Hania. Генрик Сенкевич

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СКАЧАТЬ give you my word on that, my little fellows. Ye may be bold in believing in no nonsense. Science is my fiddle-bow; Science is the foundation. Meanwhile all this has the good side, – that if thou occupy thyself with such things, thou mayst go about in broken boots boldly and sleep on a hay-loft. It will make no difference to thee. Do ye understand?"

      "To the health and honor of science!" cried Selim, whose eyes were gleaming like coals.

      Our master pushed back his immense woolly forelock, emptied his goblet, then inhaling smoke he let two enormous currents of it out through his nostrils, and continued, —

      "Besides exact sciences – Selim, thou art drunk! – besides exact sciences there is philosophy, and there are ideas. With these life is filled to the brim. But I prefer exact sciences. Philosophy, and especially ideal-real philosophy, I tell you that I revile it. It is guess-work. A man is pursuing truth, as it were, but pursuing it as a dog pursues his own tail. In general I cannot endure guess-work. I love facts. Thou canst not squeeze whey out of water. As to ideas, that is another thing. For them it is worth while to lay down one's head; but ye and your fathers travel by stupid ways. I tell you that. Long life to ideas!"

      We emptied our goblets again. Our forelocks were steaming. The dark room of the cellar seemed still darker; the candles on the table burned with a faint light; smoke hid the pictures on the walls. Outside the window in the yard an old beggar was singing the pious hymn, "Holy, heavenly, angelic Lady!" and in the pauses he played a plaintive minstrel melody on a fiddle. Wonderful feelings filled my breast. I believed the words of the master, but I felt that he had not told everything yet which could fill out one's life. Something was lacking. A species of melancholy possessed me in spite of myself; so under the influence of imagination, wine, and momentary enthusiasm I said in a low voice, —

      "But women, gentlemen! a loving woman, devoted, who stops at nothing in life?"

      Selim began to sing, —

      "Woman is changeable:

      Stupid the man who believes in her!"

      Our master looked at me with a peculiar expression. He was thinking of something else, but soon he shook himself and said, —

      "Oh, ho! thou hast shown the tip of the sentimental ear. Knowest thou, that Selim will go much farther in the world than thou. The deuce will take thee. Guard thyself, guard thyself, I say, lest some petticoat crawl into thy path and spoil thy life. Woman! woman!" (here the master blinked according to his custom), "I know that ware somewhat. I cannot complain; God knows I cannot. But I know this too, that thou must not give thy finger to the devil, for right away he will take thy whole hand. Woman! love! all our misfortune is in this, that we make great things out of nonsense. If thou wish to amuse thyself as I do, amuse thyself, but don't put thy life in it. Have reason at once, and do not pay good coin for false goods. Do ye think that I complain of women? I do not even dream of doing so. On the contrary, I love them; but I do not let myself be taken by chaff of my own imagining. I remember when I fell in love the first time with a certain Lola, I thought, for example, that her dress was sacred, but it was calico. That's the point. Was it her fault that she walked in mud instead of flying through the heavens? No! it was I who was stupid, through putting wings on her by force. Man is rather a limited beast. One or another of us carries God knows what ideal in his heart, and therewith feels a need of loving; hence on seeing the first little goose that he meets, he says to himself, 'That is she.' Afterward he finds out that he has made a mistake, and because of that small mistake the devil takes him, or he lives an idiot all his life."

      "But you will acknowledge," said I, "that a man feels the need of loving, and surely you feel that need as well as others."

      A scarcely discernible smile shot across his lips.

      "Every necessity may be satisfied," answered he, "in various ways. I help myself in my own way. I have said that I do not look on stupid things as great. I am sober, God knows, more sober than at this moment. But I have seen many men who have broken their lives, or snarled them up, like a thread, for one woman; so I say that it is not worth while to put all one's life in that. I say that there are better things, loftier objects, and that love is a trifling matter. To the health of sobriety!"

      "To the health of women!" shouted Selim.

      "Very good; let us have that," answered our master. "They are agreeable creatures, only take them not too seriously. To the health of women!"

      "To the health of Yozia!" cried I, touching Selim's glass.

      "Wait! Now is my turn," answered he. "To the health of thy Hania! one deserves the other."

      The blood began to play in me, and sparks flashed from my eyes.

      "Be silent, Selim," cried I. "Do not mention that name before me in this shop!"

      Then I threw my glass to the floor, and it broke into a thousand bits.

      "Hast gone mad?" cried our master.

      I had not gone mad at all, but anger had sprung up in me and was blazing like a flame. I could listen to everything which the master said about women; I could even take pleasure in it; I could ridicule them with others. I could do that because I did not connect the words and the ridicule with any one of my own, and because it did not even come to my mind that the general theory was to be applied to persons dear to me. But when I heard the name of my purest orphan bandied about frivolously in that room, amid smoke, dirt, empty bottles, corks, and cynical conversation, I thought that I had heard some abominable sacrilege, some defilement, some wrong wrought against Hania, and from anger I almost lost self-control.

      Selim looked at me for a moment with astonishment, and then his face began to grow dark quickly, his eyes shot sparks, on his forehead came out knots of veins, his features extended and became sharp as those of a real Tartar.

      "Thou dost forbid me to say what I please?" cried he, in a deep voice, broken by panting breath.

      Luckily the master rushed between us at this moment.

      "Ye are not worthy of the uniforms which ye wear! What is this? Ye will fight, or pull each other by the ears, like school-boys? Yes, philosophers who break glasses on each other's heads. Be ashamed of yourselves! Ye are persons with whom to talk touching universal questions! Be ashamed of yourselves! From the war of ideas to a war of fists. Stop! But I will say that I proposed a toast in honor of universities; and that ye are drones if ye will not make peace, and if ye leave even a drop in the glasses."

      We recovered. But Selim, though more drunk, recovered first.

      "I implore thy pardon," said he, in a tender voice. "I am a fool."

      We embraced heartily, and emptied the glasses to the bottom to the honor of universities. Then our master intoned Gaudeamus. Through the glass doors leading to the cellar, merchants began to look in. It was growing dark outside. We were all what is called tipsy. Our joyfulness rose to the zenith and then descended gradually. Our master was the first who fell into meditation, and after a while he said, —

      "All this is well, but, taking everything together, life is stupid. These are all artificial means; but as to what happens in the soul, that is another thing. To-morrow will be like to-day: the same misery, four naked walls, the hay-loft, broken boots, and – so on without end. Labor and labor, but happiness? A man deceives himself as best he can and deadens – Farewell!"

      So saying, he put his cap with broken crown on his head, executed a few mechanical motions which had for object the buttoning of his coat with buttons which did not exist, lighted his cigarette, and waving his hand said, —

      "But do ye pay here, for I am naked, СКАЧАТЬ