Page:Dostoyevsky - The House of the Dead, Collected Edition, 1915.djvu/154

 title aroused my curiosity, but in spite of all my inquiries I could learn nothing about this piece beforehand. I only learnt that they had not taken the play out of a book, but from a “written copy”; that they got the play from a retired sergeant living in the town who had probably once taken part in a performance of it himself in some soldiers’ entertainment. In our remote towns and provinces there are such plays which no one seems to know anything about, and which have perhaps never been printed, but seem to have appeared of themselves, and so have become an indispensable part of every “people’s theatre.” It would be a very, very good thing if some investigator would make a fresh and more careful study of the people’s drama, which really does exist, and is perhaps by no means valueless. I refuse to believe that all I saw on our prison stage was invented by the convicts themselves. There must be a continuous tradition, established customs and conceptions handed down from generation to generation and consecrated by time. They must be looked for among soldiers, among factory hands, in factory towns, and even among the working classes in some poor obscure little towns. They are preserved, too, in villages and provincial towns among the servants of the richer country gentry. I imagine indeed that many old-fashioned plays have been circulated in written copies all over Russia by house-serfs. Many of the old-fashioned landowners and Moscow gentlemen had their own dramatic companies, made up of serf actors. And these theatres laid the foundations of the national dramatic art of which there are unmistakable signs. As for “Kedril the Glutton,” I was able to learn nothing about it beforehand, except that evil spirits appear on the stage and carry Kedril off to hell. But what does the name Kedril mean, why is it Kedril and not Kiril? Whether it is a Russian story or of foreign origin I could not find out. It was announced that finally there would be a “pantomime to the accompaniment of music.” All this of course was very interesting. The actors were fifteen in number—all smart, spirited fellows. They bestirred themselves, rehearsed—sometimes behind the prison—held their tongues and kept things secret. In fact they meant to surprise us with something extraordinary and unexpected.

On working days the prison was locked up early, as soon as night came on. Christmas week was an exception: they did not lock up till the evening tattoo. This concession was made expressly for the sake of the theatre. Almost every afternoon