·when Benckendorf went up to the old man \vith the medals, the latt!:•r fell on his knees and said:
'Your Excellency, put yourself in my place.'
'How abominable ' ' cried the Count; 'you arc disgracing your medals,' and full of noble indignation he passed by without taking his petition. The old man slowly got up, his glassy eyes
\verc full of horror and craziness, his lower lip quivered and he babbled something.
How inhuman these people arc when the whim takes them to be human !
Dubelt \vent up to the old man and said: '"Whatever did you do that for? Come, give me your petition. I'll look through it.'
Benckendorf had gone to see the Tsar.
'What am I to do?' I asked Dubelt.
'Settle on any town you choose with the Minister of Home Affairs; we shall not interfere. \\'e will send the whole case on there to-morrow. I congratulate you on its having been so satisfactorily settled.'
'I am very much obliged to you! '
From Benckendorf I went t o the Ministry. Our Director, a s I have mentioned, belonged to that class of Germans who have something of the lemur about them, lanky, sluggish, and dilatory. Their brains work slowly, they do not catch the point at once and they labour a long time if th<•y are to reach any sort of conclusion. My account unfortunately arrived before the communication from the Third Division; he had not expected it at all, and so was completely bewildered, uttered incoherent
Moscow, Petersburg and Novgorod 267
phrases, noticed this himself, and in order to recover himself said to me: 'Erlauben Sie mir deutsch zu sprechen.' Possibly his remarks came out more correct grammatically in German, but they did not become any clearer or more definite in meaning. I distinctly perceived two feelings struggling in him: he grasped all the injustice of the affair, but considered himself bound a s Director to justify the action o f the government; at the same time, he did not want to show himself a barbarian before me, nor could he forget the hostility which invariably reigned between the Ministry and the secret police. So the task of expressing all this jumble was in itself not easy. He ended by admitting that he could say nothing until he had seen the Minister, and by going off to see him.
Count Strogonov sent for me, inquired into the matter, listened attentively to the whole thing, and said to me in conclusion:
'It's a police trick, pure and simple-well, all right: I'll pay them out for it.'
I imagined, I confess, that he was going straight off to the Tsar to explain the business to him ; but ministers do not go so far as that.
'I have received His Majesty's command concerning you,' he went on: 'here it is. You see that it is left to me to select the place of your exile and to employ you in the service. Where v..-ould you like to go?'
'To Tver or Novgorod,' I answered.
'To be sure . . . . Well, since the choice of a place is left to me, and it probably does not matter to you to which of those towns I appoint you, I shall give you the first councillor's vacancy in the provincial government. That is the highest position that you can receive with your seniority, so get yourself a uniform made with an embroidered collar,' he added jocosely.
So that was how I recouped myself, though not in my own suit.
A week later Strogonov recommended me to the Senate for a n appointment as councillor at Novgorod.
It really is very funny to think how many secretaries, assessors, and district and provincial officials had been long soliciting, passionately and persistently soliciting, to get that post; bribes had been given, the most sacred promises had been received, and here, all at once, a Minister, to carry out His Majesty's will and at the same time to have his revenge on the secret police, punished me with this promotion and, by way of
M Y P A S T A N D T H O U G H T S
268
g ilding the pill, flung this post, the object of ardent desires and ambitious dreams, at the feet of a man who accepted it with the firm intention of thro,ving it up at the first opportunity.
Meanwhile the months passed, the winter was over, and no one reminded me about going away. I was forgotten and I gave up being sur le qui-t·ive, particularly after the following meeting.
Bolgovsky, the military governor of Vologda, was a t that time in Petersburg: being a very intimate friend of my father, he was rather fond of mP and I was sometimes a t his house. He had taken part in the killing of Paul, as a young officer in the Semenovsky Regiment, and was afterwards mixed up in the obscure and JmexplainPd SpPranskyn affair in 1 81 2. l-IP was at that time a colonel in the army at the front. liP was suddenly arrested, brought to Petf'rsbuq�. and then sent to Sibc>ria. Bef�rf' he had timf' to rPach his place> of Pxi le Al«:>xamler pardoned h i m, and he rc>turn,.d to his regiment.IO
OnP day in the spring I \Wilt to sf'e him ; a general was sitting in a big Pasy-chair "-ith his back towards the door so that I could not Sf'e his face, hut only one silver c>paulette.
'Let me introducp you,' said Bolgovsky, and then I recognised Dubelt.
'I haw long enjo:·pd the> pleasure of Lf'onty Vasilyevich's attention,' I said, smiling.
·Are you going to Novgorod soon?' he asked me.
'I supposed I ought to ask :vou abou t that.'
'Oh ! not at all 1 I had no idc>a of reminding you . I simply asked the question. \Ve haw handed you over to Count Strogonov. and \YP are not trying to hurry you, as you see. Besides,
\\·ith such a legiti mate reason as your wife's illness . . . .'
l-It:> really was the politt>st of mt>n!
At last. at the beginning of JunP, I rect>i\·f'd the Senate's ukaz., confirming my appointment as councillor in the Novgorod Pro
,·incia l Gowrnmc>nt. Count Strogonov thought i t was time for me to sPt off. ami about the 1 st of July I arrived in Novgorod, the
'City in tlw kPPping of God anrl of Saint Sophia,' and settled on thP bank of the Volkhov, opposite the very barrow from which
!I :\ likhail :\likhaylO\·irh Speransky ( 1 ii2- 1 839). a liberal and an able and trustPd rn inistPr of Alexander I, was suddenly dismissed and on 1 7
March 1 8 1 2, was rPiega tPrl to Nizhn)' Novgorod. ( R. ) H1 The biographical d!'lails o f Bolgovsky. giYCn by H . , are not accurate.
( A .S. )
Moscow, Petersburg and Novgorod 269
the Voltairians of the twelfth century threw the wonder-working statue of Perun11 into the river.
Cou11cillor at Nov13·orocl