Childhood, Boyhood, Youth

by Leo Tolstoy

it with a frown, she muttered something between her teeth, and darted

  from the room, slamming the door behind her. Not understanding the

  reason for such strange conduct, Mamma followed her presently to her

  room, and found her sitting with streaming eyes on her trunk, crushing

  her pocket-handkerchief between her fingers, and looking mournfully

  at the remains of the document, which was lying torn to pieces on the

  floor.

  "What is the matter, dear Natalia Savishna?" said Mamma, taking her

  hand.

  "Nothing, ma'am," she replied; "only--only I must have displeased you

  somehow, since you wish to dismiss me from the house. Well, I will go."

  She withdrew her hand and, with difficulty restraining her tears, rose

  to leave the room, but Mamma stopped her, and they wept a while in one

  another's arms.

  Ever since I can remember anything I can remember Natalia Savishna and

  her love and tenderness; yet only now have I learnt to appreciate them

  at their full value. In early days it never occurred to me to think what

  a rare and wonderful being this old domestic was. Not only did she never

  talk, but she seemed never even to think, of herself. Her whole life

  was compounded of love and self-sacrifice. Yet so used was I to her

  affection and singleness of heart that I could not picture things

  otherwise. I never thought of thanking her, or of asking myself, "Is she

  also happy? Is she also contented?" Often on some pretext or another I

  would leave my lessons and run to her room, where, sitting down, I

  would begin to muse aloud as though she were not there. She was forever

  mending something, or tidying the shelves which lined her room,

  or marking linen, so that she took no heed of the nonsense which I

  talked--how that I meant to become a general, to marry a beautiful

  woman, to buy a chestnut horse, to, build myself a house of glass, to

  invite Karl Ivanitch's relatives to come and visit me from Saxony, and

  so forth; to all of which she would only reply, "Yes, my love, yes."

  Then, on my rising, and preparing to go, she would open a blue trunk

  which had pasted on the inside of its lid a coloured picture of a hussar

  which had once adorned a pomade bottle and a sketch made by Woloda, and

  take from it a fumigation pastille, which she would light and shake for

  my benefit, saying:

  "These, dear, are the pastilles which your grandfather (now in Heaven)

  brought back from Otchakov after fighting against the Turks." Then she

  would add with a sigh: "But this is nearly the last one."

  The trunks which filled her room seemed to contain almost everything in

  the world. Whenever anything was wanted, people said, "Oh, go and ask

  Natalia Savishna for it," and, sure enough, it was seldom that she did

  not produce the object required and say, "See what comes of taking care

  of everything!" Her trunks contained thousands of things which nobody in

  the house but herself would have thought of preserving.

  Once I lost my temper with her. This was how it happened.

  One day after luncheon I poured myself out a glass of kvass, and then

  dropped the decanter, and so stained the tablecloth.

  "Go and call Natalia, that she may come and see what her darling has

  done," said Mamma.

  Natalia arrived, and shook her head at me when she saw the damage I had

  done; but Mamma whispered something in her car, threw a look at myself,

  and then left the room.

  I was just skipping away, in the sprightliest mood possible, when

  Natalia darted out upon me from behind the door with the tablecloth in

  her hand, and, catching hold of me, rubbed my face hard with the stained

  part of it, repeating, "Don't thou go and spoil tablecloths any more!"

  I struggled hard, and roared with temper.

  "What?" I said to myself as I fled to the drawing-room in a mist of

  tears, "To think that Natalia Savishna-just plain Natalia-should say

  'THOU' to me and rub my face with a wet tablecloth as though I were a

  mere servant-boy! It is abominable!"

  Seeing my fury, Natalia departed, while I continued to strut about and

  plan how to punish the bold woman for her offence. Yet not more than a

  few moments had passed when Natalia returned and, stealing to my side,

  began to comfort me,

  "Hush, then, my love. Do not cry. Forgive me my rudeness. It was wrong

  of me. You WILL pardon me, my darling, will you not? There, there,

  that's a dear," and she took from her handkerchief a cornet of pink

  paper containing two little cakes and a grape, and offered it me with

  a trembling hand. I could not look the kind old woman in the face, but,

  turning aside, took the paper, while my tears flowed the faster--though

  from love and shame now, not from anger.

  XIV -- THE PARTING

  ON the day after the events described, the carriage and the luggage-cart

  drew up to the door at noon. Nicola, dressed for the journey, with his

  breeches tucked into his boots and an old overcoat belted tightly about

  him with a girdle, got into the cart and arranged cloaks and cushions on

  the seats. When he thought that they were piled high enough he sat down

  on them, but finding them still unsatisfactory, jumped up and arranged

  them once more.

  "Nicola Dimitvitch, would you be so good as to take master's

  dressing-case with you?" said Papa's valet, suddenly standing up in the

  carriage, "It won't take up much room."

  "You should have told me before, Michael Ivanitch," answered Nicola

  snappishly as he hurled a bundle with all his might to the floor of the

  cart. "Good gracious! Why, when my head is going round like a whirlpool,

  there you come along with your dressing-case!" and he lifted his cap to

  wipe away the drops of perspiration from his sunburnt brow.

  The courtyard was full of bareheaded peasants in kaftans or simple

  shirts, women clad in the national dress and wearing striped

  handkerchiefs, and barefooted little ones--the latter holding their

  mothers' hands or crowding round the entrance-steps. All were chattering

  among themselves as they stared at the carriage. One of the postillions,

  an old man dressed in a winter cap and cloak, took hold of the pole of

  the carriage and tried it carefully, while the other postillion (a

  young man in a white blouse with pink gussets on the sleeves and a black

  lamb's-wool cap which he kept cocking first on one side and then on the

  other as he arranged his flaxen hair) laid his overcoat upon the box,

  slung the reins over it, and cracked his thonged whip as he looked now

  at his boots and now at the other drivers where they stood greasing the

  wheels of the cart--one driver lifting up each wheel in turn and the

  other driver applying the grease. Tired post-horses of various hues

  stood lashing away flies with their tails near the gate--some stamping

  their great hairy legs, blinking their eyes, and dozing, some leaning

  wearily against their neighbours, and others cropping the leaves and

  stalks of dark-green fern which grew near the entrance-steps. Some of

  the dogs were lying panting in the sun, while others were slinking under

  the vehicles to lick the grease from t
he wheels. The air was filled with

  a sort of dusty mist, and the horizon was lilac-grey in colour, though

  no clouds were to be seen, A strong wind from the south was raising

  volumes of dust from the roads and fields, shaking the poplars and

  birch-trees in the garden, and whirling their yellow leaves away. I

  myself was sitting at a window and waiting impatiently for these various

  preparations to come to an end.

  As we sat together by the drawing-room table, to pass the last few

  moments en famille, it never occurred to me that a sad moment was

  impending. On the contrary, the most trivial thoughts were filling my

  brain. Which driver was going to drive the carriage and which the cart?

  Which of us would sit with Papa, and which with Karl Ivanitch? Why must

  I be kept forever muffled up in a scarf and padded boots?

  "Am I so delicate? Am I likely to be frozen?" I thought to myself.

  "I wish it would all come to an end, and we could take our seats and

  start."

  "To whom shall I give the list of the children's linen?" asked Natalia

  Savishna of Mamma as she entered the room with a paper in her hand and

  her eyes red with weeping.

  "Give it to Nicola, and then return to say good-bye to them," replied

  Mamma. The old woman seemed about to say something more, but suddenly

  stopped short, covered her face with her handkerchief, and left the

  room. Something seemed to prick at my heart when I saw that gesture of

  hers, but impatience to be off soon drowned all other feeling, and

  I continued to listen indifferently to Papa and Mamma as they talked

  together. They were discussing subjects which evidently interested

  neither of them. What must be bought for the house? What would Princess

  Sophia or Madame Julie say? Would the roads be good?--and so forth.

  Foka entered, and in the same tone and with the same air as though he

  were announcing luncheon said, "The carriages are ready." I saw Mamma

  tremble and turn pale at the announcement, just as though it were

  something unexpected.

  Next, Foka was ordered to shut all the doors of the room. This amused

  me highly. As though we needed to be concealed from some one! When

  every one else was seated, Foka took the last remaining chair. Scarcely,

  however, had he done so when the door creaked and every one looked that

  way. Natalia Savishna entered hastily, and, without raising her eyes,

  sat own on the same chair as Foka. I can see them before me now-Foka's

  bald head and wrinkled, set face, and, beside him, a bent, kind figure

  in a cap from beneath which a few grey hairs were straggling. The pair

  settled themselves together on the chair, but neither of them looked

  comfortable.

  I continued preoccupied and impatient. In fact, the ten minutes during

  which we sat there with closed doors seemed to me an hour. At last every

  one rose, made the sign of the cross, and began to say good-bye. Papa

  embraced Mamma, and kissed her again and again.

  "But enough," he said presently. "We are not parting for ever."

  "No, but it is-so-so sad!" replied Mamma, her voice trembling with

  emotion.

  When I heard that faltering voice, and saw those quivering lips and

  tear-filled eyes, I forgot everything else in the world. I felt so ill

  and miserable that I would gladly have run away rather than bid

  her farewell. I felt, too, that when she was embracing Papa she was

  embracing us all. She clasped Woloda to her several times, and made the

  sign of the cross over him; after which I approached her, thinking that

  it was my turn. Nevertheless she took him again and again to her heart,

  and blessed him. Finally I caught hold of her, and, clinging to her,

  wept--wept, thinking of nothing in the world but my grief.

  As we passed out to take our seats, other servants pressed round us in

  the hall to say good-bye. Yet their requests to shake hands with

  us, their resounding kisses on our shoulders, [The fashion in which

  inferiors salute their superiors in Russia.] and the odour of their

  greasy heads only excited in me a feeling akin to impatience with these

  tiresome people. The same feeling made me bestow nothing more than a

  very cross kiss upon Natalia's cap when she approached to take leave of

  me. It is strange that I should still retain a perfect recollection of

  these servants' faces, and be able to draw them with the most minute

  accuracy in my mind, while Mamma's face and attitude escape me entirely.

  It may be that it is because at that moment I had not the heart to look

  at her closely. I felt that if I did so our mutual grief would burst

  forth too unrestrainedly.

  I was the first to jump into the carriage and to take one of the hinder

  seats. The high back of the carriage prevented me from actually seeing

  her, yet I knew by instinct that Mamma was still there.

  "Shall I look at her again or not?" I said to myself. "Well, just for

  the last time," and I peeped out towards the entrance-steps. Exactly at

  that moment Mamma moved by the same impulse, came to the opposite side

  of the carriage, and called me by name. Hearing her voice behind me. I

  turned round, but so hastily that our heads knocked together. She gave a

  sad smile, and kissed me convulsively for the last time.

  When we had driven away a few paces I determined to look at her once

  more. The wind was lifting the blue handkerchief from her head as, bent

  forward and her face buried in her hands, she moved slowly up the steps.

  Foka was supporting her. Papa said nothing as he sat beside me. I felt

  breathless with tears--felt a sensation in my throat as though I were

  going to choke, just as we came out on to the open road I saw a white

  handkerchief waving from the terrace. I waved mine in return, and the

  action of so doing calmed me a little. I still went on crying, but the

  thought that my tears were a proof of my affection helped to soothe and

  comfort me.

  After a little while I began to recover, and to look with interest at

  objects which we passed and at the hind-quarters of the led horse which

  was trotting on my side. I watched how it would swish its tail, how it

  would lift one hoof after the other, how the driver's thong would fall

  upon its back, and how all its legs would then seem to jump together and

  the back-band, with the rings on it, to jump too--the whole covered with

  the horse's foam. Then I would look at the rolling stretches of ripe

  corn, at the dark ploughed fields where ploughs and peasants and horses

  with foals were working, at their footprints, and at the box of the

  carriage to see who was driving us; until, though my face was still wet

  with tears, my thoughts had strayed far from her with whom I had just

  parted--parted, perhaps, for ever. Yet ever and again something would

  recall her to my memory. I remembered too how, the evening before, I

  had found a mushroom under the birch-trees, how Lubotshka had quarrelled

  with Katenka as to whose it should be, and how they had both of them

  wept when taking leave of us. I felt sorry to be parted from them, and

  from Natalia Savishna, and from the birch-tree avenue, and from Foka.

/>   Yes, even the horrid Mimi I longed for. I longed for everything at home.

  And poor Mamma!--The tears rushed to my eyes again. Yet even this mood

  passed away before long.

  XV -- CHILDHOOD

  HAPPY, happy, never-returning time of childhood! How can we help loving

  and dwelling upon its recollections? They cheer and elevate the soul,

  and become to one a source of higher joys.

  Sometimes, when dreaming of bygone days, I fancy that, tired out with

  running about, I have sat down, as of old, in my high arm-chair by the

  tea-table. It is late, and I have long since drunk my cup of milk. My

  eyes are heavy with sleep as I sit there and listen. How could I not

  listen, seeing that Mamma is speaking to somebody, and that the sound

  of her voice is so melodious and kind? How much its echoes recall to

  my heart! With my eyes veiled with drowsiness I gaze at her wistfully.

  Suddenly she seems to grow smaller and smaller, and her face vanishes

  to a point; yet I can still see it--can still see her as she looks at me

  and smiles. Somehow it pleases me to see her grown so small. I blink and

  blink, yet she looks no larger than a boy reflected in the pupil of an

  eye. Then I rouse myself, and the picture fades. Once more I half-close

  my eyes, and cast about to try and recall the dream, but it has gone.

  I rise to my feet, only to fall back comfortably into the armchair.

  "There! You are failing asleep again, little Nicolas," says Mamma. "You

  had better go to by-by."

  "No, I won't go to sleep, Mamma," I reply, though almost inaudibly, for

  pleasant dreams are filling all my soul. The sound sleep of childhood is

  weighing my eyelids down, and for a few moments I sink into slumber and

  oblivion until awakened by some one. I feel in my sleep as though a

  soft hand were caressing me. I know it by the touch, and, though still