Russian Rambles Part 20

"It is plain that you don't understand in the least," answered my _izvostchik_, turning round in his seat and imperiling our lives by his driving, while he plunged into the subject with profound earnestness.

"None of them is the Virgin, and all of them are the Virgin. All the different Virgins are merely different manifestations of the Virgin to men. The Virgin herself is in heaven, and communicates her power where she wills. It is like the Life-giving Trinity." a.s.suming that as a foreigner, and consequently a heretic, I did not understand the doctrine of the Trinity, he proceeded to expound it, and did it extremely well. I lent half an ear in amazement to him, and half an ear I reserved for the objurgations of the drivers who were so good as to spare our lives in that crowded thoroughfare while my theological lesson was in progress.

While I am speaking of this unusual cabman, I may mention some unusual private coachmen in Moscow who use their masters' sledges and carriages for public conveyances while their owners are safely engaged in theatre or restaurant. I do not think that trick could be played in Petersburg.

I found it out by receiving an amazingly reasonable offer from a very well-dressed man with a superb gray horse and a fine sledge. As we dashed along at lightning speed, I asked the man whether he owned that fine turnout or worked on wages. "I own it myself," he said curtly.

Therefore, when I alighted, I slipped round behind the sledge and scrutinized it thoroughly under the gaslight. The back was decorated with a monogram and a count's coronet in silver! After that I never asked questions, but I always knew what had happened when I picked up very comfortable equipages at very reasonable rates in places which were between gas lanterns and near theatres and so forth.

I should not be doing my duty by a very important factor in Russian life if I omitted an ill.u.s.tration of the all-pervading influence of "official" rank, and the prestige which acquaintance with officialdom lends even to modest travelers like ourselves. It was, most appropriately, in the Kremlin, the heart of Russia, that we were favored with the most amusing of the many manifestations of it which came within our experience. We were looking at the objects of interest in the Treasury, when I noticed a large, handsomely bound book, flanked by pen and ink, on a side table. I opened the book, but before I could read a word an attendant pounced upon me.

"Don't touch that," he said peremptorily.

"Why not? If you do not wish people to look at this collection of ancient doc.u.ments,--I suppose that is what it is,--you should lock it up, or label it 'Hands off!'"

"It is n't ancient doc.u.ments, and you are not to touch it," he said, taking the book out of my hands. "It is strictly reserved for the signatures of _distinguished_ visitors,--crowned heads, royal princes, amba.s.sadors, and the like."

"Then it does not interest me in the least, and if you would label it to that effect, no one would care to disturb it," I said.

Very soon afterwards we were joined by one of the powerful officials of the Kremlin. He had made an appointment to show us about, but was detained for a few moments, and we had come on alone and were waiting for him. As we went about with him the attendants hovered respectfully in the rear, evidently much impressed with the friendly, unofficial tone of the conversation. When we had made the round with much deliberation, we excused our official friend to his duties, saying that we wished to take another look at several objects.

No sooner was he gone than the guardian of the autograph alb.u.m pounced upon us again, and invited us to add our "ill.u.s.trious" names to the list. I refused; he entreated and argued. It ended in his fairly dragging us to the table and standing guard over us while we signed the sacred book. I did not condescend to examine the book, though I should have been permitted then; but--I know which three royal princes immediately preceded us.

As I am very much attached to the Russian Church, anything connected with it always interested me deeply. One of the prominent features of Moscow is the number of monasteries and convents. The Russian idea of monastic life is prayer and contemplation, not activity in good works.

The ideal of devout secular life is much the same. To meet the wants in that direction of people who do not care to join the community, many of the convents have small houses within their inclosures, which they let out to applicants, of whom there is always an abundance. The occupants of these houses are under no restrictions whatever, except as to observing the hours of entry and exit fixed by the opening and closing of the convent gates; but, naturally, it is rather expected of them that they will attend more church services than the busy people of "the world." The sight of these little houses always oppressed me with a sense of my inferiority in the matter of devoutness. I could not imagine myself living in one of them, until I came across a group of their occupants engaged in discussing some racy gossip with the nuns on one of the doorsteps. Gossip is not my besetting weakness, but I felt relieved.

Convents are not aristocratic inst.i.tutions in Russia as they are in Roman Catholic countries, and very few ladies by birth and education enter them. Those who do are apt to rise to the post of abbess, influential connections not being superfluous in any calling in Russia any more than in other countries.

If I were a nun I should prefer activity. I think that contemplation, except in small doses, is calculated to produce stupidity. Ill.u.s.tration: I was pa.s.sing along a street in Moscow when my eye fell upon an elderly nun seated at the gate of a convent, with a little table whereon stood a lighted taper. Beside the taper, on a threadbare piece of black velvet, decorated with the customary cross in gold braid, lay a few copper coins before a dark and ancient _ikona_. Evidently, the public was solicited to contribute in the name of the saint there portrayed, though I could not recollect that the day was devoted to a saint of sufficient importance to warrant the intrusion of that table on the narrow sidewalk. I halted and asked the nun what day it was, and who was the saint depicted in the image. She said she did not know. This seemed incredible, and I persisted in my inquiry. She called a policeman from the middle of the street, where he was regulating traffic as usual, and asked him about the _ikona_ and the day, with the air of a helpless child. Church and State set to work guessing with great heartiness and good-will, but so awkwardly that it was the easiest thing in the world for me to refute each successive guess. When we tired of that, I gave the nun a kopek for the entertainment she had unconsciously afforded, and thanked the policeman, after which the policeman and I left the good nun sitting stolidly at the receipt of custom.

Quite at the opposite pole was my experience one hot summer day in the Cathedral of the a.s.sumption, where the emperors have been crowned for centuries; or, to speak more accurately, the two poles met and embraced in that church, the heart of the heart of Holy Russia. The early Patriarchs and Metropolitans are buried in this cathedral in superb silver-gilt coffins. Of these, the tomb and shrine of Metropolitan Jona seems to be the goal of the most numerous pilgrimages. I stood near it, in the rear corner of the church, one Sunday morning, while ma.s.s was in progress. An unbroken stream of people, probably all of them pilgrims to the Holy City, her saints and shrines, pa.s.sed me, crossed themselves, knelt in a "ground reverence," kissed the saint's coffin, then the hand of the priest, who stood by to preserve order and bless each person as he or she turned away. To my surprise, I heard many of them inquire the name of the shrine's occupant _after_ they had finished their prayers.

After the service and a little chat with this priest, who seemed a very sensible man, we went forward to take another look at the Vladimir Virgin, the most famous and historical in all Russia, in her golden case. A gray-haired old army colonel, who wore the Vladimir cross, perceiving from our speech that we were foreigners, politely began to explain to us the noteworthy points about the church and the Virgin. It soon appeared, however, that we were far more familiar with them all than he was, and we fell into conversation.

"I am stationed in Poland," he said, "and I have never been in Moscow before. I am come on a pilgrimage to the Holy City, but everything is so dear here that I must deny myself the pleasure of visiting many of the shrines in the neighborhood. It is a great happiness to me to be present thus at the ma.s.s in my own _pravoslavny_ church, and in Moscow."

"But there are Orthodox churches in Poland, surely," I said.

"Yes," he replied, "there are a few; and I go whenever I get a chance."

"What do you do when you have not the chance?"

"I go to whatever church there is,--the Roman Catholic, the Lutheran, the Synagogue."

"Is that allowed?" I asked. I knew very well that Russians attend Roman Catholic and Protestant churches when abroad, as a matter of course, though I had not before heard of the Synagogue in the list, and I wished to hear what the earnest old colonel would say.

"Why not? why should n't I?" he replied. "We all go to church to wors.h.i.+p G.o.d and to pray to Him. Does it matter about the form or the language? A man has as much as he can do to be a Christian and an honest man,-- which are two very different things nowadays, apparently,--without troubling himself about those petty details."

It is almost superfluous to say that we swore friends.h.i.+p with the colonel on the spot, on those foundations. Our acquaintance ended with our long talk there in the cathedral, since we could not well stop in Poland to accept the delightful old officer's invitation to visit him and his wife. But the friends.h.i.+p remains, I hope.

When he left us, a young fellow about seventeen years of age, who had been standing near us and listening to the last part of our conversation with an air of profound and respectful interest which obviated all trace of impertinence, stepped up and said:--

"May I have the pleasure of showing you about the cathedral? You seem to appreciate our Russian ways and thoughts. I have taken a good deal of interest in studying the history and antiquities of my native city, and I may be able to point out a few things to you here."

He was a pleasant-faced young fellow, with modest, engaging manners; a student in one of the government inst.i.tutions, it appeared. He looked very cool and comfortable in a suit of coa.r.s.e gray linen. He proved to be an admirable cicerone, and we let him escort us about for the pleasure of listening, though we had seen everything many times already.

I commented on his knowledge, and on the evident pride which he took in his country, and especially in his church, remarking that he seemed to be very well informed on many points concerning the latter, and able to explain the reasons for things in an unusual way.

"Yes," he answered, "I am proud and fond of my country and my church.

We Russians do not study them as we should, I am ashamed to say. There, for instance, is my cousin, Princess----, who is considered a very well-informed young woman on all necessary points. She was to make her communion, and so some one brought her to the church while the Hours were being read, as is proper, though she usually comes very much later.

She had not been there ten minutes before she began to ask: 'When does the Sacrament come? Is n't it pretty soon?' and she kept that up at short intervals, despite all I could do to stop her. I am quite sure,"

he added, "that I need not explain to you, though you are a foreigner, where the Hours and the Sacrament come in the service?"

"No: the Hours precede the Liturgy, and the administration of the Sacrament comes very nearly at the end of all."

"Exactly. You understand what a disgrace such ignorance was on my cousin's part."

He was charming, amusingly frank on many points which I had supposed to be rather delicate with members of the "Orthodox" (as I must call it for the lack of a possible English equivalent for _pravoslavny_) Russian Church, but so well-bred and intelligent, withal, that we were sincerely sorry to say good-by to him at the door of our hotel.

XIII.

THE NIZHNI NOVGOROD FAIR AND THE VOLGA.

The most picturesque and appropriate way of reaching Nizhni Novgorod is by the Volga, with which its life is so intimately connected, and the most characteristic time to see the Volga steamers is on the way upstream during the Fair.

What an a.s.sortment of people we had on board! To begin with, our boat was commanded by a Vice-Admiral in full uniform. His family was with him, spending the summer on board sailing up and down the river between Nizhni Novgorod and Astrakhan.

The pa.s.sengers over whom the vice-admiral ruled were delightfully varied. There were Russians from every quarter of the empire, and of as many races, including Armenians. One of the latter, an old man with a physiognomy not to be distinguished, even by our Russian friends who were traveling with us, from that of a Jew, seemed to take no interest in anything except in telling over a short rosary of amber beads, and standing guard at all stopping-places over his cabin, which he was determined to occupy alone, though he had paid but one fare. After he had done this successfully at several landing-places and had consigned several men to the second cabin, an energetic man appealed to the admiral. It required some vigorous language and a threat to break open the door if the key were not forthcoming, before the admiral could overcome the resistance of the obstinate old Armenian, who protested, in very bad Russian, that he was very ill indeed, and should certainly die if any one entered his cabin. He was still alive when we reached the end of our voyage, and had cleverly made his cabin-mate pay for all his food.

Among the second-cla.s.s pa.s.sengers was a party of students returning to the University of Kazan. They exhibited all degrees of shabbiness, but this was only the modest plumage of the nightingale, apparently. For hours they sang songs, all beautiful, all strange to us, and we listened entranced until tea, cigarettes, and songs came to an end in time to permit them a few hours of sleep before we reached their landing. The third-cla.s.s pa.s.sengers, who were also lodged on the upper deck, aft, included Tatars and other Mohammedans from the Orient, who spread their prayer-rugs at sundown and went through their complicated devotions with an air of being quite oblivious to spectators. Several got permission from the admiral to ascend to the hurricane deck. But this, while unnecessary as a precaution against crowding or interference from their numerous Russian fellow-pa.s.sengers, rendered them more conspicuous; and even this was not sufficient to make the instinctively courteous Russians stare at or notice them.

The fourth-cla.s.s pa.s.sengers were on the lower deck. Among them was a company of soldiers in very shabby uniforms, who had been far down the river earning a little money by working in the harvest fields, where hands are always too few, and who were returning to garrison at Kazan.

Some enterprising pa.s.sengers from Astrakhan had laid in a large stock of the delicious round watermelons and luscious cantaloupe melons. By the time we reached Kazan, there were not many melons left in that improvised shop on the lower deck, Russians are as fond of watermelons as are the American negroes.

At Samara we had seen enormous bales of camel's-hair, weighing upwards of eight hundred pounds, in picturesque mats of red, yellow, and brown, taken on board for the Fair. The porters seemed to find it easy to carry them on their backs, aided only by a sort of small chair-back, with a narrow, seat-like projection at the lower end, which was fastened by straps pa.s.sing over the shoulders and under the arms. When we left Kazan, I noticed that a huge open barge was being towed upstream alongside us, that it was being filled with these bales, to lighten the steamer for the sand-bars and shallows of the upper river, and that a monotonous but very musical cadence was being repeated at intervals, in m.u.f.fled tones, somewhere on board. I went down to the cargo department of the lower deck and found the singers,--the herculean porters. One after another they bent their backs, and two mates hoisted the huge bales, chanting a refrain which enabled them to move and lift in unison.

The words were to the following effect: "If all don't grasp together, we cannot lift the weight." The music was sad, but irresistibly sweet and fascinating, and I stood listening and watching until the great barge was filled and dropped behind, for the company's tug to pick up and tow to Nizhni with a string of other barges.

It is probably a vulgar detail, but I must chronicle the fact that the cooking on these Volga steamers--on the line we patronized, at least --is among the very best to be found in Russia, in my experience. On the voyage upstream, when they are well supplied with sterlet and other fish, all alive, from Astrakhan, the dinners are treats for which one may sigh in vain in the capitals of St. Petersburg and Moscow, with their mongrel German-French-Russian cookery. The dishes are very Russian, but they are very good.

I remember one particularly delicious concoction was composed of fresh sterlet and sour cabbage, with white grapes on top, baked to a brown crispness.

We arrived at our wharf on the Volga front of the old town of Nizhni Novgorod about five o'clock in the afternoon. Above us rose the steep green hills on whose crest stood the Kremlin, containing several ancient churches, the governor's house, and so forth. On a lower terrace, to right and left, stood monasteries and churches intermingled with shops and mediocre dwellings. The only noteworthy church was that in front of us, with its picturesque but un-Russian rococo plaster decoration on red brick, crowned by genuine Russian domes and crosses of elaborately beautiful patterns.

But we did not pause long to admire this part of the view, which was already familiar to us. What a change had come over the scene since we had bidden it farewell on our way downstream! Then everything was dead, or slumbering, except the old town, the city proper; and that had not seemed to be any too much awake or alive. The Fair town, situated on the sand-spit between the Volga and the mouth of the Oka, stood locked up and deserted, as it had stood since the close of last year's Fair. Now, as we gazed over the prow of the steamer, we could see the bridge across the Oka black with the swarming ma.s.ses of pedestrians and equipages.

The steamer company allows its patrons to sleep (but not to eat) on board the night after arrival and the night before starting, and we availed ourselves of the privilege, having heard that it was often no easy matter to secure accommodations in the Fair, and having no intention of returning to our former hotel, miles from all the fun, in the upper town, if we could help it.

The only vacant rooms in the Fair seemed to be at the "best hotel," to which we had been recommended, with a smile of amus.e.m.e.nt which had puzzled us, by a Moscow friend, an officer in the army. Prices were very high at this hotel, which, like American summer hotels, is forced to make its hay for the year during the season of six weeks, after which it is locked up. Our room was small; the floor, of rough boards, was bare; the beds were not comfortable. For the same price, in Petersburg or Moscow, we should have had a s.p.a.cious room on the _bel etage_, handsomely furnished, with rugs on an inlaid floor.

Across one corner of the dining-room was built a low platform, on which stood a piano. We soon discovered its use. Coming in about nine o'clock in the evening, we ordered our _samovar_ for tea in the dining-room,-- a most unusual place. The proper place was our own room. But we had found a peculiar code of etiquette prevailing here, governed by excessive modesty and propriety, no doubt, but an obstructionist etiquette, nevertheless. The hall-waiter, whose business it is to serve the _samovar_ and coffee, was not allowed to enter our room, though his fellows had served us throughout the country, after the fas.h.i.+on of the land. Here we were compelled to wait upon the leisure of the chambermaid, a busy and capricious person, who would certainly not be on hand in the evening if she was not in the morning. Accordingly, we ordered our tea in the dining-room, as I have said. Presently, a chorus of girls, dressed all alike, mounted the platform, and sang three songs to an accompaniment banged upon the piano by a man. Being violently applauded by a long table-full of young merchants who sat near, at whom they had been singing and staring, without any attempt at disguise, and with whom they had even been exchanging remarks, they sang two songs more. They were followed by another set of girls, also in a sort of uniform costume, who sang five songs at the young merchants. It appeared that one party was called "Russian singers," and the other "German singers." We found out afterwards, by watching operations on another evening, that these five songs formed the extent of their respective repertories.