by Leo Tolstoy
After riding some miles along the high road Hadji Murád checked his panting horse, which, wet with sweat, had turned from white to grey.
To the right of the road could be seen the sáklyas and minarets of the aoul Benerdzhík, on the left lay some fields, and beyond them the river. Although the way to the mountains lay to the right, Hadji Murád turned to the left, in the opposite direction, assuming that his pursuers would be sure to go to the right, while he, abandoning the road, would cross the Alazán and come out onto the high road on the other side where no one would expect him – ride along it to the forest, and then after recrossing the river make his way to the mountains.
Having come to this conclusion he turned to the left; but it proved impossible to reach the river. The rice-field which had to be crossed had just been flooded, as is always done in spring, and had become a bog in which the horses’ legs sank above their pasterns. Hadji Murád and his henchmen turned now to the left, now to the right, hoping to find drier ground; but the field they were in had been equally flooded all over and was now saturated with water. The horses drew their feet out of the sticky mud into which they sank, with a pop like that of a cork drawn from a bottle, and stopped, panting, after every few steps. They struggled in this way so long that it began to grow dusk and they had still not reached the river. To their left lay a patch of higher ground overgrown with shrubs and Hadji Murád decided to ride in among these clumps and remain there till night to rest their exhausted horses and let them graze. The men themselves ate some bread and cheese they had brought with them. At last night came on and the moon that had been shining at first, hid behind the hill and it became dark. There were a great many nightingales in that neighbourhood and there were two of them in these shrubs. As long as Hadji Murád and his men were making a noise among the bushes the nightingales had been silent, but when they became still the birds again began to call to one another and to sing.
Hadji Murád, awake to all the sounds of night, listened to them involuntarily, and their trills reminded him of the song about Hamzád which he had heard the night before when he went to get water. He might now at any moment find himself in the position in which Hamzád had been. He fancied that it would be so, and suddenly his soul became serious. He spread out his búrka and performed his ablutions, and scarcely had he finished before a sound was heard approaching their shelter. It was the sound of many horses’ feet plashing through the bog.
The keen-sighted Bata ran out to one edge of the clump, and peering through the darkness saw black shadows, which were men on foot and on horseback. Khanéfi discerned a similar crowd on the other side. It was Kargánov, the military commander of the district, with his militia.
‘Well, then, we shall fight like Hamzád,’ thought Hadji Murád.
When the alarm was given, Kargánov with a troop of militiamen and Cossacks had rushed off in pursuit of Hadji Murád, but had been unable to find any trace of him. He had already lost hope and was returning home when, towards evening, he met an old man and asked him if he had seen any horsemen about. The old man replied that he had. He had seen six horsemen floundering in the rice-field, and then had seen them enter the clump where he himself was getting wood. Kargánov turned back, taking the old man with him, and seeing the hobbled horses he made sure that Hadji Murád was there. In the night he surrounded the clump and waited till morning to take Hadji Murád alive or dead.
Having understood that he was surrounded, and having discovered an old ditch among the shrubs, Hadji Murád decided to entrench himself in it and to resist as long as strength and ammunition lasted. He told his comrades this, and ordered them to throw up a bank in front of the ditch, and his henchmen at once set to work to cut down branches, dig up the earth with their daggers, and make an entrenchment. Hadji Murád himself worked with them.
As soon as it began to grow light the commander of the militia troop rode up to the clump and shouted:
‘Hey! Hadji Murád, surrender! We are many and you are few!’
In reply came the report of a rifle, a cloudlet of smoke rose from the ditch and a bullet hit the militiaman’s horse, which staggered under him and began to fall. The rifles of the militiamen who stood at the outskirt of the clump of shrubs began cracking in their turn, and their bullets whistled and hummed, cutting off leaves and twigs and striking the embankment, but not the men entrenched behind it. Only Gamzálo’s horse, that had strayed from the others, was hit in the head by a bullet. It did not fall, but breaking its hobbles and rushing among the bushes it ran to the other horses, pressing close to them and watering the young grass with its blood. Hadji Murád and his men fired only when any of the militiamen came forward, and rarely missed their aim. Three militiamen were wounded, and the others, far from making up their minds to rush the entrenchment, retreated farther and farther back, only firing from a distance and at random.
So it continued for more than an hour. The sun had risen to about half the height of the trees, and Hadji Murád was already thinking of leaping on his horse and trying to make his way to the river, when the shouts were heard of many men who had just arrived. These were Hadji Aga of Mekhtulí with his followers. There were about two hundred of them. Hadji Aga had once been Hadji Murád’s kunák and had lived with him in the mountains, but he had afterwards gone over to the Russians. With him was Akhmet Khan, the son of Hadji Murád’s old enemy.
Like Kargánov, Hadji Aga began by calling to Hadji Murád to surrender, and Hadji Murád answered as before with a shot.
‘Swords out, my men!’ cried Hadji Aga, drawing his own; and a hundred voices were raised by men who rushed shrieking in among the shrubs.
The militiamen ran in among the shrubs, but from behind the entrenchment came the crack of one shot after another. Some three men fell, and the attackers stopped at the outskirts of the clump and also began firing. As they fired they gradually approached the entrenchment, running across from behind one shrub to another. Some succeeded in getting across, others fell under the bullets of Hadji Murád or of his men. Hadji Murád fired without missing; Gamzálo too rarely wasted a shot, and shrieked with joy every time he saw that his bullet had hit its aim. Khan Mahomá sat at the edge of the ditch singing ‘Il lyakha il Allakh!’ and fired leisurely, but often missed. Eldár’s whole body trembled with impatience to rush dagger in hand at the enemy, and he fired often and at random, constantly looking round at Hadji Murád and stretching out beyond the entrenchment. The shaggy Khanéfi, with his sleeves rolled up, did the duty of a servant even here. He loaded the guns which Hadji Murád and Khan Mahomá passed to him, carefully driving home with a ramrod the bullets wrapped in greasy rags, and pouring dry powder out of the powder-flask onto the pans. Bata did not remain in the ditch as the others did, but kept running to the horses, driving them away to a safer place and, shrieking incessantly, fired without using a prop for his gun. He was the first to be wounded. A bullet entered his neck and he sat down spitting blood and swearing. Then Hadji Murád was wounded, the bullet piercing his shoulder. He tore some cotton wool from the lining of his beshmét, plugged the wound with it, and went on firing.
‘Let us fly at them with our swords!’ said Eldár for the third time, and he looked out from behind the bank of earth ready to rush at the enemy; but at that instant a bullet struck him and he reeled and fell backwards onto Hadji Murád’s leg. Hadji Murád glanced at him. His eyes, beautiful like those of a ram, gazed intently and seriously at Hadji Murád. His mouth, the upper lip pouting like a child’s, twitched without opening. Hadji Murád drew his leg away from under him and continued firing.
Khanéfi bent over the dead Eldár and began taking the unused ammunition out of the cartridge-cases of his coat.
Khan Mahomá meanwhile continued to sing, loading leisurely and firing. The enemy ran from shrub to shrub, hallooing and shrieking and drawing ever nearer and nearer.
Another bullet hit Hadji Murád in the left side. He lay down in the ditch and again pulled some cotton wool out of his beshmét and plugg
ed the wound. This wound in the side was fatal and he felt that he was dying. Memories and pictures succeeded one another with extraordinary rapidity in his imagination. Now he saw the powerful Abu Nutsal Khan, dagger in hand and holding up his severed cheek he rushed at his foe; then he saw the weak, bloodless old Vorontsóv with his cunning white face, and heard his soft voice; then he saw his son Yusúf, his wife Sofiát, and then the pale, red-bearded face of his enemy Shamil with its half-closed eyes. All these images passed through his mind without evoking any feeling within him – neither pity nor anger nor any kind of desire: everything seemed so insignificant in comparison with what was beginning, or had already begun, within him.
Yet his strong body continued the thing that he had commenced. Gathering together his last strength he rose from behind the bank, fired his pistol at a man who was just running towards him, and hit him. The man fell. Then Hadji Murád got quite out of the ditch, and limping heavily went dagger in hand straight at the foe.
Some shots cracked and he reeled and fell. Several militiamen with triumphant shrieks rushed towards the fallen body. But the body that seemed to be dead suddenly moved. First the uncovered, bleeding, shaven head rose; then the body with hands holding to the trunk of a tree. He seemed so terrible, that those who were running towards him stopped short. But suddenly a shudder passed through him, he staggered away from the tree and fell on his face, stretched out at full length like a thistle that had been mown down, and he moved no more.
He did not move, but still he felt.
When Hadji Aga, who was the first to reach him, struck him on the head with a large dagger, it seemed to Hadji Murád that someone was striking him with a hammer and he could not understand who was doing it or why. That was his last consciousness of any connexion with his body. He felt nothing more and his enemies kicked and hacked at what had no longer anything in common with him.
Hadji Aga placed his foot on the back of the corpse and with two blows cut off the head, and carefully – not to soil his shoes with blood – rolled it away with his foot. Crimson blood spurted from the arteries of the neck, and black blood flowed from the head, soaking the grass.
Kargánov and Hadji Aga and Akhmet Khan and all the militiamen gathered together – like sportsmen round a slaughtered animal – near the bodies of Hadji Murád and his men (Khanéfi, Khan Mahomá, and Gamzálo they bound), and amid the powder-smoke which hung over the bushes they triumphed in their victory.
The nightingales, that had hushed their songs while the firing lasted, now started their trills once more: first one quite close, then others in the distance.
* * *
It was of this death that I was reminded by the crushed thistle in the midst of the ploughed field.
1 About £1, for at that time the ruble was worth about three shillings.
2 ‘Well now! You’re going to tell me what it is.’
‘But, my dear.…
‘Don’t “my dear” me! It was an emissary, wasn’t it?’
‘Supposing it was, still I must not tell you.’
‘You must not? Well then, I will tell you!’
‘You?’
3 ‘It is a thing of value.’
4 ‘We must find an opportunity to make him a present.’
5 ‘This is the opportunity! Give him the watch.’
6 ‘You would do much better to remain at home … this is my business, and not yours.’
‘You cannot prevent my going to see the general’s wife!’
7 A popular expression, meaning that the sender of the message is already dead.
8 A town thirty miles south-west of Smolensk, at which, in November 1812, the rear-guard of Napoleon’s army was defeated during the retreat from Moscow. It is mentioned in War and Peace.
9 ‘Excellent, my dear!’
10 ‘Simon has had good luck.’
11 ‘How horrible!’
12 ‘War is war.’
13 ‘All this is thanks to you!’
14 ‘He has had some unpleasantness with the commandant of the place. Simon was in the wrong.’
15 Count Michael Tariélovich Lóris-Mélikov, who afterwards became Minister of the Interior and framed the Liberal ukase which was signed by Alexander II the day that he was assassinated.
16 The military conspirators who tried to secure a Constitution for Russia in 1825, on the accession of Nicholas I.
17 ‘His Majesty has just returned.’
18 ‘There’s someone there!’
19 Widow of Nicholas’s brother Michael: a clever, well-educated woman, interested in science, art, and public affairs.
20 The Uniates acknowledge the Pope of Rome, though in other respects they are in accord with the Orthodox Russo-Greek Church.
21 A celebrated museum and picture gallery in St Petersburg, adjoining the Winter Palace.
22 ‘Poland and the Caucasus are Russia’s two sores. We need about 100,000 men in each of those two countries.’
23 ‘You say that Poland —’ ‘Oh yes, it was a masterstroke of Metternich’s to leave us the bother of it.…’
24 Each regiment had a choir of singers.
25 A way of doubling one’s stake at the game of shtos.
26 A highly prized quality of blade.
27 These expressions relate to the game of shtos and have been explained in Two Hussars.
28 Tulumbas, a sort of kettledrum.
STORIES GIVEN TO AID
THE PERSECUTED JEWS
ESARHADDON, KING OF ASSYRIA1
THE Assyrian King, Esarhaddon, had conquered the kingdom of King Lailie, had destroyed and burnt the towns, taken all the inhabitants captive to his own country, slaughtered the warriors, beheaded some chieftains and impaled or flayed others, and had confined King Lailie himself in a cage.
As he lay on his bed one night, King Esarhaddon was thinking how he should execute Lailie, when suddenly he heard a rustling near his bed, and opening his eyes saw an old man with a long grey beard and mild eyes.
‘You wish to execute Lailie?’ asked the old man.
‘Yes,’ answered the King. ‘But I cannot make up my mind how to do it.’
‘But you are Lailie,’ said the old man.
‘That’s not true,’ replied the King. ‘Lailie is Lailie, and I am I.’
‘You and Lailie are one,’ said the old man. ‘You only imagine you are not Lailie, and that Lailie is not you.’
‘What do you mean by that?’ said the King. ‘Here am I, lying on a soft bed; around me are obedient men-slaves and women-slaves, and to-morrow I shall feast with my friends as I did to-day; whereas Lailie is sitting like a bird in a cage, and to-morrow he will be impaled, and with his tongue hanging out will struggle till he dies, and his body will be torn in pieces by dogs.’
‘You cannot destroy his life,’ said the old man.
‘And how about the fourteen thousand warriors I killed, with whose bodies I built a mound?’ said the King. ‘I am alive, but they no longer exist. Does not that prove that I can destroy life?’
‘How do you know they no longer exist?’
‘Because I no longer see them. And, above all, they were tormented, but I was not. It was ill for them, but well for me.’
‘That, also, only seems so to you. You tortured yourself, but not them.’
‘I do not understand,’ said the King.
‘Do you wish to understand?’
‘Yes, I do.’
‘Then come here,’ said the old man, pointing to a large font full of water.
The King rose and approached the font.
‘Strip, and enter the font.’
Esarhaddon did as the old man bade him.
‘As soon as I begin to pour this water over you,’ said the old man, filling a pitcher with the water, ‘dip down your head.’
The old man tilted the pitcher over the King’s head, and the King bent his head till it was under water.
And as soon as King Esarhaddon was under the water, he felt that he was no longer Esarha
ddon, but someone else. And, feeling himself to be that other man, he saw himself lying on a rich bed, beside a beautiful woman. He had never seen her before, but he knew she was his wife. The woman raised herself and said to him:
‘Dear husband, Lailie! You were wearied by yesterday’s work and have slept longer than usual, and I have guarded your rest, and have not roused you. But now the Princes await you in the Great Hall. Dress and go out to them.’
And Esarhaddon – understanding from these words that he was Lailie, and not feeling at all surprised at this, but only wondering that he did not know it before – rose, dressed, and went into the Great Hall where the Princes awaited him.
The Princes greeted Lailie, their King, bowing to the ground, and then they rose, and at his word sat down before him; and the eldest of the Princes began to speak, saying that it was impossible longer to endure the insults of the wicked King Esarhaddon, and that they must make war on him. But Lailie disagreed, and gave orders that envoys should be sent to remonstrate with King Esarhaddon; and he dismissed the Princes from the audience. Afterwards he appointed men of note to act as ambassadors, and impressed on them what they were to say to King Esarhaddon. Having finished this business, Esarhaddon – feeling himself to be Lailie – rode out to hunt wild asses. The hunt was successful. He killed two wild asses himself, and, having returned home, feasted with his friends, and witnessed a dance of slave girls. The next day he went to the Court, where he was awaited by petitioners, suitors, and prisoners brought for trial; and there as usual he decided the cases submitted to him. Having finished this business, he again rode out to his favourite amusement: the hunt. And again he was successful: this time killing with his own hand an old lioness, and capturing her two cubs. After the hunt he again feasted with his friends, and was entertained with music and dances, and the night he spent with the wife whom he loved.
