A relation of mine had given me a letter of introduction to Princess B——. Now this old lady, though she but seldom left her own house, was a very great power indeed in Petrograd, and was universally known as the "Princesse Château." For some reason or another, I was lucky enough to find favour in this dignified old lady's eyes. She asked me to call on her again, and at our second meeting invited me to her Sunday evenings. The Princesse Château's Sunday evenings were a thing quite apart. They were a survival in Petrograd of the French eighteenth century literary "salons," but devoid of the faintest flavour of pedantry or priggism. Never in my life, before or since, have I heard such wonderfully brilliant conversation, for, with the one exception of myself, the Princesse Château tolerated no dull people at her Sundays. She belonged to a generation that always spoke French amongst themselves, and imported their entire culture from France. Peter the Great had designed St. Petersburg as a window through which to look on Europe, and the tradition of this amongst the educated classes was long in dying out. The Princess assembled some thirty people every Sunday, all Russians, with the exception of myself. These people discussed any and every subject—literature, art, music, and philosophy—with sparkling wit, keen critical instinct, and extraordinary felicity of phrase, usually in French, sometimes in English, and occasionally in Russian. Their knowledge seemed encyclopædic, and they appeared equally at home in any of the three languages. They greatly appreciated a neatly-turned epigram, or a novel, crisply-coined definition. Any topic, however, touching directly or indirectly on the external or internal policy of Russia was always tacitly avoided. My rôle was perforce reduced to that of a listener, but it was a perfectly delightful society. Princesse Château had a very fine suite of rooms on the first floor of her house, decorated "at the period" in Louis XVI style by imported French artists; these rooms still retained their original furniture and fittings, and were a museum of works of art; but her Sunday evenings were always held in the charming but plainly-furnished rooms which she herself inhabited on the ground floor. We had one distinct advantage over the old French salons, for Princesse Château entertained her guests every Sunday to suppers which were justly celebrated in the gastronomic world of Petrograd. During supper the conversation proceeded just as brilliantly as before. There were always two or three Grand Duchesses present, for to attend Princesse Château's Sundays was a sort of certificate of culture. The Grand Duchesses were treated quite unceremoniously, beyond receiving a perfunctory "Madame" in each sentence addressed to them. How curious that, both in English and French, the highest title of respect should be plain "Madame"! As the Russian equivalent is "Vashoe Imperatorskoe Vuisochestvo," a considerable expenditure of time and breath was saved by using the terser French term. And through it all moved the mistress of the house, the stately little smiling old lady, in her plain black woollen dress and lace cap, dropping here a quaint criticism, there an apt bon-mot. Perfectly charming people!
The relatives and friends of Princesse Château whom I met at her house, when they discovered that I had a genuine liking for their country, and that I did not criticise details of Russian administration, were good enough to open their houses to me in their turn. Though most of these people owned large and very fine houses, they opened them but rarely to foreigners. They gave, very occasionally, large entertainments to which they invited half Petrograd, including the Diplomatic Body, but there they stopped. They did not care, as a rule, to invite foreigners to share the intimacy of their family life. I was very fortunate therefore in having an opportunity of seeing a phase of Russian life which few foreigners have enjoyed. Russians seldom do things by halves. I do not believe that in any other country in the world could a stranger have been made to feel himself so thoroughly at home amongst people of a different nationality, and with such totally different racial ideals; or have been treated with such constant and uniform kindness. There was no ceremony whatever on either side, and on the Russian side, at times, an outspokenness approaching bluntness. As I got to know these cultivated, delightful people well, I grew very fond of them. They formed a clique, possibly a narrow clique, amongst themselves, and had that complete disregard for outside criticism which is often found associated with persons of established position. They met almost nightly at each others' houses, and I could not but regret that such beautiful and vast houses should be seen by so few people. One house, in particular, contained a staircase an exact replica of a Grecian temple in white statuary Carrara marble, a thing of exquisite beauty. In their perpetual sets of intellectual lawn tennis, if I may coin the term, the superiority of the feminine over the male intellects was very marked. This is, I believe, a characteristic of all Slavonic countries, and I recalled Bismarck's dictum that the Slav peoples were essentially feminine, and I wondered whether there could be any connection between the two points. Living so much with Russians, it was impossible not to fall into the Russian custom of addressing them by their Christian names and patronymics; such as "Maria Vladimirovna" (Mary daughter of Vladimir) or "Olga Andreèvna" (Olga daughter of Andrew) or "Pavel Alexandrovitch" (Paul son of Alexander). I myself became Feòdor Yàkovlevitch, (Frederic son of James, those being the nearest Russian equivalents). On arriving at a house, the proper form of inquiry to the hall porter was, "Ask Mary daughter of Vladimir if she will receive Frederic son of James." In due time the answer came, "Mary daughter of Vladimir begs Frederic son of James to go upstairs." My own servants always addressed me punctiliously as Feòdor Yàkovlevitch. On giving them an order they would answer in Moscovite fashion, "I hear you, Frederic son of James," the equivalent to our prosaic, "Very good, sir." Amongst my new friends, as at the Princesse Château's, no allusions whatever, direct or indirect, were made to internal conditions in Russia. Apart from the fact that one of these new friends was himself Minister of the Interior at the time, it would not have been safe. In those days the Secret Police, or "Third Section," as they were called, were very active, and their ramifications extended everywhere. One night at a supper party a certain Countess B—— criticised in very open and most unflattering terms a lady to whom the Emperor Alexander II was known to be devotedly attached. Next morning at 8 a.m. the Countess was awakened by her terrified maid, who told her that the "Third Section" were there and demanded instant admittance. Two men came into the Countess's bedroom and informed her that their orders were that she was to take the 12.30 train to Europe that morning. They would remain with her till then, and would accompany her to the frontier. As she would not be allowed to return to Russia for twelve months, they begged her to order her maid to pack what was necessary; and no one knew better than Countess B—— how useless any attempted resistance would be.
This episode made a great stir at the time. As the words complained of had been uttered about 3 a.m., the police action had been remarkably prompt. The informant must have driven straight from the supper party to the "Third Section," and everyone in Petrograd had a very distinct idea who the informant was. Is it necessary to add that she was a lady?
Some of my new friends volunteered to propose and second me for the Imperial Yacht Club. This was not the club that the diplomats usually joined; it was a purely Russian club, and, in spite of its name, had no connection with yachting. It had also the reputation of being extremely exclusive, but thanks to my Russian sponsors, I got duly elected to it. This was, I am sure, the most delightful club in Europe. It was limited to 150 members of whom only two, besides myself, were foreigners, and the most perfect camaraderie existed between the members. The atmosphere of the place was excessively friendly and intimate, and the building looked more like a private house than a club, as deceased members had bequeathed to it pictures, a fine collection of old engravings, some splendid old Beauvais tapestry, and a great deal of Oriental porcelain. Above all, we commanded the services of the great Armand, prince of French chefs. Associating so much with Russians, it was possible to see things from their points of view. They all had an unshakable belief in the absolute invincibility of Russia, and in her complete invulnerability, for it must not be forgotten that in 1880 Russia had never yet been defeated in any campaign, except partially in the Crimean War of 1854-50. My friends did not hide their convictions that it was Russia's manifest destiny to absorb in time the whole of the Asiatic Continent, including India, China, and Turkey. There were grounds for this article of faith, for in 1880 Russia's bloodless absorption of vast territories in Central Asia had been astounding. It was not until the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905 that the friable clay feet of the Northern Colossus were revealed to the outside world, though those with a fairly intimate knowledge of the country quite realised how insecure were the foundations on which the stupendous structure of modern Russia had been erected.
I am deeply thankful that the great majority of my old friends had passed away in the ordinary course of nature before the Great Catastrophe overwhelmed the mighty Empire in which they took such deep pride; and that they were spared the sight and knowledge of the awful orgy of blood, murder, and spoliation which followed the ruin of the land they loved so well. Were they not now at rest, it would be difficult for me to write of those old days.
To grasp the Russian mentality, it must be remembered that they are essentially Orientals. Russia is not the most Eastern outpost of Western civilisation; it is the most Western outpost of the East. Russians have all the qualities of the Oriental, his fatalism, his inertness, and, I fear, his innate pecuniary corruption. Their fatalism makes them accept their destiny blindly. What has been ordained from the beginning of things is useless to fight against; it must be accepted. The same inertness characterises every Eastern nation, and the habit of "baksheesh" is ingrained in the Oriental blood. If the truth were known, we should probably find that the real reason why Cain killed Abel was that the latter had refused him a commission on some transaction or other. The fatalism and lack of initiative are not the only Oriental traits in the Russian character. In a hundred little ways they show their origin: in their love of uncut jewels; in their lack of sense of time (the Russian for "at once" is "si chas," which means "this hour"; an instructive commentary); in the reluctance South Russians show in introducing strangers to the ladies of their household, the Oriental peeps out everywhere. Peter the Great could order his Boyards to abandon their fur-trimmed velvet robes, to shave off their beards, powder their heads, and array themselves in the satins and brocades of Versailles. He could not alter the men and women inside the French imported finery. He could abandon his old capital, matchless, many-pinnacled Moscow, vibrant with every instinct of Russian nationality; he could create a new pseudo-Western, sham-classical city in the frozen marshes of the Neva; but even the Autocrat could not change the souls of his people. Easterns they were, Easterns they remained, and that is the secret of Russia, they are not Europeans. Peter himself was so fully aware of the racial limitations of his countrymen that he imported numbers of foreigners to run the country; Germans as Civil and Military administrators; Dutchmen as builders and town-planners; and Englishmen to foster its budding commerce. To the latter he granted special privileges, and even in my time there was a very large English commercial community in Petrograd; a few of them descendants of Peter the Great's pioneers; the majority of them with hereditary business connections with Russia. Their special privileges had gradually been withdrawn, but the official name of the English Church in Petrograd was still "British Factory in St. Petersburg," surely a curious title for a place of worship. The various German-Russian families from the Baltic Provinces, the Adlerbergs, the Benckendorffs, and the Stackelbergs, had served Russia well. Under their strong guidance she became a mighty Power, but when under Alexander III the reins of government were confided to purely Russian hands, rapid deterioration set in. This dreamy nation lacks driving power. In my time, the very able Minister for Foreign Affairs, M. de Giers, was of German origin, and his real name was Hirsch. His extremely wily and astute second in command, Baron Jomini, was a Swiss. Modern Russia was largely the creation of the foreigner.
I saw a great deal, too, of a totally different stratum of Russian society. Mr. X., the head of a large exporting house, was of British origin, the descendant of one of Peter's commercial pioneers. He himself, like his father and grandfather, had been born in Russia, and though he retained his English speech, he had adopted all the points of view of the country of his birth. Madame X. came of a family of the so-called "Intelligenzia." Most of her relatives seemed to have undertaken compulsory journeys to Siberia, not as prisoners, but for a given term of exile. Madame X.'s brother-in-law owned and edited a paper of advanced views, which was being continually suppressed, and had been the cause of two long trips eastward for its editor and proprietor. Neither Mr. nor Madame X. shared their relatives' extreme views. What struck me was that behind the floods of vehement invective of Madame O—— (the editor's wife) there was never the smallest practical suggestion. "You say, Madame O——," I would hazard, "that the existing state of things is intolerable. What remedy do you suggest?" "I am not the Government," would retort Madame O—— with great heat. "It is for the Government to make suggestions. I only denounce an abominable injustice." "Quite so, Madame O——, but how can these conditions be improved. What is your programme of reform?" "We have nothing to do with reforms. Our mission is to destroy utterly. Out of the ruins a better state of things must necessarily arise; as nothing could possibly be worse than present conditions." And so we travelled round and round in a circle. Mr. O——, when appealed to, would blink through his spectacles with his kindly old eyes, and emit a torrent of admirable moral aphorisms, which might serve as unimpeachable copy-book headings, but had no bearing whatever on the subject we were discussing. Never once amidst these floods of bitter invective and cataracts of fierce denunciation did I hear one single practical suggestion made or any outline traced of a scheme to better existing conditions. "We must destroy," shouted Madame O——, and there her ideas stopped. I think the Slavonic bent of mind, like the Celtic, is purely destructive, and has little or no constructive power in it. This may be due to the ineradicable element of the child in both races. They are "Peter Pans," and a child loves destruction.
Poor dreamy, emotional, hopelessly unpractical Russia! Madame O——'s theories have been put into effect now, and we all know how appalling the result has been.
These conversations were always carried on in French for greater safety in order that the servants might not overhear, but when Mr. and Madame O—— found difficulties in expressing themselves in that language, they both broke into torrents of rapid Russian, to poor Madame X.'s unconcealed terror. The danger was a real one, for the O——'s were well known in police circles as revolutionists, and it must have gone hard with the X.'s had their servants reported to the police the violent opinions that had been expressed in their house.