Gronski

“ Gronski gazed at him with great interest, for even in Warsaw he heard of him as an original and prominent personality, in the favorable meaning of those words.
He was quite a young man, with tawny hair, swarthy like a gypsy, with a countenance alive with fire, bubbling with health, somewhat loud and brisk in his manners. In the city he played an uncommon rôle not only because he had the largest medical practice, but because he belonged to the most active men in any field. ”

“ But I see that Gronski has filled you with idle gossip. Good! Unlike him, I do not have an old bachelor's hankering after boarding-house misses and I like young teals only on a platter. Let him feast his eyes with his Marynia; let him pray to her, but let him leave me alone. They all have gone crazy on music there, and are ready to infect you in Jastrzeb. Only Miss Anney does not play on anything, and has a little sense. ”

“ At this Gronski shaded his eyes with his hand, gazed at Ladislaus intently and asked:
"My dear sir, did you ever propound to yourself one question?"
"What one?"
"What pains you the more,--the loss of Miss Anney or your wounded self-love?"
"I thank you, sir," answered Ladislaus, with irony. "In reality, only self-love. Through it, I do not sleep, do not eat; through it, in the course of a few days, I have grown lean like a shaving and were it not for this living wound, life for me would be one perpetual round of pleasure." ”

“ You, generally speaking, carry ruin with you and join Poland to that ruin. In your party there are, without doubt, men of conviction and good faith, but blind, who in their blindness are serving a different master than they imagine."
Gronski knew that he was speaking in vain, but whether from habit, or because he wanted to relieve himself of all that had accumulated within him, he talked until the rattle of the wheels on the city pavements drowned his words. They parted rather coldly before the hotel, for Gronski's views touched the young medical student to the quick. ”

“ Gronski and Ladislaus began to laugh, but Dolhanski, who spoke with greater bitterness than they supposed, shrugged his shoulders and said:
"Amuse yourselves, amuse yourselves. One of you already has received a taste of the times and the other, God grant, will not escape so easily. Nice times, indeed! Chaos, anarchy, political orgy, lack of any kind of authority, the dance of dynamite with the knout, and the downfall of 'bridge.' And you laugh!" ”

“ On the sofa in the sisters' dressing-room lay, ready at an early hour, Marynia's evening dress, white as snow, light as foam, transparent as the mist, and fragrant with violets which were to form her sole adornment. Previously, Pani Otocka and Gronski held a long and grave consultation over that dress, for both craved warmly that their beloved "divinity" should captivate not only the ears but the eyes. In the meanwhile the "divinity" bustled about all the rooms, now seizing the violin and repeating the more difficult passages, now taking the boxes of bon-bons which Gronski had sent to her ”

“ He sometimes compared himself to a man sitting on the bank of a river and watching its course, who knows indeed that it must roll on and disappear in the sea, but who is nevertheless interested in the movements of its waves, its currents, its whirlpools, mists rising from its depths, and the play of light upon its waters. Besides his genuine love of ancient languages and authors, Gronski was interested in politics, science, literature, art, the contemporary social tendencies, and finally in the private affairs of mankind ”

“ I speak of this, not as one who is infatuated with the romantic, but as a sober man who can keep accounts of expenditures and receipts, not only in husbandry but also in life."
Gronski thought that in reality every matured masculine life should bear two faces; one with wrinkled brow, expressive of intense mental strain, turned towards the problems of humanity, and the other calm and peaceable at the fireside in the home. ”

“ Society is like a person who, having for many years lived in a house, is always reluctant to move into another though that other is much better." Nevertheless the words of Gronski stung him so deeply that at that moment he hated him as much as he did Krzycki and would have given a great deal if he could trample upon and crush the charges, so odious to him. ”

“ Do you not live from human sweat and blood?"
"That is very true. But why should my death afford him any gratification personally?"
"Because he has conceived a hatred for you; has fallen in love with some one and regards you as a rival."
Hearing this, Ladislaus jumped up as if scalded.
"What, would he dare?"
"I assure you that he would dare," replied Gronski quietly, "only he made a mistake. But that he is not wanting in courage he gave proofs when he wrote an avowal of love to Marynia." ”

“ The profoundest essence of his soul was a sad scepticism. One of his friends, Kloczewski, called him "an ecclesiastic in a dress-suit." Somehow, the final result of Gronski's meditation upon the future and human life, individual as well as collective, was the conviction that the future and the human life may, with time, become different, but never better. ”

“ It is indeed a pleasure to look at all these things; so I will come here, but it is one thing to visit you for an hour, or even two, and another to introduce confusion into your mode of life."
"I will only say this," answered Gronski, "Pani Otocka and Panna Marynia regard me as an old bachelor and promised to make a call to-morrow, or the day after, as they have often done before, in the company of Miss Anney. Do you see that armchair? On it, during the music-playing, sat your light-haired beauty. Go, go to the hotel, and we will see who, besides your mother, will visit you." ”

“ He did not have sufficient culture for music to appeal to him as it did, for instance, to Gronski, nevertheless there awakened within him a certain dismal consciousness that this was something, like the air, which all breasts can breathe, regardless of whether they love or hate. Amazement seized him at the thought that there were things lying beyond the swarm of human passions. At the conclusion he so identified music with the figure of the playing girl that when the old notary, at the end of the concert, kissed her hands, he almost felt inclined to do the same. ”

“ To this Krzycki replied in anger, but without hesitation:
"I would help him--the dog's blood."
"Ah, you see!" observed Gronski. "You curse, but admit. If they come to me for a contribution--it is all the same whether with or without Laskowicz--I will tell them that I will give for people destitute of bread but will not give for bombs, dynamite, and strike propaganda. I will tell them more: that in collecting contributions for a revolution from people who do not want to give and who give only from fear, they degrade their own citizens." ”

“ But, being at the same time a man of sentiment, he fell in a continual clash with himself, his sentiment always craving for something, while his sad scepticism iterated that it was not worth while to desire anything. His feelings were preyed upon by the thought that his views were in conflict with life, while life was an imperative necessity. Therefore, whoever with doubts corroded its roots injured humanity, and Gronski did not desire to injure anybody, much less his own people. ”

“ Ladislaus, in his laughter, displayed his sound, shining teeth and answered joyously:
"Ah, how it does delight me! the soul almost squeaks."
And they both began to laugh.
"But," said Gronski, "one must be lucky enough to find that and courageous enough to win."
To Krzycki there suddenly came the recollection of a certain ball in Warsaw; of Panna Rose Stabrowska, her pensive eyes, and her white, half-childlike shoulders protruding from the net-lace like watery foam. He therefore sighed quietly.
"Sometimes," he said, "courage also is necessary to bridle one's self." ”

“ VIII Gronski spent the entire next day in the city; at night he was at Pani Otocka's, so that he did not return home until near midnight. Krzycki was not yet asleep and as his mother, on account of the disturbances on the streets could not visit him that day, he awaited with impatience Gronski's return, and immediately began to question him about the news in the city and of the ladies.
"The news in the city is bad," answered Gronski; "about noon I heard the firing of musketry in the factory district. ”

“ Ladislaus escorted her to the carriage, kissed her hands and remained alone. Her words, corroborating that which Gronski had intimated as a result of his interviews with Pani Otocka, disquieted him, however, but only for a short time, as he was too much in love to suppose that it could change his love or swerve him from his purpose. At the mere thought of this he shrugged his shoulders.
"Women," he said to himself, "are always full of scruples and to actual difficulties they add chimerical ones."
After which, he returned home in the best of humor, and besides Gronski, found there Dolhanski. ”

“ By that I drive him to rabidness."
"But that he cares to argue with you--"
"He does not want to but is unable to restrain himself. His temperament and fanaticism carry him away."
"At one time I met a similar individual," answered Gronski, "and not very long ago--out in the country, in Jastrzeb. He was a student, a tutor of Stas, whom Krzycki later discharged because he incited the field hands and was an agitator among peasants of the neighborhood."
"Ah," ejaculated, with a strange smile, Swidwicki, to whom it occurred that Pauly also was at Jastrzeb.
"What? Why do you smile?" asked Gronski. ”

“ A civil war is a superb thing. Nothing like it to clarify the situation and purify the atmosphere. But to be led to such a situation and not to be able to create it is the acme of misfortune or folly."
"I confess that I do not understand," said Ladislaus.
Gronski motioned with his hand and remarked:
"Do not attempt to, for after every fifteen minutes of conversation you will not know what is black and what is white and your head will swim, or you will get a fever, which as a wounded man you should try to avoid." ”

“ Every day on the beach they erect them and every day the waves wash them away until not a trace of them remains."
"In a way you are right," said Gronski; "but there, however, is this difference: the children build joyfully and we do not."
Afterwards he meditated and added:
"However, the law of nature is such that children grow while the adults rear dykes, not of sand, but of stone upon which the weaves dash to pieces."
"Let them be dashed to pieces as quickly as possible," exclaimed Ladislaus. ”

“ We alone unite Poland with an idea, powerful, young, and vital, if only for the reason that all youth is with us."
"In the first place, not all youth, nor even one half," answered Gronski; "and again, the church has survived and will survive many a social movement; and thirdly, your idea is as ancient as poverty itself on this earth. If you desire, sir, to contend that the form which La Salle and Marx gave it is new, then I will answer you thus: Your modern socialism has too thick tufts of hair on its scalp, but when it begins to get bald, none will scoff at it so much as the young." ”

“ Tell me what would happen if people actually did not fear?"
"They would not be themselves," answered Gronski. "They desire life, not death."
XI Swidwicki did not lie when he said that he did not know the name of the revolutionist to whom he promised an asylum, for in reality Pauly had made a secret of it. She so arranged it with Laskowicz on the way. The young student, learning that Swidwicki, to whom the girl was conducting him, was an acquaintance of Gronski and Pani Otocka, in the first moments became frightened inordinately. ”

“ Suddenly Gronski asked:
"Sacrifices! But to what divinity do you offer those sacrifices? What is your aim and what do you want?"
"Daily bread and universal liberty."
"But in the meantime, instead of bread, you give them stones. As to liberty, you will please, sir, take into consideration two thoughts. The first can be expressed thus: Woe to the nations that love liberty more than fatherland! Naturally I am not speaking of subjugated nations, for in such a situation the conceptions of liberty and fatherland become almost identical. ”

“ Gronski mentally reviewed the whole array of his acquaintances and noted that those who fervently believed, in the depths of their souls, were very few in number. Some there were who did not believe at all; others who wanted to believe and could not ”

“ And now he rushed in with the crash of a squall, became acquainted with Gronski, asked about the health of Pani Krzycki and about the pretty ladies staying in Jastrzeb of whom he had already heard; after which, observing the distressed face of the notary, he exclaimed merrily:
"What a mien! Is it so bad with us in this world, or what? Seventy-five years! A great thing! Truly it is not the age of strength, but it is the strength of the age! ”

“ To this Gronski said:
"Sero molunt deorum molæ. Do you understand what that means in Polish?"
"Having assumed the management of Jastrzeb, I sowed all my latinity over its soil, but it has not taken root."
"That means: The mills of the gods grind late."
Krzycki began to laugh and, pointing his hand in the direction of the old mill, said:
"That one will not grind anything any more; I guarantee that." ”

“ I would wish that Jastrzeb would solely belong to myself and my wife, and in succession to my children, if we have any."
"As to that, I have no doubt; but as to a dowry, I am not tormented by unnecessary fears," said Gronski. "Miss Anney lives, travels, dresses, and resides in comfort, but she is not a person who would desire to create false impressions. I assume that she does not possess millions, but her fortune, particularly in comparison to our condition, may appear even more considerable than we might have thought." ”