At the end of it all Mimi's heart is touched but not broken. Perhaps she Was even slightly disillusioned by the calmness with which her "correct" admirer met the crisis of her departure from the Caucasus.
The secondary characters are also well drawn; notably that of the mother of Mimi, a self-sacrificing "doormat" whose mission in life is to make things smooth for her cherished daughter; but to those who seek to discover the personality of an author through the medium of his puppets, and are ready to find a veiled autobiography in the career of the hero or heroine, it may be suggested that the character of Vava, the lonely, idealistic, day-dreaming cousin of Mimi, is far nearer to the writer's heart than the fascinating heroine who fills the title-role.
Vava has many traits in common with the boy-hero of Tolstoy's Childhood, which is only another way of saying that in Russia young people of both sexes are more thoughtful, introspective, and inclined to philosophise upon abstract subjects than the romps and tomboys of our English nurseries and schoolrooms.
The sympathetic earnestness of the description of Vava's love of solitude in the Caucasian woods, amounts to an avowal that the author also has felt the joy of loneliness shared with crickets, lady-birds, butterflies, and bees, "while over her head a great eagle soars calmly up, as if carrying on his broad wings her dreams, her hopes, and her faith in God." In scenes like these the prevailing tone of playful irony yields to one of genuine emotion, and one is tempted to wish that the writer had given her inner convictions fuller play. V. Mikoulitch has, however, struck a deeper note of human feeling in her recent story of humble life entitled The Bath— a village tragedy turning upon the incident of the theft of an old woman's petticoat in the public bath-house; but it seems doubtful whether her success in this new vein will equal that of her earlier works.
To the background of Mimi at the Springs may be ascribed some measure of its popularity. The Caucasus has inspired many of the greatest of the writers of Russia, and to the Russian reading public it is still dear as the land of legend and romance.
Pushkin, Lermontov, Tolstoy (in his early masterpiece The Cossacks,) have each revelled in the beauty of the great southern mountain range, with its luxuriant forests, its snow-clad peaks, and innumerable springs of mineral water.
The Slav temperament, with its swift transitions from feverish gaiety to nervous exhaustion, finds peculiar relief in reverting to the simple life of the Caucasian watering-places. There many a disgraced official or disappointed genius has regained contentment if not happiness, and realised, despite the pain of exile, that there is a sweetness in adversity.
In describing the scenery of the Caucasus, V. Mikoulitch has followed not unworthily in the steps of her great fore-runners, and shown that her cynicism is the mere protective armour of one who is at heart an idealist.
A sequel, Mimi Poisons Herself, appeared in the Vestnik Evropy in 1893, but was received more coldly than its predecessor, owing, perhaps, to the disappointment of readers with a taste for tragedy, since Mimi does not succeed in poisoning herself after all.
C. HAGBERG WRIGHT.