The Brigadier

"The Brigadier" by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev is a novella that explores themes of honor, duty, and the complexities of human relationships within a military context. Set against the backdrop of 19th-century Russia, the story follows the experiences of a retired brigadier who grapples with memories of his past service and the impact of those experiences on his current life. Turgenev's nuanced characterizations and keen observations provide insight into the struggles of identity and social status, ultimately revealing the deep emotional currents that shape the lives of his characters.

• Novel

								
I

Reader, do you know those little homesteads of country gentlefolks,
which were plentiful in our Great Russian Oukraïne twenty-five or thirty
years ago? Now one rarely comes across them, and in another ten years
the last of them will, I suppose, have disappeared for ever. The running
pond overgrown with reeds and rushes, the favourite haunt of fussy
ducks, among whom one may now and then come across a wary 'teal'; beyond
the pond a garden with avenues of lime-trees, the chief beauty and glory
of our black-earth plains, with smothered rows of 'Spanish'
strawberries, with dense thickets of gooseberries, currants, and
raspberries, in the midst of which, in the languid hour of the stagnant
noonday heat, one would be sure to catch glimpses of a serf-girl's
striped kerchief, and to hear the shrill ring of her voice. Close by
would be a summer-house standing on four legs, a conservatory, a
neglected kitchen garden, with flocks of sparrows hung on stakes, and a
cat curled up on the tumble-down well; a little further, leafy
apple-trees in the high grass, which is green below and grey above,
straggling cherry-trees, pear-trees, on which there is never any fruit;
then flower-beds, poppies, peonies, pansies, milkwort, 'maids in green,'
bushes of Tartar honeysuckle, wild jasmine, lilac and acacia, with the
continual hum of bees and wasps among their thick, fragrant, sticky
branches. At last comes the manor-house, a one-storied building on a
brick foundation, with greenish window-panes in narrow frames, a
sloping, once painted roof, a little balcony from which the vases of the
balustrade are always jutting out, a crooked gable, and a husky old dog
in the recess under the steps at the door. Behind the house a wide yard
with nettles, wormwood, and burdocks in the corners, outbuildings with
doors that stick, doves and rooks on the thatched roofs, a little
storehouse with a rusty weathercock, two or three birch-trees with
rooks' nests in their bare top branches, and beyond--the road with
cushions of soft dust in the ruts and a field and the long hurdles of
the hemp patches, and the grey little huts of the village, and the
cackle of geese in the far-away rich meadows.... Is all this familiar to
you, reader? In the house itself everything is a little awry, a little
rickety--but no matter. It stands firm and keeps warm; the stoves are
like elephants, the furniture is of all sorts, home-made. Little paths
of white footmarks run from the doors over the painted floors. In the
hall siskins and larks in tiny cages; in the corner of the dining-room
an immense English clock in the form of a tower, with the inscription,
'Strike--silent'; in the drawing-room portraits of the family, painted
in oils, with an expression of ill-tempered alarm on the brick-coloured
faces, and sometimes too an old warped picture of flowers and fruit or a
mythological subject. Everywhere there is the smell of kvas, of apples,
of linseed-oil and of leather. Flies buzz and hum about the ceiling and
the windows. A daring cockroach suddenly shows his countenance from
behind the looking-glass frame.... No matter, one can live here--and
live very well too.

II

Just such a homestead it was my lot to visit thirty years ago ... it was
in days long past, as you perceive. The little estate in which this
house stood belonged to a friend of mine at the university; it had only
recently come to him on the death of a bachelor cousin, and he was not
living in it himself.... But at no great distance from it there were
wide tracts of steppe bog, in which at the time of summer migration,
when they are on the wing, there are great numbers of snipe; my friend
and I, both enthusiastic sportsmen, agreed therefore to go on St.
Peter's day, he from Moscow, I from my own village, to his little house.
My friend lingered in Moscow, and was two days late; I did not care to
start shooting without him. I was received by an old servant, Narkiz
Semyonov, who had had notice of my coming. This old servant was not in
the least like 'Savelitch' or 'Caleb'; my friend used to call him in
joke 'Marquis.' There was something of conceit, even of affectation,
about him; he looked down on us young men with a certain dignity, but
cherished no particularly respectful sentiments for other landowners
either; of his old master he spoke slightingly, while his own class he
simply scorned for their ignorance. He could read and write, expressed
himself correctly and with judgment, and did not drink. He seldom went
to church, and so was looked upon as a dissenter. In appearance he was
thin and tall, had a long and good-looking face, a sharp nose, and
overhanging eyebrows, which he was continually either knitting or
lifting; he wore a neat, roomy coat, and boots to his knees with
heart-shaped scallops at the tops.

III

On the day of my arrival, Narkiz, having given me lunch and cleared the
table, stood in the doorway, looked intently at me, and with some play
of the eyebrows observed:

'What are you going to do now, sir?'

'Well, really, I don't know. If Nikolai Petrovitch had kept his word and
come, we should have gone shooting together.'

'So you really expected, sir, that he would come at the time he
promised?'

'Of course I did.'

'H'm.' Narkiz looked at me again and shook his head as it were with
commiseration. 'If you 'd care to amuse yourself with reading,' he
continued: 'there are some books left of my old master's; I'll get them
you, if you like; only you won't read them, I expect.'

'Why?'

'They're books of no value; not written for the gentlemen of
these days.'

'Have you read them?'

'If I hadn't read them, I wouldn't have spoken about them. A dream-book,
for instance ... that's not much of a book, is it? There are others too,
of course ... only you won't read them either.'

'Why?'

'They are religious books.'

I was silent for a space.... Narkiz was silent too.

'What vexes me most,' I began, 'is staying in the house in such
weather.'

'Take a walk in the garden; or go into the copse. We've a copse here
beyond the threshing-floor. Are you fond of fishing?'

'Are there fish here?'

'Yes, in the pond. Loaches, sand-eels, and perches are caught there.
Now, to be sure, the best time is over; July's here. But anyway, you
might try.... Shall I get the tackle ready?'

'Yes, do please.'

'I'll send a boy with you ... to put on the worms. Or maybe I 'd better
come myself?' Narkiz obviously doubted whether I knew how to set about
things properly by myself.

'Come, please, come along.'

Narkiz, without a word, grinned from ear to ear, then suddenly knitted
his brows ... and went out of the room.

IV

Half an hour later we set off to catch fish. Narkiz had put on an
extraordinary sort of cap with ears, and was more dignified than ever.
He walked in front with a steady, even step; two rods swayed regularly
up and down on his shoulders; a bare-legged boy followed him carrying a
can and a pot of worms.

'Here, near the dike, there's a seat, put up on the floating platform on

								Rate this book:0.0 / 0 votes