Stephen Graham - A Tramps Sketches

This book was written chiefly whilst tramping along the Caucasian andCrimean shores of the Black Sea, and on a pilgrimage with Russianpeasants to Jerusalem. Most of it was written in the open air, sittingon logs in the pine forests or on bridges over mountain streams, bythe side of my morning fire or on the sea sand after the morning dip.It is not so much a book about Russia as about the tramp. It is thelife of the wanderer and seeker, the walking hermit, the rebelagainst modern conditions and commercialism who has gone out into thewilderness.

I have tramped alone over the battlefields of the Crimea, visited thecemetery where lie so many British dead, wandered along the Black Seashores a thousand miles to New Athos monastery and Batum, have beenwith seven thousand peasant pilgrims to Jerusalem, and lived theirlife in the hospitable Greek monasteries and in the great Russianhostelry at the Holy City, have bathed with them in Jordan where allwere dressed in their death-shrouds, and have slept with them a wholenight in the Sepulchre.

One cannot make such a journey without great experiences bothspiritual and material. On every hand new significances are revealed,both of Russian life and of life itself.

It is with life itself that this volume is concerned. It is personaland friendly, and on that account craves indulgence. Here are thesongs and sighs of the wanderer, many lyrical pages, and the veryminimum of scientific and topographical matter. It is all writtenspontaneously and without study, and as such goes forthall that aseeker could put down of his visions, or could tell of what he sought.

There will follow, if it is given to the author both to write and topublish, a full story of the places he visited along the Black Seashore, and of the life of the pilgrims on the way to the shrine of theSepulchre and at the shrine itself. It will be a continuation of thework begun in Undiscovered Russia.

Several of these sketches appeared in the St. James's Gazette, twoin Country Life, and one in Collier's of New York, being sent outto these papers from the places where they were written. The authorthanks the Editors for permission to republish, and for their courtesyin dealing with MSS.

STEPHEN GRAHAM.

The town is one large house of which all the little houses are rooms.The streets are the stairs. Those who live always in the town arenever out of doors even if they do take the air in the streets.

When I came into the town I found that in my soul were reflected itsblank walls, its interminable stairways, and the shadows of hurryingtraffic.

A thousand sights and impressions, unbidden, unwelcome, floodedthrough the eye-gate of my soul, and a thousand harsh sounds andnoises came to me through my ears and echoed within me. I became awareof confused influences of all kinds striving to find some habitationin the temple of my being.

What had been my delight in the country, my receptivity andhospitality of consciousness, became in the town my misery and mydespair.

For imagine! Within my own calm mirror a beautiful world had seenitself rebuilded. Mountains and valleys lay within me, robed in sunnyand cloudy days or marching in the majesty of storm. I had inbreathedtheir mystery and outbreathed it again as my own. I had gazed at thewide foaming seas till they had gazed into me, and all their waveswaved their proud crests within me. Beauteous plains had tempted,mysterious dark forests lured me, and I had loved them and given themhabitation in my being. My soul had been wedded to the great strongsun and it had slumbered under the watchful stars.

The silence of vast lonely places was preserved in my breast. Oragainst the background of that silence resounded in my being the roarof the billows of the ocean. Great winds roared about my mountains, orthe whispering snow hurried over them as over tents. In my valleys Iheard the sound of rivulets; in my forests the birds. Choirs of birdssang within my breast. I had been a playfellow with God. God hadplayed with me as with a child.

Bound by so intimate a tie, how terrible to have been betrayed to atown!

For now, fain would the evil city reflect itself in my calm soul, itscommerce take up a place within the temple of my being. I had leftGod's handiwork and come to the man-made town. I had left theinexplicable and come to the realm of the explained. In the holytemple were arcades of shops; through its precincts hurried the trams;the pictures of trade were displayed; men were building hoardings inmy soul and posting notices of idol-worship, and hurrying throngs werereading books of the rites of idolatry. Instead of the mighty anthemof the ocean I heard the roar of traffic. Where had been mysteriousforests now stood dark chimneys, and the songs of birds were exchangedfor the shrill whistle of trains.

And my being began to express itself to itself in terms of commerce.

"Oh God," I cried in my sorrow, "who did play with me among themountains, refurnish my soul! Purge Thy Temple as Thou didst inJerusalem of old time, when Thou didst overset the tables of themoney-changers."

Then the spirit drove me into the wilderness to my mountains andvalleys, by the side of the great sea and by the haunted forests. Oncemore the vast dome of heaven became the roof of my house, and withinthe house was rebuilded that which my soul called beautiful. There Irefound my God, and my being re-expressed itself to itself in terms ofeternal Mysteries. I vowed I should never again belong to the town.

As upon a spring day the face of heaven is hid and a storm descends,winds ruffle the bosom of a pure lake, the flowers droop, wet, thebirds cease singing, and rain rushes over all, and then anon the faceof heaven clears, the sun shines forth, the flowers look up in tears,the birds sing again, and the pure lake reflects once more the puredepth of the sky, so now my glad soul, which had lost its sun, foundit again and remembered its birds and its flowers.

I have been a whole season in the wilds, tramping or idling on theBlack Sea shore, living for whole days together on wild fruit,sleeping for the most part under the stars, bathing every morning andevening in the clear warm sea. It is difficult to tell the riches ofthe life I have had, the significance of the experience. I have feltpulse in my veins wild blood which my instincts had forgotten in thetown. I have felt myself come back to Nature.

During the first month after my departure from the town I slept butthrice under man's roof. I slept all alone, on the hillside, in themaize-fields, in the forest, in old deserted houses, in caves, ruins,like a wild animal gone far afield in search of prey. I never knew inadvance where I should make my night couch; for I was Nature's guestand my hostess kept her little secrets. Each night a new secret wasopened, and in the secret lay some pleasant mystery. Some of themysteries I guessedthere are many guesses in these pagessome Ionly tried to guess, and others I could only wonder over. All mannerof mysterious things happen to us in sleep; the sick man is made well,the desperate hopeful, the dull man happy. These things happen inhouses which are barred and shuttered and bolted. The power of theNight penetrates even into the luxurious apartments of kings, eveninto the cellars of the slums. But if it is potent in these, how muchmore is it potent in its free unrestricted domain, the open country.He who sleeps under the stars is bathed in the elemental forces whichin houses only creep to us through keyholes. I may say from experiencethat he who has slept out of doors every day for a month, nay even fora week, is at the end of that time a new man. He has entered into newrelationship with the world in which he lives, and has allowed thegentle creative hands of Nature to re-shape his soul.