A sudden noise has arisen in the street. Plaintive moans, violent oaths, outbursts of malicious laughter have become audible.

"Some one is being beaten," remarked one of the friends, after having cast a glance out of the window.

"A criminal? A murderer?" inquired the other.--"See here, no matter who it is, such chastis.e.m.e.nt without trial is not to be tolerated. Let us go and defend him."

"But it is not a murderer who is being beaten."

"Not a murderer? A thief, then? Never mind, let us go, let us rescue him from the mob."

"It is not a thief, either."

"Not a thief? Is it, then, a cashier, a railway employee, an army contractor, a Russian Maecenas, a lawyer, a well-intentioned editor, a public philanthropist?... At any rate, let us go, let us aid him!"

"No ... they are thrashing a correspondent."

"A correspondent?--Well, see here now, let's drink a gla.s.s of tea first."

July, 1878.

TWO BROTHERS

It was a vision....

Two angels presented themselves before me ... two spirits.

I say angels ... spirits, because neither of them had any garments on their naked bodies, and from the shoulders of both sprang long, powerful wings.

Both are youths. One is rather plump, smooth of skin, with black curls.

He has languishing brown eyes with thick eyelashes; his gaze is ingratiating, cheerful, and eager. A charming, captivating countenance a trifle bold, a trifle malicious. His full red lips tremble slightly. The youth smiles like one who has authority,--confidently and lazily; a sumptuous garland of flowers rests lightly on his shining hair, almost touching his velvet eyebrows. The spotted skin of a leopard, pinned with a golden dart, hangs lightly from his plump shoulders down upon his curving hips. The feathers of his wings gleam with changeable tints of rose-colour; their tips are of a brilliant red, just as though they had been dipped in fresh, crimson blood. From time to time they palpitate swiftly, with a pleasant silvery sound, the sound of rain in springtime.

The other is gaunt and yellow of body. His ribs are faintly discernible at every breath. His hair is fair, thin, straight; his eyes are huge, round, pale grey in colour ... his gaze is uneasy and strangely bright.

All his features are sharp-cut: his mouth is small, half open, with fish-like teeth; his nose is solid, aquiline; his chin projecting, covered with a whitish down. Those thin lips have never once smiled.

It is a regular, terrible, pitiless face! Moreover, the face of the first youth,--of the beauty,--although it is sweet and charming, does not express any compa.s.sion either. Around the head of the second are fastened a few empty, broken ears of grain intertwined with withered blades of gra.s.s. A coa.r.s.e grey fabric encircles his loins; the wings at his back, of a dull, dark-blue colour, wave softly and menacingly.

Both youths appeared to be inseparable companions.

Each leaned on the other's shoulder. The soft little hand of the first rested like a cl.u.s.ter of grapes on the harsh collar-bone of the second; the slender, bony hand of the second, with its long, thin fingers, lay outspread, like a serpent, on the womanish breast of the first.

And I heard a voice. This is what it uttered:

"Before thee stand Love and Hunger---own brothers, the two fundamental bases of everything living.

"Everything which lives moves, for the purpose of obtaining food; and eats, for the purpose of reproducing itself.

"Love and Hunger have one and the same object; it is necessary that life should not cease,--one's own life and the life of others are the same thing, the universal life."

August, 1878.

THE EGOIST

He possessed everything which was requisite to make him the scourge of his family.

He had been born healthy, he had been born rich--and during the whole course of his long life he had remained rich and healthy; he had never committed a single crime; he had never stumbled into any blunder; he had not made a single slip of the tongue or mistake.

He was irreproachably honest!... And proud in the consciousness of his honesty, he crushed every one with it: relatives, friends, and acquaintances.

His honesty was his capital ... and he exacted usurious interest from it.

Honesty gave him the right to be pitiless and not to do any good deed which was not prescribed;--and he was pitiless, and he did no good ...

because good except by decree is not good.

He never troubled himself about any one, except his own very exemplary self, and he was genuinely indignant if others did not take equally a.s.siduous care of it!

And, at the same time, he did not consider himself an egoist, and upbraided and persecuted egoists and egoism more than anything else!--Of course! Egoism in other people interfered with his own.

Not being conscious of a single failing, he did not understand, he did not permit, a weakness in any one else. Altogether, he did not understand anybody or anything, for he was completely surrounded by himself on all sides, above and below, behind and before.

He did not even understand the meaning of forgiveness. He never had had occasion to forgive himself.... Then how was he to forgive others?

Before the bar of his own conscience, before the face of his own G.o.d, he, that marvel, that monster of virtue, rolled up his eyes, and in a firm, clear voice uttered: "Yes; I am a worthy, a moral man!"

He repeated these words on his death-bed, and nothing quivered even then in his stony heart,--in that heart devoid of a fleck or a crack.

O monstrosity of self-satisfied, inflexible, cheaply-acquired virtue--thou art almost more repulsive than the undisguised monstrosity of vice!

December, 1878.

THE SUPREME BEING'S FEAST

One day the Supreme Being took it into his head to give a great feast in his azure palace.

He invited all the virtues as guests. Only the virtues ... he invited no men ... only ladies.

Very many of them a.s.sembled, great and small. The petty virtues were more agreeable and courteous than the great ones; but all seemed well pleased, and chatted politely among themselves, as befits near relatives and friends.

But lo! the Supreme Being noticed two very beautiful ladies who, apparently, were entirely unacquainted with each other.