the foundation for his future greatness. In Vyátka, Saltykóff first served as one of the officials in the government office, but by the autumn he was appointed the official for special commissions immediately attached to the governor's service. He was a valued friend in the family of the vice-governor, for whose young daughters he wrote a "Short History of Russia," and after winning further laurels in the service, he was allowed to return to St. Petersburg in 1856, when he married one of the young girls, and published his "Governmental Sketches," with the materials for which his exile had furnished him. Two years later he was appointed vice-governor of Ryazán, then transferred to Tver, where he acted as governor on several occasions. In 1862 he retired from the service and devoted himself to literature, but he returned to it a couple of years later, and only retired definitively in 1868. These items are of interest as showing the status of political exiles in a different light from that usually accepted as the unvarying rule.
As we have said, Saltykóff's exile was of incalculable service to him, in that it made him acquainted with the inward life of Russia and of the people. This knowledge he put to unsparing use in his famous satires. In order fully to understand his works, one must be thoroughly familiar with the general spirit and the special ideas of the different periods to which they refer, as well as with Russia and its life and literature in general. Saltykóff (who wrote under the name of "Shtchedrín") was very keen to catch the spirit of the moment, and very caustic in portraying it, with the result that very often the names he invented for his characters clove to whole classes of society, and have become by-words, the mere mention of which reproduces the whole type. For example, after the Emancipation, when the majority of landed proprietors were compelled to give up their parasitic life on the serfs, there arose a class of educated people who were seeking fresh fields for their easy, parasitic existence. One of the commonest expedients, in the '70's, for restoring shattered finances was to go to Tashként, where the cultured classes imagined that regular gold mines awaited them. Saltykóff instantly detected this movement, and not only branded the pioneers in the colonization of Central Asia with the name of "Tashkéntzians" (in "Gospodá Tashkéntzy" Messrs. Tashkéntzians), but according to his wont, he rendered this nickname general by applying it to all cultured classes who had nothing in their souls but an insatiable appetite. In other works he branded other movements and classes with equal ineffaceableness.
His masterpiece (in his third and most developed period), the work which foreigners can comprehend almost equally well with Russians, is "Gospodá Golovlévy" ("The Messrs. Golovléff"[39]). It contains that element of the universal in humanity which his national satires lack, and it alone would suffice to render him immortal. The type of Iúdiushka (little Judas) has no superior in all European literature, for its cold, calculating, cynical hypocrisy, its miserly ferocity. The book is a presentment of old ante-reform manners among the landed gentry at their worst.
The following favorite little story furnishes an excellent example of Saltykóff's (Shtchedrín's) caustic wit and satire:
The Story of how One Peasant Maintained Two Generals.
Once upon a time there lived and flourished two Generals; and as both were giddy-pated, by jesting command, at my desire, they were speedily transported to an uninhabited island.
The Generals had served all their lives in some registry office or other; they had been born there, reared there, had grown old there, and consequently they understood nothing whatever. They did not even know any words except, "accept the assurance of my complete respect and devotion."
The registry was abolished as superfluous, and the Generals were set at liberty. Being thus on the retired list, they settled in Petersburg, in Podyátchesky (Pettifoggers) Street, in separate quarters; each had his own cook, and received a pension. But all of a sudden, they found themselves on an uninhabited island, and when they awoke, they saw that they were lying under one coverlet. Of course, at first they could not understand it at all, and they began to talk as though nothing whatever had happened to them.
"'Tis strange, your Excellency, I had a dream to-day," said one General; "I seemed to be living on a desert island."
No sooner had he said this than he sprang to his feet. The other General did the same.
"Heavens! What's the meaning of this? Where are we?" cried both, with one voice.
Then they began to feel each other, to discover whether this extraordinary thing had happened to them not in a dream, but in their waking hours. But try as they might to convince themselves that all this was nothing but a vision of their sleep, they were forced to the conviction of its sad reality.
On one side of them stretched the sea, on the other side lay a small plot of land, and beyond it again stretched the same boundless sea. The Generals began to weep, for the first time since the registry office had been closed.
They began to gaze at each other, and they then perceived that they were clad only in their night-shirts, and on the neck of each hung an order.
"How good a little coffee would taste now!" ejaculated one General, but then he remembered what unprecedented adventure had happened to him, and he began to cry again.
"But what are we to do?" he continued, through his tears; "if we were to write a report, of what use would it be?"
"This is what we must do," replied the other General. "Do you go to the east, your Excellency, and I will go to the west, and in the evening we will meet again at this place; perhaps we shall find something."
So they began their search to find which was the east and which the west. They recalled to mind that their superior official had once said, "If you wish to find the east, stand with your eyes towards the north, and you will find what you want on your right hand." They began to seek the north, and placed themselves first in one position, then in another, and tried all quarters of the compass in turn, but as they had spent their whole lives in the registry office, they could decide on nothing.
"This is what we must do, your Excellency; do you go to the right, and I will go to the left; that will be better," said the General, who besides serving in the registry office had also served as instructor of calligraphy in the school for soldiers' sons, and consequently had more sense.
So said, so done. One General went to the right, and saw trees growing, and on the trees all sorts of fruits. The General tried to get an apple, but all the apples grew so high that it was necessary to climb for them. He tried to climb, but with no result, except that he tore his shirt to rags. The General came to a stream, the fish were swimming there in swarms, as though in a fish-shop on the Fontánka canal. "If we only had such fish in Pettifoggers Street!" said the General to himself, and he even changed countenance with hunger.
The General entered the forest, and there hazel-hens were whistling, blackcocks were holding their bragging matches, and hares were running.
"Heavens! What victuals! What victuals!" said the General, and he felt that he was becoming fairly sick at his stomach with hunger.
There was nothing to be done; he was obliged to return to the appointed place with empty hands. He reached it but the other General was already waiting for him.
"Well, your Excellency, have you accomplished anything?"
"Yes, I have found an old copy of the 'Moscow News'; that is all."
The Generals lay down to sleep again, but gnawing hunger kept them awake. They were disturbed by speculations as to who would receive their pension for them; then they recalled the fruits, fish, hazel-hens, blackcock, and hares which they had seen that day.
"Who would have thought, your Excellency, that human food, in its original shape, flies, swims, and grows on trees?" said one General.
"Yes," replied the other General; "I must confess that until this day I thought that wheaten rolls came into existence in just the form in which they are served to us in the morning with our coffee."
"It must be that, for instance, if one desires to eat a partridge, he must first catch it, kill it, pluck it, roast it.... But how is all that done?"
"How is all that done?" repeated the other General, like an echo. They fell into silence, and tried to get to sleep; but hunger effectually banished sleep. Hazel-hens, turkeys, sucking-pigs flitted before their eyes, rosy, veiled in a slight blush of roasting, surrounded with cucumbers, pickles, and other salads.
"It seems to me that I could eat my own boots now!" said one General.
"Gloves are good also, when they have been worn a long time!" sighed the other General.
All at once the Generals glanced at each other; an ominous fire glowed in their eyes, their teeth gnashed, a dull roar forced its way from their breasts. They began slowly to crawl toward each other, and in the twinkling of an eye they were exasperated to fury. Tufts of hair flew about, whines and groans resounded; the General who had been a teacher of calligraphy bit off his adversary's Order, and immediately swallowed it. But the sight of flowing blood seemed to restore them to their senses.
"The power of the cross defend us!" they exclaimed simultaneously; "if we go on like this we shall eat each other!"
"And how did we get here? What malefactor has played us this trick?"
"We must divert our minds with some sort of conversation, your Excellency, or there will be murder!" said the other General.
"Begin!" replied the other General.
"Well, for instance, what do you think about this, Why does the sun rise first and then set, instead of acting the other way about?"
"You are a queer man, your Excellency; don't you rise first, then go to the office, write there, and afterward go to bed?"
"But why not admit this reversal of the order; first I go to bed, have divers dreams, and then rise?"
"Hm, yes.... But I must confess that when I served in the department I always reasoned in this fashion: now it is morning, then it will be day, then supper will be served, and it will be time to go to bed."
But the mention of supper plunged them both into grief, and broke the conversation off short at the very beginning.
"I have heard a doctor say that a man can live for a long time on his own juices," began one of the Generals.
"Is that so?"
"Yes, sir, it is; it appears that, the juices proper produce other juices; these in their turn, engender still other juices, and so on, until at last the juices cease altogether...."
"What then?"
"Then it is necessary to take some sort of nourishment."
"Tfu!"
In short, no matter what topic of conversation the Generals started, it led inevitably to a mention of food, and this excited their appetites still more. They decided to cease their conversation, and calling to mind the copy of the "Moscow News" which they had found, they began to read it with avidity.
"Yesterday," read one General, with a quivering voice, "the respected governor of our ancient capital gave a grand dinner. The table was set for one hundred persons, with wonderful luxury. The gifts of all lands seemed to have appointed a rendezvous at this magical feast. There was the golden sterlet of the Sheksna, the pheasant, nursling of the Caucasian forests, and strawberries, that great rarity in our north in the month of February...."
"Tfu, heavens! Cannot your Excellency find some other subject?" cried the other General in desperation, and taking the newspaper from his companion's hand, he read the following: "A correspondent writes to us from Túla: 'There was a festival here yesterday at the club, on the occasion of a sturgeon being caught in the river Upá (an occurrence which not even old residents can recall, the more so as private Warden B. was recognized in the sturgeon). The author of the festival was brought in on a huge wooden platter, surrounded with cucumbers, and holding a bit of green in his mouth. Doctor P., who was on duty that day as presiding officer, saw to it carefully that each of the guests received a piece. The sauce was extremely varied, and even capricious.' ..."
"Permit me, your Excellency, you also seem to be not sufficiently cautious in your choice of reading matter!" interrupted the first General, and taking the paper in his turn, he read: "A correspondent writes to us from Vyátka: 'One of the old residents here has invented the following original method of preparing fish soup: Take a live turbot, and whip him as a preliminary; when his liver has become swollen with rage.' ..."
The Generals dropped their heads. Everything on which they turned their eyes—everything bore witness to food. Their own thoughts conspired against them, for try as they would to banish the vision of beefsteak, this vision forced itself upon them.
And all at once an idea struck the General who had been a teacher of calligraphy....
"How would it do, your Excellency," he said joyfully, "if we were to find a peasant?"
"That is to say ... a muzhík?"
"Yes, exactly, a common muzhík ... such as muzhíks generally are. He would immediately give us rolls, and he would catch hazel-hens and fish!"
"Hm ... a peasant ... but where shall we find him, when he is not here?"
"What do you mean by saying that he is not to be found? There are peasants everywhere, and all we have to do is to look him up! He is certainly hiding somewhere about because he is too lazy to work!" This idea cheered the Generals to such a degree that they sprang to their feet like men who had received a shock, and set out to find a peasant.
They roamed for a long time about the island without any success whatever, but at last the penetrating smell of bread-crust and sour sheepskin put them on the track. Under a tree, flat on his back, with his fists under his head, lay a huge peasant fast asleep, and shirking work in the most impudent manner. There were no bounds to the wrath of the Generals.
"Asleep, lazybones!" and they flung themselves upon him; "and you don't move so much as an ear, when here are two Generals who have been dying of hunger these two days! March off, this moment, to work!"
The man rose; he saw that the Generals were stern. He would have liked to give them the slip, but they had become fairly rigid when they grasped him.
And he began to work under their supervision.
First of all he climbed a tree and picked half a score of the ripest apples for the Generals, and took one, a sour one, for himself. Then he dug in the earth and got some potatoes; then he took two pieces of wood, rubbed them together, and produced fire. Then he made a snare from his own hair and caught a hazel-hen. Last of all, he arranged the fire, and cooked such a quantity of different provisions that the idea even occurred to the Generals, "would it not be well to give the lazy fellow a little morsel?"
The Generals watched the peasant's efforts, and their hearts played merrily. They had already forgotten that they had nearly died of hunger on the preceding day, and they thought, "What a good thing it is to be a general—then you never go to destruction anywhere."
"Are you satisfied, Generals?" asked the big, lazy peasant.
"We are satisfied, my dear friend, we perceive your zeal," replied the Generals.
"Will you not permit me to rest now?"
"Rest, my good friend, only first make us a rope."
The peasant immediately collected wild hemp, soaked it in water, beat it, worked it—and by evening the rope was done. With this rope the Generals bound the peasant to a tree so that he should not run away, and then they lay down to sleep.
One day passed, then another; the big, coarse peasant became so skilful that he even began to cook soup in the hollow of his hand. Our Generals became jovial, light-hearted, fat, and white. They began to say to each other that, here they were living with everything ready to hand while their pensions were accumulating and accumulating in Petersburg.
"What do you think, your Excellency, was there really a tower of Babel, or is that merely a fable?" one General would say to the other, as they ate their breakfast.
"I think, your Excellency, that it really was built; because, otherwise, how can we explain the fact that many different languages exist in the world?"
"Then the flood must have occurred also?"
"The flood did happen, otherwise, how could the existence of antediluvian animals be explained? The more so as it is announced in the 'Moscow News'...."
"Shall we not read the 'Moscow News'?"
Then they would hunt up that copy, seat themselves in the shade, and read it through from end to end; what people had been eating in Moscow, eating in Túla, eating in Pénza, eating in Ryazán—and it had no effect on them; it did not turn their stomachs.
In the long run, the Generals got bored. They began to refer more and more frequently to the cooks whom they had left behind them in Petersburg, and they even wept, on the sly.
"What is going on now in Pettifoggers Street, your Excellency?" one General asked the other.
"Don't allude to it, your Excellency! My whole heart is sore!" replied the other General.
"It is pleasant here, very pleasant—there are no words to describe it; but still, it is awkward for us to be all alone, isn't it? And I regret my uniform also."
"Of course you do! Especially as it is of the fourth class,[40] so that it makes you dizzy to gaze at the embroidery alone!"
Then they began to urge the peasant: Take them, take them to Pettifoggers Street! And behold! The peasant, it appeared, even knew all about Pettifoggers Street; had been there; his mouth had watered at it, but he had not had a taste of it!
"And we are Generals from Pettifoggers Street, you know!" cried the Generals joyfully.
"And I, also, if you had only observed; a man hangs outside a house, in a box, from a rope, and washes the wall with color, or walks on the roof like a fly. I am that man," replied the peasant.
And the peasant began to cut capers, as though to amuse his Generals, because they had been kind to him, an idle sluggard, and had not scorned his peasant toil. And he built a ship—not a ship exactly, but a boat—so that they could sail across the ocean-sea, up to Pettifoggers Street.
"But look to it, you rascal, that you don't drown us!" said the Generals, when they saw the craft pitching on the waves.
"Be easy, Generals, this is not my first experience," replied the peasant, and began to make preparations for departure.
The peasant collected soft swansdown, and lined the bottom of the boat with it; having done this, he placed the Generals on the bottom, made the sign of the cross over them, and set sail. The pen cannot describe, neither can the tongue relate, what terror the Generals suffered during their journey, from storms and divers winds. But the peasant kept on rowing and rowing, and fed the Generals on herrings.
At last, behold Mother Nevá, and the splendid Katherine Canal, and great Pettifoggers Street! The cook-maids clasped their hands in amazement at the sight of their Generals, so fat, white, and merry! The Generals drank their coffee, ate rolls made with milk, eggs, and butter, and put on their uniforms. Then they went to the treasury, and the pen cannot describe, neither can the tongue relate, how much money they received there.
But they did not forget the peasant; they sent him a wineglass of vódka and a silver five-kopék piece.[41] "Make merry, big, coarse peasant!"
While Turgéneff represented the "western" and liberal element (with a tinge of the "red") in the school of the '40's, and Gontcharóff stood for the bourgeois and opportunist ideals of the St. Petersburg bureaucrats, Count Lyéff Nikoláevitch Tolstóy penetrated more profoundly into the depths of the spirit of the times than any other writer of the period in the matter of analysis and skepticism which characterized that school, and carried them to the extremes of pitiless logic and radicalness, approaching more closely than any other to democratic and national ideals. But notwithstanding all his genius, Count Tolstóy was not able to free himself to any great extent from his epoch, his environment, his contemporaries. His special talents merely caused him to find it impossible to reconcile himself to the state of affairs existing around him; and so, instead of progressing, he turned back and sought peace of mind and a firm doctrine in the distant past of primitive Christianity. Sincere as he undoubtedly is in his propaganda of self-simplification and self-perfection—one might almost call it "self-annihilation"—his new attitude has wrought great and most regrettable havoc with his later literary work, with some few exceptions.
And yet, in pursuing this course, he did not strike out an entirely new path for himself; his youth was passed in an epoch when the ideal of personal perfection and self-surrender stood in the foreground, and constituted the very essence of Russian progress.