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In a trice it could be seen that he had played his part in life as all such bailiffs do that, originally a young serf of elementary education, he had married some Agashka of a housekeeper or a mistress's favourite, and then himself become housekeeper, and, subsequently, bailiff; after which he had proceeded according to the rules of his tribe that is to say, he had consorted with and stood in with the more well-to-do serfs on the estate, and added the poorer ones to the list of forced payers of obrok, while himself leaving his bed at nine o'clock in the morning, and, when the samovar had been brought, drinking his tea at leisure.
That evening I closed my father's eyes. Early next morning I dug his grave near his hut and buried him. His bow, his arrows, a few articles of dress, his pallet, his trunk, his porridge-pot everything was a fixture of and belonged to the royal domain. The serf can own nothing.
The Count having shaken him, he rose with a start and exclaimed: "Don't touch it! The colors are all fresh; Jacob's beard is such a fine gray!" The compliant secretary retired humming an aria. M. Leminof followed him with his eyes, and, pointing after him, said to his serf in a confidential tone: "Thou seest that man there; just fancy! I feel friendship for him.
The change in her, the growing old, the revelation and responsibility of serf, as a woman, made this experience appear to have extended over months. Kells slowly became convalescent and then he had a relapse. Something happened, the nature of which Joan could not tell, and he almost died.
Over prince and subject, chieftain and serf, a body of unarmed defenceless men reigned supreme by the magic of sanctity. They tamed the fiery northern warriors who had broken in pieces the Roman Empire. They taught them they brought them really and truly to believe that they had immortal souls, and that they would one day stand at the awful judgment bar and give account for their lives there.
*Speranski, for instance, when Governor of the province of Penza, brought to justice, among others, a proprietor who had caused one of his serfs to be flogged to death, and a lady who had murdered a serf boy by pricking him with a pen-knife because he had neglected to take proper care of a tame rabbit committed to his charge! Korff, "Zhizn Speranskago," II., p. 127, note.
In a melancholy mood he leaned against the window, watching the sturdy serf in the centre of his family, as he came to share the blessings of the Mass. He was rather startled when the outer door opened and admitted the lady he had seen in the church the night before with Henry de Stramen.
In the selfish strife of factions two great existences have been blotted out of the history of England the Monarch and the Multitude; as the power of the Crown has diminished, the privileges of the People have disappeared; till at length the sceptre has become a pageant, and its subject has degenerated again into a serf.
That Magdalene weeping amid her hair, who once spoke comfort to the soul of the fallen sinner, that Sebastian, arrow-pierced, whose upward ardent glance, spoke of courage and hope to the tyrant-ridden serf that poor tortured slave to whose aid St. Mark comes sweeping down from above can they speak to us of nothing save flowing lines, and correct drawing, and gorgeous colour?
If there is no kingdom for social law, if there is no place for a science of history, till man is made unroyal, till the glory is taken from his brow, the sceptre from his right hand, and the regal hopes from his heart, till he is made a mere serf and an appanage of that ground and territory of circumstance whereon he lives and labors, why, then a science of history means much the same with an extinction of history, an extinction of all that in history which makes it inspiring.
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