Letters of Anton Chekhov (Tchekhov) - Penn State University

Letters of Anton Chekhov to His Family and Friends with biographical sketchTO A. S. SUVORIN.MOSCOW, February 23, 1890.… My brother Alexandr is a slow-witted creature; he is enthusiasticover Ornatsky’s missionary speech, in which he says that thenatives do not become Christians because they are waiting for aspecial ukaz (that is, command) from the Tsar on the subject andare waiting for their chiefs to be baptized … (by force—be it understood).This eloquent pontifex says, too, that the native priests ought,in view of their ascetic manner of life, to be removed from the nativesand put into special institutions somewhat after the fashion ofmonasteries. A nice set of people and no mistake! They have wastedtwo million roubles, they send out every year from the academydozens of missionaries who cost the treasury and the people largesums, yet they cannot convert the natives, and what is more, wantthe police and the military to help them with fire and sword ….If you have Madame Tsebrikov’s article, do not trouble to send it.Such articles give no information and only waste time; I want facts.Indeed, in Russia there is a terrible poverty of facts, and a terribleabundance of reflections of all sorts.122