Читать книгу Life of Elie Metchnikoff, 1845-1916 - Olga Metchnikoff - Страница 8

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Departure for Kharkoff—Town life.

The following year was to be spent at Kharkoff. Katia was now seventeen and her marriage had to be contemplated.

The boys’ life was still quite a childish one, made up chiefly of games and mischief. Kolia had been taught to read by the great-aunt; Ilia had learnt by himself, asking people now and then for the name of some letter. He was able to read fluently quite early.

The departure for Kharkoff was a great event, prepared long beforehand. The children, delighted at the prospect of a change, impatiently waited for the moment to start. At last every one was seated in the coaches and, saying to the coachman, “Off! God keep us,” they started to drive along the high road through the steppes.

Life at Kharkoff was very much the same as at Panassovka, with social elements added. Moreover, the children’s liberty was somewhat restricted. Already on the journey they were given to understand that, in a town, they could not go out alone, nor shout in the streets, nor point at people and things with their finger, and that they should have to make less noise, even in the house. For the first time they unconsciously realised that their family was not the centre of the universe, that there were many others who also had to be taken into account. Ilia did not welcome this discovery.

The flat occupied by the Metchnikoffs was on the first floor, above that of the owner of the house. One day when the children were running about, making a fearful noise, some one came up to say that the landlady was ill and begged that the noise should cease. Ilia, interrupted in the midst of a game, became furiously angry; in his rage he seized a whistle, and stooping to a crack in the floor, whistled with all his might. It was only with much difficulty that he was induced to stop and to calm himself.[4]

The children’s horizon soon widened; Dmitri Ivanovitch took them to the theatre and a new and fantastic world opened out to them. The very next day they attempted a performance of the play they had seen; soon, on Kolia’s suggestion, they began to compose plays for themselves. Kolia wrote a drama entitled “Burning Tea,” in which the hero having offered his friend tea that was too hot, the latter burnt his tongue; a duel ensued, etc., etc. Ilia hastened to follow his brother’s example. He composed something in the same style, but even more absurd. Having realised that it was so, he gave up literature. That period was for him a series of disappointments which perhaps helped to lead him to the path he was ultimately to follow. His brother, following the “grown-ups’ ” example, played cards with other boys or with the maids. Ilia attempted to do the same, but his nervousness left him no self-control; he lost continually and games generally ended in quarrels and tears; he became disgusted with cards for the rest of his life. Kolia was fond of muscular exercises, such as gymnastics, wrestling, etc. Ilia, younger and therefore weaker, was constantly humiliated, and his pride kept him away from physical amusements. Thus, by means of elimination, he became gradually isolated from surrounding influences. But, at that time, no new element had intervened in his daily life and he spent his existence in the gentle warmth of his mother’s tenderness, absorbed in his childish games and studies.