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Updated: June 1, 2025
At one period he spent several winters in succession with his family in Moscow. One time, after a historic concert given by Anton Rubinstein, at which Uncle Seryozha and his daughter had been, he came to take tea with us in Weavers' Row. My father asked him how he had liked the concert. "Do you remember Himbut, Lyovotchka? Lieutenant Himbut, who was forester near Yasnaya?
He carried his body out from the house with his own hands, and himself bore it to the churchyard. When he got back to Yasnaya he spoke with touching affection of his parting with this "inscrutable and beloved" brother, who was so strange and remote from him, but at the same time so near and so akin.
In conclusion, I beg leave to explain that my spelling of the name is that used by themselves when writing in English, and in print upon their French cards. It was close on midnight when we left Yasnaya Polyana.
The old home of the family, Yasnaya Polyana, where Tolstoy, his brothers and sister, spent their early years in charge of two guardian aunts, was not only a halting-place for pilgrims journeying to and from the great monastic shrines, but gave shelter to a number of persons of enfeebled minds belonging to the peasant class, with whom the devout and kindly Aunt Alexandra spent many hours daily in religious conversation and prayer.
Tolstoy's outlook was, "The gospels are true because they say this or that." You yourself must be the judge, your free reason must be the judge, of truth. There is a writing known to few, for I believe it is still unpublished. It is the Relation by Mihail Novikov the Peasant, concerning the Night of October 21, 1910, spent by him at Yasnaya Polyana.
"If the patriarch of Yasnaya Polyana had been granted a few additional years, superadded to a life already long and full of grief, he would have shuddered before the tragedy of the younger generations.
*His own "Memoirs," edited by Birukov, are now the authority for biographical detail. They are still in process of publication. He was born at Yasnaya Polyana, in south central Russia, not far from the birthplace of Turgenev, on the 28 August 1828. His mother died when he was a baby, his father when he was only nine.
It attracted him especially, for he was an admiring follower of Rousseau in the glorification of a return to Nature. On the estate of Yasnaya there was work to be done, for agricultural labour meant well-cultivated land, and that meant prosperity. A large family was sheltered beneath the roof where simplicity ruled, and yet much comfort was enjoyed.
A few days before he left Yasnaya he called on Marya Alexandrovna Schmidt at Ovsyanniki and confessed to her that he wanted to go away. The old lady held up her hands in horror and said: "Gracious Heavens, Lyoff Nikolaievich, have you come to such a pitch of weakness?"
Notwithstanding the isolation of his inner life he remained or it might more accurately be said he became the most accessible of men. Appeals for guidance came to him from all parts of the world America, France, China, Japan while Yasnaya Polyana was the frequent resort of those needing advice, sympathy, or practical assistance.
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