tion, it gained him the animosity of the more conservative elements in society. The poem was written on account of Suvorov's refusal to sign the welcoming address to the Governor-General of the north-western region, M. Muravyov, renowned for his savage reprisals against Polish and Lithuanian insurgents. His Draconian tactics earned him the sobriquet Veshatel'/Hangman. Tyutchev and other Pan-Slavists supported Muravyov's measures. 270. Possibly 1863 and probably written to N. Akinfeva. The poem hints at A. Gorchakov's feelings for N. Akinfeva. 271. Possibly some time after 1863. Nikolay Krol' (1823-71) was a minor poet and dramatist and, with Polonsky, one of the few people who were linked with democratic cricles with whom Tyutchev had any dealings. 272. February, 19th.-21st. 1864. On the death of Count Dmitry Bludov, February 19th. the third anniversary of the publication of the manifesto on the reform of serfdom. 273. April 12th. 1864. Sent to Darya on her birthday. 274. October, 1864. Geneva. As so often, Tyutchev encompasses many of his poetic themes in one very short poem. Here, within the natural framework, there is the sea-movement of Na Neve/On the Neva [172], the lush, leaf-rustling, sunny feel of so many, and the anguish of the memory of Elena's death. .... one grave less: a reference to Elena. 275. Late 1864. Nice. Dedicated to the memory of Elena's final hours. 276. November 3rd. 1864. Nice. Dedicated to the Empress, Maria Alexandrovna. 277. November 21st. 1864. Tyutchev lived in Nice from October 18th. of this year to March 4th. 1865. Leaving the town in the spring of 1865, Tyutchev wrote to Anna: "Italy has played a strange role in my life... Twice it has appeared before me like some fateful vision, after the two greatest sorrows I have ever been fated to experience... There are countries where they wear the mourning of bright flowers. Obviously, this is my lot ...." The two sorrows were the deaths of Eleonore and Elena. His characteristic impatience with anything which prevented him from being among people is described in a letter Anna wrote to her sister, Ekaterina (Dec. 4th. 1864): "Just imagine what poor dad is like when the weather's like this. When it's raining in Nice, no-one goes out, social life comes to a halt, the cabs vanish, the streets become impassable. Poor dad is thoroughly down-hearted". 278. November, 1864. Nice. Inspired by his meeting with the Empress. 279. November, 1864. Written in connection with the promulgation of the encyclical of Pius IX, condemning, among other "aberrations of the age", freedom of conscience. Stanza 1 contains a reference to the destruction of the temple of Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 A.D. 280. 1864. Addressed to Prince Alexander Gorchakov (1798-1883), a conspicuous figure in government, from 1856 occupying the post of Minister of Foreign Affairs. He replaced the Austrophil, Count K. Nesselrode (1780-1862). While Tyutchev considered it his duty to support the nationalist motives behind Gorchakov's policies, to which numerous letters and verses bear witness, nonetheless he caustically mocked the man's ambition and self-love, calling him "the narcissus of his own inkwell". Gorchakov was inordinately proud of his prose style. His vanity even came to the attention of Bismarck, who once remarked that Gorchakov was "incapable of stepping over a puddle without examining his own reflection in it". (C:7/43) There is an allusion here to Gorchakov's diplomatic activity during the Polish uprising and to the rebuff thrown him by the foreign powers. Aksakov points to the veiled suggestion that "new constraints are threatening the Russian press". (A:1/281) 281. January, 1865. The poem was distorted when Darya copied it and it appeared in print in such a manner that Tyutchev was extremely annoyed, claiming they had published without informing him and presented the poem "in its ugliest form". He further complained to the editorial board in February: "God knows, I place very little value on my verses, even less now than ever before, but I see no reason to take responsibility for poetry which does not belong to me". 282. January 12th. 1865. Dedicated to Darya. The text ends with the following words: "My dear daughter, keep this in memory of yesterday's stroll and our conversation, but don't show it to anyone. Let it be meaningful only to us two.... I embrace and bless you with all my heart. F.T." We do not know what they talked about, although the first stanza does appear to have something in common with the following lines from a letter he wrote to Darya in September, 1864: " .... if there were anything which could lift my spirits, could create at least an outward appearance of life, then it is to preserve myself for you, to dedicate myself to you, my poor, sweet child, you, so loving and so alone, outwardly so apparently lacking in sense and so deeply sincere, to you I have, perhaps, bequeathed this frightful capacity which has no name, which destroys all equilibrium in life, this thirst for love which in you, my poor child, has remained unassuaged". 283. January, 1865. Written on account of the address to Alexander II by the Moscow nobility concerning the convocation of the Zemskaya duma (a representative district council in Russia in the last half of the century up till the Revolution). Tyutchev's frequent reactionary outbursts must have irritated many less capable of expressing their feelings than he. However, on this occasion, he appears to have got almost as good as he gave, as the following anonymous reply to his epigram demonstrates: Vy oshibaetesya grubo, I v vashei Nitstse dorogoi Slozhili, vidno, vmeste s shuboi Vy pamyat' o zemle rodnoi. V rayu terpenie umestno, Politike tam mesta net; Tam vsyo umno, soglasno, chestno, Tam net zimy, tam vechnyi svet. No kak zhe byt' v strane unyloi, Gde nyne pravit Konstantin I gdye slilis' v odno svetilo, Valuev, Reitern, Golovnin? Net, nam parlamenta ne nuzhno, No pochemu zh nas proklinat' Za to, chto my derznuli druzhno I gromko karaul krichat'? *** You made a coarse mistake, and in your dear Nice you've buried, together with your fur coat, the very memory of your native land. Patience is appropriate in paradise, there's no place for politics there. Everything's clever, harmonious, honourable. There's no winter there, just eternal light. But how about in a sad land where right now Constantine rules and where, into one luminary, there have merged Valuev, Reitern and Golovnin? No, we don't need a parliament, but why curse us for daring in a friendly manner to loudly sound the alarm? The references are to Grand Duke Konstantin, from 1865 Chairman of the State Council; Pyotr Valuev (1816-1890), home affairs minister; finance minister, Mikhail Reytern (1826-1886) and education minister, Alexander Golovnin (1821-1886). In the exclusive English club, high-ranking civil servants and those with whom it was important to be seen would gather to play cards and billiards, converse and take part in readings. Tyutchev's brother, Nikolay was in the club when he died suddenly on December 8th. 1870. He suffered from a heart condition. 284. Late March, 1865. Petersburg. Dedicated to the memory of Elena. Lines from Tyutchev's letter of October 1864 to her brother-in-law, A. Georgievsky (1830-1911), are his epistolary variant of this poem: "I just can't get on with life.... I can't get on... The wound is festering and won't heal. Call it faint-heartedness, call it impotence, I don't care. Only in her company and for her was I an individual, only in her love, in her limitless love for me was I aware of myself... Now I'm some sort of unthinking living thing, some living, tormented nothing...". 285. Early April, 1865. Written on the occasion of the 100th. anniversary of the death of Lomonosov, marked on April 4th. of that year. Sending the first draft of his poem to A. Maykov, Tyutchev wrote: "Here, my friend ... are a few poor rhymes for our festival. I can manage nothing better thanks to my present disposition". While Maykov took part in the proceedings, Tyutchev's verses were not read out for some reason. On his death bed, Lomonosov feared that all his 'useful intentions' would die with him. (See Note on Lomonosov in [7]). Jacob is obviously referred to at the end of the poem, understanding at dawn that his night-long struggle had been with God. (Genesis, XXXII, 24-32). 286. April 8th. 1865. St. Petersburg. The eldest son of Alexander II, Nikolay (1843-1865), died on April 12th. 287. April 12th. 1865. On the death of Grand Duke Nikolay. 288. April 30th. 1865. The epigram is directed at Count Sergei Stroganov, entrusted with the care of the heir to the throne, and refers to rumours that the count's ukhod/care might have been the ukhod/ruin of the young man. The verb ukhodit' can mean "to wear out" and colloquially "to do in". In a diary entry (April 17th. 1865), A. Nikitenko tells us that Tyutchev was convinced that the heir had been "worn out by the ridiculous education he had received, especially by the kind that Stroganov had imposed on him in recent years. His physical condition was completely ignored; they exhausted him dreadfully by forcing him to study and perform beyond his capacity and by ignoring the salutary warnings of certain level-headed doctors.... The Emperor was kept in complete ignorance of his condition. So not until several days before the heir's death did the Emperor learn accidentally from a state messenger about the imminent tragedy". (C:24/297) 289. May 11th. 1865. When Aksakov wrote that he did not like the barbarism protest in the final stanza, Tyutchev deleted the entire stanza. Tyutchev, as is well known, tended to lose sight all together of his best lyrics once he had written them. Since the immediate inspiration was of the first importance in the composition of so many of his poems, I have chosen to reinstate the final stanza. The epigraph comes from the Epistolarum liber/Book of Letters (B:1/282) of the Roman poet Ausonius (4th. Century BC): est et harundineis modulatio musica ripis cumque suis loquitur tremulum coma pinea uentis. *** There is musical harmony in the reeds along river banks and the hair (i.e. leaves) of pine trees speaks tremulously to its winds. The epigraph shows a clear parallel with the poem on Goethe's death [89]. ... the thinking reed: le roseau pensant of Pascal's famous aphorism, "Man is no more than the weakest reed in nature - but he is a thinking reed". (Pensees [231]) 290. May 30th. 1865. Yakov Polonsky (1819-98) was a poet and friend of Tyutchev, with whom he served on the censorship committee. He shared with many poets the distinction of having his lyrics rubbished by Belinsky for lack of civic feeling. 291. June 5th. 1865. Dedicated to N. Akinfeva and written at her request to compose something for her album. 292. June 28th. 1865. A greetings telegram sent to Vyazemsky on his name-day. Appended are the words, "Here are some fairly bad verses to please the recipient". 293. June 29th. 1865. Tyutchev writes on the verses, "These are better, but they're too long for a telegram". Addressed to Vyazemsky. 294. July 15th. 1865. While the first stanza recalls Elena, we are not sure as to the poem's addressee. Alexander Georgievsky (1829-1911), Elena's brother-in-law, is a possibility. 295. July 25th. or 29th. 1865. Once again, allegorical interpretations are hard to resist, though the poem is superb on a literal level. 296. August 3rd. 1865, the eve of the anniversary of Elena's death. 297. August 5th. 1865. This and Molchit somnitel'no Vostok/The east is doubtful, silent [295] share structure with the following poem [298], though each, like Fontan/ The Fountain [119], is too clearly aiming at a philosophical or political statement. 298. August 18th. 1865. The previous day Tyutchev had left Ovstug for Dyad'kovo, returning the following day. The poem was written en route. 299. November 23rd. 1865. The old separation theme returns in a striking image. Tyutchev's anguish about the past is rarely absent throughout his life. 300. December 21st. 1865. This clearly concerns Nadezhda Akinfeva (1839-91), nee Annenkova, the great-niece of Prince A. Gorchakov, and was inspired by gossip caused by her divorce and proposed marriage to her uncle. 301. March 1st. 1866. Dedicated to Countess A. Bludova, daughter of Count D. Bludov. 302. Written after the abortive attempt by Dmitry Karakozov on the life of Alexander II (April 4th. 1866). The terrorist was a young, neurotic member of a tiny group calling itself Hell. Karakozov shot at and missed the tsar, was interviewed by him in person and hanged. 303. April 12th. 1866. St. Petersburg. The previous poem may have elicited some official reaction and these lines could be a response to that. 304. April, 1866. Addressed to A. Suvorov. The relatively liberal Suvorov was held partly responsible for the attempt on the Tsar's life and was removed from office. The sharp tone of Tyutchev's poem reflects the dislike felt for the prince among the more conservative St. Petersburg circles. 305. May 11th. 1866. In connection with the intention of the Ministry of Internal Affairs to suspend the journal Moskovskie vedomosti/Moscow News for three months. Tyutchev was close to the editorial board at the time. 306. June 3rd. 1866. When Samuil Greig (1827-87), who had once served in the horse guards, was moved from the Admiralty to become deputy finance minister, Tyutchev pointed that that if they had given Reitern, the finance minister, command of a regiment of horse guards, Russia would be shaken to its foundations by the howls of protest, despite the fact that administering the finances of the Russian Empire was somewhat more difficult than commanding a regiment. 307. July 1866. Tsarskoe Selo. Time and the physical presence of swan voices are joined as reflections in water. 308. September 2nd. 1866. Count Mikhail Muravyov died on August 31st. 309. September 1st.-3rd. 1866. Vyazemsky's satirical poems, Vospominaniya iz Bualo/Recollections from Boileau and Khlestakov/Khlestakov, were directed at the editor of the Russkii vestnik/The Russian Herald and The Moscow News. The openly nationalistic editor, M. Katkov believed in lecturing the authorities, a trait Vyazemsky hated. Tyutchev's poem appears to be a defence of Kakov. It is also an oblique attack on Vyazemsky's dislike of anything new. Tyutchev once compared Vyazemsky's attitude to the younger generation to that of the "prejudiced, hostile explorer first stepping foot on foreign soil of which he has no knowledge. (LET. ERN., Jan. 3rd. 1869). In order to maintain an old friendship intact, Tyutchev asked for the poem not to be published. 310. September 17th. 1866. Petersburg. On the occasion of the arrival in St. Petersburg of the Danish Princess Dagmar (1847-1928), bride of the heir to the throne, the future Alexander III. Dagmar, later Maria Fyodorovna, had, in fact, been the fiancee of Alexander's elder brother, Nikolay Alexandrovich. (See [286].) 311. November 28th. 1866. The poem encapsulates the idea of many Slavists (indeed, of many Russians through the ages up till the present) that Russia was a land with a way of life all its own, significantly different to European states. 314. Late December, 1866. TR of a French poem which I have yet to locate. 315. July 1867. Connected with the Cretan rebellion of 1866. Marya mentions Lady Georgina Eliza Buchanan, wife of the British Ambassador, Sir Andrew Buchanan (1807-82, Ambassador Extraordinary to Russia), making a quip about un bal pour les cretins/a ball for cretins, instead of for chretiens/Christians. Such British aristocratic arrogance cannot have failed to anger Tyutchev. On the other hand, Lady Buchanan's father, 11th. baron of Blantyre, had been killed by a stray bullet during an insurrection in Brussels in September 1830, so her attitude towards revolutionary movements would have been somewhat coloured. She was the third daughter of Robert Walter Stuart and the second wife of the ambassador. Andrew Buchanan had been a paid attache in St. Petersburg in the late 1830s and Tyutchev might have met him. Buchanan's first diplomatic duties took him to Constantinople. (See [326].) Ironically, some years earlier, Tyutchev himself had played with the French word cretins, as Anna mentions in a letter to Vyazemsky (1854): "Dad is now like an animal throwing itself around its cage. He is extremely disheartened at the way events have turned and finds that people are pretty stupid and the world is absurd. He says that this is a war of scoundrels against cretins (c'est la guerre des gredins contre les cretins - FJ)". 316. Summer, 1867. In 1897, a book was published entitled Bratskaya pomoshch' postradavshim v Turtsii/armyanam Armenii/Fraternal Aid to the Armenians Suffering in Turkey. Tyutchev's poem appeared on p.128 (A:20, vol.1/179-181). 317. 1866-67. Directed at Prince Pyotr Shuvalov (1827-1889). Chief of police and head of the Third Section (the political police), Shuvalov was nicknamed "Alexander IV" and "Arakcheev II". Arakcheev was a petty noble who rose to high rank under Paul I (reigned 1796-1801), finding favour with the tsar by relentless drilling of his troops and various ruthless measures taken against dissidents. 318. March 1st. Addressed to Countess A. Bludova. 319. April, 1867. On Tyutchev's first reading of Turgenev's novel, Dym/Smoke. The novel was considered "lamentable" by many and considered to be the beginning of the decline of the novelist's artistic career. Tyutchev was extremely displeased with it, especially its "moral feel" and the absence of any "national feeling": "Smoke is still being read, and people have not yet formed an opinion on it. Yesterday, I visited F.I. Tyutchev, he had just read it and was very displeased. While admitting the skill with which the main character was depicted, he deplored bitterly the ethical mood pervading the novella and the total lack of patriotic sentiment". (A:2/420-430) 320. May, 1867. The main image of the poem compares the "mighty and beautiful", "magic, kindred" forest of the 1850s, i.e. Turgenev's earlier novels, with his later work, whose title suggests that the educated and intellectuals of Russia are so much smoke. Tyutchev genuinely respected Turgenev's earlier work and felt let down by his later novel. 321. Early May, 1867. Read at a banquet at the Slavonic Congress. Kosovo ("Blackbirds") Field: this topical location marks the place of the battle at which the Turks, led by Murad II, defeated the Serbs in 1389. The Serbian Prince Lazar was killed. At that time the Turks were advancing rapidly through the Balkans. The battle is one of those in any country's history which takes on symbolic importance to its people, here the Serbs. White Mountain: a hilly area near Prague. The defeat of the Czechs by the German Emperor Ferdinand II on November 8th. 1620 led to the loss of Czech political independence. After that point Bavarian Catholic elements took over from the former Protestant German and Czech nobility and employed terror to attempt to oust Protestantism. 322. May 11th. 1867. The epigraph is the words of the Austrian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Count Friedrich von Beust, who conducted an anti-Slav policy ("The Slavs must be pressed against the wall"). At the Slav Congress of this year, the poem was read twice to rapturous applause. 323. 1867. In this postscript to the earlier poem, K Ganke/To Hanka [136], Tyutchev refers to the first so-called All-Slav festival, having in mind the Slavonic Congress which took place in 1867. It followed on from an Ethnographic Exhibition in Moscow, there being a Slavonic section. In May 1867, eighty one representatives of various Slav nations arrived at the exhibition and celebrations followed in St. Petersburg from May 8th. to May 15th. and in Moscow for a further twelve days. Petrovich (C:26) points out that this "congress" (s''ezd) was more a get-together than a real congress. Despite the aspirations of the guests, such conferences and celebrations had no hard political significance. 324. May, 1867. St. Petersburg. Tyutchev was ever irritated by what he saw as a haughty lack of nationalist feeling on the part of the powers that be and a polite society which followed fashionable fawning after Europe. 325. June 13th. 1867. On the fiftieth anniversary of A. Gorchakov's entry into public life. 326. Mid-July, 1867. On the occasion of Queen Victoria's acceptance of the Sultan as her guest. Sent to Lady Buchanan. (See [315].) In a letter to Aksakov (Aug. 23rd. 1867), Tyutchev continues sniping at Turkey: "Fuad Pasha's embassy to Levadeia (a major town in eastern Greece - FJ) Livadia was confined to an exchange of banalities, and the order they awarded him - going against Prince Gorchakov's view - was no more than routine ritual, significant only in the sense that such absurdity demonstrates how little today's mood is understood, or how little value is placed on it". Having unsuccessfully tried to persuade the Turks to return Crete to Greece, although union was, indeed, vetoed by Britain, Alexander II saw fit, nonetheless, to award Mehmet Fuad Pasha the Order of Alexander Nevsky. Tyutchev was characteristically incensed by the entire affair, not least by what he perceived as the constant stupidity of Russian diplomacy. 327. October 14th. 1867. During a session of the Chief Council of the Management of Press Affairs, Count P. Kapnist (1830-98) noticed that Tyutchev "was extremely vacant-looking and was scribbling or drawing something on a sheet of paper on the table in front of him". (A:33/ii, vol.1/430) After the meeting he left, looking very thoughtful, leaving the paper. Kapnist retrieved the paper "with which to remember a favourite poet". 328. October 27th. 1867. On the struggle between Garibaldi's patriots and the papal forces, the result being the unification of Italy in 1870. ... and whoever.... a reference to the assistance the French gave the Pope. Lines 9-12 are addressed to Pius IX (1792-1878). 329. December 5th. 1867. In connection with Russia's refusal to agree to the guaranteed integrity of the Turkish Empire. Tyutchev's hope that the Slav peoples would rise against the Turks came to nothing. The Journal de St. Petersbourg was the organ of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. 330. June, 1868. ... with you: a reference to Elena. 331. July 16th. 1868. During that summer there were forest fires in the St. Petersburg vicinity. Writing to Ekaterina, Tyutchev describes with some humour the situation in which "... I'm choking not only from the suffocating heat of the town (Staraya Russa - FJ), but as well from the smoke of the fire which, for several miles all around, envelops all of Petersburg, thanks to the burning peat which is being allowed to burn quite quietly.... They tell us it will make excellent soil. Well, let's suffer for the sake of the future". 332. August 2nd.1868. On a farmstead at Gostilovka, near Ovstug. 333. Late August, 1868. Pogodin was an undergraduate friend of Tyutchev and the two remained close throughout their lives. 334. September 21st. 1868. Egor Kovalevsky was a student of the Middle East. 335. Mid-April, 1868. Tyutchev expressed a similar view in a letter to his brother, Nikolay (April 13th. 1868), claiming that all the officials of the Ministry of Internal Affairs were "more or less a set of rogues and looking at them is enough to make you feel sick, though our trouble is that this nausea never actually comes to throwing up". 336. 1868-early 1869. A variation on a theme from Heine's The Homecoming [87]. Der Tod, das is die kuhle Nacht, Das Leben ist der schwule Tag. Es dunkelt schon, mich schlafert, Der Tag hat mich mud' gemacht. .......... Uber mein Bett erhebt sich ein Baum, Drin singt die junge Nachtigall; Sie singt von lauter Liebe, Ich hor' es sogar im Traum. *** Death is the cool night, Life is the hot day. It's dark already. I'm tired. Day has exhausted me. .......... A tree rises up above my bed and the young nightingale sings in it, singing about honourable love, I hear it as if in a dream. 337. Mid-January, 1869. Aimed at Vladimir Skaryatin, the ultra-reactionary, anti-Slavophile editor of the aristocratic, short-lived newspaper Vest'/The News. Line 8 is a reference to the closure of Aksakov's Moskva/Moscow in 1868, after which the Slavophils had no separate voice in the press. szlachta: the Polish petty nobility. 338. February 5th. 1869. To A. Gorchakov. 339. 1869. First printed in the pamphlet entitled Prazdnovanie tysyacheletnei pamyati pervosvyatitelya slavyan sv. Kirilla 14 fevralya 1869 g. v S.-Peterburge i Moskve/A Celebration of the One Thousandth Anniversary of the High Prelate of the Slavs, the Great Saint Cyril, April 14th. 1869, in St. Petersburg and Moscow. St. Cyril was one of the teachers and converters of the Slavs, the conversion of whom, in the south, took real form in the 9th. century. He and St. Methodius are credited with giving the Slavs their Cyrillic alphabet. 340. February 27th. 1869. If further evidence were needed of Tyutchev's ability to say a lot in a very small space, this poem provides it. One of his favourite ideas, that of blagodat'/grace (also "abundance"), seen as something which "comes naturally" to us (dayotsya), is joined with sochuvstvie/sympathy, but there is no evidence as to what or to whom the "sympathy" might refer. 341. March, 1869. This is a longer, more considered poem than the shorter ones in which Tyutchev take Elena's side against society's gossips. 342. May 11th. 1869. (See Note 339.) Lines 4-5 are from Matthew (V,14). 343. May, 1869. The reference is to the gardens laid out by Peter I around the Ekaterinintal palace, built by him near Tallin. 344. July 11th. 1869. Otrada, Serpukhov uezd, Moscow province. Addressed to the wife of a well known public figure, Count V. Orlov-Davydov. Tyutchev visited the family at their estate, Otrada, famous for its fine collection of rare books (C:15/247) and was there on his hostess's name day. Aksakov describes Orlova-Davydova as a "curious phenomenon and remarkable character" (A:20, vol.1/181) who spent most of her time in the country, had a hospital built on their estate, opened schools for peasant women and did a very great deal to alleviate the situation of the Otrada peasants. In their own way, many aristocrats and members of the petty nobility acted philanthropically, vaguely aware of the condition of the vast masses of peasants in their country. Tyutchev, of course, could not resist the temptation to look cynically at their efforts, while enjoying the results. In the winter of 1867-8 famine struck parts of northern and central Russia. He wrote to Anna (February 1868); "Right now we're up to our ears in festivals, balls and concerts ... thanks to the famine... This method of showing how to be charitable towards people is the equivalent of an amusing task dreamed up for the teaching of children, and the result is the same. It's unbelievable to what point people can be so lacking in seriousness. And in the midst of all this hubbub of dancing charity and this display of making subscriptions, what will never be established, even as a warning for the future, is the part played by the administration's lack of foresight and negligence in the disaster striking the country". With such words Tyutchev shows yet again his genuine anger at administrative ineptitude, his contempt for the society of which he was a member, and his equally strong desire to be a conspicuous part of that society. 345. August, 1869. Written after a meeting in Kiev with Andrey Muravyov. (See [13].) In a letter of August 16th. 1869, Muravyov thanks Tyutchev for his verses, quoting some lines from Schiller: Die Konige und die Poeten Wohnen auf Menschen-Hohen. *** Kings and poets live on humanity's heights. The temple is the Andreevsky cathedral in Kiev, built in the eighteenth century according to a Rastrelli design. 346. August 16th. 1869. Written on one his last visits to the village of Ovstug. The dog is Romp, the family pet, who, true to his breed, swam backwards and forwards chasing fowl during a walk. 347. August, 1869. Ovstug. The absence of a riddle is, perhaps, the absence of any kind of faith. 348. August, 1869. On the five-hundredth anniversary of the birth of the reforming Czech preacher and martyr, Jan Hus (1369-1415), a patriot and religious leader who led his people in a revolt against Papal and German domination. Some considered Hus to have been put to death by anti-Slavic, anti-Greek elements. The verses accompanied a golden cup sent to Prague. Lines 13-16 refer to Hus's execution. See [356]. 349. October 14th. 1869. 350. First half of October, 1869. On the celebrations in Egypt following the opening of the Suez Canal. The shrewd Khedive Ismail succeeded in staging a major public relations exercise by touring Europe and inviting as many countries as possible to attend the opening. From General Ignatiev of Russia (ambassador to The Porte) to Henrik Ibsen of Norway, representatives flocked to Egypt. The festival described by Tyutchev took place over several weeks, including trips up the Nile to Assuan for selected celebrities. While Tyutchev attacks the "pasha" for spilling Christian blood, the Khedive, technically a vassal of The Porte, was exploiting the waning influence of Turkey in Egypt and, aiming at eventual Egyptian independence, was somewhat more in charge of events than Tyutchev gives him credit for. The poem is remarkable for the final two stanzas, a favourite formula Tol'ko tam, gde.../Only there, where ...., contrasting two locations, one of riotous happiness, the other of horror and fear. In [111] Tyutchev employs the same structure to refer to mountains disappearing into the distance in a light-hearted poem with a fairytale feel to it. The same structure used here imparts an eerie, nocturnal atmosphere of dread. 351. December 17th. 1869. Addressed to the renowned Jewish Slavist philologist, ethnographer and compiler of legends from the Onega region, Alexander Hilferding (1831-1871). Chosen as a junior member of the second section of the Academy of Sciences, a meeting of the conference failed to elect him a full member. It was said that the German members of the academy considered him a renegade, having renounced his German roots to become a Russian. His family had moved from Germany in the early eighteenth century. Hilferding and Tyutchev were good friends. 352. December 22nd. 1869. Dedicated to the musician and singer Yulia Abaza, nee Stubbe. She was friendly with Gounod and Liszt and participated in the foundation of the Russian Musical Society. 353. The 1860s. Nothing is known about the theme nor the addressee. 354. Possibly November 27th. 1869. Although Ernestine has written "Hilferding" on the manuscript, Pigaryov has his doubts in view of the high esteem in which Tyutchev held this scholar. 355. February, 1870. TR Goethe: Clarchen's song from Egmont (III,2). Freudvoll Und leidvoll, Gedankenvoll sein, Langen Und bangen In schwebender Pein, Himmelhoch jauchzend, Zum Tode betrubt; Glucklich allein Ist die Seele, die Liebt. *** To be full of joy and full of sorrow and of thought, to get by and to fear in hovering agony, rejoicing to the skies, depressed to death; happily alone is the soul which loves. Egmont was written over about seven years during the 1780s and is a drama of revolutionary nationalism set in the Netherlands in 1566-8 on the eve of the country's rebellion against Phillip II of Spain. Egmont is a charismatic count. 356. March, 1870. Composed to be read at an evening with "living pictures" in aid of the Slavonic Charitable Committee. The perfidious kaisar was the German Emperor, Sigismund. When Hus was summoned to the church council in Constanz, Sigismund gave him a safe-conduct pass but, under pressure from the council, declared it null and void. According to legend, one old lady threw a handful of brushwood onto the pyre, calling forth the words, Sancta simplicitas!/Holy simplicity! from Hus. 357. Early July, 1870. Written as he was travelling to take the baths at Karlsbad via Vilnius, just south east of Kaunas on the Neman. In a letter written from the spa, he complained bitterly to Elena Bogdanova that the waters were only making him feel worse. Bogdanova (1823-1900) was a widow (nee Baroness Uslar, Frolova by her first marriage) with whom Tyutchev engaged in a affair of some sort during the last six years of his life, much to the annoyance of his patient family and long-suffering wife. The Polish uprising of 1863 is referred to here. 358. July 26th. 1870. According to Polonsky, the reversed initials ("K.B.") stand for "Baroness Krudner", whom Tyutchev met in Karlsbad with her second husband, Count N. Adlerberg. More recently, however, Lane and Nikolaev have established that the addressee is more probably Tyutchev's sister-in-law, Klothilde. (A:24) 359. A telegram sent to Ernestine on September 14th. 1870, en route from Ovstug to Moscow. 360. Late September, 1870. This poem deals with the Franco-Prussian War. While Tyutchev believed that Germany had right on her side, he could not help but experience "a pang of anguish" (Letter to Bogdanova, August) at the "final collapse of this great and beautiful France, whose name has been so glorious in the history of the world". Unity....: Bismarck's words. 361. October 27th. 1870. Written into the album of Platon Vakar (1820-99), a member of the Foreign Censorship Committee. 362. NL early November, 1870. Dedicated to Alexandra Pletnyova (nee Shchetinina, 1826-1901). Her husband, the minor poet and critic, P. Pletnyov (1792-1865), had been a friend of Pushkin and was an editor of the latter's magazine, The Contemporary. Nekrasov and Panaev (1812-62), both men of Belinsky's party, bought the magazine in 1864. Princess Shchetinina, Pletnyov's second wife, was "a woman of rare spiritual qualities. She is somewhat like Tyutchev's poetry, in which there is depth and original charm". (C:20, vol.1/77) 363. November, 1870. Provoked by the promulgation of State Chancellor Prince N. Gorchakov's declaration that the 13th. been abrogated. Following Russia's defeat in the Crimean War, Article XIII of the Peace Treaty of Paris (March 30th. 1856), stated: "The Black Sea being neutralised according to the terms of Article XI, the maintenance or establishment upon its Coast of Military-Maritime Arsenals becomes unnecessary and purposeless; in consequence, His Majesty the Emperor of All the Russia's, and His Imperial Majesty the Sultan, engage not to establish or to maintain upon that Coast any Military-Maritime Arsenal..." (C:5, vol./606) The content of the final stanza can be clarified by a letter Tyutchev wrote to Aksakov on the 22nd., in which he contrasts the "hard, worthy stance of the cabinet" to the "pitiful and even loathsome behaviour of the Petersburg salons", ingratiating themselves into the favour of the foreigners. 364. November-early December, 1870. Inspired by Maria's desire to work as a Sister of Mercy in the Georgievsky commune. 365. December 11th. 1870. Dedicated to the memory of Tyutchev's brother, Nikolay (1801-1870), who had died three days earlier. According to Aksakov, Nikolay was the "one friend of Fyodor Ivanovich, a man who had many 'friends' outside his family, but who would not share his heart's thoughts and secrets with any one of them in particular, who would not choose any one of them for that exclusively close relationship of sincere friendship. Nikolay Ivanovich Tyutchev loved his brother not only with fraternal, but with paternal tenderness, and with no-one else was Fyodor Ivanovich so intimate, so closely linked by his own personal fate from his very childhood". (A:1/307) Tyutchev and his brother fell out more than once but always remained the friends Aksakov said they were. Sending this verse to Ekaterina on December 31st. Tyutchev wrote of "this terrible year" (in July his son Dmitry died) and in particular of "one image... odious and horrible: It is seeing him fallen, on the premises of this club I know so well, him, so frail and fearful, who had always been afraid of this fall, lying on the ground, injured, fatally stricken and asking people to get him up". As a P.S. to the letter, Tyutchev mentions that the poem was written in a state of "half-sleep" on the way back from Moscow after the funeral. 366. Late December, 1870. The only extant text is engraved on a silver serviette ring in the shape of a dog's collar, probably Romp's. 367. 1870. Written into Vakar's album. 368. End of January-early February, 1871. Darya wrote to her sister, on sending the verses: "Here's a quatrain which dad composed the other day. He'd gone to sleep and, waking up, heard me saying something to mum". 369. Early March, 1871. The lines in italics are from Pushkin's poem, K moryu/To the Sea, written on leaving Odessa in 1825: Proshchai, svobodnaya stikhiya! V poslednii raz peredo mnoi Ty katish' volny golubye I bleshchesh' gordoyu krasoy. *** Farewell, free element! Before me, one last time, you roll your blue waves and glitter in proud beauty. Lines 39-40: the grave of Nicholas I. 370. Early July, 1871. On the anniversary of the proclamation of papal infallibility (1st. Vatican Council, 1869-70; Pius IX). 371. Second half of August, 1871. Tyutchev records his reflections during a visit to Vshchizh, a former princedom where barrows may still be seen. Bloody legends are associated with the area's history. 372. December 29th. 1871. Dedicated to M. Pogodin. 373. NL March 3rd. 1872. Written on the death of the authoress and translator, M. Politkovskaya. 374. April 16th. 1872 (Easter Sunday). Sent to Tyutchev's youngest daughter, Maria, who was dying of tuberculosis in Bad Reichenhall, Bavaria. 375. April 21st. 1872. Sent to Anna on her birthday, which coincided with the poet's name day, hence the final verse of this telegram. 376. November 23rd 1872. Written in the album of Maria Peterson, married to Count Montgelas and the grand-daughter of Tyutchev's first wife. 377. NL 1872. A social compliment to Ekaterina Zybina (1845-1923) one of whose minor poems was at the time a popular romance, L'yot livmya dozhd', nesutsya tuchi/The rain is pouring down, clouds are scurrying. 378. NL 1872. The couplet is the start of an arrangement of the Orthodox canticle, sung at matins on the first three days of the seventh week of Lent. 379. Possibly December, 18