All this studied suggestion of difficulties profits the reactionists nothing. They are immediately informed that the Imperial mind is made up,—that the business of the Muscovite nobility is now to arrange that the serf be freed in twelve years, and put in possession of homestead and inclosure.
The next movement of the retrograde party is to misunderstand everything. The plainest things are found to need a world of debate,—the simplest things become entangled,—the noble assemblies play solemnly a ludicrous game at cross-purposes.
Straightway comes a notice from the Emperor, which, stripped of official verbiage, says that they must understand. This sets all in motion again. Imperial notices are sent to province after province, explanatory documents are issued, good men and strong are set to talk and work.
The nobility of Moscow now make another move. To scare back the advancing forces of emancipation, they elect as provincial leaders three nobles bearing the greatest names of old Russia, and haters of the new ideas.
To defeat these comes a miracle.
There stands forth a successor of Saint Gregory and Saint Bavon,—one who accepts that deep mediaeval thought, that, when God advances great ideas, the Church must marshal them, or go under,—Philarete, Metropolitan of Moscow. The Church, as represented in him, is no longer scholastic,—it is become apostolic. He upholds emancipation,—condemns its foes; his earnest eloquence carries all.
The work having progressed unevenly,—nobles in different governments differing in plan and aim,—an assembly of delegates is brought together at St Petersburg to combine and perfect a resultant plan under the eye of the Emperor.
The Grand Council of the Empire, too, is set at the work. It is a most unpromising body,—yet the Emperor's will stirs it.
The opposition now make the most brilliant stroke of their campaign. Just as James II. of England prated toleration and planned the enslavement of all thought, so now the bigoted plotters against emancipation begin to prate of Constitutional Liberty.
Had they been fighting Nicholas, this would doubtless have accomplished its purpose. He would have become furious, and in his fury would have wrecked reform. But Alexander bears right on. It is even hinted that visions of a constitutional monarchy please him.
But then come tests of Alexander's strength far more trying. Masses of peasants, hearing vague news of emancipation,—learning, doubtless, from their masters' own spiteful lips that the Emperor is endeavoring to tear away property in serfs,—take the masters at their word, and determine to help the Emperor. They rise in insurrection.
To the bigoted serf-owners this is a godsend. They parade it in all lights; therewith they throw life into all the old commonplaces on the French Revolution; timid men of good intentions begin to waver. The Tzar will surely now be scared back.
Not so. Alexander now hurls his greatest weapon, and stuns reaction in a moment. He frees all the serfs on the Imperial estates without reserve. Now it is seen that he is in earnest; the opponents are disheartened; once more the plan moves and drags them on.
But there came other things to dishearten the Emperor; and not least of these was the attitude of those who moulded popular thought in England.
Be it said here to the credit of France, that from her came constant encouragement in the great work. Wolowski, Mazade, and other true-hearted men sent forth from leading reviews and journals words of sympathy, words of help, words of cheer.
Not so England. Just as, in the French Revolution of 1789, while yet that Revolution was noble and good, while yet Lafayette and Bailly held it, leaders in English thought who had quickened the opinions which had caused the Revolution sent malignant prophecies and prompted foul blows,—just as, in this our own struggle, leaders in English thought who have helped create the opinion which has brought on this struggle now deal treacherously with us,—so, in this battle of Alexander against a foul wrong, they seized this time of all times to show all the wrongs and absurdities of which Russia ever had been or ever might be guilty,—criticized, carped, sent plentifully haughty advice, depressing sympathy, malignant prophecy.
Review-articles, based on no real knowledge of Russia, announced desire for serf-emancipation,—and then, in the modern English way, with plentiful pyrotechnics of antithesis and paradox, threw a gloomy light into the skilfully pictured depths of Imperial despotism, official corruption, and national bankruptcy.
They revived Old-World objections, which, to one acquainted with the most every-day workings of serfage, were ridiculous.
It was said, that, if the serfs lost the protection of their owners, they might fall a prey to rapacious officials. As well might it have been argued that a mother should never loose her son from her apron-strings.
It was said that "serfism excludes pauperism,"—that, if the serf owes work to his owner in the prime of life, the owner owes support to his serf in the decline of life. No lie could be more absurd to one who had seen Russian life. We were first greeted, on entering Russia, by a beggar who knelt in the mud; at Kovno eighteen beggars besieged the coach,—and Kovno was hardly worse than scores of other towns; within a day's ride of St. Petersburg a woman begged piteously for means to keep soul and body together, and finished the refutation of that sonorous English theory,—for she had been discharged from her master's service in the metropolis as too feeble, and had been sent back to his domain, afar in the country, on foot and without money.
It was said that freed peasants would not work. But, despite volleys of predictions that they would not work if freed, despite volleys of assertions that they could not work if freed, the peasants, when set free, and not crushed by regulations, have sprung to their work with an earnestness, and continued it with a vigor, at which the philosophers of the old system stand aghast. The freed peasants of Wologda compare favorably with any in Europe.
And when the old tirades had grown stale, English writers drew copiously from a new source,—from "La Vérité sur la Russie,"—pleasingly indifferent to the fact that the author's praise in a previous work had notoriously been a thing of bargain and sale, and that there was in full process of development a train of facts which led the Parisian courts to find him guilty of demanding in one case a "blackmail" of fifty thousand roubles.13
All this argument outside the Empire helped the foes of emancipation inside the Empire.
But the Emperor met the whole body of his opponents with an argument overwhelming. On the 5th of March, 1861, he issued his manifesto making the serfs FREE. He had struggled long to make some satisfactory previous arrangement; his motto now became, Emancipation first, Arrangement afterward. Thus was the result of the great struggle decided; but, to this day, the after-arrangement remains undecided. The Tzar offers gradual indemnity; the nobles seem to prefer fire and blood. Alexander stands firm; the last declaration brought across the water was that he would persist in reforms.
But, whatever the after-process, THE SERFS ARE FREE.
The career before Russia is hopeful indeed; emancipation of her serfs has set her fully in that career. The vast mass of her inhabitants are of a noble breed, combining the sound mind of the Indo-Germanic races with the tough muscle of the northern plateaus of Asia. In no other country on earth is there such unity in language, in degree of cultivation, and in basis of ideas. Absolutely the same dialect is spoken by lord and peasant, in capital and in province.
And, to an American thinker, more hopeful still for Russia is the patriarchal democratic system,—spreading a primary political education through the whole mass. Leaders of their hamlets and communities are voted for; bodies of peasants settle the partition of land and assessments in public meetings; discussions are held; votes are taken; and though Tzar's right and nobles' right are considered far above people's right, yet this rude democratic schooling is sure to keep bright in the people some sparks of manliness and some glow of free thought.
In view, too, of many words and acts of the present Emperor, it is not too much to hope, that, ere many years, Russia will become a constitutional monarchy.
So shall Russia be made a power before which all other European powers shall be pigmies.
Before the close of the year in which we now stand, there is to be celebrated at Nijnii-Novogorod the thousandth anniversary of the founding of Russia. Then is to rise above the domes and spires of that famed old capital a monument to the heroes of Russian civilization.
Let the sculptor group about its base Rurik and his followers, who in rude might hewed out strongholds for the coming nation. Let goodly place be given to Minime and Pojarski, who drove forth barbarian invaders,—goodly place also to Platov and Kutusov, who drove forth civilized invaders. Let there be high-placed niches for Ivan the Great, who developed order,—for Peter the Great, who developed physical strength,—for Derjavine and Karamsin, who developed moral and mental strength. Let Philarete of Moscow stand forth as he stood confronting with Christ's gospel the traffickers in flesh and blood. In loving care let there be wrought the face and form of Alexander the First,—the Kindly.
But, crowning all, let there lord it a noble statue to the greatest of Russian benefactors in all these thousand years,—to the Warrior who restored peace,—to the Monarch who had faith in God's will to make order, and in man's will to keep order,—to the Christian Patriot who made forty millions of serfs forty millions of men,—to Alexander the Second,—ALEXANDER THE EARNEST.
* * * * *
MR. AXTELL
PART IV.
I said that the afternoon sunlight poured its rain into the church-yard.
It was four of the clock when Aaron left me.
The dream that I had received impression of still dwelt in active remembrance, and a little fringe from the greater glory mine eyes had seen went trailing in flows of light along the edge of earth, as if saying unto it, "Arise and behold what I am!"
One child habiting earth dared to lift eyes into the awful arch of air, wherein are laid the foundation-stones of the crystalline wall, and, beholding drops of Infinite Love, garnered one, and, walking forth with it in her heart, went into the church-yard,—a regret arising that the graves that held the columns fallen from the family-corridor had found so little of place within affection's realm. The regret, growing into resolution, hastened her steps, that went unto the place devoted to the dead Percivals. It was in a corner,—the corner wherein grew the pine-tree of the hills.
"A peaceful spot of earth," I thought, as I went into the hedged inclosure, and shut myself in with the gleaming marble, and the low-hanging evergreens that waved their green arms to ward ill away from those they had grown up among. "It is long since the ground has been broken here," I thought,—"so long!" And I looked upon a monumental stone to find there recorded the latest date of death. It was eighteen hundred and forty-four,—my mother's,—and I looked about and sought her grave. The grass seemed crispy and dry. I sat down by this grave. I leaned over it, and looked into the tangled net-work of dead fibres held fast by some link of the past to living roots underneath. I plucked some of them, and in idlest of fancies looked closely to see if deeds or thoughts of a summer gone had been left upon them. "No! I've had enough of fancies for one day; I'll have no more to-night," I thought; and I wished for something to do. I longed for action whereon to imprint my new impress of resolution. It came in a guise I had not calculated upon.
"It's very wrong of you to sit upon that damp ground, Miss Percival."
The words evidently were addressed to me, sitting hidden in among the evergreens. I looked up and answered,—
"It is not damp, Mr. Axtell."
He was leaning upon the iron railing outside of the hedge.
"Will you come away from that cold, damp place?" he went on.
"I'm not ready to leave yet," I said, and never moved. I asked,—
"How is your sister since morning?"
I thought him offended. He made no reply,—only walked away and went into the church close by.
"One can never know the next mood that one of these Axtells will take," I said to myself, in the stillness that followed his going. "He might have answered me, at least." Then I reproached Anna Percival for cherishing uncharity towards tried humanity. There's a way appointed for escape, I know, and I sought it, burying my face in my hands, and leaning over the stillness of my mother's heart. I heard steps drawing near. Looking up, I saw Mr. Axtell entering the inclosure. He had brought one of the church pew-cushions.
"Will you rise?" he asked.
He did not bring the cushion to where I was; he carried it around and spread it in a vacant spot between two graves, the place left beside my mother for my precious father's white hairs to be laid in. Having deposited it there, he looked at me, evidently expecting that I would avail myself of his kindness. I wanted to refuse. I felt perfectly comfortable where I was. I should have done so, had not my intention been intercepted by a shaft of expression that crossed my vein of humor unexpectedly. It was only a look from out of his eyes. They were absolutely colorless,—not white, not black, but a strange mingling of all hues made them everything to my view,—and yet so full of coloring that no one ray came shining out and said, "I'm blue, or black, or gray;" but something said, if not the mandate of color, "Obey!"
I did.
"Sacrilege!" I said. "It is a place for worship."
"Whose grave is this?" Mr. Axtell asked, as he bent down and laid his hand upon the sod. It was upon the one next beyond my mother's; between the two it was that he had placed the cushion.
"The head-stone is just there. You can read, can you not?" I asked, with a spice of malice, because for the second time this barbaric gentleman had commanded me to obey.
He lifted himself up, leaned against the towering family-monument, and slowly said,—
"Miss Percival, it is very hard for an Axtell to forgive."
I thought of the face in the Upper Country, and asked,—
"Why?"
"Because the Creator has almost deprived them of forgiving power. Don't tempt one of them to sin by giving occasion for the exercise of that wherein they mourn at being deficient."
I pulled dead grassy fibres again, and said nothing.
The second time he bent to the mound of earth, and said,—
"Please tell me now, Miss Anna, whose grave this is;" and there were tears in his eyes that made them for the moment grandly brown.
"Truly, Mr. Axtell, I do not know. I've been so busy with the living that I've not thought much of this place. It long since all these died, you know;" and I looked about upon the little village closed in by the iron railing. "I do not know that I can tell you one, save my mother's, here. I remember her; the others I cannot."
I arose to walk around to the headstone and see.
"No," he said. "Will you listen to me a little while?"
"If you'll sing for me."
"Sing for you?"—and there was a world of reproach in his meaning. "Is this a place for songs? or am I a man to sing?"
"Why not, Mr. Axtell? Aaron told me that you could sing, if you would; he has heard you."
"I will sing for you," he said, "if, after I am done, you choose to hear the song I sing."
I thought again of Miss Lettie, and put the question, once unheeded, concerning her.
"She is better. Your sister is a charming nurse."
A long quiet ensued; in it came the memory of Dr. Eaton's interest in the young girl's face.
"Is Mr. Axtell an artist?" I asked, after the silence.
"Mr. Axtell is a church-sexton," was the response.
"Cannot he be both sexton and artist?"
"How can he?"
"You have a strange way of telling me that I ought not to question you,"
I said, vexed at his non-committal words and manner.
He changed the subject widely, when next he spoke.
"Have you the letter that you picked up last night?" he asked.
"Yes, Mr. Axtell."
"Give it to me, please."
"Did Miss Lettie commission you to ask?"
"She did not."
"Then I cannot give it to you."
"Cannot give me my sister's letter?"
"It was to me that it was intrusted."
"And you are afraid to trust me with it?"
"I am afraid to break the trust reposed in myself."
Again the black roll of silent thunder gloomed on his brow; as once his sister's eyes had been, his now were coruscant.
"Do you refuse to give it to me?" he demanded.
"I do," I said, "now, and until Miss Lettie says, 'Give.'"
"You've learned the contents, I presume," he said, with untold sarcasm.
"Woman's curiosity digs deeply, when once aroused."
"You've been taught of woman in a sad school, I fear. I'll forgive the faults of your education, Mr. Axtell. Have you any more remarks to me? I'm waiting."
"Do you know the contents of the letter that made Lettie so anxious?"
"You accused me before questioning formerly, or I should have given you truth. I have no knowledge of what is in the letter."
He had resumed his former position, leaning against the monument, where I had mine. He changed it now, drawing nearer for an instant, then went to the side of the grave that he had asked me concerning, kneeled there, laid two hands above it, and said,—
"Letty was right, Miss Anna. God has made you well,—made you after the similitude of her who sleeps underneath this sod. Will you forgive my rudeness?"
And he looked down as I had done, ere he came, into the tangled, matted fibres, then out into the great all-where of air, as if some mysterious presence encompassed him.
Very lowly I said,—
"Forgiveness is of God;" and I remembered the vision that came in my dream. The little voice that steals into hearts crowded with emotions, and tells tiny nerves of wish which way to fly, went whispering through the niches of my mind, "Tell the dream."
Mr. Axtell went back to his monumental resting-place. I said,—
"I have had a wonderful dream to-day;" and I began to tell the opening thereof.
The first sentence was not told when I stopped, suddenly. I could not go on. He asked me, "Why?" I only re-uttered what I felt, that I could not tell it.
"Oh! I have had a dream," he said,—"one that for eighteen years has been hung above my days and woven into my nights,—a great, hopeless woof of doom. I have tried to broider it with gold, I have tried to hang silver-bells upon the drooping corners thereof. I have tried to fold it about me and wear it, as other men wear sorrows, for the sun of heaven and the warmth of society to draw the wrinkled creases out. I have striven to fold it up, and lay it by in the arbor-vitae chest of memory, with myrrh and camphor, but it will not be exorcised. No, no! it hangs firm as granite, stiff as the axis of the sun, unapproachable as the aurora of the North. Miss Percival, could you wear such a vestment in the march of life?"
"Your dream is too mystical; will you tell me what it has done for you?
As yet, I only know what you have not done with it."
"What it has done for me?"—and he went slowly on, thinking half aloud, as if the idea were occurring for the first time.
"It touched me one soft summer day, before the earth became mildewed and famine-stricken. I was a proud, wilful Axtell boy; all the family traits were written with a white-hot pen on me. My will, my great high will, went ringing chimes of what I would do through the house where I was born, where my mother has just died, and I swung this right arm forth into the air of existence, and said, 'I will do what I will; men shall say I am a master in the land.'
"My father sent me away from home for education. I walked with intrepid mind through the course where others halted, weary, overladen, unfit for burden.
"To gain the valedictory oration was one goal that I had said I would attain to. I did. That was nineteen years ago. I came home in the soft, hot, August-time. It was the close of the month. The moon was at its highest flood of light. I was at the highest tide of will-might. That night, if any one had told me I could not do that which I had a wish to accomplish, I would have made my desire triumphant, or death would have been my only conqueror. Oh! it is dreadful to have such a nature handed down from the dark past, and thrust into one's life, to be battled with, to be hewn down at last, unless the lightning of God's wrath cleaves into the spirit and wakes up the volcano, which forever after emits only fire and sulphur. There's yet one way more, after the lightning-stroke comes,—something unutterable, something that canopies the soul with doom, and forever the spirit tries to raise its wings and fly away, but every uplifting strikes fire, until, singed, scorched, burnt, wings grow useless, and droop down, never more to be uplifted."
Mr. Axtell drooped his arms, as if typical of the wings he had described. Borne away by the excitement of his words, he stood straight up against the far-away sky, with the verdure of Norway-evergreens soothingly waving their green around him. There was a magnificence of mien in the man, that made my spirit say—
"The Deity made that man for great deeds."
He glanced down at the grave once more, and resumed:—
"I came home that August night. The prairie of Time rolled out limitless before my imagination. I built pyramids of fame; I laid the foundation of Babel once more, in my heart,—for I said, 'My name shall touch the stars,—my name! Abraham Axtell!' It is only written in earth, ground to powder, to-day."
"An atom of earth's powder may be a star to eyes vast enough to see the fulness that dwells therein, until to angelic vision our planet stands out a universe of starry suns, each particle of dust luminous with eternities of limitless space between," I said, as he, pausing, stooped, and stirred the crisp grass, to outline his name there.
"All things are possible," he murmured, "but the rending of my mantle of doom."
He looked from the tracing of his name to the west.
"The sun is going down once more," he said, and bowed his head, as one does, waiting for pastoral benediction. His eyes were fixed now, as I had seen his sister's held, but his lips poured out words.
"The moonlight sheened the earth, hot and heavy and still, that night. My father, mother, and Lettie were in the home where you have seen sorrow come. Up from the sea came the low, hollow boom of surges rising over the crust of land.
"'To the sea, to the sea, let us go!' I cried; 'it is the very night to tread the hall of moonbeams that leads to palace of pearls!'
"My mother was weary; she would have stayed at home, but I was her pearl of price; she forgot herself. You know the stream that comes down from the mountain and empties into the ocean. It was in that stream that my boat floated, and a long walk away. Lettie left us. Just after we started, I missed her, and asked where she had gone.
"'You'll see soon,' replied my mother; and even as I looked back, I saw Lettie following, with a shadow other than her own falling on the midsummer grass. She did not hasten; she did not seek to come up with us. My mother was walking beside me.
"Thus we came to the river, at the place where it wanders out into the ocean. I saw my boat, my River-Ribbon, floating its cable-length, but never more, and undulating to the throbs of tide that pulsated along the blue vein of water, heralding the motion of the heart outside. We stopped there. The moon was set in the firmament high and fast, as when it was made to rule the night. The hall of light, lit up along the twinkling way of waters, looked shining and beckoning in its wavy ways of grace, a very home for the restless spirit. I wanted to thread its labyrinth of sparkles; I wanted to cool my wings of desire in its phosphorescent dew. I said,—
"'I am going out upon the sea.'
"My mother seemed troubled.
"' Abraham, the boat is unsafe; the water comes through. See! it is half full now'; and she pointed to where it lay in the stream, lined with a mimic portraiture of the endless corridor of moonlight that went playing across the bit of water it held.
"'This is childish, this is folly,' I thought, 'to be stayed on such a spirit mission by a few cups of water in a boat! What shall I ever accomplish in life, if I yield thus?—and without waiting to more than half hear, certainly not to obey, my father's stern 'Stay on shore, Abraham,' I went down the bank, stepped into a bit of a bark, and pushed it into the stream, where my boat was now rocking on the strengthened flow of ocean's rise.
"I came to the boat, bailed out the water with a tin cup that lay floating inside, and calling back to land, 'Go home without me; do not wait,' I took the oars, and in my River-Ribbon, set free from its anchorage, I commenced rowing against the tide. I looked back to the bank I was fast leaving. I saw figures standing there.
"'They'll go home soon,' I said, and I turned my eyes steadfastly toward the sheeny track, all crimpled and curled with fibrous net-work, and rowed on.
"It was a glorious night,—a night when one toss of a mermaid's hair, made visible above the waters, as she flew along the track I was pursuing, would have been worth a life of rowing against this incoming tide.
"You have never tried to row, Miss Anna. You don't know how hard it is to push a boat out of a river when the sea sends up full veins to course the strong arms she reaches up into the land."
For one moment, as he addressed me, his eyes lost their rapt look; they went back to it, and he to his story.
"I saw the fin of a shark dancing in the waves. Sharks were nothing for me. I did not look down into my boat. No, men never do; they look beyond where they are. They're a sorry race, Miss Anna.
"The shark went down after some bit of prey more delicious than I. My will would have been hard for him to manage. I forgot the shark. I forgot the figures standing, waiting on the shore that I had left, ere Lettie and the shadow that walked with her, whatever it was, had come to it. I forgot everything but the phosphorescent dew that would cool my spirit, athirst for what I knew not, ravenous for refreshment, searching for manna where it never grew. The plaudits of yesterday were ringing in my ears, the wavelets danced to their music, my oars kept time to the vanity measure of my beating mind. Still I was not content. I wanted something more. A faded flower, an althea-bud, was still pendent from my coat. I had taken it out from the mass of flowers with which I had been honored. I noticed it now. The moon dewed it over with its yellowness. 'An offering to the sea-nymphs!' I said, and I cast it forth into the wide field. It did not go down, as I had fancied it would. No, it went on, whither the movement of the ceaseless dance of motion carried it. I leaned upon my oars and watched it until it went out of the illuminated track. I was now in the bay, outside the river. I looked once more shoreward. I had threaded the curve of the stream, and could not see around the point. No living human thing was in sight. I was alone with Nature in the night, when she looks down glories, and spreads out fields where we long to walk, and our footsteps are fast in clay. I was not far from shore; it lay dark behind me; it was only before that I could see. As I paused in my rowing to watch the althea-bud set afloat, I heard a tiny splash in the waters.
"'A school of fish flashing up a moment,' I thought, and did not further heed it."
The man looked as if he were now out at sea. He turned his head the least bit: the effect against the sky was fine. He had an attitude of watching and listening.
"I saw an object before me moving on the waters. I looked down. The water was rising in my own boat. I could not heed it just now.
"'In a moment,' I thought, 'I would stop to bail it out.'
"It was a boat that I saw. It moved on so swiftly,—the chime of the oars, tiny oars they were, was so sweetly, softly musical, the very drippling drops fell so like globules of silver, that I forgot my mission. I held my oars and waited. At last—how long it seemed!—I saw the boat come into the bridge of light. I saw fair, golden hair let loose to the sea-breezes that began to blow. I saw two hands striving with the oars. I saw the owner of the hair and of the hands, a young girl, sitting in that boat, coming right across the way where I ought to be going. "'Does she mean to stay me?' I said, and even then my will rose up.
"I bent to the oars; but whilst I had watched her, my boat had been rapidly filling. I was forced to stay. My feet were already in the waves. Right across my pathway she came, close up to my filling boat.
"Her eyes were in the shadow, the moon being behind, but her voice rang out these words:—
"'Mr. Axtell, you're committing a great sin. You're putting your own life in peril. You're killing your mother. I have come to stay you. Will you come on shore?'
"I only looked at her. When I found voice, it was to ask,—
"'Who are you?'
"'Who I am doesn't matter now. Drowning men mustn't ask questions'; and, putting one oar within my boat, now more than half filled, she drew her own to its side, and said,—"'Come in.'
"'Conquered by a woman,' I thought. 'Never!'—and I began to search for the cup, that I might give back to the sea its intruding contents.
"I had left it in the other boat.
"'Conquered by thine own sin,' said the young girl, still holding fast to my boat.
"'Not so easily, fairy, or whoe'er thou art,' I said; for I saw that her boat was well furnished with both bailing-bowl and sponge, and I reached out for them, saying, 'I'm going on the track, farther out.'
"She divined my intent, and quick as was my thought were her two hands; she cast both bowl and sponge into the sea.
"'Mr. Axtell,' she said; 'there's a power in the world greater than your own. The sooner you yield, the less you'll feel the thorns. Your mother, on the shore, is suffering agonies for you. Will you come into this boat, now?'