Book: Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXIX.

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BLACKWOOD'S EDINBURGH MAGAZINE

NO. CCCXXIX. MARCH, 1843. VOL. LIII.




CONTENTS.


AMMALAT BEK. A TRUE TALE OF THE CAUCASUS FROM THE RUSSIAN OF MARLINSKI
POEMS AND BALLADS OF SCHILLER.--NO. VI.
CALEB STUKELY. PART XII.
IMAGINARY CONVERSATION. BY WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR. SANDT AND KOTZEBUE
THE JEWELLER'S WIFE. A PASSAGE IN THE CAREER OF EL EMPECINADO
THE TALE OF A TUB:
AN ADDITIONAL CHAPTER--HOW JACK RAN MAD A SECOND TIME
PAUL DE KOCKNEYISMS, BY A COCKNEY
THE WORLD OF LONDON. SECOND SERIES. PART III.
THE LOST LAMB. BY DELTA
COMTE

* * * * *




AMMALAT BEK.

A TRUE TALE OF THE CAUCASUS.

TRANSLATED FROM THE RUSSIAN OF MARLINSKI. BY THOMAS B. SHAW, B.A. OF
CAMBRIDGE, ADJUNCT PROFESSOR OF ENGLISH LITERATURE IN THE IMPERIAL
LYCEUM OF TSARSKOE SELO.


THE TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.

The English mania for travelling, which supplies our continental
neighbours with such abundant matter for wonderment and witticism, is of
no very recent date. Now more than ever, perhaps, does this passion seem
to possess us:

"----tenet insanabile multos
_Terrarum_ [Greek: kakoithes], et aegro in corde senescit:"

when the press groans with "Tours," "Trips," "Hand-books," "Journeys,"
"Visits."

In spite of this, it is as notorious as unaccountable, that England
knows very little, or at least very little correctly, of the social
condition, manners, and literature of one of the most powerful among her
continental sisters.

The friendly relations between Great Britain and Russia, established in
the reign of Edward V., have subsisted without interruption since that
epoch, so auspicious to both nations: the bond of amity, first knit by
Chancellor in 1554, has never since been relaxed: the two nations have
advanced, each at its own pace, and by its own paths, towards the
sublime goal of improvement and civilization--have stood shoulder to
shoulder in the battle for the weal and liberty of mankind.

It is, nevertheless, as strange as true, that the land of Alfred and
Elizabeth is yet but imperfectly acquainted with the country of Peter
and of Catharine. The cause of this ignorance is assuredly not to be
found in any indifference or want of curiosity on the part of English
travellers. There is no lack of pilgrims annually leaving the bank of
Thames,

"With cockle hat and staff,
With gourd and sandal shoon;"

armed duly with note-book and "patent Mordan," directing their wandering
steps to the shores of Ingria, or the gilded cupolas of Moscow. But a
very short residence in the empire of the Tsar will suffice to convince
a foreigner how defective, and often how false, is the information given
by travellers respecting the social and national character of the
Russians. These abundant and singular misrepresentations are not, of
course, voluntary; and it may not be useless to point out their
principal sources.

The chief of these is, without doubt, the difficulty and novelty of the
language, and the unfortunate facility of travelling over the beaten
track--from St Petersburg to Moscow, and from Moscow, perhaps, to Nijny
Novgorod, without any acquaintance with that language. The foreigner may
enjoy, during a visit of the usual duration, the hospitality for which
the higher classes are so justly celebrated; but his association with
the nobility will be found an absolute obstacle to the making even a
trifling progress in the Russian language; which, though now regaining a
degree of attention from the elevated classes,[1] too long denied to it
by those with whom their native tongue _was_ an unfashionable one--he
would have no occasion at all to speak, and not even very frequent
opportunities of hearing.

[1] There is, strictly speaking, no middle class in Russia; the
"bourgeoisie," or merchants, it is true, may seem to form an
exception to this remark, but into their circles the traveller
would find it, from many reasons, difficult, and even
impossible, to enter.

But even in those rare cases where the stranger united to a
determination to study the noble and interesting language of the
country, an intention of remaining here long enough to learn it, he was
often discouraged by the belief, that the literature was too poor to
repay his time and labour. Besides, the Russian language has so little
relation to the other European tongues--it stands so much alone, and
throws so little direct light upon any of them, that another obstacle
was thrown into his way.

The acquisition of any one of that great family of languages, all
derived, more or less remotely, from the Latin, which extends over the
whole south and west of Europe, cannot fail to cast a strong light upon
the other cognate dialects; as the knowledge of any one of the Oriental
tongues facilitates, nay almost confers, a mastery over the thousand
others, which are less languages of distinct type than dialects of the
same speech, offshoots from the same stock.

Add to this, the extraordinary errors and omissions which abound in
every disquisition hitherto published in French, English, and German
periodicals with regard to Russian literature, and deform those wretched
rags of translation which are all that has been hitherto done towards
the reproduction, in our own language, of the literature of Russia.
These versions were made by persons utterly unacquainted with the
country, the manners, and the people, or made after the Russian had been
distilled through the alembic of a previous French or German
translation.

Poetry naturally forces its way into the notice of a foreign nation
sooner than prose; but it is, nevertheless, rather singular than
honourable to the literary enterprise of England, that the present is
the first attempt to introduce to the British public any work of Russian
Prose Fiction whatever, with any thing like a reasonable selection of
subject and character, at least _directly_ from the original language.

The two volumes of Translations published by Bowring, under the title of
"Russian Anthology," and consisting chiefly of short lyric pieces, would
appear at first sight an exception to that indifference to the
productions of Russian genius of which we have accused the English
public; and the popularity of that collection would be an additional
encouragement to the hope, that our charge may be, if not ill-founded,
at least exaggerated.

We are willing to believe, that the degree--if we are rightly informed,
no slight one--of interest with which these volumes were welcomed in
England, was sufficient to blind their readers to the extreme
incompetency with which the translations they contained were executed.

It is always painful to find fault--more painful to criticise with
severity--the work of a person whose motive was the same as that which
actuates the present publication; but when the gross unfaithfulness[2]
exhibited in the versions in question tends to give a false and
disparaging idea of the value and the tone of Russian poetry, we may be
excused for our apparent uncourteousness in thus pointing out their
defects.

[2] In making so grave a charge, proof will naturally be
required of us. Though we might fill many pages with instances
of the two great sins of the translator, commission and
omission, the _poco piu_ and _poco meno_, we will content
ourselves with taking, _ad aperturam libri_, an example. At
page 55 of the Second Part of Bowring's Russian Anthology, will
be found a short lyric piece of Dmitrieff, entitled "To Chloe."
It consists of five stanzas, each of four very short lines. Of
these five stanzas, three have a totally different meaning in
the English from their signification in the Russian, and of the
remaining two, one contains an idea which the reader will look
for in vain in the original. This carelessness is the less
excusable, as the verses in question present nothing in style,
subject, or diction, which could offer the smallest difficulty
to a translator. Judging this to be no unfair test, (the piece
in question was taken at random,) it will not be necessary to
dilate upon minor defects, painfully perceptible through
Bowring's versions; as, for instance, a frequent disregard of
the Russian metres--sins against _costume_, as, for example,
the making a hussar (a _Russian_ hussar) swear by his _beard_,
&c. &c. &c.

It will not, we trust, be considered out of place to give our readers a
brief sketch of the history of the Russian literature; the origin,
growth, and fortunes of which are marked by much that is peculiar. In
doing this we shall content ourselves with noting, as briefly as
possible, the events which preceded and accompanied the birth of letters
in Russia, and the evolution of a literature not elaborated by the slow
and imperceptible action of time, but bursting, like the armed Pallas,
suddenly into light.

In performing this task, we shall confine our attention solely to the
department of Prose Fiction, looking forward meanwhile with anxiety,
though not without hope, to a future opportunity of discussing more
fully the intellectual annals of Russia.

In the year of redemption 863, two Greeks of Thessalonika, Cyril[3] and
Methodius, sent by Michael, Emperor of the East, conferred the precious
boon of alphabetic writing upon Kostislaff, Sviatopolk, and Kotsel, then
chiefs of the Moravians.

[3] Cyril was the ecclesiastical or claustral name of this
important personage, his real name was Constantine.

The characters they introduced were naturally those of the Greek
alphabet, to which they were obliged, in order to represent certain
sounds which do not occur in the Greek language,[4] to add a number of
other signs borrowed from the Hebrew, the Armenian, and the Coptic. So
closely, indeed, did this alphabet, called the Cyrillian, follow the
Greek characters, that the use of the aspirates was retained without any
necessity.

[4] For instance, the _j_, (pronounced as the French _j_), _ts,
sh, shtsh, tch, ui, yae_. As the characters representing these
sounds are not to be found in the "case" of an English
compositor, we cannot enter into their Oriental origin.

These characters (with the exception of a few which are omitted in the
Russian) varied surprisingly little in their form,[5] and perhaps
without any change whatever in their vocal value, compose the modern
alphabet of the Russian language; an examination of which would go far,
in our opinion, to settle the long agitated question respecting the
ancient pronunciation of the classic languages, particularly as Cyril
and his brother adapted the Greek alphabet to a language totally foreign
from, and unconnected with, any dialect of Greek.

[5] Not to speak of the capitals, the [Greek: gamma, delta,
zeta, kappa, lambda, mu, omicron, pi, rho, sigma, phi, chi,
theta], have undergone hardly the most trifling change in form;
[Greek: psi, xi, omega], though they do not occur in the
Russian, are found in the Slavonic alphabet. The Russian
pronunciation of their letter B, which agrees with that of the
modern Greeks, is V, there being another character for the
_sound_ B.

In this, as in all other languages, the translation of the Bible is the
first monument and model of literature. This version was made by Cyril
immediately after the composition of the alphabet. The language spoken
at Thessalonika was the Servian: but from the immense number of purely
Greek words which occur in the translation, as well as from the fact of
the version being a strictly literal one, it is probable that the
Scriptures were not translated into any specific spoken dialect at all;
but that a kind of _mezzo-termine_ was selected--or rather formed--for
the purpose. What we have advanced derives a still stronger degree of
probability from the circumstance, that the Slavonic Bible follows the
Greek _construction_. This Bible, with slight changes and corrections
produced by three or four revisions made at different periods, is that
still employed by the Russian Church; and the present spoken language of
the country differs so widely from it, that the Slavonian of the Bible
forms a separate branch of education to the priests and to the upper
classes--who are instructed in this _dead_ language, precisely as an
Italian must study Latin in order to read the Bible.

Above the sterile and uninteresting desert of early Russian history,
towers, like the gigantic Sphynx of Ghizeh over the sand of the Thebaid,
one colossal figure--that of Vladimir Sviatoslavitch; the first to
surmount the bloody splendour of the Great Prince's bonnet[6] with the
mildly-radiant Cross of Christ.

[6] The crown was not worn by the ancient Russian sovereigns,
or "Grand Princes," as they were called; the insignia of these
potentates was a close skull-cap, called in Russian shapka,
bonnet; many of which are preserved in the regalia of Moscow.
This bonnet is generally surrounded by the most precious furs,
and gorgeously decorated with gems.

From the conversion to Christianity of Vladimir and his
subjects--passing over the wild and rapacious dominion of the Tartar
hordes, which lasted for about 250 years--we may consider two languages,
essentially distinct, to have been employed in Russia till the end of
the 17th century--the one the written or learned, the other the spoken
language.

The former was the Slavonian into which the Holy Scriptures were
translated: and this remained the learned or official language for a
long period. In this--or in an imitation of this, effected with various
degrees of success--were compiled the different collections of Monkish
annals which form the treasury whence future historians were to select
their materials from among the valuable, but confused accumulations of
facts; in this the solemn acts of Government, treaties, codes, &c., were
composed; and the few writings which cannot be comprised under the above
classes[7] were naturally compiled in the language, emphatically that of
the Church and of learning.

[7] For instance, sermons, descriptions, voyages and travels,
&c. Two of the last-mentioned species of works are very curious
from their antiquity. The Pilgrimage to Jerusalem of Daniel,
prior of a convent, at the commencement of the 12th century;
and the Memoirs of a Journey to India by Athanase Nikitin,
merchant of Tver, made about 1470.

The sceptre of the wild Tartar Khans was not, as may be imagined, much
allied to the pen; the hordes of fierce and greedy savages which
overran, like the locusts of the Apocalypse, for two centuries and a
half the fertile plains of central and southern Russia, contented
themselves with exacting tribute from a nation which they despised
probably too much to feel any desire of interfering with its language;
and the dominion of the Tartars produced hardly any perceptible effect
upon the Russian tongue.[8]

[8] The only traces left on the _language_ by the Tartar
domination are a few words, chiefly expressing articles of
dress.

It is to the reign of Alexei Mikhailovitch, who united Little Russia to
Muscovy, that we must look for the germ of the modern literature of the
country: the language had begun to feel the influence of the Little
Russian, tinctured by the effects of Polish civilization, and the spirit
of classicism which so long distinguished the Sarmatian literature.

The impulse given to this union, of so momentous an import to the future
fortunes of the empire, at the beginning of the year 1654, would
possibly have brought forth in course of time a literature in Russia
such as we now find it, had not the extraordinary reign, and still more
extraordinary character, of Peter the Great interposed certain
disturbing--if, indeed, they may not be called in some measure
impeding--forces. That giant hand which broke down the long impregnable
dike which had hitherto separated Russia from the rest of Europe, and
admitted the arts, the learning, and the civilization of the West to
rush in with so impetuous a flood, fertilizing as it came, but also
destroying and sweeping away something that was valuable, much that was
national--that hand was unavoidably too heavy and too strong to nurse
the infant seedling of literature; and the command and example of Peter
perhaps rather favoured the imitation of what was good in other
languages, than the production of originality in his own.

This opinion, bold and perhaps rash as it may appear to Russians, seems
to derive some support, as well as illustration, from the immense number
of foreign words which make the Russian of Peter's time

"A Babylonish dialect;"

the mania for every thing foreign having overwhelmed the language with
an infinity of terms rudely torn, not skilfully adapted, from every
tongue; terms which might have been--have, indeed, since
been--translated into words of Russian form and origin. A review of the
literary progress made at this time will, we think, go far to establish
our proposition; it will exhibit a very large proportion of
translations, but very few original productions.

From this period begins the more immediate object of the present note:
we shall briefly trace the rise and fortunes of the present, or
vernacular Russian literature; confining our attention, as we have
proposed, to the Prose Fiction, and contenting ourselves with noting,
cursorily, the principal authors in this kind, living and dead.

At the time of Peter the Great, there may be said to have existed (it
will be convenient to keep in mind) three languages--the Slavonic, to
which we have already alluded; the Russian; and the dialect of Little
Russia.

The fact, that the learned are not yet agreed upon the exact epoch from
which to date the origin of the modern Russian literature, will probably
raise a smile on the reader's lip; but the difficulty of establishing
this important starting-point will become apparent when he reflects upon
the circumstance, that the literature is--as we have stated--divisible
into two distinct and widely differing regions. It will be sufficiently
accurate to date the origin of the modern Russian literature at about a
century back from the present time; and to consider Lomonosoff as its
founder. Mikhail Vassilievitch Lomonosoff, born in 1711, is the author
who may with justice be regarded as the Chaucer or the Boccacio of the
North: a man of immense and varied accomplishments, distinguished in
almost every department of literature, and in many of the walks of
science. An orator and a poet, he adorned the language whose principles
he had fixed as a grammarian.

He was the first to write in the spoken language of his country, and, in
conjunction with his two contemporaries, Soumarokoff and Kheraskoff, he
laid the foundations of the Russian literature.

Of the other two names we have mentioned as entitled to share the
reverence due from every Russian to the fathers of his country's
letters, it will be sufficient to remark, that Soumarokoff was the first
to introduce tragedy and opera, and Kheraskoff, the author of two epic
poems which we omit to particularize, as not coming within our present
scope, wrote a work entitled "Cadmus and Harmonia," which may be
considered as the first romance. It is a narrative and metaphysical
work, which we should class as a "prose poem;" the style being
considerably elevated above the tone of the "Musa pedestris."

The name of Emin comes next in historical, though not literary,
importance: though the greater part of his productions consists of
translations, particularly of those shorter pieces of prose fiction
called by the Italians "novelle," he was the author of a few original
pieces, now but little read; his style bears the marks, like that of
Kheraskoff, of heaviness, stiffness, and want of finish.

The reputation of Karamzin is too widely spread throughout Europe to
render necessary more than a passing remark as to the additions made by
him to the literature of his country in the department of fiction: he
commenced a romance, of which he only lived to finish a few of the first
chapters.

Narejniy was the first to paint the real life of Russia--or rather of
the South or Little Russia: in his works there is a good deal of
vivacity, but as they are deformed by defects both in style and taste,
his reputation has become almost extinct. We cannot quit this division
of our subject, which refers to romantic fiction anterior to the
appearance of the regular historical novel, without mentioning the names
of two, among a considerable number of authors, distinguished as having
produced short narratives or tales, embodying some historical
event--Polevoi and Bestonjeff--the latter of whom wrote, under the name
of Marlinski, a very large number of tales, which have acquired a high
and deserved reputation.

It is with Zagoskin that we may regard the regular historical
novel--viewing that species of composition as exemplified in the works
of Scott--as having commenced.

With reference to the present state of romance in Russia, the field is
so extensive as to render impossible, in this place, more than a cursory
allusion to the principal authors and their best-known works: in doing
which, we shall attend more exclusively to those productions of which
the subject or treatment is purely national.

One of the most popular and prolific writers of fiction is Zagoskin,
whose historical romance "Youriy Miloslaffskiy," met with great and
permanent success. The epoch of this story is in 1612, a most
interesting crisis in the Russian history, when the valour of Minin
enabled his countrymen to shake off the hated yoke of Poland. His other
work, "Roslavleoff," is less interesting: the period is 1812. We may
also mention his "Iskonsitel"--"the Tempter"--a fantastic story, in
which an imaginary being is represented as mingling with and influencing
the affairs of real life.

Of Boulgarin, we may mention, besides his "Ivan Vuijgin," a romance in
the manner of "Gil Blas," the scenery and characters of which are
entirely Russian, two historical novels of considerable importance. "The
False Dimitri," and "Mazeppa,"--the hero of the latter being _a real
person_, and not, as most readers are aware, a fictitious character
invented by Byron.

Next comes the name of Lajetchnikoff, whose "Last Page" possesses a
reputation, we believe, tolerably extensive throughout Europe. The
action passes during the war between Charles XII. and Peter the Great,
and Catharine plays a chief part in it, as servant of the pastor Glueck,
becoming empress at the conclusion. The "House of Ice," by the same
writer, is perhaps more generally known than the preceding work. The
last-named romance depicts with great spirit the struggle between the
Russian and foreign parties in the reign of Anna Ivanovna. But perhaps
the most remarkable work of Lajetchnikoff is the romance entitled
"Bassourman," the scene of which is laid under Ivan III., surnamed the
Great.[9] Another Polevoi (Nikolai) produced a work of great
merit:--"The Oath at the Tomb of Our Lord," a very faithful picture of
the first half of the fifteenth century, and singular from the
circumstance that love plays no part in the drama. Besides this, we owe
to Polevoi a wild story entitled "Abbaddon." Veltman produced, under the
title of "Kostshei the Deathless," a historical study of the manners of
the twelfth century, possessing considerable merit. It would be unjust
to omit the name of a lady, the Countess Shishkin, who produced the
historical novel "Mikhail Vassilievitch Skopin-Shuisky," which obtained
great popularity.

[9] The non-Russian reader must be cautioned not to confuse
Ivan III. (surnamed Velikiy, or the Great) with Ivan IV., the
Cruel, the latter of whom is to foreigners the most prominent
figure in the Russian history. Ivan III. mounted the throne in
1462, and his terrible namesake in 1534; the reign of Vassiliy
Ivanovitch intervening between these two memorable epochs.

The picturesque career of Lomonosoff gave materials for a romantic
biography of that poet, the work of Xenophont Polevoi, resembling, in
its mixture of truth and fiction, the "Wahrheit und Dichtung" of Goethe.

Among the considerable number of romances already mentioned, those
exhibiting scenes of private life and domestic interest have not been
neglected. Kalashnikoff wrote "The Merchant Jaloboff's Daughter," and
the "Kamtchadalka," both describing the scenery and manners of Siberia;
the former painting various parts of that wild and interesting country,
the latter confined more particularly to the Peninsula of Kamtchatka.
Besides Gogol, whose easy and prolific pen has presented us with so many
humorous sketches of provincial life, we cannot pass over Begitcheff,
whose "Kholmsky Family" possesses much interest; but the delineations of
Gogol depend so much for their effect upon delicate shades of manner,
&c., that it is not probable they can ever be effectively reproduced in
another language.

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