And now it will be easier to describe the state of my mind. It all lies in these words: I do not know. In this--in the acknowledged impotence of the human mind--lies the tragedy. Not to mention the fact that humanity always has asked, and always will ask, for an answer, they are truly questions of more importance than anything else in the world. If there be something on the other side, and that something an eternal life, then misfortunes and losses on this side are, as nothing. 'I am content to die,' says Renan, 'but I should like to know whether death will be of any use to me.' And philosophy replies, 'I do not know.' And man beats against that blank wall, and like the bedridden sufferer fancies, if he could lie on this or on that side, he would feel easier. What is to be done?"* *Translated by Iza Young. Those last five words are often heard in Russian mouths. It is a favourite question. It is, indeed, the title of two Russian books. The description of the Slavonic temperament given by Sienkiewicz tallies exactly with many prominent characters in Russian novels. Turgenev first completely realised it in "Rudin;" he afterwards made it equally clear in "Torrents of Spring," "Smoke," and other novels.* Raskolnikov, in Dostoevski's "Crime and Punishment," is another illustration; he wishes to be a Napoleon, and succeeds only in murdering two old women. Artsybashev, in his terrible novel, "Sanin," has given an admirable analysis of this great Russian type in the character of Jurii, who finally commits suicide simply because he cannot find a working theory of life. Writers so different as Tolstoi and Gorki have given plenty of good examples. Indeed, Gorki, in "Varenka Olessova," has put into the mouth of a sensible girl an excellent sketch of the national representative. *Goncharov devoted a whole novel, "Oblomov," to the elaboration of this particular type. "The Russian hero is always silly and stupid, he is always sick of something; always thinking of something that cannot be understood, and is himself so miserable, so m--i--serable! He will think, think, then talk, then he will go and make a declaration of love, and after that he thinks, and thinks again, till he marries. . . . And when he is married, he talks all sorts of nonsense to his wife, and then abandons her." Turgenev's Bazarov and Artsybashev's Sanin indicate the ardent revolt against the national masculine temperament; like true Slavs, they go clear to the other extreme, and bring resolution to a reductio ad absurdum; for your true Russian knows no middle course, being entirely without the healthy moderation of the Anglo-Saxon. The great Turgenev realised his own likeness to Rudin. Mrs. Ritchie has given a very pleasant unconscious testimony to this fact.