y. "It seemed to them that ferocious demons were
chuckling and sneering silently behind human faces. And this
masquerade lasted so long that the poor little tots thought that it
would never end...."

Sologoub is, above all, a chanter of death. Almost all of his works
unveil a murder, suicide, or madness. Moreover, the author, who
shows only the injustices, evils, and infamy of life, and who
affirms that the only happiness that he foresees for man is the
possibility of "creating for himself a chimera" by turning away from
reality, finds the clearest colors and the sweetest expressions in
speaking of death.

"There is not a surer and more tender friend on earth than death,"
says one of his heroes. "And if men fear the name of death, it is
because they do not know that it is the real life, eternal and
invariable. Life deceives very often, death never. It is sweet to
think of death, as it is to think of a dear friend, distant and yet
always close at hand.... One forgets all in the arms of the
consoling angel, the angel of death."

The ever supremely correct and beautiful language of Sologoub shows
the power of a master, and it is most regrettable that an artist of
his merit should confine himself to so morbid an art.

* * * * *

These then are the principal authors--some of whom have enjoyed an
immense popularity--who treat the "cursed questions:" the rights of
the flesh, the problem of death, and other equally "cursed"
problems.

The other writers are principally occupied with social questions,
and, without rigorously following in the steps of their
predecessors, remain, however, most of the time, realists.

Among these, Sergyev-Tzensky occupies a prominent place. The stories
of this writer show us beings who seem strangers to what is going on
around them. This peculiarity comes from the fact that Tzensky does
not understand the physical facts in the same way that the
naturalists do. For him, they are the manifestations of the will of
a supernatural entity, incomprehensible, inconceivable, and, at the
same time, clearly hostile to man.

His story, "The Sadness of the Fields," testifies to this singular
conception. A farmer and his wife, good and peaceful people, have
for many years wished for a child. Up to this time, the six children
which the mother has given birth to have died in their infancy. They
are anxiously awaiting the seventh. Will this one live? Will not the
sadness of