Diary of Marie Bashkirtseff
CZENUKFR

Tuesday, 14 April 1874

Another death: M. Fedoroff passed from life to death yesterday evening while playing cards at M. Patton's. What a surprise for the master and mistress of the house. He died of an aneurysm. How people die this year -- and marry, too.
It is raining.
Stiopa made a scene with his wife -- a coarse, barbarous, impossible, frenzied, savage scene -- because she had bought a few marble trifles and it increased the weight of the trunks. He very nearly struck that poor little woman, who was weeping. It was revolting and comical at the same time to hear the deep voice of this savage monster, and then Machenka's, plaintive and tearful. One could hear plainly that he felt himself obeyed and feared. The monster! May God and the angels of paradise protect me from a Russian husband and landowner. What coarseness! What rudeness, what savagery, what barbarism, what moujik manners! Lord God!
Above all, a great lord and well bred.
At once Miloradovitch came to mind, while I heard and listened to the shouting and stamping of feet.
He too is a frightful monster. My God, keep me from such a husband.
I want only an English duke. This nationality and this adored title seem to me a complete guarantee against the horrors of which I am so afraid.
I went in for a few minutes to the house of death, to bring the muslin I was asked to buy. In this journal I had not yet seen the dead.
This morning I made a speech to Maman, full of dignity and proof. A speech about our life. Often I despair. How I suffer living thus.
Yesterday, returning from Monte Carlo, at the Nice station, [Crossed out: an event] a very disagreeable adventure befell Maman. At the exit, a young German, perfectly dressed and [Crossed out: of a] a gentleman in appearance but a little tipsy, came toward Maman with open arms, saying "ma chere." She had only time to throw herself back. I believe he even touched her, for she said nothing to me of the affair, and when I asked if he had touched her, they did not answer directly. Then Stiopa and M. Anitchkoff, who were quite near, seized him, dragged him out of the exit, into the open air. M. Anitchkoff, that good fellow of seventy, blazed up as if he were seventeen and kept pushing him [Crossed out: giving him] with punches to the back of the neck.
Stiopa [Crossed out: then] cried Walitsky! to send him to Maman; he ran up, and then, forgetting Maman, Stiopa said to him: Hit him, that scoundrel! And Walitsky, without hesitating an instant, gave him fine blows to the face and everywhere. All three beat him until he bled.
Stiopa assures us that if he lives another hundred years, he will never again accost a lady without knowing her.
He deserved to be so treated, but if he is a gentleman, I pity him, for he is more than dead.
Poor man!