Anna Karenina (Dole)/Part Eight/Chapter 15
CHAPTER XV
"Do you know, Kostia, whom Sergyeï Ivanovitch found on the train?" said Dolly, after she had given her children their cucumbers and honey. "Vronsky. He's going to Serbia."
"Yes! and not alone either. He's taking out a squadron of cavalry at his own expense," said Katavasof.
"That's like him," answered Levin. "But are volunteers still going off?" added he, looking at Sergyeï Ivanovitch.
Sergyeï Ivanovitch was busy with a knife-blade rescuing a live bee from the honey that had flowed out of the white honeycomb at the bottom of his cup, and he did not answer.
"Indeed! I should say so!" said Katavasof, biting into a cucumber. "If you had only seen them at the station this morning!"
"Now, what an idea this is! For Christ's sake, tell me, Sergyeï Ivanovitch, where all these volunteers are going, and whom they are going to fight with?" asked the old prince, evidently pursuing a conversation which they had begun before Levin joined them.
"With the Turks," answered Sergyeï Ivanovitch, smiling quietly, as he at last rescued the helpless honey-smeared bee on the point of his knife, and set him on an aspen leaf.
"But who has declared war on the Turks? Is it Ivan Ivanovitch Ragozof and the Countess Lidia Ivanovna and Madame Stahl?"
"No one has declared war; but the people sympathize with their oppressed brethren, and want to help them," said Sergyeï Ivanovitch.
"The prince was not speaking of help, but of war," said Levin, coming to the assistance of his father-in-law. "The prince means that private persons have no right to take part in a war without being authorized by the government."
"Kostia, look out! there's a bee! Won't he sting?" cried Dolly, defending herself from a wasp.
"That's not a bee; that's a wasp!" said Levin.
"Come, now! give us your theory," demanded Katavasof, evidently provoking Levin to a discussion. "Why shouldn't private persons have that right?"
"Well, my theory is this: war, on the one hand, is such a terrible, such an atrocious, thing that no man, at least no Christian man, has the right to assume the responsibility of beginning it; but it belongs to government alone, when it becomes inevitable. On the other hand, both in law and in common sense, where there are state questions, and above all in matters concerning war, private citizens have no right to use their own wills."
Sergyeï Ivanovitch and Katavasof were both ready at the same instant with answers.
"That's where you're mistaken, batyushka," said Katavasof. "There may be cases when government does not carry out the will of its citizens, and then society declares its own will."
But Sergyeï Ivanovitch did not approve of this reply. He frowned as Katavasof spoke, and put it another way:—
"You state the question all wrong. Here there is no declaration of war, but simply an expression of human, of Christian, sympathy. Our brethren, men of the same blood, the same faith, are butchered. Now, we do not merely regard them as brethren and as coreligionists, but as women, children, old men. Our feelings are stirred, and the whole Russian people fly to help check these horrors. Suppose you were walking in the street, and saw a drunken man beating a woman or a child. I think you would not stop to ask whether war had been declared or had not been declared on such a man before you attacked him and protected the object of his fury,"
"No; but I should not kill him."
"Yes, you might even kill him."
"I don't know. If I saw such a sight, I might yield to the immediate feeling. I cannot tell how it would be. But in the oppression of the Slavs, there is not, and cannot be, such a powerful motive."
"Perhaps not for you, but other people think differently," said Sergyeï Ivanovitch, angrily. "The people still keep the tradition of sympathy with brethren of the orthodox faith, who are groaning under the yoke of the 'unspeakable Turk.' They have heard of their terrible sufferings, and are aroused."
"That may be," answered Levin, in a conciliatory tone, "only I don't see it. I myself am one of the people, and I don't feel it."
"I can say the same," put in the old prince, - "I was living abroad; I read the newspapers, and I learned about the Bulgarian atrocities; but I never could understand why all Russia took such a sudden fancy for their Slavic brethren. I am sure I never felt the slightest love for them. I was greatly ashamed. I thought I must be either a monster, or that Carlsbad had a bad effect on me. But since I have come back, I don't feel stirred at all; and I find that I am not the only one who is not so much interested in the Slav brethren as in Russia. Here is Konstantin."
"Private opinions are of no consequence—there is no meaning in private opinions—when all Russia, when the whole people, signified what they wished," said Sergyeï Ivanovitch.
"Yes. Excuse me. I don't see this. The people don't know anything," said the prince.
"But, papa, how about that Sunday in church?" said Dolly, who had been listening to the conversation.—"Get me a towel, please," she said in an aside to the old bee-keeper, who was looking at the children with a friendly smile. "It can't be that all ...."
"Well! What about that Sunday at church? They tell the priest to read a prayer. He reads it. Nobody understands one word. They snore just as they do during the whole sermon," continued the prince. "Then they tell them that the salvation of their souls is in question. Then they pull out their kopeks, and give them, but why they have not the least idea,"
"The people cannot know their destiny. They have an instinctive feeling, and at times like these they show it," said Sergyeï Ivanovitch, looking at the old beekeeper.
The handsome, tall old man, with his black beard, wherein a few gray hairs were beginning to show, and with his thick, silvery hair, stood motionless, holding a cup of honey in his hand, looking at the gentlemen with a mild, placid air, evidently not understanding a word of the conversation, nor caring to understand.
He nodded his head with deliberation as he heard Sergyeï Ivanovitch's words, and said:—"That's certainly so."
"Well, now! Ask him about it," said Levin. "He does n't know. He does n't think.—Have you heard about the war, Mikhaïluitch?" asked he of the old man. "You know what was read on Sunday at church, don't you? What do you think? Ought we to fight for the Christians?"
"Why should we think? Our Emperor Aleksander Nikolayevitch will think for us, as in everything else. He knows what to do.—Should you like some more bread? shall I give some to the little lad?" asked he, turning to Darya Aleksandrovna, and pointing to Grisha, who was munching a crust.
"What's the use of asking him?" said Sergyeï Ivanovitch. "We have seen, and still see, hundreds and hundreds of men abandoning all they possess, giving their last penny, enlisting and trooping from every corner of Russia, all clearly and definitely expressing their thought and purpose. What does that signify?"
"It signifies, in my opinion," said Levin, beginning to get excited, " that out of eighty millions of men, there will always be found hundreds, and even thousands, who have lost their social position, are restless, and are ready to take up the first adventure that comes along, whether it is to follow Pugatchof or to go to Khiva or to fight in Serbia."
"I tell you they are not adventurers who devote themselves to this work, but they are the best representatives of the nation," cried Sergyeï Ivanuitch, excitedly, as if he were defending his last position. "There are the contributions; is n't that a test of popular feeling?"
"That word 'people' is so vague," said Levin; "long-haired scribblers, professors, and perhaps one in a thousand among the peasants understand what it is all about, but the rest of the eighty millions do as Mikhailuitch here does. They not only don't express their will, but they have n't the slightest idea that they have any will to express. What right, then, have we to say that this is the will of the people?"