VERSE-MAKING
RATHER less than a month after our arrival in Moscow I was
sitting upstairs in my Grandmamma's house and doing some writing
at a large table. Opposite to me sat the drawing master, who was
giving a few finishing touches to the head of a turbaned Turk,
executed in black pencil. Woloda, with out-stretched neck, was
standing behind the drawing master and looking over his shoulder.
The head was Woloda's first production in pencil and to-day--
Grandmamma's name-day--the masterpiece was to be presented to her.
"Aren't you going to put a little more shadow there? " said
Woloda to the master as he raised himself on tiptoe and pointed
to the Turk's neck.
"No, it is not necessary," the master replied as he put pencil
and drawing-pen into a japanned folding box. "It is just right
now, and you need not do anything more to it. As for you,
Nicolinka " he added, rising and glancing askew at the Turk,
"won't you tell us your great secret at last? What are you going
to give your Grandmamma? I think another head would be your best
gift. But good-bye, gentlemen," and taking his hat and cardboard
he departed.
I too had thought that another head than the one at which I had
been working would be a better gift; so, when we were told that
Grandmamma's name-day was soon to come round and that we must
each of us have a present ready for her, I had taken it into my
head to write some verses in honour of the occasion, and had
forthwith composed two rhymed couplets, hoping that the rest
would soon materialise. I really do not know how the idea--one so
peculiar for a child--came to occur to me, but I know that I liked
it vastly, and answered all questions on the subject of my gift
by declaring that I should soon have something ready for
Grandmamma, but was not going to say what it was.
Contrary to my expectation, I found that, after the first two
couplets executed in the initial heat of enthusiasm, even my most
strenuous efforts refused to produce another one. I began to read
different poems in our books, but neither Dimitrieff nor
Derzhavin could help me. On the contrary, they only confirmed my
sense of incompetence. Knowing, however, that Karl Ivanitch was
fond of writing verses, I stole softly upstairs to burrow among
his papers, and found, among a number of German verses, some in
the Russian language which seemed to have come from his own pen.
To L
Remember near
Remember far,
Remember me.
To-day be faithful, and for ever--
Aye, still beyond the grave--remember
That I have well loved thee.
"KARL MAYER."
These verses (which were written in a fine, round hand on thin
letter-paper) pleased me with the touching sentiment with which
they seemed to be inspired. I learnt them by heart, and decided
to take them as a model. The thing was much easier now. By the
time the name-day had arrived I had completed a twelve-couplet
congratulatory ode, and sat down to the table in our school-room
to copy them out on vellum.
Two sheets were soon spoiled--not because I found it necessary to
alter anything (the verses seemed to me perfect), but because,
after the third line, the tail-end of each successive one would
go curving upward and making it plain to all the world that the
whole thing had been written with a want of adherence to the
horizontal--a thing which I could not bear to see.
The third sheet also came out crooked, but I determined to make
it do. In my verses I congratulated Grandmamma, wished her many
happy returns, and concluded thus:
Endeavouring you to please and cheer,
We love you like our Mother dear."
This seemed to me not bad, yet it offended my car somehow.
"Lo-ve you li-ike our Mo-ther dear," I repeated to myself. "What
other rhyme could I use instead of 'dear'? Fear? Steer? Well, it
must go at that. At least the verses are better than Karl
Ivanitch's."
Accordingly I added the last verse to the rest. Then I went into
our bedroom and recited the whole poem aloud with much feeling
and gesticulation. The verses were altogether guiltless of metre,
but I did not stop to consider that. Yet the last one displeased
me more than ever. As I sat on my bed I thought:
"Why on earth did I write 'like our Mother dear'? She is not
here, and therefore she need never have been mentioned. True, I
love and respect Grandmamma, but she is not quite the same as--
Why DID I write that? What did I go and tell a lie for? They may
be verses only, yet I needn't quite have done that."
At that moment the tailor arrived with some new clothes for us.
"Well, so be it!" I said in much vexation as I crammed the
verses hastily under my pillow and ran down to adorn myself in
the new Moscow garments.
They fitted marvellously-both the brown jacket with yellow
buttons (a garment made skin-tight and not "to allow room for
growth," as in the country) and the black trousers (also close-
fitting so that they displayed the figure and lay smoothly over
the boots).
"At last I have real trousers on!" I thought as I looked at my
legs with the utmost satisfaction. I concealed from every one the
fact that the new clothes were horribly tight and uncomfortable,
but, on the contrary, said that, if there were a fault, it was
that they were not tight enough. For a long while I stood before
the looking-glass as I combed my elaborately pomaded head, but,
try as I would, I could not reduce the topmost hairs on the crown
to order. As soon as ever I left off combing them, they sprang up
again and radiated in different directions, thus giving my face
a ridiculous expression.
Karl Ivanitch was dressing in another room, and I heard some one
bring him his blue frockcoat and under-linen. Then at the door
leading downstairs I heard a maid-servant's voice, and went to
see what she wanted. In her hand she held a well-starched shirt
which she said she had been sitting up all night to get ready. I
took it, and asked if Grandmamma was up yet.
"Oh yes, she has had her coffee, and the priest has come. My
word, but you look a fine little fellow! " added the girl with a
smile at my new clothes.
This observation made me blush, so I whirled round on one leg,
snapped my fingers, and went skipping away, in the hope that by
these manoeuvres I should make her sensible that even yet she had
not realised quite what a fine fellow I was.
However, when I took the shirt to Karl I found that he did not
need it, having taken another one. Standing before a small
looking-glass, he tied his cravat with both hands--trying, by
various motions of his head, to see whether it fitted him
comfortably or not--and then took us down to see Grandmamma. To
this day I cannot help laughing when I remember what a smell of
pomade the three of us left behind us on the staircase as we
descended.
Karl was carrying a box which he had made himself, Woloda, his
drawing, and I my verses, while each of us also had a form of
words ready with which to present his gift. Just as Karl opened
the door, the priest put on his vestment and began to say
prayers.
During the ceremony Grandmamma stood leaning over the back of a
chair, with her head bent down. Near her stood Papa. He turned
and smiled at us as we hurriedly thrust our presents behind our
backs and tried to remain unobserved by the door. The whole
effect of a surprise, upon which we had been counting, was
entirely lost. When at last every one had made the sign of the
cross I became intolerably oppressed with a sudden, invincible,
and deadly attack of shyness, so that the courage to, offer my
present completely failed me. I hid myself behind Karl Ivanitch,
who solemnly congratulated Grandmamma and, transferring his box
from his right hand to his left, presented it to her. Then he
withdrew a few steps to make way for Woloda. Grandmamma seemed
highly pleased with the box (which was adorned with a gold
border), and smiled in the most friendly manner in order to
express her gratitude. Yet it was evident that, she did not know
where to set the box down, and this probably accounts for the
fact that she handed it to Papa, at the same time bidding him
observe how beautifully it was made.
His curiosity satisfied, Papa handed the box to the priest, who
also seemed particularly delighted with it, and looked with
astonishment, first at the article itself, and then at the artist
who could make such wonderful things. Then Woloda presented his
Turk, and received a similarly flattering ovation on all sides.
It was my turn now, and Grandmamma turned to me with her kindest
smile. Those who have experienced what embarrassment is know that
it is a feeling which grows in direct proportion to delay, while
decision decreases in similar measure. In other words the longer
the condition lasts, the more invincible does it become, and the
smaller does the power of decision come to be.
My last remnants of nerve and energy had forsaken me while Karl
and Woloda had been offering their presents, and my shyness now
reached its culminating point, I felt the blood rushing from my
heart to my head, one blush succeeding another across my face,
and drops of perspiration beginning to stand out on my brow and
nose. My ears were burning, I trembled from head to foot, and,
though I kept changing from one foot to the other, I remained
rooted where I stood.
"Well, Nicolinka, tell us what you have brought?" said Papa.
"Is it a box or a drawing? "
There was nothing else to be done. With a trembling hand held out
the folded, fatal paper, but my voiced failed me completely and I
stood before Grandmamma in silence. I could not get rid of the
dreadful idea that, instead of a display of the expected drawing,
some bad verses of mine were about to be read aloud before every
one, and that the words "our Mother dear " would clearly prove
that I had never loved, but had only forgotten, her. How shall I
express my sufferings when Grandmamma began to read my poetry
aloud?--when, unable to decipher it, she stopped half-way and
looked at Papa with a smile (which I took to be one of
ridicule)?--when she did not pronounce it as I had meant it to be
pronounced?--and when her weak sight not allowing her to finish
it, she handed the paper to Papa and requested him to read it all
over again from the beginning? I fancied that she must have done
this last because she did not like to read such a lot of stupid,
crookedly written stuff herself, yet wanted to point out to Papa
my utter lack of feeling. I expected him to slap me in the face
with the verses and say, "You bad boy! So you have forgotten
your Mamma! Take that for it!" Yet nothing of the sort happened.
On the contrary, when the whole had been read, Grandmamma said,
"Charming!" and kissed me on the forehead. Then our presents,
together with two cambric pocket-handkerchiefs and a snuff-box
engraved with Mamma's portrait, were laid on the table
attached to the great Voltairian arm-chair in which Grandmamma
always sat.
"The Princess Barbara Ilinitsha!" announced one of the two
footmen who used to stand behind Grandmamma's carriage, but
Grandmamma was looking thoughtfully at the portrait on the snuff-
box, and returned no answer.
"Shall I show her in, madam?" repeated the footman.
