Lull in fighting until March, while arms supply improves. June—new offensive along Austrian front, with some two million Russian deaths and injuries. Mobilization creates havoc in agriculture, industry and transport. December—Rasputin murdered.
February—Andrei Tolstoy dies of pleurisy. Yasnaya Polyana, like other large estates, deteriorates. Ilya Tolstoy leaves his wife and children and emigrates to the United States.
19th January. My son Ilya arrived with two people who want to make a cinematographic film of the story ‘What People Live for’.* One appears to be a Jew, the other is a boy of 16. I walked to the grave today and felt a little calmer.
20th. Ilya and the visitors walked around the estate taking photographs for the film. One of them, an actor playing an angel, stood naked in the snow!
11th February. Dreadful news of Andryusha, who is ill with a high fever. The days pass quickly and uneventfully. Bulgakov is leaving for Gusev’s tonight with Dushan Petrovich’s memoirs. It would have been better to post them.
17th. There are no trains from Tula to Moscow this week, as they’re letting a military cargo through. I am planning to leave for Petersburg with Lyova to see Andryusha, and am packing my bags. Andryusha begged Katya to ask me to go there. He is evidently very ill.
18th. Lyova and I left for Petrograd, via Tula. Unimaginably crowded trains. We were given two first-class tickets apparently by mistake, and squeezed ourselves into a compartment with two men who were extremely courteous and obliging. At 8 a.m. we were given our own compartment, and slept until late morning. I stayed with the Kuzminskys, Lyova with his family. Andryusha looks very ill and I am dreadfully worried.
19th. The doctors keep repeating the same senseless words: “It’s serious but there’s no danger at present.” He has pleurisy and a bad liver. His breathing is laboured, he is a greenish-yellow colour, he shrieks and groans continuously, and three or four times a day he is racked by a fierce, agonizing chill.
22nd. I suggested he should receive the Eucharist. He calmly consented, and when the priest came he confessed in a loud voice, repeating the responses and kissing everyone. He grew tired, and towards evening started shivering again.
23rd. Andryusha has been unconscious all day. His breathing is agonizingly laboured.
24th. Andryusha died at 10 minutes past one in the morning. It was on the 23rd that Vanechka died.
26th. A splendid, brilliant funeral. Masses of wreathes, a crowded church. It was like a dream. Seryozha arrived late. We buried him at the Nikolskoe cemetery of the Alexander Nevsky Monastery.
9th March. There has been a strong wind howling all day. Where is my Andryusha now!
23rd. It’s very sad that Lyova’s family life has broken down, but it’s pleasant to have him living here, especially now that Tanya has left for the trial.*
26th. They have written to us from Krapivna ordering us to take in three prisoners of war. I added my signature to those of the other women protesting against the sinking of the Portugal.*
27th. I sent for the prisoners of war, four Romanians, who arrived on government horses.
29th. I coloured my children’s drawings again, and sit in silence for hours on end, my heart aching for Andryusha.
30th. I heard today that the two Tanechkas won’t be coming for another month, and that all the Tolstoyans, apart from Seryozha Popov, have been acquitted.*
16th April. This evening my son Misha arrived, looking well. He is leaving again for this cursed war on the 25th.
10th May. This afternoon I invited a Molokan to tea—an interesting old man who used to visit Lev Nik.
14th. There were a lot of visitors—three officers and 28 common folk from the co-operative society.
23rd. My grandson Andryusha Ilich came. He has two George Crosses from the war.
26th. News of 30,000 soldiers taken prisoner, and a battle in which all of our officers were killed.
29th. A vast number of visitors—workers from a metal factory, a great many soldiers with their officer and his wife.
18th June. Sasha’s birthday. Where is she now, I wonder? I wrote down some information about the beginning and end of my marriage to Lev Nikolaevich, and became dreadfully agitated.
7th July. Today, 7th July, is a great day—my daughter Sasha returned from the war. She looked cheerful and healthy, thank God, and we listened to her stories all evening.
18th. Sasha has gone off to war again. It was very painful to see her go, worse than before.
24th. Today is the Kuzminskys’ 49th wedding anniversary. They’ve never been very happy together! My sister was telling me only recently that she never truly loved him.
6th August. I had a visit this evening from my grandson Ilya Ilich Tolstoy, who has just finished at the Naval Academy. Such a nice young man.
9th. Spent the day in Tula with Nina and wrote a new will.* It breaks my heart to see the soldiers and hear them singing.
6th September. We had a visit from two Japanese men, a journalist and an artist; they had lunch with us, looked around the house with great interest and asked a great many questions. One of them spoke Russian, the other a little French. Lyova has written a memorandum for the Tsar called ‘On Fixed Prices’, and wants to give it to him in person.
11th. Today was a happy day. First my two Tanechkas came, then Seryozha arrived with Orlov. Fascinating conversations, then Seryozha played some Indian songs and an Arabian dance on the piano.
22nd October. 33 tourists, final-year students from Malakhovka, came to visit. I showed them Lev Nik.’s rooms, and Tanya gave them tea and something to eat in the wing. Then they all went out to the meadow, played games, sang songs and visited the grave.
3rd November. Lyova has returned with new plans to travel to India and China and give lectures. Ilya has just left for America with the same thing in mind.* I have a lot of grief in store—if I don’t die soon.
5th. I am living through my last days with Lyova before his latest mad scheme—a journey through China and India. Today there is to be a Tolstoy evening in Moscow, organized by Tanya in aid of the Tolstoy Museum,* and on the 7th there will be another evening to commemorate Lev Nik.’s death.
6th. I played Schubert’s Tragic Symphony as a duet with Varya. Lovely. I was interested to read the article about the Tolstoy evening organized by the Tolstoy Society. Tomorrow is the anniversary of his death; it’s sad to recall the tragic events of that period.
7th. I visited the grave first thing this morning with some chrysanthemums and primulas. Our visitors today were an old woman and two young Slavs. Every city in Russia is organizing evenings in memory of L.N. Tolstoy.
8th. Varya and I played Mozart’s Eighth Symphony as a duet, followed by Haydn’s Twelfth. They’re both lovely. I read Rolland’s Vie de Tolstoï and did some newspaper cuttings.
11th. An unbearably sad parting with Lyova today. He has brought so much to our lives—music, ideas and a good, gentle attitude to life. How talented he is, and what a good disposition he has! Yet he is so wretched and unstable.
21st December. I am engrossed in the newspapers. The war, the murder of Rasputin, the chaos in the government—it fascinates and horrifies me.
29th. Visitors to Lev Nikolaevich’s rooms all morning. It must be pleasant to feel this deep love for him—especially if one is young. People are always astonished by the simplicity of our life here.
31st. We all saw in the New Year together, and I think everyone enjoyed themselves. But my heart was grieving for my children—Ilya in America, Lyova on his way to Japan, Sasha at war and Misha about to leave any day now. And Andryusha no more! Thank God I still have Seryozha, Tanya and my darling grandchildren. The end of the sad year of 1916!