The sight of this drawing-room and of the people collected in it impressed me very unpleasantly. Not to mention that the fortunes of the people there assembled amounted to some millions of rubles, or that the interest on the cost of their dresses, lace, bronzes, jewellery, carriages, horses, liveries, and footmen, would a hundred times exceed the value of their work, the cost of this one gathering alone: the gloves, clean linen, and conveyances, with the candles, tea, sugar and biscuits provided, must have exceeded a hundred times the value of the things produced. I saw all this and could therefore understand that here at any rate I should find no sympathy for my plan, but I had come to make the proposal, and, difficult as I felt it, I said my say (almost the same as was said in my article).
Of those present, one lady said she was too sensitive to go among the poor herself but she would give money. How much, and when she would send it, she did not say. Another lady and a young man offered their services to go among the poor, but I did not avail myself of their offer. The chief person to whom I addressed myself told me it would not be possible to do much, for lack of means. Means would be lacking because the rich in Moscow were all well known and what could be got out of them had already been got. All the philanthropists had already received rank, medals and other honours, and for a monetary success’ it would be essential to secure a fresh grant of honours from the Government, and this-the only thing that is really effective-is very difficult to obtain.
After returning home that day I lay down to sleep not merely with a foreboding that my plan would come to nothing, but with a sense of shame and a consciousness that I had
been doing something very nasty and shameful all day. But I did not abandon the attempt. In the first place, it had been started and false shame kept me to it; secondly, the mere fact of being occupied with it enabled me to continue to live in the conditions habitual to me, while its failure would oblige me to abandon these and seek new ways of life-a thing I unconsciously dreaded. So I did not trust my inward voice, and continued what I had begun.
Having given my article to be printed, I read it in proof at the Town Duma. While reading it, I felt so uncomfortable that I hesitated and blushed to tears. I noticed that everybody present was also uncomfortable. On my asking, at the end of the reading, whether the Census organizers accepted my proposal that they should remain at their posts to act as intermediaries between society and the necessitous poor, an awkward silence ensued. Then two members made speeches.
These, as it were, corrected the awkwardness of my proposal. Sympathy was expressed with my idea, but the impracticability of my thought (of which every one approved) was pointed out. After that all felt more at ease. But when subsequently, still wishing to carry my point, I asked the organizers separately whether they agreed to investigate the needs of the poor during the Census and to remain at their posts to serve as intermediaries between the poor and the rich, they all again appeared uncomfortable. Their looks seemed to say, ‘There now, we smoothed over your folly out of respect for you, but you are again obtruding it!’ That was what their looks said.
But verbally they consented and two of them separately, as though by arrangement, remarked in the self-same words ‘We consider ourselves morally bound to do it.’
When I said to the students engaged to take the Census, that besides the usual aims of the. Census the aim of philanthropy needed also to be kept in view, my communication produced a similar effect on them. I noticed that when we talked about it they were ashamed to look me in the face, as one is ashamed to look a kindly man in the face when he talks nonsense.
My article had the same effect on the newspaper editor to whom I gave it, and also on my son, and on my wife, and on the most diverse people. All, for some reason, felt uncomfortable, but all considered it necessary to approve of my idea, and all after expressing approval at once began to express doubts of its success; and all without exception began also to condemn the indifference and coldness of society and of everybody, except (evidently) themselves.
In the depth of my soul I continued to feel that all this was not the right thing, and that nothing would come of it; but the article was printed and I undertook to take part in the Census. First I had started the affair and now it dragged me along.
CHAPTER IV
AT my request they allotted me for the Census the district in the Khamovniki ward near the Smolensk market, along Protochny side-street between Riverside Passage and Nikolski side-street, in which are situated the houses generally called Rzhanov house or Rzhanov fortress. These houses formerly belonged to a merchant named Rzhanov, but
1 About the Census in Moscow, 1882.-A. M.
now belong to the Zimins. I had long heard of it as a den of most terrible poverty and vice and had therefore asked the organizers to let me take that district.
After receiving instructions from the Town Duma, I went-a few days before the Census to inspect my district, and easily found Rzhanov house by the plan they gave me…
I entered the adjoining Nikolski side-street. This ends on the left with a gloomy house which has no exit on that side, and by its appearance I guessed that this was the Rzhanov fortress.
Descending the slope of the Nikolski street I overtook some boys of ten to fourteen years old, in jackets or thin coats, sliding down the slope or going on one skate along the frozen pavement by that house. The boys were ragged and like town boys in general they were alert and impudent. I stopped to look at them. From round the corner appeared a ragged old woman with sallow flabby cheeks. She was going towards the Smolensk marketplace and wheezing like a broken-winded horse at each step she took. On coming up to me she paused, breathing hoarsely.
Anywhere else this old woman would have asked me for money, but here she only began talking. ‘See,’ she said, pointing to the skating boys, ‘all they do is to get into mischief. They will be just such Rzhanovites as their fathers.’ One of the boys, in an overcoat and a cap that had lost its peak, heard what she said and stopped. ‘What are you rowing at us for?’ he shouted at the old woman. ‘You are a Rzhanov bitch yourself!’ ‘And do you live here?’
I asked the boy. ‘Yes, and she lives here. She stole the leg of a boot!’ shouted the boy and, putting a foot out in front of him, skated away. The old woman broke out into a stream of abuse interrupted by coughs. Just then an old man all in rags, with quite white hair, came along the middle of the road descending the slope and swinging his hands, in one of which was a string of bread-stuff and cracknell rings. The old man had the appearance of one who had just fortified himself with a glass of vodka. He had evidently heard the old woman’s scoldings, and he took her part. ‘I’ll give it you, little devils, uh!’ shouted he at the boys, pretending to make for them; and having reached me, he came onto the pavement. On the Arbat1 this old man would strike one by his age, his weakness, and his destitution. Here he was a merry workman returning from his day’s work.
I followed the old man. He turned the corner to the left into the Protochny side-street, and having gone the whole length of the house and its gates he disappeared into a tavern.
Two gates and several doors open onto the Protochny side-street; there are taverns, gin shops, some provision shops and others. This is the Rzhanov fortress itself. Everything here is grey, dirty, and stinking-the building, the lodgings, the yard, and the people.
Most of those I met here were ragged and half-dressed. Some walked and some ran from one door to another. Two were bargaining about some rag or other. I went round the whole building from the Protochny side-street and the Riverside passage, and on returning I stopped at one of the gates. I wanted to enter to see what was going on inside, but felt timid about it; what was I to say if asked what I wanted? After some hesitation, however, I entered the gate. As soon as I did so I noticed an abominable stench. The yard was horribly filthy. I turned a corner and at that moment, upstairs to the left,
