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A Personal Record-Part6_JOSEPH CONRAD (1857-1924)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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perishable mortality that he lives in my memory. I knew, at a

very early age, that my granduncle Nicholas B. was a Knight of



the Legion of Honour and that he had also the Polish Cross for

valour Virtuti Militari. The knowledge of these glorious facts



inspired in me an admiring veneration; yet it is not that

sentiment, strong as it was, which resumes for me the force and



the significance of his personality. It is over borne by another

and compleximpression of awe, compassion, and horror. Mr.



Nicholas B. remains for me the unfortunate and miserable (but

heroic) being who once upon a time had eaten a dog.



It is a good forty years since I heard the tale, and the effect

has not worn off yet. I believe this is the very first, say,



realistic, story I heard in my life; but all the same I don't

know why I should have been so frightfully impressed. Of course



I know what our village dogs look like--but still. . . . No! At

this very day, recalling the horror and compassion of my



childhood, I ask myself whether I am right in disclosing to a

cold and fastidious world that awful episode in the family



history. I ask myself--is it right?--especially as the B. family

had always been honourably known in a wide countryside for the



delicacy of their tastes in the matter of eating and drinking.

But upon the whole, and considering that this gastronomical



degradation overtaking a gallant young officer lies really at the

door of the Great Napoleon, I think that to cover it up by



silence would be an exaggeration of literaryrestraint. Let the

truth stand here. The responsibility rests with the Man of St.



Helena in view of his deplorable levity in the conduct of the

Russian campaign. It was during the memorableretreat from



Moscow that Mr. Nicholas B., in company of two brother

officers--as to whose morality and natural refinement I know



nothing--bagged a dog on the outskirts of a village and

subsequently devoured him. As far as I can remember the weapon



used was a cavalry sabre, and the issue of the sporting episode

was rather more of a matter of life and death than if it had been



an encounter with a tiger. A picket of Cossacks was sleeping in

that village lost in the depths of the great Lithuanian forest.



The three sportsmen had observed them from a hiding-place making

themselves very much at home among the huts just before the early



winter darkness set in at four o'clock. They had observed them

with disgust and, perhaps, with despair. Late in the night the



rash counsels of hungerovercame the dictates of prudence.

Crawling through the snow they crept up to the fence of dry



branches which generally encloses a village in that part of

Lithuania. What they expected to get and in what manner, and



whether this expectation was worth the risk, goodness only knows.

However, these Cossack parties, in most cases wandering without



an officer, were known to guard themselves badly and often not at

all. In addition, the village lying at a great distance from the



line of French retreat, they could not suspect the presence of

stragglers from the Grand Army. The three officers had strayed



away in a blizzard from the main column and had been lost for

days in the woods, which explains sufficiently the terrible



straits to which they were reduced. Their plan was to try and

attract the attention of the peasants in that one of the huts



which was nearest to the enclosure; but as they were preparing to

venture into the very jaws of the lion, so to speak, a dog (it is



mighty strange that there was but one), a creature quite as

formidable under the circumstances as a lion, began to bark on



the other side of the fence. . . .




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