Russia in 1839 -Empire of the Czar: A Journey Through Eternal Russia

that roused public passion to the highest pitch. Petersburg, Moscow, the whole empire was in excitement. The emperor, who knows the Russians better than any man in Russia, took care to join in the public affliction. He ordered a service to be performed, and I am not pure that he did not carry his pious affectation so far

FATE OF HIS SUCCESSOR.8?

as to assist in person at the ceremony, in order to publish his regret by taking God to witness his admiration of the national genius, removed too soon for his glory.

?< However this may be, the sympathy of the sovereign so flattered the Muscovite spirit as to awake a generous patriotism in the breast of a young man, endowed with much talent. This too credulous poet was so enraptured by the august protection accorded to the first of all arts, that he grew bold enough to believe himself inspired ! In the ingenuous yearnings of his gratitude, he ventured even to write an ode — a patriotic ode, to thank the emperor for becoming the protector of literature. He concluded his remarkable production by singing the praises of the departed bard. This was all he did; I have read the verses and I can attest the innocent intentions of the author: unless at least it might be a crime to conceal in the depths of his bosom a hope, perhaps, of becoming one day a second Pouskine — a hope very pardonable, it seems to me, in a youthful imagination.

' Audacious youth ! to aim at renown, to betray a passion for glory under a despotism ! It was the same as if Prometheus had said to Jupiter — 'Take care of yourself, I am going to rob you of your thunderbolts.'

' The recompense which this young aspirant received for having thus publicly shown his confidence in his master's love for the fine arts and the belles let-tres, was a secret order to go and pursue his poetical studies on the Caucasus, a chapel of ease to the ancient Siberia.

' After having remained there two years, he has

86DESPOTISM IN LITERATURE.

returned, his health destroyed, his mind cast down, and his imagination radically cured of its chimeras. After this trait will you yet put trust in the official words or the public acts of the Emperor?'

' The Emperor is a man ; he shares human weaknesses. Something must have shocked him in the allusions of the young poet. Perhaps they were European rather than national. The emperor proceeds on a principle the very opposite to that of Catherine II., he braves Europe instead of flattering it. This is wrong, I admit; for studied opposition is in itself a species of dependence, since under it a man is only influenced by contradiction ; but it is pardonable, especially if yon reflect on the evil caused to Russia by princes who were possessed all their life with the mania of imitation.'

' You are incorrigible !' exclaimed the advocate of the ancient boyards. ' You believe, then, in the pos-siblity of Russian civilisation ? It promised well before the time of Peter the Great, but that prince destroyed the fruit in its germ. Go to Moscow, it is tli? centre of the ancient empire; yet you will see that all minds are turned towards speculations of industry, and that the national character is as much effaced there as at St. Petersburg. The Emperor Nicholas commits to-day, though with different лаеws, a fault analogous to that of Peter the Great. He does not take into account the history of an entire age, the age of the Emperor Peter : history has its fatalities, — the fatalities of faits accompl?s. Woe to the prince who does not submit to these !'

The day was advanced; wTe separated, and I continued my walk, musing upon the energetic feeling

POETRY OF POUSKIXE.

87

of opposition which must spring up in minds accustomed to reflect under the silence of despotism. Characters which such a government does not debase, it steels and fortifies.

On my return, I sat down to read again some translations of the poems of Pouskine. They confirmed me in the opinion that a previous reading had imparted. This author has borrowed much of his colouring from the new poetical school of Western Europe. Not that he has adopted the anti-religious opinions of Lord Byron, the social notions of our poets, or the philosophy of those of Germany ; but he has adopted their manner of describing. I therefore do not recognise him as a real Muscovite poet. The Pole, Mickiewiteh, strikes me as being much more Slavonic, although he, like Pouskine, has bowed to the influence of occidental literature.

The real Russian poet, did one exist, could, in the present day address only the people; he would neither be understood nor read in the salons. Where there is no language, there is no poetry ; neither indeed are there any thinkers. The Emperor Nicholas has begun to require that Russian be spoken at court; they laugh at present at a novelty which is viewed as merely a caprice of their master's; the next generation will thank him for this victory of good sense over fashion.

How could the national genius develope itself in a society where people speak four languages without knowing one ? Originality of thought has a nearer connection than is imagined with purity of idiom. This fact has been forgotten in Russia for a century, and in France for some years. Our children will

88FOREIGN NURSES AND GOVERNESSES.

feel the effects of the rage for English nurses which

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has, among us, taken possession of all 'fashionable ' mothers.*

In France formerly, the first, and I believe the best French tutor, was the nurse. A man should study his native language throughout his whole life, but the child should not be formally taught it; he should receive it in the cradle, without study. Instead of this, our little Frenchmen of the present day lisp English. and stammer German from their birth, and are afterwards taught French as a foreign language.

Montaigne congratulated himself on having learned Latin previously to French. It is perhaps to the advantage in which the author of the Essays thus glories, that we owe the most pure and national style in our ancient literature ; he had a right to rejoice, for the Latin is the root of our language; but all purity and spontaneity of expression is lost among a people who do not respect the language of their fathers. Our children speak English, just as our footmen wear powder ! 1 am persuaded that the want of originality in modern Slavonian literature is attributable to the custom, which the Poles and Russians adopted during the eighteenth century, of introducing into their families foreign tutors and preceptors. When the Russians turn their thoughts again into their own language, they translate; and this borrowed style cheeks the flow of thought, at the same time that it destroys the simplicity of expression.

How is it that the Chinese have hitherto done more for the human race in literature, in philosophy,

* Les meresfashionables.?-

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in morals and in legislation than the Russians ? It is, perhaps, because these men have not ceased to entertain a strong affection for their primitive dialect.

The confusion of languages does not injure mediocre minds ; on the contrary, it aids them in their efforts. Superficial instruction, the only kind which is suited to such minds, is facilitated by a study, equally superficial, of the living languages — an easy study, or rather a mental recreation perfectly suited to indolent faculties, or to faculties devoted to material aims. But whenever, by mischance, this system is applied to the education of superior talent, it