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"He
has perspired," said Prince Andrew.
"I
was coming to tell you so."
The
child moved slightly in his sleep, smiled, and rubbed his
forehead
against
the pillow.
Prince
Andrew looked at his sister. In the dim shadow of the curtain her
luminous
eyes shone more brightly than usual from the tears of joy that
were
in them. She leaned over to her brother and kissed him, slightly
catching
the curtain of the cot. Each made the other a warning gesture
and
stood still in the dim light beneath the curtain as if not
wishing
to
leave that seclusion where they three were shut off from all the
world.
Prince Andrew was the first to move away, ruffling his hair
against
the muslin of the curtain.
"Yes,
this is the one thing left me now," he said with a sigh.
CHAPTER
X
Soon
after his admission to the masonic Brotherhood, Pierre went to
the
Kiev
province, where he had the greatest number of serfs, taking with
him
full directions which he had written down for his own guidance as
to
what
he should do on his estates.
When
he reached Kiev he sent for all his stewards to the head office
and
explained
to them his intentions and wishes. He told them that steps
would
be taken immediately to free his serfs--and that till then they
were
not to be overburdened with labor, women while nursing their
babies
were
not to be sent to work, assistance was to be given to the serfs,
punishments
were to be admonitory and not corporal, and hospitals,
asylums,
and schools were to be established on all the estates. Some of
the
stewards (there were semiliterate foremen among them) listened
with
alarm,
supposing these words to mean that the young count was displeased
with
their management and embezzlement of money, some after their
first
fright
were amused by Pierre's lisp and the new words they had not heard
before,
others simply enjoyed hearing how the master talked, while the
cleverest
among them, including the chief steward, understood from this
speech
how they could best handle the master for their own ends.
The
chief steward expressed great sympathy with Pierre's intentions,
but
remarked
that besides these changes it would be necessary to go into the
general
state of affairs which was far from satisfactory.
Despite
Count Bezukhov's enormous wealth, since he had come into an
income
which was said to amount to five hundred thousand rubles a year,
Pierre
felt himself far poorer than when his father had made him an
allowance
of ten thousand rubles. He had a dim perception of the
following
budget:
About
80,000 went in payments on all the estates to the Land Bank,
about
30,000
went for the upkeep of the estate near Moscow, the town house,
and
the allowance to the three princesses; about 15,000 was given in
pensions
and the same amount for asylums; 150,000 alimony was sent to
the
countess; about 70,000 went for interest on debts. The building of
a
new
church, previously begun, had cost about 10,000 in each of the
last
two
years, and he did not know how the rest, about 100,000 rubles,
was
spent,
and almost every year he was obliged to borrow. Besides this the
chief
steward wrote every year telling him of fires and bad harvests,
or
of
the necessity of rebuilding factories and workshops. So the first
task
Pierre had to face was one for which he had very little aptitude
or
inclination--practical
business.
He
discussed estate affairs every day with his chief steward. But he
felt
that this did not forward matters at all. He felt that these
consultations
were detached from real affairs and did not link up with
them
or make them move. On the one hand, the chief steward put the
state
of
things to him in the very worst light, pointing out the necessity
of
paying
off the debts and undertaking new activities with serf labor, to
which
Pierre did not agree. On the other hand, Pierre demanded that
steps
should be taken to liberate the serfs, which the steward met by
showing
the necessity of first paying off the loans from the Land Bank,
and
the consequent impossibility of a speedy emancipation.
The
steward did not say it was quite impossible, but suggested
selling
the
forests in the province of Kostroma, the land lower down the
river,
and
the Crimean estate, in order to make it possible: all of which
operations
according to him were connected with such complicated
measures--the
removal of injunctions, petitions, permits, and so on--
that
Pierre became quite bewildered and only replied:
"Yes,
yes, do so."
Pierre
had none of the practical persistence that would have enabled him
to
attend to the business himself and so he disliked it and only
tried
to
pretend to the steward that he was attending to it. The steward
for
his
part tried to pretend to the count that he considered these
consultations
very valuable for the proprietor and troublesome to
himself.
In
Kiev Pierre found some people he knew, and strangers hastened to
make
his
acquaintance and joyfully welcomed the rich newcomer, the largest
landowner
of the province. Temptations to Pierre's greatest weakness--
the
one to which he had confessed when admitted to the Lodge--were so
strong
that he could not resist them. Again whole days, weeks, and
months
of his life passed in as great a rush and were as much occupied
with
evening parties, dinners, lunches, and balls, giving him no time
for
reflection, as in Petersburg. Instead of the new life he had
hoped
to
lead he still lived the old life, only in new surroundings.
Of
the three precepts of Freemasonry Pierre realized that he did not
fulfill
the one which enjoined every Mason to set an example of moral
life,
and that of the seven virtues he lacked two--morality and the
love
of
death. He consoled himself with the thought that he fulfilled
another
of
the precepts--that of reforming the human race--and had other
virtues--love
of his neighbor, and especially generosity.
In
the spring of 1807 he decided to return to Petersburg. On the way
he
intended
to visit all his estates and see for himself how far his orders
had
been carried out and in what state were the serfs whom God had
entrusted
to his care and whom he intended to benefit.
The
chief steward, who considered the young count's attempts almost
insane--unprofitable
to himself, to the count, and to the serfs--made
some
concessions. Continuing to represent the liberation of the serfs
as
impracticable,
he arranged for the erection of large buildings--schools,
hospitals,
and asylums--on all the estates before the master arrived.
Everywhere
preparations were made not for ceremonious welcomes (which he
knew
Pierre would not like), but for just such gratefully religious
ones,
with offerings of icons and the bread and salt of hospitality,
as,
according
to his understanding of his master, would touch and delude
him.
The
southern spring, the comfortable rapid traveling in a Vienna
carriage,
and the solitude of the road, all had a gladdening effect on
Pierre.
The estates he had not before visited were each more picturesque
than
the other; the serfs everywhere seemed thriving and touchingly
grateful
for the benefits conferred on them. Everywhere were receptions,
which
though they embarrassed Pierre awakened a joyful feeling in the
depth
of his heart. In one place the peasants presented him with bread
and
salt and an icon of Saint Peter and Saint Paul, asking
permission,
as
a mark of their gratitude for the benefits he had conferred on
them,
to
build a new chantry to the church at their own expense in honor
of
Peter
and Paul, his patron saints. In another place the women with
infants
in arms met him to thank him for releasing them from hard work.
On
a third estate the priest, bearing a cross, came to meet him
surrounded
by children whom, by the count's generosity, he was
instructing
in reading, writing, and religion. On all his estates Pierre
saw
with his own eyes brick buildings erected or in course of
erection,
all
on one plan, for hospitals, schools, and almshouses, which were
soon
to
be opened. Everywhere he saw the stewards' accounts, according to
which
the serfs' manorial labor had been diminished, and heard the
touching
thanks of deputations of serfs in their full-skirted blue
coats.
What
Pierre did not know was that the place where they presented him
with
bread and salt and wished to build a chantry in honor of Peter
and
Paul
was a market village where a fair was held on St. Peter's day,
and
that
the richest peasants (who formed the deputation) had begun the
chantry
long before, but that nine tenths of the peasants in that
villages
were in a state of the greatest poverty. He did not know that
since
the nursing mothers were no longer sent to work on his land, they
did
still harder work on their own land. He did not know that the
priest
who
met him with the cross oppressed the peasants by his exactions,
and
that
the pupils' parents wept at having to let him take their children
and
secured their release by heavy payments. He did not know that the
brick
buildings, built to plan, were being built by serfs whose
manorial
labor
was thus increased, though lessened on paper. He did not know
that
where
the steward had shown him in the accounts that the serfs'
payments
had
been diminished by a third, their obligatory manorial work had
been
increased
by a half. And so Pierre was delighted with his visit to his
estates
and quite recovered the philanthropic mood in which he had left
Petersburg,
and wrote enthusiastic letters to his "brother-instructor"
as
he called the Grand Master.
"How
easy it is, how little effort it needs, to do so much good,"
thought
Pierre, "and how little attention we pay to it!"
He
was pleased at the gratitude he received, but felt abashed at
receiving
it. This gratitude reminded him of how much more he might do
for
these simple, kindly people.
The
chief steward, a very stupid but cunning man who saw perfectly
through
the naive and intelligent count and played with him as with a
toy,
seeing the effect these prearranged receptions had on Pierre,
pressed
him still harder with proofs of the impossibility and above all
the
uselessness of freeing the serfs, who were quite happy as it was.
Pierre
in his secret soul agreed with the steward that it would be
difficult
to imagine happier people, and that God only knew what would
happen
to them when they were free, but he insisted, though reluctantly,
on
what he thought right. The steward promised to do all in his power
to
carry
out the count's wishes, seeing clearly that not only would the
count
never be able to find out whether all measures had been taken for
the
sale of the land and forests and to release them from the Land
Bank,
but
would probably never even inquire and would never know that the
newly
erected buildings were standing empty and that the serfs
continued
to
give in money and work all that other people's serfs gave--that is
to
say,
all that could be got out of them.
CHAPTER
XI
Returning
from his journey through South Russia in the happiest state of
mind,
Pierre carried out an intention he had long had of visiting his
friend
Bolkonski, whom he had not seen for two years.
Bogucharovo
lay in a flat uninteresting part of the country among fields
and
forests of fir and birch, which were partly cut down. The house
lay
behind
a newly dug pond filled with water to the brink and with banks
still
bare of grass. It was at the end of a village that stretched
along
the
highroad in the midst of a young copse in which were a few fir
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