Page:Tolstoy - Essays and Letters.djvu/176

 IX

SHAME!

There was a time, between 1820 and 18.30, wlieii the officers of tlie Semeiiof Ilofi-iiiient, the flower of the young generation of tljat time, men who were for the most part Freemasons, and suhse(itiently Decembrists,* decided not to use corporal ])unishment in their regi- ment, and, notwithstanding the stringent discipline then recjuired, without using corjioral punisliment, theirs continued to be a model regiment.

The officer in charge of one of the companies of this same Semenof Regiment, meeting Sergius Ivano- vitch Mouravyof— one of the best men of his, or indeed of any, time — spoke of a certain soldier, a thief and a drunkard, saying that such a man could only be tamed with rods. Sergius Mouravyof did not agree with him, and proposed transferring the man into his own company.

The transfer was made, and almost the next day the soldier stole a comrade's boots, sold them for drink, and made a disturbance. Sergius Ivanovitch mustered the company, called the soldier out, and said to him : ' You know that in my regiment we neither strike men nor flog them, and I am not going to punish you. I shall pay, with my o^vn money, for the boots you stole, but 1 ask you, not for my sake but for your own, to think over your way of life and to amend it.' And

secure by force a liberal constitution for Russia, in 1825, when Nicholas I. ascended the throne. [ 160 ]
 * Members of the party which attempted, but failed, to