The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Volume 10

After some delay the gates opened and the alguazil, some kind of a higher official clad in old-fashioned garb, rode in and announced that the game was about to begin. He was everywhere greeted with hoots, ridicule and disrespectful whistling; I do not know why. But he seemed to know what to expect, for he apparently did not mind his reception in the least. The Romans in the circus made sport of their consuls and emperors, and the Spaniards at a bullfight are permitted an equal latitude of behavior.

Then the chulos entered—on foot, with gay hangings draped over their right arms. They were followed by six picadores on horseback, dressed in leather jerkins and breeches, protected on the right side with bands of iron. They wore Spanish hats and carried each a heavy spear on which there was an iron point only half an inch long. Their saddles were of the high cowboy type, and they sat their horses well. Under the accompaniment of deafening applause the matador (literally, the murderer) took his place at their head. His name was Cuchiera, and he was a famous and celebrated hero of the arena. Thus this phalanx advanced toward the royal box, where Queen Christine, wife of Muñoz, Duke of Rianzares, was seated, and dropped to their knees to offer her the royal salute; whereupon twelve thousand people hissed.

At last the chief actor entered, a powerful black bull with sharp horns and fiercely glistening eyes. He had been in a room with holes in the ceiling through which he had been poked with pointed sticks. He was, therefore, tolerably ill-humored before he entered the arena. As soon as the doors of his prison were opened he shot forward to the centre of the field, looked fiercely about him, greatly astonished, pawed the sand with his feet, and then hurled himself upon the nearest picador. This man held his ground, and permitted the maddened bull to rush against his pointed spear. The horse had his right eye bandaged lest he see the bull and bolt. The attack, however, was so fierce, and the rider so firmly seated in his saddle, that both he and his horse were lifted up and thrown over backwards. At the same moment the sharp horns of the bull were fastened in the horse's belly. A stream of blood, thick as your finger, spurted out directly from the horse's heart. The picador was lying under his charger, and was prevented by his costume from freeing himself. His certain end was at hand if the chulos had not come to his assistance with their gay draperies. The bull immediately let go his prey and hurled himself upon the men on foot, or rather upon their gaudy cloaks. He chased one the entire length of the arena and, when his foe had escaped him by jumping the barrier, he made the stout fence tremble under his hammering horns. At the disappearance of his enemy the bull stood stock still, as if dumfounded, until a second picador met his glance. This horseman had the same experience as his predecessor, but before the chulos could bring help the bull buried his horns a second time in the belly of the convulsed horse and carried it high up in the air through half the length of the arena. The third horse was ripped open in a trice. The wretched animal actually caught his feet in his own entrails and dragged them from his body bit by bit. In this condition he was beaten and given the spurs and was forced to await a second attack by the infuriated bull.

Since the bull each time had received a terrific thrust on his left shoulder from the spear, he finally refused to charge another one of the picadores. Their places, therefore, had to be taken by the banderilleros. These gay-looking people are men on foot with arrows two feet long, each with a hooked point. On the other end these arrows are decorated with little flags, brass foil, tinsel, and even bird cages whence gaily decked birds are permitted to escape. With these arrows the banderilleros walk right up to the bull, and, when he is ready to charge, jump to one side and thrust their weapons deep into his neck, halfway between his ears and his horns. Then the beast grows altogether mad and furious, and often chases a whole band of chulos in wild flight over the barrier, which calls for noisy shouts of ridicule from the crowd. Once the bull straddled the fence, and there have been times when he has succeeded in scaling it. One of the chulos was so bold as to put his gaudy cloak over his shoulders, so that the bull charged straight at him. But as the beast lowered his head and threw himself forward with closed eyes, the man jumped over him and stood by his side.

When finally the rage of the bull is at its height, but his strength is waning, the matador faces him, all alone. At once a hush falls over the spectators, who sit in rapt attention, for the matador's work is by far the most dangerous.

He is a fine-looking man, in shoes and white stockings. His silk coat and breeches are sky blue; his hair is tied in a net, in his left hand he carries a small scarlet cloak, and in his right a diamond-shaped blade of sharp Toledo steel, four feet in length. It is necessary to drive this into the neck of the bull at a very definite point, for if it hits him elsewhere he can shake it off and break it into splinters. In order to hit the right spot the man must let the bull pass him at a distance of only two or at best three inches. Everything is based on the assumption that the bull will attack the red cloth rather than the man, and will continue his course in an absolutely straight line. There are exceptions, and then the matador is lost.

Very deliberately the caballero walked up to his black antagonist and shook his red cloth at him. Twice he let him pass under his arm. At the third attempt he thrust his blade up to the hilt into the neck of the beast. For another minute perhaps the bull rages, then he begins to bleed from his mouth, he totters and then collapses. Immediately a kind of hangman's assistant sneaks up from behind and plunges a dagger into the neck of the bull, who expires on the spot.

At this juncture five mules decorated with ribbons and tinkling bells came trotting into the arena; they were hitched up to the horses and then to the bull, and at a fast clip carried the corpses away. Some sand was then sprinkled on the puddles of blood, and a new bull brought out. In this way eight bulls were driven to death. Twenty horses fell dead, while several more were led away mortally wounded. A single bull killed eight horses. No men were seriously hurt.

The horses, it is true, are of such a quality that, if they are not killed today, they will be taken to the horse-butcher tomorrow. Good horses would not only be too expensive, but they would also refuse to await the attack of the bull without shying or offering resistance, even if their right eyes were bandaged. The more horses the bull has killed and the more dangerous to the men he has become, the louder is the applause. One bull persistently refused to attack the picadores. He ran up and down the arena, trembling with fear, while the crowd shrieked curses and imprecations. At last they yelled: Los perros! (the dogs!) When the dogs arrived in the arena they could hardly be restrained. Madly they rushed upon the bull, who at once gored one of them and tossed him high in the air. The others, however, fastened on him, one of them seizing his tongue so firmly that he was swung high up in the air and down again. You could have torn him to pieces before he would have let go. Finally four dogs had the bull in a position where he could not free himself, and the matador struck him down.

While this butchery was at its height, the young queen with the Infanta entered, accompanied by Don Francesco, her husband, and the Duke of Montpensier. Aumale had arrived earlier. The queen looked very happy and is by no means so ugly as the papers say. She is blonde, rather stout, and not at all plain. The Infanta is small, extremely dark and thin. The queen was greeted by the matador just as her mother had been, but by the spectators with much enthusiasm. When the eighth bull was killed, it began to grow dark, but all the people yelled "un otro toro," and the ninth bull was hunted down almost in darkness—which is very dangerous for the matador.

This, then, is the spectacle which the Spaniards love better than anything else, which is watched by the tenderest of women, and which brought a smile to the face of the Infanta, a recent bride. So far as I am concerned, one bullfight was quite enough for me, and its description, I fancy, will be enough for you.

DESCRIPTION OF MOSCOW39 (1856)

TRANSLATED BY GRACE BIGELOW

Thursday, August 28th

The City of Moscow takes it for granted that the Emperor has not yet arrived. A few assert that he has been since yesterday at the Castle Petrofskoy, an hour's ride from here, where he is holding court and reviewing a hundred thousand Guards; but that is his incognito; officially, he is not yet here.

The Holy City is preparing for the reception that is to take place tomorrow. They are hammering and pounding in all the streets and on all the squares. Most of the houses here stand alone, in the centre of a garden or court. Large tribunes for spectators have been erected in these spaces. In several of these I counted three thousand numbered seats. Before the houses themselves, moreover, small platforms with chairs have been erected, protected by linen awnings, decorated with tapestries, carpets and flowers. There must be at least several hundred thousand seats, so that there can be no crowd. Only those who cannot pay the few kopecks,40 the Tschornoi Narod, or "the black brood of the people," will form the movable mass, and the police will have to restrain them.

All palaces and churches have laths nailed on their architectonic lines, upon which the lamps for the festive illuminations are to be fastened. The Giant Ivan, which will speak from the mouths of twenty-five large bells, bears upon its golden dome a crown formed of lamps, surmounted by the great glittering cross, which the French pulled down with immense toil and danger, and which the Russians victoriously reinstated. As an atonement for the offense, they laid one thousand guns of the godless enemy at the feet of Ivan, where Count Morny can see them to this day.

Half of the population of the city are in the streets, looking about, and they are allowed to go everywhere, even in the Kremlin.

Every day six-and eight-horse teams, mostly dark gray and black, which are going to convey the state coaches of the Empress and the Grand-Duchesses, are going to and fro from the Kremlin to Petrofskoy. Strangely enough, the outriders sit on the right front horses. An equerry of the Guards walks by each horse and leads it by the bridle. Yesterday their Excellencies carried a fearfully heavy canopy, supported by thick gold posts, through the salons and over the stairs of the palace. The aides-de-camp walk by the side of it, and balance it by golden cords.

The state coaches, most wonderful products of former centuries, have been drawn out of their semi-obscurity in the Arsenal, where they have rested twenty-eight years. The oldest are entirely without springs, are suspended by leather straps six feet long over a tongue twenty feet long and correspondingly thick, which is so bent that the coach almost reaches the ground. Those of the Empresses are ornamented with diamonds and jewels. It will hardly be possible to use the oldest. There is, further, a kind of house on wheels, made of gold, velvet, and crystal, which Peter the Great received as a present from England, and compared to which a thirty-six pounder is but a child's toy. In short, everything is life and activity here, in expectation of the volleys of cannon which will announce tomorrow from the old gate towers of the Kremlin the solemn entrance of the Czar.

Yesterday the Emperor wished to ride through the camp of the Guards, whom he has not seen since he ascended the throne, because, in consequence of the war, they had been removed to Lithuania and Poland, and are now encamped at an hour's distance on a vast plain. A solemn mass, at which the Empress was also present, preceded this. We drove out in complete gala dress through thick clouds of dust. The Emperor rode with his suite. He looked very well on horseback. At this moment it began to rain, and poured uninterruptedly. Fortunately we found shelter under the open tent in which the altar was, and in which the mass was said, or, rather, sung. All further inspection was countermanded, and we returned home.

In the evening I drove to Petrofskoy. It lies in the midst of a wood, and has a very odd appearance. The castle proper is a three-storied quadrangle with a green cupola. The entrances are supported by the most singular bottle-shaped bulging columns, and the whole is surrounded by a turreted wall, with battlements and loopholes. This red-and white-painted fortress, the light of which radiates from the high windows through the dark forest, recalls a fable of the Arabian Nights. All monasteries and castles here are fortified. They were the only points capable of holding out when the Golden Tribe rushed upon them with twenty or thirty thousand horses, and devastated all that flat country. Long after their yoke was broken, the Khans of Tartary in the Crimea were formidable enemies. The watchmen from the highest battlements of the Kremlin were continually observing the wide expanse toward the south; and when the dust-clouds rose thence, and the great bell (kolokol) of Ivan Welicki rang the alarm, every one fled behind the walls of the Czar's palace or to the monasteries, upon whose walls the infuriated horsemen struck and dashed in vain. The Christianity, science, and culture of the Russian nation sought shelter in the cloisters, and from them started afterward Russia's deliverance from the domination of the Mongolians and Poles.

Today there was again mass in the open air, and five battalions received new flags, which in addition were blessed by the priests; then the Metropolitan Archbishop walked the length of the front and sprinkled the troops thoroughly with holy water; some of the men were practically soaked to the skin. The Emperor and both Empresses not only kissed the cross, but the archbishop's hand. Then the Emperor passed the front of every battalion, and, with a true military attitude, spoke a few words to the men, which were received with endless applause. He was an excellent rider, and rode a well-trained horse. Then he inspected the front of the whole camp—one and a half German miles. There were seventy-four battalions, with eight hundred men apiece—about sixty thousand men in all. They stood unarmed and in caps, all of them old, bearded, and dark-faced.

I care nothing for the deafening hurrahs that lasted two hours; but these old, mustached men show how glad they are to see their Czar.

The Emperor spoke to some of them. They answered their Batuschka (little father) without embarrassment. In Russia the family is the microcosm of the State. All power rests with the father. All theories of representative government in Russia are pure nonsense. "How can human statutes circumscribe the divine right of a father?" asks the Russian. So that the unlimited power in the hands of the Emperor is necessary and beneficial in a land where nothing is done that is not ordered from above.

Whoever should gaze, as I have done, on a warm, sunny day, upon the city of Moscow for the first time from the height of the Kremlin would certainly not think that he was in the same latitude in which the reindeer graze in Siberia, and the dogs drag the sleighs over the ice in Kamtchatka. Moscow reminds one of the South, but of something strange never seen before. One seems to be transported to Ispahan, Bagdad, or some other place—to the scene of the story of the Sultaness Scheherezade.

Although Moscow does not count more than three hundred thousand inhabitants, it covers two square miles with its houses, gardens, churches, and monasteries. In this flat region one can hardly see beyond the extreme suburbs, and houses and trees extend to the horizon.

No city in the world, with the exception of Rome, has so many churches as the holy Stolitza of Russia. It is affirmed that Moscow boasts of forty times forty churches. Each one has at least five, and several even sixteen, cupolas that are brilliantly painted, and covered with colored glazed bricks, or richly silvered and gilded, glittering in the blue atmosphere like the sun when it is half above the horizon. Even the graceful towers, rising sometimes to considerable heights from the immense mass of houses and gardens, are similarly ornamented, and neither do the larger ones among the palaces lack the addition of a cupola.

The dwelling houses are almost always in gardens, and are distinctly outlined against the dark background of trees by their white walls and flat iron roofs painted light green or red. The oldest part alone, close to the Kremlin—the Kitai-Gorod, or the Chinese quarter—forms a city according to our notions, where the houses touch each other, and are carefully enclosed by a beautiful turreted wall, here, of course, painted white. All the rest seems to be a large collection of country houses, between which the Moskwa winds its way.

The Kremlin contains (besides the palaces of the Czars and the Patriarchs) the Arsenal and the treasures of the church. Here are concentrated the highest civil and religious powers. The cloisters, mostly at the extremities of the city, are fortresses in themselves.

It was in the Kitai-Gorod that the commercial guild established itself, needing for its wares, imported from China, Bucharia, Byzantium, and Novgorod, the protection of walls. The rest, and by far the larger part of Moscow, was built by the nobility for themselves; and long after the first Emperor had raised a new capital upon the enemy's ground it was looked upon with contempt by the grandees of the Empire, still faithfully clinging to the customs of their fathers.

The venerable city of Moscow, with its ancient, sacred relics and historical reminiscences, still remains an object of veneration and love to every Russian; and, often coming from a distance of hundreds of miles, when getting a glimpse of the golden cross on the Church of Ivan Welicki, he falls on his knees in reverence and patriotic fervor. St. Petersburg is his pride, but Moscow is nearer to his heart. And, in truth, Moscow has no resemblance to St. Petersburg. There is no Neva here, no sea, no steamers; nowhere a straight street, a large square, or a wooded island. But Moscow has as little resemblance to any other city. The cupolas, the flat roofs and the trees remind one of the East; but there the cupolas are more curved, covered with gray lead, and surmounted by delicate minarets; the houses show no windows toward the street; and the gardens are enclosed by high, dead, monotonous walls. Moscow has a character of its own; and if one wishes to compare it with anything, it must be called Byzantine-Moresque. Russia received her Christianity and first civilization from Byzantium. Until of late years she remained completely shut off from the East, and what culture she once adopted became rapidly nationalized. The heavy scourge of the Mongolian and Tartar domination, which burdened this country for nearly three centuries, prevented for a long time any further progress. All culture was confined to the monasteries, and to these they afterward owed their deliverance. The Khans of Tartary never required their submission to Islam; they satisfied themselves with the tribute. In order to raise this, they had recourse to native authority. They supported the power of the Grand Dukes and of the priesthood; and the despotism of the Golden Tribe, much as it circumscribed further improvement, strengthened the oppressed in their faith in their religion, fidelity to their rulers, and love to their mutual fatherland.

These are still the characteristics of the people; and when one reflects that the embryo of this nation, the Great Russians—thirty-six million people of one root, one faith, and one language—forms the greatest homogeneous mass of people in the world, no one will doubt that Russia has a great future before her.

It has been said that with an increase of population this boundless empire must fall to pieces. But no part of it can exist without the other—the woody North without the fertile South, the industrial centre without both, the interior without the coast, nor without the common joint stream, navigable for four hundred miles—the Volga. But, more than all this, the national spirit unites the most distant portions.

Moscow is now the national centre not only of the European Empire, but of the ancient and holy kingdom of the Czars, from which the historical reminiscences of the people spring, which, perhaps, is big with the destinies of the future empire in spite of a deviation of two centuries.

The foreign civilization which was forced upon them has never penetrated the mass of the people. The national peculiarity has remained complete in language, manners, and customs, in a highly remarkable municipal constitution, the freest and most independent existing anywhere; and, finally, in their architecture. The last can, of course, only be applied to the churches. In Russia nearly everything is new. What is older than a hundred years is looked upon as an antiquity. The Russian dwelling-house is of wood, and therefore never reaches that age, unless, like the one of Peter the Great, it be encased by a stone one. Even the palaces of the Emperor are new, and only here in Moscow can be found a ruin of the old Dworez of the Czars. There are churches in existence of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries (a great age for Russia), and the strictly conservative spirit of the priesthood has been instrumental in retaining the same style of architecture in the later buildings.

The St. Sophia, in Constantinople, is the model upon which all Russian churches are built. It was imitated everywhere, but never equalled, not even by St. Mark's in Venice. There was lack both of material and skill to build an arch with a span of one hundred and twenty-six feet. What could not be accomplished in width was attempted in height. The domes became narrow and tall, like towers. The rough stone, handled without art, rendered clumsy pillars and thick walls necessary, in which the windows, like embrasures, are cut narrow and deep. The brightest light falls through the windows in the thinner wall which supports the cupolas. Nearly all churches are higher than they are long and wide. The clumsy tetragonal pillars contract the already narrow space. One has nowhere a free view, and a mystic twilight reigns everywhere. The most famous Russian churches can only accommodate as many hundreds as a Gothic cathedral can thousands. It is true most of them were built by Italian masters; but the latter were obliged to conform to the rules and forms already in use.

Since the architectonic conditions were unfavorable to the creation of a magnificent whole, an attempt was made to ornament the individual parts with brilliancy and magnificence. Not contented to gild the churches inside and out, the floors were paved with half-precious stones, and the pictures (of no artistic value) were covered with jewels, diamonds, and pearls. Only the faces and hands are painted; the garments, crown, and all else are plated with silver, gold, and jewels.

Sculpture is entirely prohibited, as far as representing the human form is concerned; but they do not hesitate to represent God himself on canvas. The gilt background is of itself disadvantageous for the carnation of the pictures, and added to this are the long-drawn outlines of the Byzantine and old German schools, without the genuine feeling of the latter. Gigantic scarecrows gaze down from the cupolas, meant to represent the Virgin Mary, Christ, St. John, or God the Father. A Russian buys no holy picture that is not quite black or faded out. A lovely Madonna of Raphael, or a fine Sebastian of Correggio, does not seem to him expressive. His creed needs the obscurity of his church—the clouds of incense which at every mass veil the mysterious movements of the priests.

The Byzantine element in the Russian architecture is then historically easy to explain. The Moresque originated with the necessity of decorating the individual parts, and relates only to these.

The railings of the Ikonostase are interlaced with vines, garlands, and animal forms. The flat walls, principally where they are not gilt, are decorated with leafwork, rosettes, and twining vines. Where this could not be cut in stone it was painted, and the deficiency in drawing was supplied by a variety of the most glaring colors. Of course, they remained far behind the tasteful, artistic arabesques of the Alhambra and the Alcazar.