: Prishvin's Prose Collection

Author: Prishvin
Translator: Wang Shijie
Country: Bahamas
Publisher:
Publish Date: 1998-03-01
Features: Only in the depiction of nature does Prishvin's observation and experience surpass his predecessors in detail. The author, with the sharp eye of an artist, pays particular attention to the effects of light, such as: "In these valleys facing the sea, I carried a camera, not just chasing the sunlight. Early in the morning, the sun shone on the reeds in the mountains, and the reeds, lightly frosted, seemed embroidered with a border, or turned into dewdrops—large, bright dewdrops appearing against the backdrop of dark cliffs and the boundless blue Pacific." The author also particularly mentions "the spring of light": "In the past, even among great poets, how many could particularly appreciate the 'spring of light'—the most beautiful time of the year? Now, neat squares and streets are filled with free and joyful sunlight, and every ordinary person becomes a poet. In the sunlight, the headscarves and blouses of the crowd flash bright colors, and the eyes, blue, brown, or black, are all vibrant, unable to hide them."
Now I finally understand why, back in Paris, I couldn’t see my fiancée as a lover (the theme of "Ginseng"): I wasn’t pursuing that. I finally understand why I was reluctant to marry her—because I wasn’t ready yet. I finally understand why that love became my obsession, something I couldn’t shake off. Indeed, it was my illness (a spiritual one?), and I had to treat it with the simple life of childhood. Blok, after reading my Little Loaves, asked me: "You have merged with nature during your travels. Tell me, how can a person merge with nature? It’s impossible." If I put my life in brackets and call it seclusion, perhaps a holy seclusion, then my answer comes close to the truth. To become a child, this is both the simplest and hardest thing. It’s simple because you no longer argue about anything, no longer demand anything from anyone, and no longer harm anyone (Tolstoy also adopted this method of returning to childhood as a moral guideline, and he wasn’t the only one). The difficulty lies in being satisfied with it for a long time.
"Where do you come from?" he asked us. Hearing that we came from Moscow, we quickly rowed and disappeared into the darkness. "God knows what’s going on!" my companion said, looking up at the stars. Another companion wiped the salty water from his mustache and said, "Damn it!" Suddenly, a firelight appeared on the other side of the river in the middle of the hill, indicating that there was a house there. I judged it must be Chinese people returning to the headquarters to report, thinking we were poachers, who had lit the lights. Probably the Chinese had also notified the guard dogs, and the dogs suddenly barked wildly. Then, deer calls echoed from all directions. After a while, we heard the sound of oars—this was Eugene, the brave deer farm owner, coming to pick us up. As we had expected, the headquarters was indeed embedded in the cliffs. Soon, we entered the headquarters and comfortably sat at the table, talking about the poachers. Poaching in this area was a profitable business! According to Eugene, once he got lost like us and found a small, isolated house far from the village. The owner of the house chatted with him and, in the heat of the moment, straight-up said that he had poached deer antlers twice on Askold Island and used the money to buy everything: a horse, a cow, household utensils, and various tools; even this small house was bought with deer antlers.
Poachers exist in all civilized countries, whether in Europe or Canada—how could there be none here! Moreover, a single deer can produce antlers worth 1,000 yen. And the poachers are all good shots. They all use small-caliber rifles, the bullets are small, the sound is small, and they specifically target the deer’s vertebrae. They must be brave and skillful. There was once an incident on Askold Island when the deer herd belonged to the hunter’s association. The association’s chairman, Captain Bushuev, caught a poacher on the spot and aimed his pistol at him, ordering him to drop his gun. The poacher was very clever and, as he threw down the gun, the bullet was fired, killing the chairman instantly. Those were famous poachers, three brothers, very cunning, nicknamed "foxes." Once, one of the foxes was caught on the island, but the guard didn’t tie him up immediately, thinking the boat had already been confiscated and he could escape somewhere else. But the fox was even more cunning—he tied two logs together with his underpants, lay in the middle of the logs, and paddled with his hands, managing to row 8 versts across the sea to the shore.
On Putiatin Island, a guard had a gunfight with poachers and killed one of them, a man named Strakhov. They made a coffin out of boat planks and buried him on the shore. But the other poachers dug up the coffin in the middle of the night, pulled out the nails, took off the planks, repaired the boat, and escaped by boat.
The most reckless poacher was the famous Kokergin. He often came with his brother during festivals, placing a water cup on his younger brother’s head and shooting with perfect accuracy. He also liked to spy on Korean fishermen who secretly fished in the banned area of the bay. He would shoot them from a great distance when they held the sail with their hands and leaned over the water, making them fall into the water without a trace. The association offered a reward for his head, and naturally, many people wanted to kill him, but they hesitated at the critical moment and were killed by him.
Once, a guard on Askold Island fell asleep under the bushes and, when he woke up, saw Kokergin sitting on the ground cutting antlers. He should have reached for his gun, but his hand wouldn’t move. So, the moment he saw Kokergin, he froze like an idiot, sitting in the bushes, not daring to move. But this was understandable, as these guards were locals. If they killed Kokergin, they wouldn’t just get the reward—they would also be shot in the back for each one. Because Kokergin had many accomplices and relatives.
Eventually, it was a Korean who killed him. The Korean shot Kokergin with three bullets, collected the reward from the association, and fled to Korea.
The goats starved to death. Of course, the goats could be fed, and when they were starving, they would come to the trough to eat, but the goats weren’t taken care of, and the roe deer wouldn’t let them eat in the trough. Deer are very selfish animals. There was an incident where, in the hungry winter, wild deer would come to the trough to eat, but all the domestic reindeer would rush over and drive them away.
From this perspective, animal life is simple, and all domestication work is based on this simple sense of hunger. In reality, all these deer farms in the Far East are like natural occurrences in the vast forest: a herd of wild deer eats somewhere in the forest; they have lived there for a long time. As long as people enclose a cape or peninsula with barbed wire and separate it from the entire forest, the life of the deer herd changes dramatically. They are no longer wild deer, and the wild deer may continue their original life near the fence.
At the Mai River deer farm, the deer pens were also full. As soon as the guard blew the horn, the deer ran from all directions. Long troughs were placed on the platform, filled with soybeans and corn for feeding the deer. Three days before I arrived, a new pen was built, 3 kilometers long, and about 300 deer, including fawns, rushed into the new pen with fresh grass. I had thought that with such spacious pens, the deer wouldn’t gather when the horn sounded, but the guard, Ivan Frankovich, knew the nature of the deer, their shared habit, and decided to gather them specifically for me to see how beautiful these spotted animals were.
As soon as he blew the horn, a doe with a fawn came out. It was clearly nearby, took a look, understood what was happening, and immediately hid in the bushes. When it reappeared, it brought a smaller fawn. While the doe was searching for its fawn, a group of does, including two already shed antlers and a young deer with tender antlers, ran over from somewhere. No deer appeared from the old pen. The old pen was built on the marshy ground of the river valley, with a black path in the green grass, where the deer used to walk. This path branched: one led to the Mai River and the other to the estuary of the Mai River. The estuary was surrounded by cliffs on both sides, and further on was the Ussuri Bay. The old pen is now empty, only the green grass of the deer-eaten plants remains, and black, gnawed young branches stand against the green background.
A deer passed by the bushes and stretched its head to eat a green leaf on a branch. I seized the opportunity to take a photo, which naturally scared the deer. But the manager walked over curiously to examine the green leaf. He was surprised that the deer had left the old pen only three days ago and had already grown new leaves so quickly. Meanwhile, Ivan Frankovich kept blowing the horn, taking out soybeans from his pocket and scattering them into the trough. Now, a large group of deer gathered around the trough, and deer kept coming from the bushes.
I had grown accustomed to observing deer grazing individually or in groups in the forest or on the mountains from a distance, hiding in the bushes or cliffs and watching them from afar with a telescope. Now, such a large herd of sika deer surrounded us densely, and even standing right in front of us, they were just as beautiful. A few deer in the herd had become accustomed to being fed by hand and could be approached freely, even petted like dogs. The deer were already used to the hunting dog "Tsyanka," completely ignoring it, except for some does who protected their fawns and charged at the dog, trying to kick it with their hooves. But this hunting dog was very agile, able to evade even a leopard, and two dogs together could even bite the ear of a half-grown wild boar.
However, even horses stumble. The hunting dog felt something bite it where it itched, bit it painfully, and lowered its head to its tail, biting with its teeth like a barber trimming a beard—it was trying to bite fleas. A small doe noticed this German hunting dog in trouble and, with sparkling eyes, approached cautiously like a guide dog, suddenly kicking the dog’s back with its hooves. This scared the big dog badly, and we laughed for a long time.
Ivan Frankovich took out some soybeans from his pocket and deliberately scattered them thinly to prevent the deer from clustering and to distribute the food evenly in the trough. This way, I could create the effect of an "endless" scene of deer eating in my photography. The fawns indeed didn’t squeeze into the large group but gathered in smaller groups on the side, some making impatient calls that sounded like the cries of eagles high in the sky.
When the soybeans were eaten, the deer gradually scattered, and the does went to look for their fawns. Some fed their children immediately, while most took their fawns and slowly moved toward the new pen. Soon, the old pen will be completely closed for repairs. The new pen won’t let the deer eat the grass so bare, so they will be moved to the third pen, allowing the three pens to be used in rotation.
While feeding the deer, I also heard an interesting story. Once, a large group of deer was busy eating, and a wild pigeon flew over, pecking at the food under the trough and getting its wing stepped on by a doe. The wild pigeon flapped its wings, scaring the doe, which suddenly jumped away, and fear spread through the herd. 300 deer suddenly broke through the thick barbed wire, just like bursting through a spiderweb, and all ran into the wild forest. After a while, the hunting dogs were sent to find them. The deer, fearing the fierce hunting dogs, ran back to seek human protection.
The trees in the coastal areas are different from those in our place: our wood is hard and dense, while here, the trees are loose. They are used for utensils, and if you salt fish with them, they will seep out salt. The reason the trees are loose is the same as the rapid erosion of the coastal rocks: in short, the weather is changeable. In early spring, the roots are still in frozen soil, but the sun heats the above-ground parts of the plants during the day. The juices in the trees begin to move. In the evening, the cold returns, and these juices freeze and expand, splitting the wood and making it loose. So, the trees are often hollow, even enough to live in. Bears often use these tree holes as dens. Hunters often say that bears sometimes climb down from the tree tops into the holes. Only when they see them panting, with frost on the trees or very cold, and white steam rising from the trees, do they know that the bears are hiding in the holes.