The Essential Russian Plays & Short Stories. Максим Горький
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Servant (entering): Your highness, the marshal has come with a strange gentleman.
Count: I’ll go to meet him; but you, Countess, receive them here.
Scene II
Count: Countess, this is Mr. Flatternot. Mr. Flatternot, my wife.
Flatternot (kissing Countess’s hand): I recommend myself to your highnesses’ favour as a neighbour and nobleman of these parts.
Count: I beg you to be seated. Our respected marshal, no doubt, has already told you of our desire, just as we heard from him of your proposal to take charge of a young nobleman?
Flatternot: He has informed me of everything; but beforehand I ought to hear from you yourselves what education you intend to give your son: what you wish to teach him, and to prepare him for which service?
Count: I wished to hear of this from you.
Flatternot: I should think to educate his mind as is fitting for a nobleman.
Countess: Of the rank of count!
Flatternot: I do not understand; what difference do you find between the rank of nobleman and count?
Countess: I find, sir, this difference, that a count should be more careful than a nobleman that no one is lacking in respect of him.
Count: A count should be more delicate than a nobleman on the point of his honour. . . . (A page is missing here in the original manuscript.)
Countess: But I thought that nature and rank were the same thing.
Wisely: You hear, madame, that a natural count may be also a natural fool.
Countess: And so Mr. Flatternot is not pleased that our son should know he is a count, and does not wish to give him the title of “Highness.”
Flatternot: I would not take upon myself the sin — do not be angry with me — to turn a little boy’s head, like your son’s, with fancies about his countship, highness, and similar folly; but I shall strive hard to set into his head and heart that he, being of noble birth, should possess, also, a noble mind.
Countess: And that is not a bad thing. But what are you thinking about, Count?
Count: I am thinking of what I hear, and can think about nothing; I know it’s dinner-time, and I beg you, marshal, and you, sir, to dine with me.
Flatternot: At your service.
Servant: Dinner is served.
Count: Come.
Scene III
Countess (alone): Thank Heaven that dinner is over! I have come here to rest from the conversation of the marshal and Flatternot; Heaven protect us from such fault-finders! At dinner I received a letter from Countess Folliest; I did not manage to read it; now I’ll read it at my leisure. (Reads.) “Dear Countess, — If you wish, you can take Mr. Pelican now as tutor for Count Basil. The Frenchman is full of abilities; he draws teeth expertly and cuts corns.” Oh, what luck! He can cut corns too, and I so want some one! “He will take a moderate salary, and will call you, Countess, as well as the Count: votre altesse!” (Enter Count.)
Countess: Oh, my dear Count! Countess Folliest is doing us a great favour; she has found a tutor for Count Basil who can also draw teeth and cut corns; and, what is most important, he will call us: votre altesse!
Count: What could be better? (Enter Wisely and Flatternot.)
Count: What would you wish to teach my son?
Flatternot: First of all, the principles of the faith in which he was born.
Countess: And dancing?
Flatternot: You are pleased to joke.
Count: And what foreign languages?
Flatternot: I begin with Latin.
Countess: But is he to be a priest?
Flatternot: But is Latin only fit for priests?
Count: I do not know why a count’s son should learn Latin.
Flatternot: Because it is the root of many languages.
Countess: Well, I never.
Count (to her): Do not forget to send an answer quickly to Countess Folliest.
Countess: At once. We will come back at once. Excuse us that we have to send off a postilion to our neighbour.
Flatternot: At your service. (Exeunt Count and Countess.)
Wisely: Do you find the Count’s household as I described it to you?
Flatternot: Exactly. But it seems to me I am already beginning to be a burden to them.
Wisely: Yes, and they do not seem to be very contented with me. (To Servant.) Have my carriage got ready, friend. (To Flatternot.) We can go away at once.
Countess (entering, to Count): I have invited the Countess herself with Pelican; maybe Count Basil will have a tutor after our heart.
Count (aloud): Here we are, gentlemen. We have hurried back to enjoy your conversation.
Flatternot: A great honour.
Countess: I wanted to ask you, Mr. Wisely, do yon think it would be good to send our son to France in ten years’ time?
Wisely: You are looking far ahead, madame. We do not know whether in ten years’ time there will be anyone to send or anyone to send him to.
Flatternot: And I say in addition that we cannot foresee whether in ten years’ time France itself will exist if the French gentlemen do not soon cease their runnings about.
Wisely: There is what a kingdom has come to, which all Europe for so many years has wished to imitate in everything. When I read descriptions of the ruinous condition of France, I should like to know against which political rule the French aim in establishing equality of condition.
Count: I do not understand it.
Wisely (to Flatternot): I have not happened to speak with you of this; I should like to know your opinion of it.
Flatternot: I do not undertake at all to decide your question; but I am ready to offer my opinion for your judgment. Here it is: nowhere and never have been or can be such laws as would make every individual man happy. It is indispensably necessary that one part of the subjects should sacrifice something for the sake of the whole kingdom; consequently there cannot be equality of position. That is the invention of the lying philosophers who by their eloquent intellectualisms have led the French to their present situation. They, desiring to avert the abuse of power, are endeavouring to destroy the form of government by which France has attained all her glory. For all this, however much the attempt may and will cost them, they will never attain an equality of situation, whatever laws they make; for one part of the subjects will always require the sacrifice of another. That is what I think of the present French legislation.
Wisely: But if there cannot be laws to make every individual man happy, then what sort of legislation is left?
Flatternot: It remains to calculate that the number of sacrifices should be proportionate to the number of those for whose happiness sacrifices are made.
Wisely: So a legislator ought to be a great calculator.
Flatternot: But these political calculations demand a far more excellent mind than is wanted for mathematical calculations. You can value a hundred Eulers for one Colbert and a thousand Colberts for one Montesquieu.
Wisely: But why?
Flatternot: Because in mathematics from one certainty one goes on to another mechanically, so to speak, and the mathematician has before him all