Diary of Marie Bashkirtseff
CZENUKFR

Friday, 4 August 1876 (23 July, Russian style)

Yesterday at three o'clock I went to watch the arrival of the train, and fortunately my uncle was there. But he could stay only a quarter of an hour, for at the Russian frontier, Wirballen, he had obtained with difficulty leave to come here without a passport and had given his word of honour to a customs officer that he would return on the next train. Chocolat ran to fetch my aunt; there were only a few minutes when she arrived, and there was barely time to exchange two words. My aunt, in her anxiety for me, on returning to the inn imagined she had noticed a strange air in Étienne, and by all manner of half-spoken words discouraged me so thoroughly that I too began to grow anxious. At last, at midnight, I got into the carriage; my aunt was weeping; I kept my eyes raised and fixed so that they should not overflow. The guard gave the signal, and for the first time in my life I found myself alone!
I began to weep aloud — but if you think I drew no profit from it!... I was studying from life how one weeps.
"Enough, my girl!" I said, rising to my feet — and it was time: I was in Russia. On alighting I was received in the arms of my uncle, two gendarmes, and two customs officers. I was conducted like a princess — my baggage was not even inspected. The station is large; the officials are elegant and excessively polite. I thought myself in an ideal country, everything is so well arranged. A simple gendarme here is better than an officer in France. And here let me enter a word in defence of our poor Emperor, who is accused of having strange eyes. Everyone who wears a helmet — and there are not a few at Wirballen — has eyes like the Emperor. I do not know whether this is owing to the helmet which falls over the eyes, or to imitation. As for imitation — it is well known that in France all soldiers used to resemble Napoleon, so hard did they strive to imitate him.
I was given a separate compartment, and after talking business and other matters with Étienne, I fell asleep, fuming over my telegram to Antonelli.
At the station buffets one eats very properly, so that I descended frequently — accompanied by a chambermaid, a little Black boy, followed by a great deal of luggage, and with fifty roubles in my pocket. What do you say to that?
My compatriots awaken in me no particular emotion, no kind of ecstasy such as I feel at revisiting countries I have seen before — but I feel a great deal of sympathy for them, and there returns to me from them a strong sense of well-being.
And besides, everything is so comfortably arranged; people are so polite; there is in the bearing of every Russian so much cordiality, so much good nature, so much frankness, that one's heart is content.
Étienne came to wake me this morning at ten o'clock. The locomotives are fired with wood, which spares us the horrible filth of coal; I woke perfectly clean and spent the day talking, sleeping, and looking through the window at our beautiful Russia, so flat — but this countryside recalls that of Rome.
At half past nine it was still light. We had passed Gatchina — the old residence of Paul I, so persecuted during the lifetime of his magnificent mother — and at last here we are at Tsarskoye Selo, and in twenty-five minutes at Petersburg.
I have put up at the Hôtel Demouth, accompanied by an uncle, a chambermaid, a little Black boy, followed by a great deal of luggage, and with fifty roubles in my pocket. What do you say to that?
While I was supping in my salon, [One line crossed out but legible: quite large, paintings on the ceiling] I was thinking of the somnambule's prediction and was already imagining Antonelli flinging himself at my feet, when Étienne came in.
"Do you know who is here — who is staying at my place?" he asked.
"No — who?"
"Guess, Princess."
"I have no idea!"
"Come, little queen — it is Paul Yssayevitch; may he come in?"
"Yes, let him come in."
Paul is in Petersburg with the Governor-General of Vilna, M. Albedinsky — the one who married the Emperor's former favourite. He received my telegram from Eydkühnen just as he was leaving; unable to miss his duties, he had charged his friend Comte Mouravieff to come to meet me. But this Count was put to trouble in vain, as we passed Vilna that night at three o'clock while I slept like one blessed.
Who will deny my good nature after I say that I was cheerful this evening because I felt that Yssayevitch was glad to see me? Is that selfishness? I was rejoicing solely at the pleasure I was procuring for another. Well, here is an escort to serve me in Petersburg — I am in Petersburg... but I have so far seen only droschkis (a droschki is a one-seat carriage with eight springs — like the large Binder carriages — and one horse), the Kazan Cathedral with its colonnade in the manner of St Peter's in Rome, and a great many drinking establishments.
It is three o'clock in the morning and already it is light.
From all sides I hear the praises of Princess Marguerite — "So simple, so kind!" people say. Simple! — no one values simplicity in a woman who is not a princess. Be simple and kind and agreeable, and not a queen, and your inferiors will take liberties, while your equals will say "Nice little thing!" and will in everything prefer women who are neither simple nor kind.
Ah! if I were a queen, I should be adored; I should be popular.
The Italian princess, her husband, and their suite have not yet left Russia; they are visiting Kiev at this moment — "the mother of all Russian cities," as the Grand Prince Saint Vladimir said after becoming a Christian and baptizing half of Russia in the Dnieper. Kiev is the richest city in the world in churches, monasteries, monks, and relics; and as for the precious stones possessed by these monasteries, it is fabulous — there are cellars full of them, as in the tales of the Thousand and One Nights. I saw Kiev nine years ago and still remember its underground corridors, filled with relics, which encircle the city, run beneath all the streets, and connect the monasteries underground, giving thus kilometres of corridors lined on right and left with the tombs of saints. My God, forgive a wicked thought... but it is not possible that there can have been so many.

Notes

Russia still used the Julian ("Old Style") calendar, which ran 13 days behind the Gregorian calendar used in Western Europe. Marie consistently notes both dates during her time in Russia. ↩
Paul I (1754–1801), Emperor of Russia, was suppressed and marginalized by his mother Catherine II ("the Great") throughout her reign; he succeeded her in 1796 only to be assassinated five years later. ↩
Hôtel Demouth (or Demut): one of the most prestigious hotels in St. Petersburg, located on the Moika embankment; Pushkin stayed there; a favourite with foreign aristocrats. ↩
Maisons à boire (drinking establishments): taverns and wine-shops; Marie notes the contrast with the architectural splendours she has just described. ↩
"Mother of all Russian cities": the traditional epithet for Kyiv, derived from the Primary Chronicle. ↩
Vladimir I (c. 958–1015), Grand Prince of Kiev, who converted to Orthodox Christianity in 988 and ordered the mass baptism of his people in the Dnieper River. ↩