Page:The life of Tolstoy.djvu/147

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POPULAR LITERATURE
105

vitch , Mamin-Sibiriak, etc. Besides books, popular pictures were issued by artists like Rèpin, Kivshenko, Savitsky, and Sologub, and also reproductions from foreign masterpieces; the text for these pictures was always written or edited by Tolstoy himself.

While serving the people as an author, Tolstoy never neglected his physical labours. When living in Moscow he was frequently cutting and splitting wood, drawing water, working as a cobbler; and he wore boots made by himself.

In early spring he was in the habit of returning to Yasnaya Polyana, often on foot with a knapsack on his back. There he shared in the peasants’ work: ploughing, manuring, sowing, haymaking, harvesting. When at home in autumn and winter, he might often be seen with a hatchet and saw, cutting wood, which he distributed among the peasants for building purposes, or to orphans and other needy ones for firewood. Tolstoy’s life was, indeed, full of many and varied activities.

Sometimes he had to pay dearly for his zeal, and his want of care for himself whilst at work with the peasants. In 1866, for instance, during hay-making, he hurt his knee when climbing into a cart. When the worst pain had subsided he paid no further attention to the hurt. After