Book 2 Part 4 Chapter 10 (Chapter 139 Overall)

Chapter Summaries: Dole: Twelfth night. Confidential talk. Old recollections. The negro. Dimmler plays a Field nocturne. Talking philosophy. Fallen angels. Natasha sings. The maskers. The young folks masquerade. Projected visit to Mrs. Milyukova. Sonya's costume. The sledge ride. The race. The enchanted castle.
Briggs: The Rostov children reminisce. Mummers. A troika ride to the Melyukovs'.
Maude: Nicholas, Natasha and Sonya indulge in recollections. Dimmler plays and Natasha sings. The maskers. A troyka drive to the Melyukovs'

Translation:

X.

— Is it with you, — said Natasha to her brother, when they sat down on the sofa, — is it with you that to you it seems that nothing will be — nothing; that all that is good, was? And not that what is boring, but sad?

— Still so! — he said. — In me it happened that everything is okay, everyone is happy, but it will come into my head that everyone is really tired and that all need to die. I in my time in the regiment did not go on a walk, but there played music... and so I suddenly had become bored...

— Ah, this I know. I know, I know, — picked up Natasha. — I was still small, so with me this was. I remember the time I for the plums was and you all danced, but I sat in the cool and sobbed, and never forgot: I was sad and the pity was all in myself, and all and all pitied. And, the main thing, I was not to blame, — said Natasha, — Do you remember?

— I remember, — said Nikolay. — I remember that I came to you then and I wanted to console you and, I know, I was ashamed. How terribly funny we were. In me then was a dummy toy and I wanted to give it to you. Do you remember?

— But do you remember, — said Natasha with a thoughtful smile, — how for a long time, a long time, we still were really small, our uncle called into the office, still in the old house, but it was dark — we came and suddenly there stood...

— A moor, — finished Nikolay with a joyful smile — how the same do you not remember? I now do not know that this was a moor, or if we in a dream saw them, or we were told.

— He was gray, remember, with white teeth — he stood and was watching us...

— You remember, Sonya? — asked Nikolay...

— Yes, yes, I also remember something, — timidly answered Sonya...

— I because of it asked about this moor to Papa and to Mama, — said Natasha. — They speak that there was no moor. But because here you remember!

— How the same, as now I remember his teeth.

— How this is weird, exactly in a dream it was. I love this.

— But remember how we rolled eggs in the hall and suddenly two old women became by the carpet spun around. Was this, or no? Remember how okay it was?

— Yes. But remember, how daddy in a blue fur coat on the porch shot off a gun. — they recalled smiling from the enjoyment of memories, not sadly senile, but poetic youth memories, those impressions from itself far past, where dream merges with reality, and quietly laughed, rejoicing for some reason.

Sonya, as always, was behind from them, although their memories were general.

Sonya did not remember a lot of what they remembered, but that what she did remember, did not excite in her this poetic feeling, which they tested. She only enjoyed their joy, trying to fake it.

She accepted participation only in this, when they remembered the first arrival of Sonya. Sonya told how she was afraid of Nikolay because of how on his jacket were cords, and her nurse said that her into the cords will be sewn.

— But I remember: I said that you under cabbage were given birth, — said Natasha, — and I remember that I then did not dare to not believe, but knew that this was not really, and so I was awkward.

In the time of this conversation from the back door of the sofa leaned out the head of the maid.

— Young lady, the rooster has been brought, — whispering said the girl.

— I do not need it, Polya, lead to carry it off, — said Natasha.

In the middle of the talking, marching to the sofa, Dimmler entered into the room and came up to the harp, standing in the corner. He stripped off the cloth, and the harp issued a fake sound.

— Edward Karlych, play please My Love Nocturne Monsieur Field, — said the voice of the old countess from the living room.

Dimmler took the chord and, turning to Natasha, Nikolay and Sonya, said:

— Young people, how still you sit!

— Yes we are philosophizing, — said Natasha, in a moment looking back, and continued the conversation. The conversation was walking now to about dreaming.

Dimmler started to play. Natasha could not hear, on tiptoe, came up to the table, took the candle, carried it out and, returning, quietly sat in her place. In the room, especially on the couch on which they were sitting, it was dark, but on the large window fell to the floor the silver light of the full moon.

— I know, I think, — said Natasha in a whisper, moving up to Nikolay and Sonya, when now Dimmler had finished and all sat, weakly sorting out strings, apparently in indecision to leave, or start something new, — that when I so remember, remember, remember all before this remember that I remember that what was still before than I was in the world...

— This is metempsychosis, — said Sonya, who always studied well and remembered all. — The Egyptians believed that our soul was in animals and again will go into animals.

— No, I know, I do not believe that we have been in animals, — said Natasha by that same whisper, although the music ran out, — but I know for sure that we were angels there somewhere and have been here, and from this all remember...

— Can I join to you? — said the quietly approaching Dimmler and hooked to them.

— Should we have been angels, so for what again we hit lower? — said Nikolay. — No, this may not be!

— Not lower, who said to you that we are lower?... Why I know what I was before, — with conviction objected Natasha. — because the soul is immortal... has become, should I live always, so I before lived, a whole eternity lived.

— Yes, but it is difficult for us to represent eternity, — said Dimmler, who came up to the young people with a meek contemptuous smile, but he spoke so the same quietly and seriously as they did.

— From what again is it difficult to represent eternity? — said Natasha. — Now will be, tomorrow will be, always will be, yesterday was and the third day was...

— Natasha! Now it is your turn. Sing me something, — was heard the voice of the countess, — what for have you sat down, exactly as conspirators.

— Mama! I so do not want, — said Natasha, but together with that got up.

To all of them, even the middle-aged Dimmler, it was not wanted to interrupt the conversation and go away from the corner of the sofa, but Natasha got up, and Nikolay sat down behind the clavichord. As always, coming to the middle of the hall and choosing the most profitable place for resonance, Natasha began to sing the favorite song of her mother.

She said that she did not want to sing, but she for a long time before, and for long after did not sing so, as she sang on this night. Count Ilya Andreich from the office, where he conversed with Mitenka, heard her singing, and as a student hurrying to go play, finishing a lesson, confused in words, gave back orders to the manager and finally fell silent, and Mitenka, also listening, silently with a smile, stood before the count. Nikolay did not lower his eyes from his sister, and together with her transferred breaths. Sonya, listening, thought about how huge of a difference there was between her and her friend and how impossible it was for her to be someone so charming as her cousin. The old countess sat with a happily-sad smile and with tears in her eyes, occasionally shaking her head. She thought about Natasha, and about their youth, and about how something unnatural and scary was in this lying ahead marriage of Natasha with Prince Andrey.

Dimmler, seating to the countess and closing his eyes, listened.

— No, countess, — he said finally, — this is European talent, for her to learn there is nothing, this softness, tenderness, the forces...

— Ah! How I am afraid for her, how I am afraid, — said the countess, not remembering with whom she spoke. Her maternal flair said to her that something too much was in Natasha, and that from this she will not be happy. Natasha had still not finished singing as in the room ran in the enthusiastic fourteen year old Petya with news that the mummers had come.

Natasha suddenly stopped.

— Fool! — she screamed at her brother, ran up to the chair, fell in it and sobbed so, that she couldn’t stay.

— Nothing, Mama, it’s rightly nothing, so: Petya frightened me, — she said, trying to smile, but tears all flowed and sobbing squeezed her throat.

Dressed up yardmen, bears, Turks, innkeepers, ladies, scary and funny, brought with themselves the cold and fun, first timidly huddling at the front; then, hiding one behind the other, crowded out in the hall; and first shyly, but then all the more fun and friendlier began songs, dancing round dances and Christmastide games. The countess, upon learning the faces and laughing at the dressed up, left into the living room. The Count Ilya Andreich with a shining smile sat in the hall, approving of the playing. The young people disappeared somewhere.

In half an hour in the hall between the other mummers appeared still an old lady in a frame — this was Nikolay. The Turk was Petya. The clown — this was Dimmler, the hussar — Natasha and the Circassian — Sonya, with a drawn cork mustache and eyebrows.

After the condescending wonder, unrecognition and praise from the parties not dressed, the young people found that the costumes were so good that it was needed to show someone more.

Nikolay, who wanted by the great road ride all in his carriage, proposed, to take with himself from the court nine dressed up people and go to the uncle’s.

— No, well for what do you make him, an old man, upset! — said countess, — yes and nowhere to turn at him. Really go, so to Melyukova.

Melyukova was a widow with children of varied ages, also with governesses and governors, living four versts from the Rostovs.

— Here, ma chère (my pretty), cleverly, — picked up the stirred up old count. — Come on now I will dress up and ride with you. Really I will stir up Pache.

Yet the countess did not agree to let the count go: in him all this day was an ill leg. She decided that Ilya Andreyevich could not go, but that should Louisa Ivanovna (m-me Schoss) ride, that the young ladies can go to Melyukova. Sonya, always timid and shy, more urgent than all began to beg Louisa Ivanovna not to refuse them.

The outfit of Sonya was better than all. Her mustache and eyebrows unusually went to her. All said to her that she was very good, and she was found in her uncharacteristic lively energetic mood. Some inner voice spoke to her that now or never will decide her fate, and she in her male dress seemed really another human. Louisa Ivanovna agreed, and in half an hour four carriages with bells and rattles, squealing and whistling the undercuts by the frosty snow, pulled up to the porch.

Natasha was the first to give the tone of Christmastide fun, and this fun, reflecting from one to to another, all the more and more intensified and reached to a higher extent in that time, when all came out into the frost, and in conversation, echoing, laughing and shouting, sat down on the sleigh.

Two carriages were accelerating, the third carriage of the old count with the Orlov trotter in a root; the fourth owned by Nikolay with his short, black, shaggy root. Nikolay in his old lady outfit, in which he in the allotment of a hussar, with a belted cloak, stood in the middle of his sledge, picking up his reins.

It was so light that he saw glittering in the lunar light the buckle and eyes of the horses, scaredly looking around at the riders, making noise under the dark canopy entrance.

On the sleigh of Nikolay sat down Natasha, Sonya, m-me Schoss and two girls. On the sleigh of the old count sat down Dimmler with his wife and Petya; in the rest sat down the dressed up yardmen.

— Go forward, Zahar! — shouted Nikolay to the coachman of his father, so to have the case to overtake him on the road.

The carriage of the old count, in which sat down Dimmler and the other mummers, with squealing runners as if freezing to the snow, rattling a thick bell, set off forward. The pins huddled in the shafts and stuck, twisting as strong sugar in brilliant snow.

Nikolay set off behind the first carriage; in the back rustled and screamed the rest. The first rode a little trotting by the narrow road. While riding past the garden, shadows from the naked woods lied down often across the road and hid the vivid light of the moon, but as only leaving behind the fence, diamond brilliant, with bluish sheen, the snow plain, all doused with lunar radiance and motionless, opened to all parties. Time and time, pushed the bump in the front sleigh ride; exactly so the same pushed the following sleigh and the following and, insolently breaking the chained silence, one behind the other came the stretch of sleighs.

— The footprint of a hare, many footprints! — was heard in the frosty fettered air the voice of Natasha.

— How it is seen, Nicolas! — said the voice of Sonya. Nikolay turned back to Sonya and bent down, so that to nearer consider her face. Some really new, sweet, face, with black eyebrows and mustache, in the lunar light, close and long away, looked out from the sables.

"This was before Sonya," thought Nikolay. He nearer peered at her, and smiled.

— What, Nicolas?

— Nothing, — he said and turned again to the horses.

Leaving the torn, big road, oiled by runners and all excised by the track of thorns, prominent in the light of the moon, the horses themselves began to pull the reins and added to the going. The left attachment, bending its head, jumped and twitched them out. The root swayed, driving with ears, as if asking: "to begin or is it still early?" — Ahead, already long away separated and ringing a receding thick bell, it could clearly be seen in the white snow of the black carriage of Zahar. Was heard from his sledge shouting and laughter and the voices of the dressed up.

— Well whether you do, dear! — shouted Nikolay, with one party pulling the reins and taking somewhere with the whip in his hand. And only increased as if in meeting the wind, and by twitching and pulling all added to the gallop and adhered, it was noticeable how the carriage flew very much. Nikolay turned backwards. with screaming and screeching, waving his whip and forcing the root to a gallop, kept up with the other carriages. The root shook steadily under an arc, not thinking to knock down and promise more and more putting on when it will be needed.

Nikolay caught up with the first three. They moved out from some mountains, entering into a wide and crooked road by the meadow about the river.

"Where is this we are going?" — thought Nikolay. —"By the Kocoy meadow it must be. Yet no, this is something new, that I have never seen. This is not the Kocoy meadow and not Demkina mountain, but this is God knows what! This is something new and magical. Well, what would there be!" And he, shouting at the horses, began to travel to the first three.

Zahar held back his horses and turned to them his now frosty to the eyebrow face.

Nikolay let his horses; Zahar, stretched out forward his hand, smacked and let them.

— Well, hold, baron, — he said. Still faster nearby flew the carriages, and quickly changed the legs of the prancing horses. Nikolay began to take forward. Zahar, not changing the situation of his elongated hands, raised one hand with the reins.

— Lie, baron, — he screamed to Nikolay. Nikolay in a lope let all the horses and surpassed Zahar. The horses fell in petty, dry snow on the face of the riders, nearby with them was heard the frequent brute force and confused fast moving legs, and the shadows of the distilled carriages. The whistling runners by the snow and womanly squeals were heard from different parties.

Again stopped the horses, Nikolay turned back around himself. Around was all that same soaked through lunar light of the magic plain with scattered by it stars.

"Zahar shouts, so that I take the left; but what for the left? thought Nikolay. Don't we to Melyukova go, isn't this Melyukova? God knows where we go, and God knows what with us is done — and very weird and okay that which is with us is done." He turned back in the sleigh.

— Look at him and his mustache and eyelashes, all white, — said one of the sitting strange, pretty and strange people with a thin mustache and eyebrows.

"This, it seems, was Natasha, thought Nikolay, but this is m-me Schoss; but maybe not, but this Circassian with the mustache whom I do not know, but I love her."

— Whether you are not cold? — he asked. They did not answer and laughed. Dimmler from the rear of the sledge shouted something probably funny, but it could not be heard what he shouted.

— Yes, yes, — answered a laughing voice.

— However here is some magic forest with iridescent black shadows and sequins of diamonds and with that enfilade of marble steps, and that silver roofs of magic buildings, and the piercing screeching of some kind of animals."But should in this very case be Melyukovka, that still is stranger that we rode God knows where, and have arrived at Melyukovka," thought Nikolay.

Really this was Melyukovka, and on the porch ran out girls and lackeys with candles and joyful faces.

— Who is it? — was asked from the entrance.

— The count is dressed up, by the horses I see, — answered a voice.

Time: see previous chapter
Mentioned: one day, when Natasha was small, a long, long time ago, eternity, to-day, to-morrow, yesterday, two days ago, Christmas

Locations: see previous chapter, the Melyukovs
Mentioned: Egyptians, European, Turks (and Turkish), Circassian, the upland meadows (Kosoy meadow in Briggs, Dunnigan, Mandelker, and Maude. Sloping Meadow in Pevear and Volkhonsky.), Demkin's mound (...hill in Maude. Dyomkin hill in Briggs, Mandelker, and Dunnigan. Diomkin Hill in Pevear and Volkonsky.),

Pevear and Volokhonsky Notes: Natasha and Nikolai's conversation. She expresses her concern that there is "nothing more".

The nostalgia, including the episode of the "blackamoor".

"Sonya, as always, lagged behind them, though they had memories in common."

Natasha, in a rare moment of semi-religiousity, believes that they used to be angels, not animals like the Egyptians believed. Natasha then, thanks to the urging of her mother, sings. "She had said she did not want to sing, but for a long time before and a long time after she did not sing as she sang that evening."

The reaction of all the characters, lastly (other than Dimmler) and most notably, "She (the old countess) was thinking of Natasha, and of her own youth, and of how there was something unnatural and frightening in this
forthcoming marriage of Natasha and Prince Andrei...Her maternal intuition told her that there was too much of something in Natasha, and that because of it she would not be happy."

Petya then startles Natasha, who falls and cries in a strange segue to the party where the servants and children dress up. They then drive to a widow's house in their costumes.

The rest of the chapter concentrates on Nikolai in a rather strange episode that has him directing the sleigh, not sure where they were going, but feeling it strange and new before they arrive.

Characters (characters who do not appear, but are mentioned are placed in italics. First appearances are in Bold. First mentions are underlined. Final appearance denoted by *):

Natasha (also "sister")

Nikolai (also "brother", "barin", and "Nicolas".)

Sonya

A Negro (that they believed they saw in their house when they were little. Briggs prints "black man".)

Count Ilya Andreyitch (also "papenka")

Polya (a chambermaid who tells Natasha "they have brought the cock". "Polia" in Bell.)

Dimmler (whose first and second names are "Eduard Karluitch" in Dole. Edmonds and Briggs call him "Herr Dimmler." Just "Mr. Dimmler" in Maude and Mandelker. "Eduard Karlych" in Dunnigan and Wiener. "Edward
Karlitch" in Garnett. "Edward Karlovitch" in Bell. And his wife, who is just mentioned in passing and is given no characteristics.)

Countess Rostova ("old countess", "mamenka" and "mamma".)

Mitenka

Prince Andrei

Petya (called "Durak! idiot!" by Natasha)

little uncle

Melyukova (as in Dole, Mandelker, and Maude. a widow "with a host of children". "Madame Melyukov" in Edmonds, Wiener, and Briggs. "Mme. Melukow" in Bell. She appears to be who the count refers to as "Pasheta",
as in Dole and Wiener. "Pashette" in Dunnigan, Maude, and Edmonds. Bell doesn't use this name. Dole offers a variant spelling of "Melyukovka" later in the chapter, as does Briggs, Wiener, and Edmonds.)

Madame Schoss (also "Luiza Ivanovna" as in Dole and Wiener. "Louisa Ivanovna" in Briggs, Edmonds, and Mandelker. "Luisa Ivanovna" in Garnett and Dunnigan. Bell doesn't use this name.)

Zakhar

(Natasha references an "uncle". Whether that is Shinshin, "the little uncle" or someone else is unclear. They also reference two "little old women". "Monsieur Field", which Dole footnotes as John Field wrote the song
Countess Rostova wants Dimmler to play. Dunnigan just prints "Field". Bell prints "Field's". Mr. Field in Wiener. Of course the many house servants that dress up. There seems to be a reference to an Orlof, but it is
unclear and is probably just the name of the kind of carriage/buggy the horses are pulling. Also maids and servants at the Melyukovka house.)

Abridged Versions: End of Chapter 13 in Bell.
Gibian: Chapter 10.

Fuller: Entire chapter is cut.

Komroff: Almost the entirety of their early chapter conversation (the memories they have about "the negro" and their father for example) is cut. Because Dimmler hadn't been mentioned earlier and the "cock" hadn't
been set up in this version, both of these are cut (though Dimmler's commenting on Natasha's singing remains). The "philosophizing" sections of the chapter are removed. Line break before Petya interrupts her singing.
The driving to Melyukova's house is shortened, with the confusion Nikolai feels about where they are going is removed. The chapter ends a little early, with Nikolai saying "this used to be Sonya" and then saying "nothing"
in response followed by a line break.

Kropotkin: Chapter 5: The section where they are discussing their memories is slightly cut off. Polya is cut. Their philosophizing after Dimmler starts to play is cut. The chapter ends a little early, at "I love her all the same!"

Bromfield: Chapter 5 ends with them leaving in their costumes to go to uncle's house. Chapter 6 begins with the trek with Zakhar. They actually go to uncles, who seems "embarrassed and awkward".
Simmons: Chapter 10: Entire chapter is cut and replaced with "A group of Rostov serfs, dressed in outlandish costumes as Christmas mummers, break in on Natasha's singing. Nicholas, Sonya, Petya, and Natasha also
dress in costumes and decide to go with the mummers to call on neighbors, the Melyukovs. The whole company merrily races over the snow in troika sleighs. Sonya feels that her relations with Nicholas will be decided."

Additional Notes: Maude note on Field: "John Field (1782-1837) was a Dublin-born composer, noted for his nocturnes, who lived in St Petersburg from 1804 to 1831."

My Life Sofiya Andreevna Tolstoya Page 338: “In the Tsar’s study stood two black Africans in native uniforms.”

Montefiore: Page 95: In 1703, Gavril Golovkin had ordered the purchase in Constantinople of a black slaveboy, “Abram the blackamoor,” probably seized by slave traders from Chad or Ethiopia. Peter stood godfather at the christening of this Muslim boy--who was henceforth Abram Petrovich Hannibal. He served as one of Peter’s black pages, known as Nubians, Arabs or Abyssinians who became an exotic feature of the Romanov court up until 1917. Hannibal was exceptionally talented. Spotting that the boy had a gift for languages and mathematics, Peter had him educated in France. He rose to become the first black general in Europe and great-grandfather of the poet Pushkin, who wrote his life-story as The Negro of Peter the Great.”

Bloom: Page 154: “the image that he held of himself was...of the singer, intent on affecting his audience...human society consisted of men, each pouring his feelings into another...One must see War and Peace not as a single narrative issuing from one author, but as a dynamic pattern of many narratives...one’s response must be not to the author’s tale, but to the work’s many narratives...Much time and metal activity was spent by Tolstoy in the search for a beginning that would set his War and Peace in motion; over a dozen false starts are recorded.”