Journey from St. Petersburg to Moscow Irina Reyfman (snow like ashes .TXT) 📖

take your money.” There was no end to my surprise in finding so much nobility in the manner of thought of these rustic dwellers. In the meantime, Anyuta entered the hut and showered praise on me to her mother. I again attempted to give them money, giving it to Ivan for the establishment of their home. But he said to me, “I have, Master, two hands, and with them I shall establish my household.” Noting that my presence was not very pleasant for them I left them and returned to my carriage.

While I was leaving Edrovo, Anyuta did not quit my thoughts. Her innocent sincerity pleased me infinitely. The noble action of her mother captivated me. I compared this venerable mother, her sleeves rolled up over the dough or with a milking pail next to a cow, with city mothers. The peasant woman did not want to take my untainted, well-intended hundred rubles, which in proportion to wealth would be like ten, fifteen, or more thousand for the wife of a colonel, state councillor, major, or general; indeed, if to a madam colonel, major, state councillor … (in accordance with my promise to the widow of the Edrovo carriage driver) whose daughter has a not bad-looking face, or is at least innocent, which would itself be sufficient, a distinguished gentleman of a seventy-year or, God forbid, seventy-two-year vintage, would offer five, ten, fifteen thousand or a fine dowry of an undetermined amount, or would find a high-ranking groom, or would get for her a maid-of-honor position at court—if that were so I ask you, city mothers, would your heart not skip a beat? Would you not want to see your daughter covered in diamonds in a gilded carriage drawn by four horses instead of walking on foot; or see her transported by a train of horses rather than the two famished nags that drag her? I agree with you on the point that you would observe ceremony and propriety and that you would not surrender readily, as stage actresses do. No, my little doves, I give you a month or two but not more. But if you should compel a grandee lover to sigh away for a longer time pointlessly, then he, preoccupied as he is with affairs of state, will leave you in order not to waste valuable time with you that he could better spend for the good of society.—A thousand voices rise up against me, they curse me with all the possible foul names: rogue, thief, rasc …, dev …, and so on and so on.—My little doves, calm down, I am not besmirching your honor. Are all of you like this? Take a good look in this mirror. If any of you recognizes yourself in it then curse me without mercy. I shall not make a complaint about her, I shall not take her to court over this.

Anyuta, Anyuta, you have turned my head! Why did I not meet you fifteen years ago? Your sincere innocence, impervious to the lascivious daring of a seducer, would have taught me to stay on the path of chastity. Why was the first kiss of my life not the one I planted on your cheek in a state of spiritual rapture? The reflection of your liveliness would have penetrated to the depths of my heart, and I would have avoided the nastiness that has filled my existence. I would have kept my distance from putrid women hired for lust, respected the marital bed, not disturbed the bond of family with my fleshly insatiety; virginity would have been to me the holy of holies and I would not have dared to touch it. O my Anyutushka! Remain always seated by the village gate and be an example through your uninhibited innocence. I am certain that you will turn to the path of good behavior one who has begun to stray from it and will reinforce one inclined to stray. Do not be alarmed if someone rooted in corruption, having grown grey in the embraces of shamelessness, walks past you and despises you. Do not attempt in vain to hinder his progress with the pleasure of your conversation. His heart is already stone, his soul has a carapace of diamond. The beneficial prod of innocent virtue is incapable of leaving on him a deep trace. Its tip will skate over the surface of his smoothly hardened vice. Take care lest your stinger is blunted against it. But do not let pass the youth deceived by the dangerous delights of beauty, catch him in your net. He seems proud, arrogant, impulsive, insolent, bold, insulting, wounding. But his heart will give way to the impression you make and open up to receive your positive example.—Anyuta, I cannot take my leave of you although already I spot the twentieth milestone from you.—

What is this custom about which Anyuta was telling me? They wanted to give her in marriage to a ten-year-old child. Who could allow such a union? Why does the hand guarding the laws not act for the extirpation of such an abuse? In Christian law marriage is a sacrament, in civil law an agreement or contract. What kind of hierophant could bless such an unequal marriage, or what sort of judge could record it in his journal? Where ages are not equivalent there can be no marriage. The laws of nature prohibit this sort of thing as something that is useless for humanity; it should be prohibited by civil law as harmful to society. A man and wife in society are two citizens who make an agreement confirmed by law binding them to give one another reciprocal sensual pleasure (may nobody dare to contest this most elementary law of cohabitation and a foundation of marital concord, the basis of untainted love, and the firm foundation stone of spousal harmony), undertake to live together, to share a common property, to cultivate the fruits of their passion, and so as to live peacefully not to