So he wrote long before the book was completed, know- ing that it would rank among the best, and certain that in this quiet contemplative account of a prison colony there were the seeds of a future revolution which would eventu- ally bring about the end of prison colonies in Russia. The book had no immediate effect. It did not change the Tsarist prison system, and it had no effect on the altogether more terrible prison systems of the Bolsheviks. Yet he had lit the fuse, and it is still burning.
In a story written a few weeks after leaving Sakhalin, Chekhov spoke of "the huge bull without eyes," the ulti- mate horror, the symbol of all that was powerful, degrad- ing and meaningless in life. The Island describes his de- liberate confrontation with the bull and his attempt to tame
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it and reduce it to human proportions. The bullring was an obscure wind-swept island in the north Pacific; the bull- fighter had no weapons except his bare hands and his native intelligence. He fought because he had to fight, and it never occurred to him that his health or his reputation might suffer. What concerned him was the act of protest, the need to protect the humiliated and degraded, the slow burning of the fuse. In this sense he was a greater revolutionary than many of those who came after him.
Rob"t Payne
SEAOF JAPAN
SEA OF OKHOTSK
The Island
A Journey to Sakhalin
1 verst 1 sazhen 1 vershok 1 arshin 1 desyatin
I ^^
WEIGHTS AND MEASURES USED IN TEXT
o.66 mile 7 feet 1.7; inches 28 inches
2.7 acres 40 pounds
Ttmptratures art givtn in Centigradt'
I Nikolayevsk-on-the-Arnur - The Steamship Baikal - Cape Prange and the Est11ary Inlet - The Sakhalin Peninsula - La Perouse, Broughton, Krusemtern and Nevelskoy - Japanese Explorers - Cape Dzhaore - The Tatar Coast - De Kastri
on july 5, 1890, I arrived by ship at Nikolayevsk, one of the easternmost outposts of our Fatherland. Here the Amur is very wide and the sea is only 27 versts away. It is a majestic and beautiful place. Stories told abom the past, the tales told by my companions abom the vicious winters and the no less vicious local pastimes, the proximity of the convict camps and the very aspect of the filthy, dying town completely banished any desire to enjoy the landscape.
Nikolayevsk was founded not too long ago, in 1850, by the famous Gennady Nevelskoy: this was probably the only bright spot in the town's history. In the '50S and '6os, when, sparing neither soldiers, prisoners nor emigrants, civilization was being planted along the Amur, residences were maintained in N ikolayevsk b)' the governing officials of the region. Many Russian and foreign adventurers came here, and colonists settled here, attracted by the abundance of fish and game, and so the town was obviously not devoid of human interest; this was illustrated by the fact that a visiting scholar found it necessary and possible to give a public lecture at the club.
Now almost half of the houses have been abandoned by their owners. They stand dilapidated, the dark frameless windows staring like the eye sockets of a skull. The in- habitants pursue a somnolent, drunken existence and gen- erally live hand to mouth on whatever God has provided. They subsist by supplying fish to Sakhalin, stealing gold, exploiting non-Russians and selling deer antlers, from which the Chinese make stimulating medicines. On the
1
way from Khabarovka to Nikolayevsk I met a number of smugglers. They do not conceal their profession. Showing me gold dust and a pair of antlers, one of them proudly taid me, "My father was also a smuggler!" The exploitation of non-Russians, in addition to customarily turning them into drunkards, hoaxing them and the like, is occasionally quite original. Thus the now deceased Nikolayevsk trader Ivanov yearly took a trip to Sakhalin and exacted tribute from the Gilyaks. He tonured and hanged those who did nor pay up promprly.
There is no hatel in the town. At the club permission was granted me to rest after dinner in a low-ceilinged room where, they taid me, balls were given during the winter. They only shrugged their shoulders when I asked where I could spend the night. There is nothing one can do. I was obliged ro spend two nights on the boat. \'V'hen it depaned on the retum voyage to Khabarovka, I found myself stranded like a crayfish on the sand. Where should I go? My baggage was on the pier. I walked along the shore and did not know what to do. Exactly opposite the town, some rwo or three versts away, lay the Baikal, the boat on which I would voyage down the Tatar Strait, but they said it would not sail for four or five days, although the departure flag already waved from the mast. Perhaps I should go on board the Baikal? But that is awkward; suppose they don't allow it—they'll say it is too early.
The wind began to blow. The Amur turned dark and threatening, like the sea. I became melancholy. I went to the club and took a long time over my dinner and listened to people at the neighboring table talking about gold and antlers, about a juggler who had arrived in Nikolayevsk, and about a Japanese who does not pull teeth with pliers but with his fingers. If one listens carefully and long, then, 0 my God, how remote is this life from that of Russia!
Everything here, from the cured back of salmon which is taken with vodka to the quality of the conversation, is native to the place, not Russian. While sailing along the Amur I had the distinct impression that I was not in Russia at all but somewhere in Patagonia or Texas. Without even considering the strange, non-Russian aspects of my sur- roundings, it constantly seemed to me that the composition of our Russian life was alien to the native Amurians, that here Pushkin and Gogol were incomprehensible and there- fore unnecessary, that our history was boring, and that we who came from Russia were indeed foreigners. I noted complete indifference to religion and politics.
The priests I saw on the Amur eat meat during Lent. I was told that one who was dressed in a white silk cassock was a gold smuggler who competes with his spiritual charges. If you want to bore an Amurian and stan him yawning, talk to him of politics, the Russian government or Russian art. Moreover, morality here is quite peculiar, unlike our own. Chivalrous behavior toward women has become a cult, but at the same time it is not considered reprehensible to relinquish one's wife to a friend in ex- change for money. Here is an even better illustration: there are no class prejudices, for exiles here are considered equals, but at the same time it is not regarded as a sin to shoot some Chinese beggar met in the forest, killing him like a dog, or to engage in secret hunting parties against escaping convicts.
However, I will continue relating my experience;,. Not having found shelter, toward evening I decided to board the Baikal. But there was a new problem. A strong swell had developed and the Gilyak boatmen refused to row me over no matter how much money I offered them. I wan- dered along the shore, and did not know what to do. Mean- while the sun was setting and the waves of the Amur were darkening. On both banks of the river the Gilyak dogs were howling frantically. "Why have I come here?" I asked myself, and my journey seemed to be utter folly. The knowledge that the convict camps were nearby, that in a few days I would disembark on Sakhalin soil without pos- sessing even a letter of recommendation, and that they might force me to rurn back, disturbed me unpleasantly. Finally the Gilyaks agreed to carry me for a ruble and I arrived safely on the Baikal in a rowboat constructed of three planks nailed together.