TO-DAY I was taken to the Provincial Government Board to be certified. Opinions differed. They disputed, and finally decided that I was not insane – but they arrived at this decision only because during the examination I did my utmost to restrain myself and not give myself away. I did not speak out, because I am afraid of the madhouse, where they would prevent me from doing my mad work. So they came to the conclusion that I am subject to hallucinations and something else, but am of sound mind.
They came to that conclusion, but I myself know that I am mad. A doctor prescribed a treatment for me, and assured me that if I would follow his instructions exactly all would be right – all that troubled me would pass. Ah, what would I not give that it might pass! The torment is too great. I will tell in due order how and from what this medical certification came about – how I went mad and how I betrayed myself.
Up to the age of thirty-five I lived just as everybody else does and nothing strange was noticed about me. Perhaps in early childhood, before the age of ten, there was at times something resembling my present condition, but only by fits, and not continually as now. Moreover in childhood it used to affect me rather differently. For instance I remember that once when going to bed, at the age of five or six, my nurse Eupraxia, a tall thin woman who wore a brown dress and a cap and had flabby skin under her chin, was undressing me and lifting me up to put me into my cot. ‘I will get into bed by myself – myself!’ I said, and stepped over the side of the cot.
‘Well, lie down then. Lie down, Fédya! Look at Mítya. He’s a good boy and is lying down already,’ she said, indicating my brother with a jerk of her head.
I jumped into the bed still holding her hand, and then let it go, kicked about under my bed-clothes, and wrapped myself up. And I had such a pleasant feeling. I grew quiet and thought: ‘I love Nurse; Nurse loves me and Mítya; and I love Mítya, and Mítya loves me and Nurse. Nurse loves Tarás, and I love Tarás, and Mítya loves him. And Tarás loves me and Nurse. And Mamma loves me and Nurse, and Nurse loves Mamma and me and Papa – and everybody loves everybody and everybody is happy!’
Then suddenly I heard the housekeeper run in and angrily shout something about a sugar-basin, and nurse answering indignantly that she had not taken it. And I felt pained, frightened, and bewildered, and horror, cold horror, seized me, and I hid my head under the bed-clothes but felt no better in the dark.
I also remembered how a serf-boy was once beaten in my presence, how he screamed, and how dreadful Fóka’s face looked when he was beating the boy. ‘Then you won’t do it any more, you won’t?’ he kept repeating as he went on beating. The boy cried, ‘I won’t!’ but Fóka still repeated, ‘You won’t!’ and went on beating him.
And then it came upon me! I began to sob, and went on so that they could not quiet me for a long time. That sobbing and despair were the first attacks of my present madness.
I remember another attack when my aunt told us about Christ. She told the story and was about to go away, but we said: ‘Tell us some more about Jesus Christ!’
‘No, I have no time now,’ she said.
‘Yes, do tell us!’
Mítya also asked her to, and my aunt began to repeat what she had told us. She told us how they crucified, beat, and tortured him, and how he went on praying and did not reproach them.
‘Why did they torment him, Auntie?’
‘They were cruel people.’
‘But why, when he was good?’
‘There, that’s enough. It’s past eight! Do you hear?’
‘Why did they beat him? He forgave them, then why did they hit him? Did it hurt him, Auntie? Did it hurt?’
‘That will do! I’m going to have tea now.’
‘But perhaps it isn’t true and they didn’t beat him?’
‘Now, now, that will do!’
‘No, no! Don’t go away!’
And again I was overcome by it. I sobbed and sobbed, and began knocking my head against the wall.
That was how it befell me in my childhood. But by the time I was fourteen, and from the time the instincts of sex were aroused and I yielded to vice, all that passed away and I became a boy like other boys, like all the rest of us reared on rich, overabundant food, effeminate, doing no physical work, surrounded by all possible temptations that inflamed sensuality, and among other equally spoilt children. Boys of my own age taught me vice, and I indulged in it. Later on that vice was replaced by another, and I began to know women. And so, seeking enjoyments and finding them, I lived till the age of thirty-five. I was perfectly well and there were no signs of my madness.
Those twenty years of my healthy life passed for me so that I can hardly remember anything of them, and now recall them with difficulty and disgust. Like all mentally healthy boys of our circle I entered the high school and afterwards the university, where I completed the course of law-studies. Then I was in the Civil Service for a short time, and then I met my present wife, married, had a post in the country and, as it is called, ‘brought up’ our children, managed the estates, and was Justice of the Peace.
In the tenth year of my married life I again had an attack – the first since my childhood.
My wife and I had saved money – some inherited by her and some from the bonds I, like other landowners, received from the Government at the time of the emancipation of the serfs – and we decided to buy an estate. I was much interested, as was proper, in the growth of our property and in increasing it in the shrewdest way – better than other people. At that time I inquired everywhere where there were estates for sale, and read all the advertisements in the papers. I wanted to buy an estate so that the income from it, or the timber on it, should cover the whole purchase price and I should get it for nothing. I looked out for some fool who did not understand business, and thought I had found such a man.
An estate with large forests was being sold in Pénza province. From all I could learn about it, it seemed that its owner was just such a fool as I wanted and the timber would cover the whole cost of the estate. So I got ready and set out.
We (my servant and I) travelled at first by rail and then by road in a post-chaise. The journey was a very pleasant one for me. My servant, a young good-natured fellow, was in just as good spirits as I. We saw new places and met new people and enjoyed ourselves. To reach our destination we had to go about a hundred and forty miles, and decided to go without stopping except to change horses. Night came and we still went on. We grew drowsy. I fell asleep, but suddenly awoke feeling that there was something terrifying. As often happens, I woke up thoroughly alert and feeling as if sleep had gone for ever. ‘Why am I going? Where am I going to?’ I suddenly asked myself. It was not that I did not like the idea of buying an estate cheaply, but it suddenly occurred to me that there was no need for me to travel all that distance, that I should die here in this strange place, and I was filled with dread. Sergéy, my servant, woke up, and I availed myself of the opportunity to talk to him. I spoke about that part of the country, he replied and joked, but I felt depressed. I spoke about our folks at home, and of the business before us, and I was surprised that his answers were so cheerful. Everything seemed pleasant and amusing to him while it nauseated me. But for all that while we were talking I felt easier. But besides everything seeming wearisome and uncanny, I began to feel tired and wished to stop. It seemed to me that I should feel better if I could enter a house, see people, drink tea, and above all have some sleep.
We were nearing the town of Arzamás.
‘Shall we put up here and rest a bit?’
‘Why not? Splendid!’
‘Are we still far from the town?’
‘About five miles from the last mile-post.’
The driver was a respectable man, careful and taciturn, and he drove rather slowly and wearily.