There is one marked feature in the Russian peasant's character to which the Skazkas frequently refer--his passion for drink. To him strong liquor is a friend, a comforter, [Pg 43] a solace amid the ills of life. Intoxication is not so much an evil to be dreaded or remembered with shame, as a joy to be fondly anticipated, or classed with the happy memories of the past. By him drunkenness is regarded, like sleep, as the friend of woe--and a friend whose services can be even more readily commanded. On certain occasions he almost believes that to get drunk is a duty he owes either to the Church, or to the memory of the Dead; at times without the slightest apparent cause, he is seized by a sudden and irresistible craving for ardent spirits, and he commences a drinking-bout which lasts--with intervals of coma--for days, or even weeks, after which he resumes his everyday life and his usual sobriety as calmly asif no interruption had taken place. All these ideas and habits of his find expression in his popular tales, giving rise to incidents which
are often singularly out of keeping with the rest of the narrative in which they occur. In one of the many variants,[38] for instance, of a widespread and well known story--that of the three princesses who are rescued from captivity by a hero from whom they are afterwards carried away, and who refuse to get married until certain clothes or shoes or other things impossible for ordinary workmen to make are supplied to them--an unfortunate shoemaker is told that if he does not next day produce the necessary shoes (of perfect fit, although no measure has been taken, and all set thick with precious stones) he shall be hanged. Away he goes at once to a traktir, or tavern, and sets to work to drown his grief in drink. After awhile he begins to totter. "Now then," he says, "I'll take home
a bicker of spirits with me, and go to bed. And to-morrow morning, as soon as they come to fetch me to be hanged, [Pg 44] I'll toss
off half the bickerful. They may hang me then without my knowing anything about it."[39]
In the story of the "Purchased Wife," the Princess Anastasia, the Beautiful, enables the youth Ivan, who ransoms her, to win a large sum of money in the following manner. Having worked a piece of embroidery, she tells him to take it to market. "But if any one
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purchases it," says she, "don't take any money from him, but ask him to give you liquor enough to make you drunk." Ivan obeys, and this is the result. He drank till he was intoxicated, and when he left the kabak (or pot-house) he tumbled into a muddy pool. A crowd collected and folks looked at him and said scoffingly, "Oh, the fair youth! now'd be the time for him to go to church to get married!"
"Fair or foul!" says he, "if I bid her, Anastasia the Beautiful will kiss the crown of my head."
"Don't go bragging like that!" says a rich merchant--"why she wouldn't even so much as look at you," and offers to stake all that he is worth on the truth of his assertion. Ivan accepts the wager. The Princess appears, takes him by the hand, kisses him on the crown of his head, wipes the dirt off him, and leads him home, still inebriated but no longer impecunious.[40]
Sometimes even greater people than the peasants get drunk. The story of "Semiletka"[41]--a variant of the well known tale of how a woman's wit enables her to guess all riddles, to detect all deceits, and to conquer all difficulties--relates how the heroine was chosen by a Voyvode[42] as his [Pg 45] wife, with the stipulation that if she meddled in the affairs of his Voyvodeship she was to be sent back to her father, but allowed to take with her whatever thing belonging to her she prized most. The marriage takes place, but one day the well known case comes before him for decision, of the foal of the borrowed mare--does it belong to the owner of the mare, or to the borrower in whose possession it was at the time of foaling? The Voyvode adjudges it to the borrower, and this is how the story ends:--
"Semiletka heard of this and could not restrain herself, but said that he had decided unfairly. The Voyvode waxed wroth, and demanded a divorce. After dinner Semiletka was obliged to go back to her father's house. But during the dinner she made the Voyvode drink till he was intoxicated. He drank his fill and went to sleep. While he was sleeping she had him placed in a carriage, and then she drove away with him to her father's. When they had arrived there the Voyvode awoke and said--
"'Who brought me here?'
"'I brought you,' said Semiletka; 'there was an agreement between us that I might take away with me whatever I prized most. And so
I have taken you!'
"The Voyvode marvelled at her wisdom, and made peace with her. He and she then returned home and went on living prosperously."
But although drunkenness is very tenderly treated in the Skazkas, as well as in the folk-songs, it forms the subject of many a moral lesson, couched in terms of the utmost severity, in the stikhi (or poems of a religious character, sung by the blind beggars and other wandering minstrels who sing in front of churches), and also in the "Legends," which are tales of a semi-religious (or rather
demi-semi-religious) [Pg 46] nature. No better specimen of the stories of this class referring to drunkenness can be offered than the
history of--
The Awful Drunkard.[43]
Once there was an old man who was such an awful drunkard as passes all description. Well, one day he went to a kabak, intoxicated himself with liquor, and then went staggering home blind drunk. Now his way happened to lie across a river. When he came to the river, he didn't stop long to consider, but kicked off his boots, hung them round his neck, and walked into the water. Scarcely had he got half-way across when he tripped over a stone, tumbled into the water--and there was an end of him.
Now, he left a son called Petrusha.[44] When Peter saw that his father had disappeared and left no trace behind, he took the matter
greatly to heart for a time, he wept for awhile, he had a service performed for the repose of his father's soul, and he began to act
as head of the family. One Sunday he went to church to pray to God. As he passed along the road a woman was pounding away in front of him. She walked and walked, stumbled over a stone, and began swearing at it, saying, "What devil shoved you under my feet?"
Hearing these words, Petrusha said:
"Good day, aunt! whither away?"
"To church, my dear, to pray to God."
"But isn't this sinful conduct of yours? You're going to church, to pray to God, and yet you think about the Evil One; your foot
stumbles and you throw the fault on the Devil!"
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Well, he went to church and then returned home. He walked and walked, and suddenly, goodness knows whence, there appeared
before him a fine-looking man, who saluted him and said: [Pg 47] "Thanks, Petrusha, for your good word!"
"Who are you, and why do you thank me?" asks Petrusha.
"I am the Devil.[45] I thank you because, when that woman stumbled, and scolded me without a cause, you said a good word for me." Then he began to entreat him, saying, "Come and pay me a visit, Petrusha. How I will reward you to be sure! With silver and with gold, with everything will I endow you."
"Very good," says Petrusha, "I'll come."
Having told him all about the road he was to take, the Devil straightway disappeared, and Petrusha returned home.
Next day Petrusha set off on his visit to the Devil. He walked and walked, for three whole days did he walk, and then he reached
