A romance instead of a song of freedom? Why not? in order to cover an untimely appearance, the wisest thing for a poet to do was to read or recite something, no matter what, so that the others meanwhile could recover their self-possession. But this was no mere rhyming jingle. No sooner had he begun than the attention of all was riveted on his verses. The poetic form was striking and brilliant, the thought original, the conception fine; there were fire, passion, audacity, and beauty of expression in it, united to a natural grace and simplicity. No one had heard the lines before. As he finished, Zeneida, hurrying up to him, pressed both his hands in hers. She did not kiss him as she had kissed Ryleieff, but the tears which flowed from her eyes were a higher recompense. A kiss is cheap. Tears are costly. The whole company of conspirators, forgetting alike "green book" and reorganization, hastened to congratulate the poet, who suddenly, like a comet from before which the wind has chased the clouds, found himself revealed in all his glory. Chevalier Galban was now convinced that this was no gathering of conspirators, but merely a select assemblage who met for games of chance and intellectual and literary interchange of thought--both prohibited, it is true, in Russia--for which reason they were obliged to meet in secret. _Par exemple_, such verses would be public property in any other country, and half the world would be running after the poet. "Bah!" returned Pushkin, excited by the applause he had created. "Do you not know that feebleness is the goddess we worship, and the priest of her altar is called the 'Censor'?" General laughter broke out at these cutting words. The Censor is as stereotyped a marionette in Russia as in other countries. Galban seized the opportunity to bring his talents as _agent provocateur_ into the field. "Yes, indeed, ladies and gentlemen, the Censor is a necessary evil among us. You are aware that the Czarina Catherine II. once, at the instance of her men of letters, commanded full freedom of the press in Russia for--three days! It would be seen then what fruit the tree would bear. It would have been thought that those three days would have proved a harvest-time for songs of freedom, prohibited pamphlets, and philosophical treatises to crawl out of their hiding-places, but the result was only an avalanche of low slander and scurrilous anecdotes. The press was flooded with a stream of scandalous personalities, directed against well-known families and personages; so that already on the second day of the freedom of the press the Czarina was besieged with petitions to countermand the third day and reinstate the censure." No one save Pushkin deemed it advisable to accept the proffered challenge; but he, as a poet, could not suffer the liberty of the press to be a mark for ridicule.