Chapter 34 : An Experiment In Russian History

I made still other experiments in teaching the history of our own time, and these experiments were thoroughly successful. I told the story of the Crimean campaign; I described the reign of the Emperor Nicholas, and I related the story of the year 1812. All this was in an almost narrative tone, for the larger part, with no attempt at historical accuracy, but grouping the events around some single individual. I obtained the greatest success, as I might have expected, from my story of the war with Napoleon.

This lesson made a memorable hour in our lives. I shall never forget it. For some time the children had been promised that I should tell them from the ending, and the other teacher from the beginning, and that thus we should meet. My evening scholars were beginning to disperse; I went to the class of Russian history; the account of Sevastopol was in progress: they were bored. On the high bench three peasant girls wrapped up in shawls were sitting together, as always. One was asleep. Mishka nudged me.

"Look-a-there! See those cuckoos sitting there, and one of them has gone to sleep."

And she was just like a cuckoo.

"Tell from the ending instead," said some one, and all started up.

I sat down and began my story. As was always the case, the confusion, groans, and hubbub lasted several minutes. One climbed on the table; another, on a chair; another, on a bench; another leaned on his mate's shoulder; another sat in her friend's lap; and at last all became quiet.

I began with Alexander I. I told them about the French Revolution, about Napoleon's triumphs, about his usurpation of power, and about the war which ended with the peace of Tilsit.

As soon as Russia began to come into the story, then from all sides were heard sounds and words expressive of lively sympathy.

"Why did he want to conquer us also?"

"Never mind; Alexander will give it to him!" said some one who knew about Alexander I.; but I was obliged to dash their hopes: the time of triumph had not yet come, and they were very much aggrieved because of the scheme that Napoleon should marry the Czar's sister, and because Alexander spoke with him as an equal at the interview on the raft.

"You just wait!" said Petka, with a threatening gesture.

"Well, well; tell on!"

When Alexander did not give in to Napoleon, that is, when he declared war, all expressed their assent. When Napoleon, with his "twelve languages," marched against us, and aroused the Germans and Poland against us, all were overwhelmed with grief.

A German friend of mine was present in the room. "Ah! and you, too, were against us!" cried Petka, our best story-teller, to him.

"Hush, now!" cried the others.

The retreat of our armies was a cruel disappointment to my listeners, and on all sides were heard exclamations and objurgations on Kutuzof and Barklay:

"Why! and what a coward Kutuzof was!"

"You wait!" said another.

"Well, did he surrender?" asked a third.

When we came to the battle of Borodino, and when at the end I was obliged to tell them that after all we did not conquer, I could not help pitying them: it was evident that I was giving them all such a terrible shock.

"Still, it was neither ours nor theirs that beat."

When Napoleon came to Moscow and demanded the keys and the salutations, there was a perfect storm expressing their disgust.

The burning of Moscow, of course, was hailed with satisfaction. Finally, there came the triumph the retreat.

"As soon as he left Moscow, then Kutuzof began to follow him, and began to attack him," said I.

"He got a-straddle of him," interrupted Fedka, who, all of a glow, was sitting in front of me, and in his excitement was twisting his little dirty fingers. That was a habit of his.

As soon as he said that, the whole room seemed to groan with proud enthusiasm. They crowded one little fellow in the rear, and no one noticed it.

"Ah! that's the way to do it! That's how he got the keys!" and so on.

Then I went on to tell how we drove out the Frenchmen. It was painful for the scholars to hear about the delay at the Berezina River, and that we let him escape.

Petka even shouted, "I would have shot him dead for stopping there!"

Then we began to feel a little compunction for the frozen Frenchmen. Then, when we had crossed the border, and the Germans who had been opposed to us before declared for us, some one remembered the German present in the room.

"Ah! and that is the way you did? First you were against us, and then when we got strong you took our side!" and suddenly all got up and began to oh! oh! and ah! ah! at the German, so that the noise could have been heard in the street.

When they came to order, I went on to tell them how we escorted Napoleon to Paris; how we set the rightful king on the throne; how we enjoyed our triumphs and feasted; but then the memory of the Crimean War spoiled for us all this glory.

"Just wait! "cried Petka again, shaking his curls. "Wait till I grow up, and I will pay 'em back!"

If now the allied armies had attacked the Shevardinsky redoubt or the Malakhof Tower, we should have driven them back!

It was already late when I brought my story to an end. As a general thing the children are asleep by this time. But no one was sleepy; even the eyes of the cuckoos were aglow. The moment I stood up, Taraska, to my great amazement, crept out from under my arm-chair, and looked at me with eager, but at the same time serious, face.

"How came you under there?"

"He has been there from the very first," said some one.

There was no need of asking if he had understood: it was evident by his face.

"What can you tell us about it?" I asked.

"I?" he repeated; "I can tell it all. I am going to tell about it when I get home."

"And I."

"And I too."

"Won't it be too long?"

"No, indeed!"

And all slipped down-stairs, one promising to give it to the Frenchman, another upbraiding the German, and another repeating how Kutuzof had "straddled" him.

"You have given it to them wholly from the Russian standpoint," [51] said my German friend, who had been almost mobbed by the boys that evening. "You ought to hear how that story is told among us Germans. You have told them nothing about the German battle for liberty." [52]

I entirely agreed with him that my narrative was not history, but a tale kindling the national sentiment.

Of course, as instruction in history this experiment also was even more unsuccessful than the first.