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Show '1‘1111: 11.11111 1-‘111115s'1‘ 233 '/ MARIE IVANOVNA 11111111111 of 1':111111111, 11111-1~ and again, sounded like the lazy snore 111'.~:o1ne 511111pi1111 111-1M. Near the 11~\\'11711;111 we 1111111111 :1 company of fantastic creatures awaitina‘ 115'. 'l‘hey were pr1~55111l 1111:111111‘1' in 11 11111150 crowd as though they were afraid 111' some one attack- 111:: 11111111. 1111-111 were many 11111 men, like the clowns 111 Shakespeare.1111'1y1111y11111l l1eliel‘i11 1:1111‘1‘1‘11e‘:11‘111e111s,\\'ide- hrinnned 111115, 111111111 .5kir15‘ and baggy trousers: 11111111011 with 11111;: tangled hair. hare 111111y 111'1‘a5t5 and slohberinq 1111115. Many of the women 511111111111 strong and young; their faces were on the whole 1'111'111'1'111 a brazen indill'erenee to anything and e\'e1'.\‘1hin;1 was their :1111111111‘. There were many children. 'l‘wo n11111la1'111e5 guarded 1111‘111 with rough friendly di5eipline. l thought that 1 112111 seen nothing more terrible at 1111) war than 1111- eager pitiful doeility with whieh they 1111111111 111111111 fro 111 1111111111111111111'1theeendarmes' orders. 1\ dreadful, broken. 111-1101111114 5111111115‘5ion. . . . But it was their tanta.~y, 1111-11' eoloured incredible unreality that oy'erw‘hel111e11 me. The building, black and twisted against the hard blue sky, raised its head behind us like a malicious 11111115101: liefore us this crowd, all tattered faded pieces of scarlet. and yellow and blue, men with huge noses, sunken eye5. 511:11'p chins, long skinny hands, women with hard, bright, dead facts, little children with eyes that were afraid and 1111.11 li'erent, hungry and mad; all this crowd swaying before 11.5, with the cannon muttering beyond the walls, and the thin 1111501111110 thread of the fir 11eral hymn trickling like water under our feet. . . . I looked from these to Semyouoy' and Marie ly'anoy'na, they 111 their white overalls Working- at the meat kitehen and the huge l11‘ead-l'1askets. radiant in their lore, their sueceSS, the1r struggle, confident, both of them, this morning that they had the fire of life in their hands to do with it as they pleased. I have not wished during,r the progress of this book, which is the history of the experiences of others rather than of myself, to lay any stress on my personal history, and here I would only say that any one who is burdened with a physical disease or encumbrance that will remain to the end of life must know that there are certain moments when this hindrance leaps up at him like the grinning face of a devil-despairing hideous moments they are! I have said that during our drive I had felt a confident happy participation 111 the joy of those others who were with 1110 . . . now as we stood there feeding: that company of seareerows, a sudden horror of my own lameness, a sudden consciousness that 1 1101011ng rather to that band of miserable diseased hungry fugitives than to the two triumphant figmres on the other side of me, overwhelmed and defeated me. I bent my head; I felt a shame, a degradation as though I should have crept into some shadow and hidden. . . . I would not 111011tion this were it not that afterwards, in retrospect, the 1111111111111 seemed to me an omen. After all, life is not always to the Victorious! . . . ()ur scarecrows wanted, horribly, their food. It was dreadful to see the anxiety with which they watched the 11111111111111}: of the thiek heay'y hunks of black bread. They had 111 51111w Marie lvauovna their dirty little. scraps of paper whieh de5erihe11 the portions to which they were 111111111311. How their hony tine'ers clutched the paper after- wards as, they pre5se1l it haek into their skinny bosonml 81111111111105 they could not wait to return home, hut would 51111at down 1111 the ground and lap their soup like dogs. The day grew hotter and hotter, the World smelt of disease and 1111'11 Waste and destdation. Marie ly'anoy'na's face was soft. |
