Note 128 — Chapter 32 The Last Visit to Sokolovo—The Theoretical Rupture—A Strained Position—Dahin! Dahin!

The story of how one of the students got into the university is so full of the native flavour of the Nicholas period that I cannot resist telling it. The anniversary day with which we are all familiar from Pushkin’s superb verses was celebrated annually in the Lyceum. As a rule, on this day of parting from companions and seeing again former schoolfellows the young people were allowed to make merry. On one of these anniversaries a youth who had not yet finished his studies in a light-hearted moment flung a bottle at the wall; unluckily, the bottle struck a marble slab on which was inscribed in gold letters: ‘His Imperial Majesty the Emperor graciously deigned to visit us on such and such a date ...’ and broke a piece off it. A superintendent ran up, fell upon the culprit with terrible abuse, and tried to remove him. The youth, insulted before his comrades and exhilarated by the wine, tore the cane out of his hand and struck him with it. The superintendent promptly reported the incident; the youth was arrested and kept in detention on the terrible charge not merely of striking a superintendent but also of sacrilegious disrespect for a slab on which the sacred name of the monarch was inscribed.

He might very easily have been sent for a soldier had not another calamity saved him. At that very time his elder brother died. His mother, overwhelmed with grief, wrote to him that he was now her only hope and support, and urged him to make haste and finish his studies and come to her. The principal of the Lyceum, General Bronevsky I believe it was, was touched on reading this letter and resolved to save the youth without bringing it to the knowledge of Nicholas. He told the Grand Duke Michael of the incident, and the latter directed that he should be expelled from the Lyceum privately, and that that should end the matter. The youth left the Lyceum with a certificate on which he could not enter any educational institution, that is, almost every career was barred to him for he was not at all wealthy, and all this for damaging a slab adorned with the Imperial name! And even this was only thanks to the peculiar favour of Providence which killed his brother at the right moment, to a tenderness unheard of among generals, and an indulgence almost incredible in a grand duke! Being a young man of exceptional talent, he succeeded long afterwards in obtaining the right to attend lectures in the Moscow University.