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

of opposition which must spring up in minds accustomed to reflect under the silence of despotism. Characters which such a government does not debase, it steels and fortifies.

On my return, I sat down to read again some translations of the poems of Pouskine. They confirmed me in the opinion that a previous reading had imparted. This author has borrowed much of his colouring from the new poetical school of Western Europe. Not that he has adopted the anti-religious opinions of Lord Byron, the social notions of our poets, or the philosophy of those of Germany ; but he has adopted their manner of describing. I therefore do not recognise him as a real Muscovite poet. The Pole, Mickiewiteh, strikes me as being much more Slavonic, although he, like Pouskine, has bowed to the influence of occidental literature.

The real Russian poet, did one exist, could, in the present day address only the people; he would neither be understood nor read in the salons. Where there is no language, there is no poetry ; neither indeed are there any thinkers. The Emperor Nicholas has begun to require that Russian be spoken at court; they laugh at present at a novelty which is viewed as merely a caprice of their master's; the next generation will thank him for this victory of good sense over fashion.

How could the national genius develope itself in a society where people speak four languages without knowing one ? Originality of thought has a nearer connection than is imagined with purity of idiom. This fact has been forgotten in Russia for a century, and in France for some years. Our children will