Russia in 1839 -Empire of the Czar: A Journey Through Eternal Russia

THE VIRTUES OF OUTCASTS.249

is magic in their glances, and their features and attitudes are graceful, and at the same time imposing. In short, they resemble the sibyls of Michael Angelo.

Their singing is about the same as that of the gypsies at Moscow, but if any thing, I thought it yet more expressive, forcible, and varied. I am assured that they have much pride of character, that they have warm passions, yet are neither light nor mercenary, and that they often repel, with disdain, very advantageous offers.

The more I see, the more I am astonished at the remains of virtue in persons who are not virtuous. Individuals whose state is the most decried, are often, like nations degraded by their governments, full of great qualities, ill-understood; whilst, on the contrary, we are disagreeably surprised to discern weakness in people of high character, and a puerile disposition in nations said to be well governed. The conditions of human virtues are nearly always impenetrable mysteries to the mind of man.

The idea of rehabilitation, which I here only vaguely point out, has been laid open and defended, with all the power of talent, by one of the boldest minds of our own or any epoch. It seems as though Victor Hugo had sought to consecrate his theatre to revealing to the world all that remains of human, that is, of divine, in the souls of those creatures of God who are the most reprobated by society : this design is more than moral, it is religious. To extend the sphere of pity is to perform a pious work : the multitude is often cruel by levity, by habit, or by principle, but yet more often by mistake. To cure, if it be possible, the wounds of hearts ill-understood, M 5