Tsar

“ He lived in a palace of black marble and ivory with terraces of turquoise mosaic, windows of pure crystal and heavy curtains of silver cloth brocaded with brilliant designs. The Tsar had no pity for the poor and humble; he wrapped himself in a mantle of pride, and made subject kings and princes wait on him at table, and help him into his coat when he went out to drive in his golden chariot behind twelve black horses. If a poor beggar was bold and foolish enough to cry out to him: “Alms, alms, for the love of St. Peter, O most wealthy and wonderful!” ”

“ Was history repeating itself; a state-fed mob, state-governed industries, the fist of autocracy beneath the glove of impotent democracy, and those terrific incarnations of cruelty and insane pride in power?
I saw the Tsar, a dwarfish, wretched figure in a tinsel crown, dragged, groveling, to Lembken’s feet, while Lembken assumed an attitude of inflexibility; and then once more the curtain darkened.
“Praise your Boss!” hooted the funnels. “He is the people’s friend. That’s how he deals with kings! He shows no mercy to the people’s enemies. The Tsar is a low-grade moron. ”

“ Once more a mist comes down—a thin white veil, which passes like a pout from an infant's face. The city is the same in size, in splendor, in the fullness of her fearful life. The Tsar, who went away from her gates low and humble, has come back, like a wild beast thirsting for blood and prey. ”

“ All the people gathered together and wept. The old man went to the capital city. He was taken into the Tsar's rooms. The Tsar, the little sun, appeared, saw the old man with his three daughters, two tied by the hands, and the third daughter like a spring flower, the light of Paradise in her eyes, with the dawn on her face, tears flowing in her eyes, falling like pearls.
The Tsar looked and was amazed, and was wroth with the wicked sisters. He asked the fair maiden, "Where are your saucer and the crystal apple?" ”

“ Were I one of them I should pray to God from this moment until the last hour of the choice that the Tsar might choose any one of the maidens rather than myself. Imagine, my brothers, the being mated with such a thing! A Tsar that dribbles at the mouth and chatters to himself, but will speak to no other if he can avoid it. A Tsar that falls in a fit if startled or loudly spoken to; a creature that—if he were not a Tsar—must be laughed at, or wept over ”

“ THE world in mourning for a Russian Tsar!
⁠A despot of the nineteenth century
⁠Mourned by the nations that have made men free!
⁠Ye captives of his rule! where'er ye be,
Whether in dungeons or in mines afar—
Wretches who mourn, yet mourn not for the Tsar,—
⁠Forgive the tears that seem a wrong to grief
⁠Barren of comfort and without relief;
The Tsar was Russia's martyr—as ye are! ”

“ Everywhere his foot slips in blood: an evil smell of carnage hangs in the air, the joyous yells of the drunken feasters mingle with the shrieks of pain wrung from prisoners who are being tortured close by. The whole palace is a Gehenna, a charnel-house. And wherefore? No man knows, or rather all men guess: the Tsar is amusing himself, and these are his pleasures. ”

“ Dimitry's name! SHUISKY. Then he knew nothing. TSAR. Listen: take steps this very hour that Russia Be fenced by barriers from Lithuania; That not a single soul pass o'er the border, That not a hare run o'er to us from Poland, Nor crow fly here from Cracow. Away! SHUISKY. I go. TSAR. Stay!—Is it not a fact that this report Is artfully concocted? Hast ever heard That dead men have arisen from their graves To question tsars, legitimate tsars, appointed, Chosen by the voice of all the people, crowned By the great Patriarch? Is't not laughable? Eh? What? Why laugh'st thou not thereat? ”

“ When the Tsar saw this he raised his hands to high heaven and cried, 'This is a great day, for the giants are all slain!' And the people, who still remained to him, hearing his cry of joy, came running, and gathered about him, praying that God would preserve the mighty one who had done this astonishing deed. They were still praising the unknown hero, when some attendants came running swiftly from the palace, to tell the Tsar that a great snake had almost succeeded in killing the Princess. ”

“ Never before has his soul been so filled with unrest. And to-morrow morning he must begin another battle—the last terrible fight with the Tsar Alexander the Blessed, on the field of Borodino.
"Akh!" he thinks, "I'll show them to-morrow what a leader I am! I'll lift the soldiers of the Tsar into the air on my lances and trample their bodies under the feet of my horses. I'll make the Tsar himself a prisoner, and I'll kill or scatter the whole Russian people." ”

“ But in several portions of Europe the war made conversions abound. Imagine the state of mind that it must have induced in many a plain Russian peasant, literal, serious, and straight, like the Bohemian. First the Tsar, in the name of God and of Holy Russia, sent him, perhaps without so much as a rifle, to starve and be shelled in a trench. If he escaped, the Soviet chiefs, in the name of Justice, sent him to fight against those for whom the Tsar had made him fight before, while his wife and babies were starved by those whom he fought both for and against. ”

“ Such was the first introduction to Europe of the Tsar of Russia! They had long heard of this autocrat before whom millions trembled, ruling like a savage despot in the midst of splendors rivaling the Arabian Nights. Now they saw him! And the amazement can scarcely be described. He dined with the Great Electress Sophia, afterwards first Queen of Prussia, and she wrote of him: "Nature has given him an infinity of wit. With advantages he might have been an accomplished man. ”

“ The Tsar ordered everybody to pack up as many things as the sleighs could carry, food and clothes and cook-pots and the children’s school-books, money and jewels, tool-chests and linen-chests, cups and saucers, bed-clothes and brushes and tooth-powder, and flee from the city before the snow should bury them all alive. ”

“ Listen, it has been whispered me that his Highness my brother looks kindlier upon you than upon any other maiden that he has yet seen: there, sweet one, does not that awaken thy slumbering fancy? He is a great king—remember this—though, to say truth, but an afflicted youth.{77} Do not lose sight of the greater issue by foolishly magnifying the lesser. The Tsar is the Tsar, whether he be lusty or afflicted; a handsome youth or, by the will of God, a pale invalid. ”

“ It is not I that choose a bride, but the Tsar. If he choose thee, it is thou that art greatly honoured, not I! Stand upon thy feet, and shame not thyself before these men. Send for the Tsar, Galitsin, and let us have this comedy played and done with.’ Poor Vera fell a second time to her knees. ”

“ Vera laughed; "at present I am a new toy, and my jailer is content to play with me!" The Tsar laughed again.
"By the Saints, Madame, if he should show signs of falling short in his appreciation of his good fortune, you shall tell me and he shall be sent to Siberia. Such a man would deserve his fate."
"It may be, your Majesty, that he married me out of patriotic motives in order to prevent my falling into French hands."
"Good—good! it was a worthy act and shall be rewarded," said the Tsar, smiling kindly. "Adieu, Madame; we shall meet again I trust." ”

“ The Tsar is strong, and has a mighty host; sword and scimitar wound him not; fire does not burn, water does not drown him. Yet I have a sword which can wound him, but unluckily I could not wield it, and he struck me down. Nevertheless, I will do you good service, and give you counsel; when you come to the city of Shtchetin and the Tsar Fireshield sees and questions you, answer that you desire to serve him. ”

“ To whom shall we give our daughter in marriage that he may govern our realm, defend it in war, sit as judge in the royal council, help the Tsar in his old age, and succeed him at the end of his days? The Tsar and the Tsaritsa sought for a bridegroom who was to be a valiant young warrior, a handsome hero, who was to love the Tsarevna, and make the Tsarevna love him. ”

“ For the Tsar is not only the executive and the law-making power of the state, head of the Church, fountain of justice, commander-in-chief of the army and navy, but, more than all these, he is father to his people. His subjects owe him, in theory, a filial respect and obedience; and, with the exception of the Nihilists, they are dutiful children. The relation is an Oriental one, which we of the West can not understand. But it is powerfully operative in Russia. It has not been really weakened by anything that the Nihilists have done, but, on the contrary, strengthened. ”

“ And when he died The palace was with holy fragrance filled. And like the sun his countenance outshone. Never again shall we see such a tsar.-- O, horrible, appalling woe! We have sinned, We have angered God; we have chosen for our ruler A tsar's assassin. GREGORY. Honoured father, long Have I desired to ask thee of the death Of young Dimitry, the tsarevich; thou, 'Tis said, wast then at Uglich. ”

“ Look now, that thou doest good to thy people, and judgest righteous judgment, as from henceforth thou shalt be Tsar again, but I must fly back to God in heaven.”––And when he had said this he bade them wash and shave him (for his beard had grown right down to his girdle) , and put upon him the raiment of a Tsar. And the angel said further, “Go now into the inner apartments. There the courtiers of the Tsar are sitting and making merry, and none will recognize in thee the vagabond old man. May God help thee always to do good!” ”

“ There was no possible doubt of the acquiescence and assistance of the Tsar, and no man ever looked down a fairer perspective than he, as he galloped over the ugly country, often far ahead of his caravan, splashing through bogs and streams, fording rivers without ferries, camping at night in forests so dense the cold never escaped their embrace, muffled to the eyes in furs as he made his way past valleys whose eternal ice fields chilled the country for miles about ”

“ But the old woman ran off to the Tsar, and said to him, “A certain man has come to me and laid a certain feather on the window-sill, and it shines like fire!” Then the Tsar guessed that it was a feather of the bird Zhar, and 258 said to his soldiers, “Go and fetch that man hither!” And the Tsar said to him, “Wilt thou enter my service?”––“Yes,” he replied, “but you must give me all your keys.” So the Tsar gave him all the keys and a hut of his own to live in besides. But one day the Tsar said to his servants, “Boil me now a vat of milk!” ”

“ By-and-by the Terrible Tsar made up his mind to marry, and he wrote a proclamation in golden ink on a large piece of crimson velvet, and sent a herald into every town and village to read the announcement, which was to this effect—that whoever should find for him a bride who was ruddier than the sun, fairer than the moon, and whiter than snow should be given a reward so great that he would be forced to spend most of his time in computing its value. ”

“ All the explosive forces of passion which had been stored up in centuries of tyranny by a brutal Tsardom and its Governors burst out against its present representatives, although the last Tsar was a gentle man who loved his people. ”

“ Better fitted is he for the routine of an office and a desk than for the perils and responsibilities of a crown. Then, when the day's work is done, what joy to reach his home and toss his children in his arms, and picnic on a holiday or a Sunday in the suburbs with his family. Such, they tell us, is the gentle, homely, wife loving nature of the present Tsar. Whatever the destiny of the autocrat and of the autocracy, the Russian people remain. ”

“ So they went into the Tsar's palace. He, with his lacqueys, met them; music sounded; and they began dancing: and they danced until their shoes were worn thin. Then the Tsar bade wine to be served to his guests. The poor nobleman took a single goblet from under his nose, poured out the wine, and put the cup into his pocket. ”

“ Then the Tsar, her father, made a proclamation that people should come and read the prayers for the dead over her dead body, and so exorcise the evil spirit, and whosoever delivered her was to have half his power and half his tsardom. ”

“ As for the present Tsar, he has followed, in a humane spirit, the best traditions of his ancestors. Any one who has had opportunities of studying closely his character and aims, and who knows the difficulties with which he has had to contend, can hardly fail to regard him with sympathy and admiration. Among the qualities which would commend him to Englishmen are his scrupulous honesty and genuine truthfulness. ”

“ These representatives were made aware of the advice tendered to the Tsar by his Majesty’s trusted advisers in various critical emergencies, and they announced it to their chiefs, the Tsar’s present enemies. There was, for instance, a few years ago, one influential Russian statesman without whose assent the Government would undertake nothing of real importance, a patriot whose leanings towards Austria and Germany were natural and frankly proclaimed. ”

“ Russia will never be Protestant; Russia will never be juste-milieu; Russia will not make a revolution simply in order to get rid of Tsar Nicholas and to replace him by tsar-deputies, tsar-judges, and tsar-policemen.
Herzen now found himself able to explain certain undesirable historical facts quite in the slavophil manner.
Take tsarism, for example. Tsarism is not monarchy. European monarchy developed out of feudalism and Catholicism, and is animated by a peculiar social and religious ideal. The tsar is tsar for tsardom's sake. He is nothing more than an unlimited dictator. ”