One of the most recent and remarkable publications in this the literature of the deported (for so it is called in Poland to distinguish it from the literature of the emigrated) is that which has just been given to us by M. Rufin Piotrowski.[2] His book recommends itself not only by the richness of its detail and the breadth with which it is composed, but also, and chiefly, because the author of it is an escaped ‘Siberian.’ In him, since the case of Beniowski, we have the only example of a deported person who has attempted such an enterprise, and who has also succeeded in it. It is the more extraordinary because M. Piotrowski was also condemned to hard labour in the public works. Beniowski, as we have seen, had much assistance and many accomplices. A comparatively narrow tract alone separated him from the land of freedom, whereas our contemporary had no one to rely on but himself, and without map or succours, almost without money, he had to traverse Siberia in its entire length, and a great part of Russia in Europe in addition. On foot he made the long and perilous journey from beyond Omsk in Western Siberia, penetrating the Oural mountains to Archangel, Petersburg, Riga, even into Prussia, never imparting to a living soul his fatal secret, in order not to involve any one in his own probable and terrible fate. If the narrative of M. Piotrowski has not all that romantic brilliancy which the story of the confederate of Bar can afford, it reveals to us greater dangers and a perseverance of will far superior in every way. Nor is the marvellous element wanting to this strange Odyssey, albeit its hero is no mythological being; he exists, nay, he lives among us, and we rub shoulders with him every day. This escaped convict and exile from the banks of Irtiche, this former unhappy one (for thus do the natives of Siberia call the deported Poles), is now a modest professor in that excellent Polish school of the Batignolles, for which the emigrated sons of Poland are partly indebted to the generosity of France. M. Rufin Piotrowski was one of those heroic emissaries who, from the extreme limits of Polish emigration, sought to carry back and impart to an oppressed country the hopes, the ideas, and the dreams of exile; and his narrative begins precisely at the point when he started from Paris, on the journey which he undertook to Kaminiec in Podolia. These emissaries brought with them, generally speaking, impossible plans, and calls which could not be answered, because sufficient reflection had not been bestowed upon them. Sometimes, too, they imported ideas which were positively dangerous, and if they almost always half atoned for their errors by a constancy which braved both death and danger; they did not the less draw along with them in their own unhappy fate some generous and innocent victims. M. Piotrowski has at least this consolation, that he never made himself the apostle of perverse doctrines, and that he never sowed the seeds of hatred. His actions as an emissary were always enlightened by sentiments of that religious charity to which mob law in all its meanings is utterly repugnant. The same profoundly religious spirit characterises his book—a book which was written now many years ago, but which, for reasons obvious in a case of Polish publication, it was impracticable to publish before 1861. We have thought that the recollections of M. Piotrowski were likely to find favour with the French public. At a time when nothing else is heard of in Poland but sentences to Siberia pronounced upon the most respectable of her citizens, upon canons, rabbins, provosts, merchants, professors, students, and artisans, it surely cannot be useless or amiss to explain by one striking example all that is contained for Poland and the Poles in the single word ‘deportation.’ Is it necessary now to add that what we are about to read in these pages is in every particular strict matter of fact? The narrative of M. Piotrowski bears the stamp of truth, and of a good faith which pleads for itself, and removes every suspicion of exaggeration. For the rest, as we shall see, the author hardly, if ever, blames persons; as often as not, he expresses himself with regard to them in words marked by a lively sense of gratitude. It is the system only which he accuses; and, shall we confess it, the countrymen of M. Piotrowski, and above all his companions in misfortune, while unanimous as to the perfect authenticity of his tale, have rather reproached him with an excessive indulgence in speaking of the Russian officials. How many Poles, for example, have been surprised to see the portraits which he has sketched of Prince Bibikov and of M. Pissarev, men whose names are so painfully distinguished in the annals of the Poland of to-day? As we do not think it necessary to anticipate or preach a conviction which will soon make itself felt, it remains for us only to point out the method which we have followed in borrowing here from the Polish original of the book. A mere analysis would have effaced its character of individuality, while it spoilt the originality of the book. What is presented here is a faithful abridgement of a more detailed and lengthy narrative—an abridgement of an abyss, if one may borrow Pascal’s energetic phrase—for the ‘Recollections of a Siberian Exile’ reveal to us a perfect abyss of suffering and of misery.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] We use here the Latin v as the best equivalent for the b (viedi) of the Russian alphabet, although the letters f and w in Russian have nearly the same sound. To be consistent, it is necessary to write not only Móskova, Iainbov, Bérézov, but Orlov, Menstchikov, etc.: as for the name of Kiow, we adopt the orthography of the inhabitants of this town (Little Ruthenes); the Russians alone write it Kiew, pronouncing it always as Kiow.
[2] Pamietniki Rufina Piotrowskiego, 3 vols. in 8vo. Posen 1861.
CHAPTER I.
OF A MISSION INTO POLAND.
A PASSPORT—THE JOURNEY—THE RUSSIAN FRONTIER—KAMINIEÇ—A TEACHER OF LANGUAGES—ANNOYANCES OF DISGUISE—M. ABAZA—SUSPICIONS OF THE POLICE.
I had long decided to take my departure for my native land, and was only occupied by the necessary preparations for it, when I fell suddenly sick in Paris. It was in the year 1842. I was received into the hospital of La Pitié, then under the direction of Baron Lisfranc, who had formerly served with Polish troops during the wars of the Empire, and who still preserved towards them a friendly sentiment. A number of my compatriots and companions in exile found themselves along with me in the hospital, a prey to the two forms of disease so common among us emigrants—consumption and madness. More than one of them died in my ward, and at my side—a sight which was well calculated to sadden my spirit, for they died, though without uttering a single complaint, in utter prostration and gloom. One would almost have said that they had felt, in leaving this world, as if, even in the next, for them there might still be no country.
This sojourn in the hospital was nevertheless not without a good result on my projects. I had the fortune to make the acquaintance of another invalid, an American from the United States, who promised to get a passport for me, a thing which was indispensable for my undertaking, and which up to this time I had never been able to procure. Leaving, after a detention of about six weeks, the hospital from which the American had been discharged a few days earlier, I went at once to seek him at the address which he had given me. He then and there handed over to me an English passport, made out in the name of ‘Joseph Catharo, native of La Valette (Malta), aged 36.’ The document was quite regular, delivered at the English embassy in Paris, and signed by the ambassador, Lord Cowley. I could desire nothing better. In my situation an English passport was preferable to any other. I spoke Italian perfectly, whereas I could only speak English very imperfectly; but then my supposed Maltese antecedents would make good any failings on that score. The different visa of Baden, Wurtemberg, Bavaria, Austria, and Turkey, were soon procured; but at the office of the Minister for Foreign Affairs there had been put alongside of the seals two printed lines containing these fatal words—‘Bound to present himself at the Prefecture of the Police.’ Now I had all sorts of reasons for not wishing to announce my departure at the Prefecture of Police, where they might very likely have had more inquisitiveness than I had found in my American friend. After casting about in my mind for a long time how best to dispose of this luckless clause, I selected the not very ingenious plan of spilling some ink over the two lines, thus counterfeiting a big blot, and leaving nothing visible but the seal of the Minister. The method was a rude enough one, but it was not the less serviceable, and at none of the numberless police stations at which the passport had afterwards to be presented was any exception taken to the blot which disfigured it.