When I offered to place her children in a children’s home, the woman abandoned by her husband grew confused, considered a bit, thanked me very much, but evidently did not want that: she would have preferred a gift of money. The eldest girl helped her with the washing and the middle one took care of the little boy. The old woman begged hard to be put in an alms-house, but when I looked at the corner she lived in I saw that she was not destitute. She had a small trunk with goods in it, a teapot with a tin spout, two cups, and boxes that had held sweets and now had tea and sugar in them.
She knitted socks and gloves and had a monthly allowance from a benefactress. What the peasant for his part evidently wanted was not something to eat but something to drink, and all that might be given him would go to the gin-shop. So that in that lodging there were none of those with whom, as I fancied, the house overflowed-people whom I could make happy by a gift of money. They were, It seemed to me, poor people of a dubious kind. I noted down the old woman, the woman with children, and the peasant, and decided that they would have to be attended to, but only after I had attended to those specially unfortunate ones whom I expected to find in that house.
I decided that in the help we were going to distribute there must be a sequence: first would come the most unfortunate, and afterwards these people. But in the next and the next lodging it was the same thing. All the people were of the same kind, cases one would have to look into more carefully before helping them. I did not find any unfortunates who could be made fortunate by a mere gift of money. Ashamed as lam to admit it, I began to feel disappointed at not seeing in these houses anything like what I had expected. I thought I should find people of an exceptional kind, but when I had been to all the lodgings I became convinced that the inhabitants of these houses are not at all exceptional, but are just such people as those among whom I live.
Among them, as among us, there were some more or less good and more or less bad, more or less happy and more or less miserable; and the unhappy were just such as exist among ourselves; people whose unhappiness depends not on external conditions but on themselves-a kind of unhappiness bank-notes cannot cure.
CHAPTER VI
dwellers in these houses form the lowest layer of the town population, of whom there are in Moscow probably more than a hundred thousand. Here in this house were representatives of all sections of this population: small employers and artisans, boot makers, brush makers, carpenters, joiners, cobblers, tailors, and smiths, and here too were cabmen and men trading on their own account, also women who kept stalls, washerwomen, dealers in old clothes, petty money-lenders, day-labourers, and people with no fixed occupation, as well as beggars and dissolute women.
Many of the very people I had seen at the entrance to Lyapin House were here, but here they were distributed among many workers. And moreover, whereas I had then seen them at their most wretched time when they had eaten and drunk all they possessed: and when, cold, naked, and driven from the taverns, they were waiting, as for heavenly manna, for admission into the free Night-Lodging-House to be taken thence to the promised land of prison and sent under police escort back to their villages-here I saw them scattered among a large number of workers and at a time when one way or other they had obtained three or five kopeks1 to pay for a night’s lodging, or perhaps even had some rubles to spend on food and drink.
Strange as it may seem to say so, I did not here experience anything like the feeling I. had at Lyapin House. On the contrary, during the first round both I and the students had an almost pleasant feeling. Why do I say, ‘almost pleasant’? That is untrue-the feeling produced by intercourse with these people, strange as it seems to say so, was simply a very pleasant one.
The first impression was that the majority of those who lived here were working people, and very good-natured ones.
We found most of them at work: washerwomen at their troughs, carpenters at their benches, boot makers on their stools. The narrow lodgings were full of people, and brisk, cheery work was going on. The place smelt of workmen’s perspiration, and at the boot maker’s of leather, and at the carpenter’s of shavings. One often heard singing, or saw sinewy bare arms quickly and skillfully performing accustomed movements.
Everywhere we were greeted cheerily and kindly: almost everywhere our intrusion into the daily life of these people was far from evoking the pretension or desire to show off and reply curtly which was evoked by the Census-takers’ call at the houses of most of the wealthy families, but on the contrary these people replied to all our questions properly, without attaching any special importance to them. Our questions merely gave them occasion to make merry and joke about how the return should be filled in, who ought to count as two, and which two as one, and so forth.
1 A kopek was about a farthing.
We found many of them at dinner or tea, and every time in reply to our greeting: ‘Bread and salt’ or ‘Tea and sugar’,1 they replied ‘Please to join us’, and even moved up to make room for us. Instead of the haunt of constantly changing inhabitants we thought we should find here, it turned out that in this house there were many lodgings in which people had lived a long time. One carpenter with his workmen, and a boot maker with his assistants, had been there for ten years. At the boot maker’s it was very dirty and crowded, but all the people at work were very cheerful I tried to talk with one of the workmen, wishing to hear from him of the misery of his position and of his being in debt to his master, but the workman did not understand me and spoke very well of his master and of his own life.
In one lodging an old man lived with his old wife. They sold apples. Their room was warm, clean, and full of goods. The floor was spread with straw sacking which they got at the wholesale apple-dealers. There were trunks, cupboards, a samovar, and crockery. In the comer were many icons, with two little lamps burning before them; on the walls hung warm overcoats covered up with sheets. The old woman, who had star-shaped wrinkles, was affable, talkative, and apparently pleased at her own quiet well ordered life.
Ivan Fedotych, the landlord of the tavern and the lodgings, came from the tavern and went along with us. He jested good-humouredly with many of the lodgers, calling them all by their Christian names and patronymics,2 and gave us brief sketches of them. They were all people of ordinary types, Martin Semenoviches, Peter Petroviches, Mary Ivanovnas-people who did not consider themselves unfortunate, but considered themselves, and really were, like anyone else.
We came prepared to see nothing but horrors; and instead of horrors we were shown something good that involuntarily evoked our respect. There were so many of these good people that the tattered, fallen, idle ones, scattered here and there among them, did not destroy the general impression.
The students were not so much struck by this as I was. They had come simply to do something they considered to be of scientific value, and were incidentally making casual observations; but I was a philanthropist and came to help the unfortunate, perishing, depraved people I expected to find here. And instead of unfortunate, perishing, depraved people, I saw a majority of tranquil, contented, cheerful, kindly and very good working people.
I felt this most vividly when in these lodgings I really came on some cases of crying need such as I was prepared to help.
When I discovered such need I always found that it had already been met, and that the help I wished to render had already been given: given before I came, and by whom? By those same un-fortunate depraved creatures I was prepared to save; and given in a better way than I could have done.
In one cellar lay a lonely old man, ill of typhus. He had no connexions. A widow with a little daughter-a stranger to him but his neighbour (occupying another corner of the
1 Customary Russian folk-greetings to people having a meal.
2 This is a usual Russian practice, but indicates some amount of familiarity with the lodgers on the part of the landlord.-A. M.
room he lived in) was looking after him. She gave him tea, and bought medicine for him out of her own money. In another room lay a woman suffering from puerperal fever. A woman of the town was rocking the baby, had made it some pap wrapped in a rag to suck, and for two days had not gone out to ply her trade. A
