"My Visit to Tolstoy": Five DiscoursesKrauskopf, Joseph
Religion
"My Visit to Tolstoy": Five Discourses
Krauskopf, Joseph
Tolstoy, Leo, graf, 1828-1910
After that statement, he walked silently, lost in deep thought,
perhaps picturing to himself his declining days among fellow martyrs
in far-away Siberia, perhaps thinking of the agonies and tortures
and untimely deaths that had been inflicted by a cruel or misguided
government on thousands of Russia's noblest sons and daughters.
Silently he led the way toward a tree that stood near the house, upon a
slight eminence. It was the _Poverty Tree_ that was destined to afford
him beneath its wide spreading branches his last resting place. It
derived its name from the custom of poor peasants laying there their
troubles before the count. Seating himself on a bench beneath the tree
he beckoned to us to seat ourselves along side of him. He continued
silent for some time, while the setting sun bathed his lionine face and
hair in crimson and golden light, and gave him an appearance not unlike
one of the old Norse gods or vikings which the artist's brush has made
familiar to us. At last he resumed his speech.
My Visit to Tolstoy.
(_Continued._)
A DISCOURSE, AT TEMPLE KENESETH ISRAEL,
BY
RABBI JOSEPH KRAUSKOPF, D. D.
Philadelphia, December 18th, 1910.
[Resumé--Discourse I: Reason for my visit to Russia and for my
calling on Tolstoy. Description of his appearance and personality.
Some of his views on Russia, its statesmen, its religion, its
misgovernment. A pause under _Poverty Tree_ beneath which he now lies
buried.]
Tolstoy recalled
aid sent from
Philadelphia to
famine-stricken in
Russia.
The first question count Tolstoy put to me, after his long silence,
was from what part of the United States I hailed. Upon my telling
him that Philadelphia was my home, he expressed himself as much
pleased. He recalled the two shiploads of food we sent from our port,
two years earlier, for the relief of the famine-stricken of Russia,
and of the distribution of which he had had personal charge, and he
spoke with pleasure and appreciation of Mr. Francis B. Reeves, our
fellow-townsman, who had accompanied the food-relief.
Said first aid came
from Sacramento
synagogue.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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