“Who lost the Japanese War—the Russian Government or the people?”
“The Government, of course,” I replied. Whereupon he unexpectedly flung his arms round my neck and kissed me on both cheeks.
“If I had had charge of the war, whew!” he whistled. “D’you see the palm of my hand there; now, there’s the Japanese Army.” Puff, he puffed out his cheeks with air and blew the Japanese Army off his palm and off the face of the earth. He winked at me with assurance. “That’s what I’d do.” He tapped his head and his chest and said knowingly: “Do you see these, ah-ha, pure Russian, they are.”
“Speak to me in English,” he went on. “I learned English at school, but I’ve forgotten—‘Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note’—eh? D’ye know that?”
When we got to table the uncle made a long speech, wishing prosperity and happiness to the young Englishman who had come out to Russia to make his fortune. England was the greatest country in the world, next to Russia. If the English soldiers would give up rum and take to vodka they would be the greatest soldiers in the world. When we had all drunk that toast he proposed another, hoping I might find a beautiful Russian girl to love. The count was what we should call a good sort in England. He let everyone do exactly as he pleased, except in the matter of wine, to which no refusals were accepted. It was an uproarious dinner-table; not only the young men, but the girls joined in the conviviality. I was lionised. They drank eleven healths to me all round; it was a matter of wonder what the next plea would be, but the uncle’s brain was very fertile. I counted that in all I drank twenty-six glasses of wine that day, and yet when I had been in England I was not quite sure whether I was a teetotaller or not. I was finally persuaded to make a speech in Russian, in which my Russian gave way, and I was forced to conclude in English. I managed to propose the host’s health, and that was the best thing I could have done. Approbation was uproarious.
When, at last, the dinner was over, we filed into the concert-hall to see the Life of Man performed. My student companion was evidently one of the actors, since I looked to resume our conversation, but he was nowhere to be found. The drama was one of Leonid Andrief’s, a new Russian author, whose works have been making him a great name in Russia during the last five years. The Life of Man was produced in the Theatre of Art, Moscow, said to be the greatest theatre in the world. It has made a great impression in Russia; I have come across it everywhere in my wanderings, even in the most unlikely places. Its words and its characters have become so familiar to the public that one scarcely opens a paper without finding references to it. It has been the inspiration of thousands of cartoonists.
It was true, as the student had said, God, as it were, gave the play. The words of the prologue were among the most impressive I have ever heard, and spoken as they were in dreadful sepulchral tones by a figure who, at least, stood for God, they are fixed indelibly in my memory. My programme said, “Prologue: Someone in the greyness speaks of the life of a Man.” As the Prologue is a summary of the play, I shall give it. Picture a perfectly dark stage, and in the darkness a figure darker than the darkness itself, enigmatical, immense.
“Behold and listen,” it said, “ye people, come hither for amusement and laughter. There passes before you the life of a Man—darkness in the beginning, darkness at the end of it. Hitherto not existent, buried in the boundless time, unthought of, unfelt, known by none; he secretly oversteps the bounds of nonentity, and with a cry announces the beginning of his little life. In the night of nothingness, a lamp casts a gleam, lit by an unseen hand—it is the life of Man. Look upon the flame of it—the life of a Man.
“When he is born he takes the form and name of man and in all things becomes like other people already living upon the earth. And the cruel destiny of these becomes his destiny, and his cruel destiny the destiny of all people. Irresistibly yoked to time he unfailingly approaches all the steps of Man’s life, from the lower to the higher, from the higher to the lower. By sight limited, he will never foresee the next steps for which he raises his tender feet; by knowledge limited, he will never know what the coming day will bring him, the coming hour—minute. And in his blind ignorance, languishing through foreboding, agitated by hopes, he submissively completes the circle of an iron decree.
“Behold him—a happy young man. Look how brightly the candle burns! The icy wind of the limitless sky cannot disturb, or in the slightest deflect the movement of the flame. Radiantly and brightly burns the candle. But the wax diminishes with the burning. The wax diminishes.