Precursor

2. The Second Net-1

The Second Net

Hryhoriy had been absent from home only three years, but how much water had passed under the bridge, and how many good and bad changes had taken place! Without having bidden their younger son farewell, his father and mother had passed away. His sister‑in‑law had given birth to a girl, and her boys had already grown up and now tended cattle and rode horseback no worse than grown Cossacks. And his brother had changed too. He no longer jabbered like a mill, and now spoke staidly, demurely, stroking his moustache as he brought a glass to his mouth. True, after Hryhoriy told him that he entertained no intentions of farming and let him retain all the land and property acquired by their father, Stepan beamed joyously and yelled out: “Dash into the larder, wife, there’s another hunk of bacon there somewhere!”

Hryhoriy felt both sad and happy when he recalled this meeting with his brother Stepan. Sad, because it was the first time he had seen him in the firm grip of land and prosperity, but also happy, for once more, at the crossroads of life, he had not followed his older brother along the most travelled path, which destiny had prepared for him, but had chosen his own path. Even though it was difficult and thorny, it suited his temperament.

For two long months he wandered about the Hetmanate1 lands, with books in his bag and grief in his heart. He was like that stalk in the field. No one cared about him; he had no one to confide in. Each person had his own life, his own troubles, sorrows and joys. Only his friends from the Academy rejoiced at his arrival, as if youth itself was visiting them from years past, from Kyiv. Oh, how many embraces there had been in the summer, how many memories shared and tears shed! Though a student’s life was not easy, it was still preferable to the vanity dominating the world, the eternal turmoil, disease, and fear for one’s own welfare, the fate of one’s children...

He sighed, adjusted his bag so it wouldn’t dig into his shoulder, and stepped off the road to make way for a cart rattling up behind him. He was delighted to be like a bird in the sky, free as free can be, a vagrant Cossack for whom the steppe was his home, the grasses his bed, and the sabre his wife. True, he had no sabre... However, he had books, knowledge and wisdom, which humanity had nurtured within the hearts of its better sons, from the wise Hellenes to Prokopovych.2 And what in this world was superior to wisdom?!

“Whoa! Whoa!” someone shouted frantically beside him. “Who do I see there?! Is this a mirage, Hrytsko?!”

Hryhoriy shielded his eyes against the sun and on the cart which had drawn up alongside him he spied a giant in Cossack dress, with a lambskin hat pushed to one side.

Jumping down from the cart, the Cossack embraced Hryhoriy and kissed him awkwardly on the nose and cheek.

“I thought you’d already vanished somewhere in foreign parts!”

Only now did Skovoroda recognise the giant as the Mykyta who had been nicknamed Stork in the dormitory because of his long legs. He was also overjoyed at this unexpected, though welcome meeting.

“Whither and whence?” Mykyta asked briefly, without releasing Skovoroda from his embrace.

“To Pereyaslav...”

“Really?!” Stork threw up his arms.

“To teach in your Collegium...”

“But that’s wonderful! My nephew’s studying there and we have a future student running about without pants back home! And our instructors aren’t exactly among the wisest... Why have we stopped? Let’s go!”

He grabbed Skovoroda about the waist and dragged him over to the cart. Once they had made themselves comfortable and the horses set off, he fell back, grabbed his pistol and, with a shout of “vivat professores!”,3 fired into the deep blue sky.

Frightened, the horses surged forward at a gallop. Trees and stooked sheaves of wheat flashed past.

“How about you, serving in the army?” Hryhoriy asked after his spirited fellow classmate had quietened down a little and put away his pistol.

“A lieutenant!” Stork struck his breast.

“Oho!”

“Why, am I some country bumpkin?! What stops me from being a Cossack?”

“I can’t get used to the idea,” Hryhoriy said softly. “So thin, long‑legged...”

“Like a stork!” Mykyta guffawed, lifted a finger, wrinkled his forehead, and announced in Latin: “Tempora mutantur, et nos mutamut in illis!4 Isn’t that so, teacher? You were the first among us!”

“You’re not the man you used to be...”

“Small wonder! I’ve tasted freedom! Thanks to the Empress and God, Cossackdom is revelling again!”

“A bitter beggar’s piece...”

“Have you seen the hetman?” Stork asked fervently. “He’s an eagle! A philosopher! One like that will defend our freedom! And we’ll help him.”

“Tell me, Mykyta, does the hetman have many serfs?”

“A few thousand.”

“Wow, that’s a regiment of Cossacks, perhaps two...”

“You always were a strange one, Hrytsko,” the lieutenant replied after a silence.

“Can freedom be defended by someone who himself enslaves others?” Hryhoriy asked.

Mykyta pulled his neck in. Turning away, he examined the reigns intently, coughed, and whipped the horses. It was obvious, he had his finger in the pie too. Throughout the Hetmanate lords and lordlings were raking land, estates and commoners under themselves, including their own relatives. And Rozumovsky, that Cossack son who was now a count and a hetman, the brother of the empress’ lover, blessed all this, this ‘freedom’ of the Cossack officers, while playing the father defending Mother Ukraine and her poor orphans from the St. Petersburg court dragons.

“Here it is, our miracle of a city!” Mykyta pointed into the sun‑bathed distance.

Girded by a blue‑green belt, a walled city was perched atop a hill. In the misty sky above it floated crosses and church domes aflame with gold, as if competing with the sun. Fishing boats rocked lazily on the Trubizh River, horses grazed in the meadow, and near the walls, under the willows, there were graceful white figures of women and strips of linen spread out on the grass in the sun.

“Have you been in Pereyaslav before?”

“Never had the opportunity.”

Mykyta stretched out on the cart, supported his head with his arm, and began recounting everything he knew about his home town. However, only every second word reached Hryhoriy, for he sat as if bewitched, taking in the beauty not only with his eyes, but with his whole being, which had suddenly become buoyant and insensible, like mist over a dawn meadow. His soul was filled with a foreboding of something new and joyous. Like all vagrants, he too had a niche in his heart where there lurked a desire for certainty, to have his own corner in this uneasy, cruel world, his own piece of bread, albeit stale, and even enjoy the smile of a girl’s lips...

“Have you fallen asleep there? Wake up, Hryhoriy!” Mykyta shook him.

Still smiling because of his daydreams, Skovoroda glanced at him and asked with his eyes what it was that he had wanted to ask him.

“Who invited you to the Collegium?”

“The bishop, through Father Hervasiy.”

“What will you be teaching the offspring?”

“Poetry.”

“Oho!”

“Why not? I’m no country bumpkin, you know!”

At the crossroads the horses turned toward the city of their own accord and, thumping over the new bridge, made off at a faster gait along the well‑travelled road on the dam wall.

Mykyta stopped the perspiring horses outside his grace’s residence, adjusted his hat, and said: “Well, here we are. Go through the gate, there’s a door on the left there and you’ll spy the bishop.”

In the city Mykyta became staid and reserved. He seemed like any other respected lieutenant, not Stork.

“Once you’ve settled in,” he added, “come and visit. It’s not far, near Mykhailivsky Cathedral. We can down a chalice or two, recall our Kyiv days and the Academy!”

“I’ll drop by, Mykyta,” Hryhoriy said hurriedly, slipped his bag over his shoulder and said farewell: “Good luck!”

“In good time!” Mykyta called out and waved.

Moving his heavy, stiff legs Hryhoriy made his way under the pale‑blue arch of the gate and entered the courtyard. On his right he saw the dark shape of a wrought‑iron oak door in the pale‑blue wall, and further on were windows and more windows; up above was a high iron roof and white cherubic clouds. To the right was an orchard, a well, stables, and a gilded light coach.

He suddenly felt scared for some reason, imagining the face of the bishop whom he had seen back in the Academy, and stopped dead in his tracks. Lord Almighty, what would he say to him? How would he prove his ability to teach squires the great wisdom of composing poetry? Mentor of youth, Hryhoriy Skovoroda, the son of farmer Sava! Is this not blasphemy, Hryhoriy? Do you wish to play someone else’s role in the theatre of life? Don’t tempt fickle fate! Before it is too late, leave this yard, this city and, having blessed your vagabond path, go forth among the people, play the flute, teach people to do good and grow wise. Wisdom is boundless! And yet, having grabbed its miserable crumb, you are insolently prepared to mount the pulpit and deliver its maxims...

Near the gate he met Father Hervasiy. The father superior embraced Hryhoriy, kissed him as a close friend, and asked: “Been to see Iosaf?”

“Not yet…”

“Then off you go! This is his little temple!”

The rounded, lively Father Hervasiy pattered along like a woman; he recounted, inquired, rejoiced at the pleasant meeting and cheered up Hryhoriy without letting him utter a word. He led him indoors, bade a novice inform his grace that he had a visitor, and said in parting: “I will go and tell them to prepare a decent cell for you.”

The chamber Hryhoriy was standing in was high and spacious. Benches hugged the walls, in the corner under the icons stood a large table covered with a luxurious tablecloth, and there were several deep, comfortable armchairs. And also, an icon lamp. Its meandering crimson light illuminated Sabaoth’s face, then, with a flicker, crossed to the Holy Mother or The Precursor standing at the edge of the desert, setting a crowd of heathens onto the true path...

“Is it you, Hryhoriy?” the bishop appeared in the doorway. He blessed him and motioned him into an armchair. Sitting opposite, he spoke softly but clearly, as if fearing that his interlocutor might not comprehend something and leave without quenching his thirst, like a traveller who had not drunk at a well because there was no shadoof. He was thin, delicate, his long hair fell onto his shoulders. Almost unchanged from several years earlier. Except that he had turned a little greyer.

“I’ve heard that you recently visited foreign parts.”

Skovoroda nodded.

“So, what did you see? Whom did you meet? How did you enrich your mind and soul?”

“I was in Tokay, Vienna, Pressburg, Offen... I travelled quite a few roads and spoke with all kinds of people...”

“With the Orthodox? Or with Lutherans and Catholics?”

“I did not inquire. Similarly, no one asked me my faith.” Skovoroda smiled. He understood what his grace was intimating: afraid that he had absorbed too many foreign ideas. “They don’t revere the church there very much at all,” he added on purpose. “Even though they have faith in their hearts and pray to the Lord...”

“It is merely half a step from Protestantism to heresy,” the bishop intoned and moved closer to the point: “Father Hervasiy told you that we need a teacher who knows poetics and can teach our students how to compose and comprehend poetry. I’ve heard that you have knowledge and experience in this difficult area, so I’ve agreed to your coming and saved a place for you. Watch out that you are worthy! Try hard. Don’t begrudge your powers or knowledge. And so that you have someone to emulate...” He opened a drawer. “…take this book – very wise, though still unpublished. It was given to me by the author himself. Guard it like the apple of your eye and draw wisdom from it!”

Iosaf rose and came up to the newly appointed poetics instructor, who also jumped to his feet and stood, clutching the book to his chest.