‘But here too, events soon took such a turn that it became a problem not only to work but even to survive, no one ever knowing what the morrow would bring.
‘The district of the Mineral Waters, where we were living, became a centre of civil war, and we found ourselves literally between two fires.
‘Towns passed from hand to hand: one day to the Bolsheviks, the next day to the Cossacks, and the day after to the White Army or to some newly formed party.
‘Sometimes on getting up in the morning we would not know under which government we were that day and only on going out into the street would discover what politics had to be professed.
‘For me personally, of all that I went through in Russia, this was the period of most intense nervous strain.
‘All the time I not only had to think and worry about obtaining the most immediate necessities of life, which had become almost unprocurable, but I was also constantly concerned about the lives of the hundred or so people who were in my care.
‘What made me most anxious was the situation of about twenty of my pupils—as they began to call themselves—who were of military age. Young and even middle-aged men were being conscripted every day—one day by the Bolsheviks, the next day by the “Whites”, the day after by some other faction.
‘This constant tension could not be endured any longer; cost what it might, some way out had to be found.
‘One night, when there was more shooting than usual, and echoes of the anxious conversations of my companions reached me from the adjoining rooms, I began to reflect very seriously.
‘While I was considering ways out of the impasse, I remembered by association one of the sayings of the wise Mullah Nassr Eddin, which long before this had become for me a sort of fixed idea, namely: “In every circumstance of life always strive to combine the useful with the agreeable.”
‘I should mention here that for many years I had been interested in an archaeological question, and, in order to clarify certain details, I needed to find out as much as possible about the situation and pattern of arrangement of those monuments called dolmens, which have survived from very ancient times and can be found in our day in certain specific locations on almost every continent.
‘I had definite information that such dolmens were to be found in many places in the Caucasus, and even knew the approximate location of some of them as indicated by official science. Although I had never had enough time for a systematic exploration of these places, nevertheless, during my frequent trips through the mountains of the Caucasus and Transcaucasia I had never missed an opportunity for going to see them, choosing for this the times least detrimental to the pursuit of my fundamental aim.
‘As a result of what I had already discovered myself, it had become quite clear to me that in the regions between the eastern shores of the Black Sea and the chain of the Caucasus Mountains, especially in the neighbourhood of certain passes I had not as yet been over, dolmens were to be found, standing singly and also in little groups, of a particular type which would be of great interest to me.
‘So, as I found myself cut off from the world, with my activities brought to a standstill by the situation which had arisen, I decided to use the time at my disposal for a special expedition to those regions of the Caucasus, in order to search for and examine these dolmens—and at the same time bring both myself and the people in my care into safety.
‘The next morning I marshalled all my resources and, with the help of several persons who were more or less half-consciously or unconsciously devoted to me, and who had some kind of relationship with the various power-possessors of that moment, I set about trying to procure official permission for organizing a scientific expedition into the Caucasus Mountains.
‘Having succeeded in getting this permission, I obtained by all sorts of devices everything necessary for a journey of this kind. I then chose a number of my pupils, chiefly those for whom it was most dangerous to stay in the district of the Mineral Waters. After I had provided for the others remaining behind, we set off in two parties, which were to meet at an agreed place.
‘The first party of this scientific expedition, which started from the town of Piatigorsk, consisted of twelve persons, and the second, from the town of Essentuki, of twenty-one-of whom I was one.
‘Officially, these two groups were considered quite independent of each other and as having nothing in common.
‘Without really knowing the conditions then prevailing in this country, one must have a particularly fertile imagination to form even a rough idea of what it meant to organize a scientific expedition, moreover an official one, at such a time.
‘From Essentuki I intended to go first through inhabited districts to Mount Indur, situated not far from Tuapse, and from there to begin searching in a south-easterly direction, along a line from twenty-five to sixty miles distant from the shores of the Black Sea. For the first part of the journey I managed, after great difficulties, to procure from the Bolshevik Government, which was then in power, two railway wagons, and this I did at a time when, owing to the constant movement of troops, it was almost unthinkable even for one man without luggage to travel by rail.
‘Having squeezed into these wagons all twenty-one persons, two horses, two mules and three two-wheeled carts, not to mention the great quantity of equipment bought for the expedition, such as tents, provisions, and various instruments and weapons, we started off.
‘We travelled this way as far as Maikop. But since almost the whole road-bed of the railway beyond this town had been destroyed the previous day by a newly formed group of rebels who called themselves by some such title as the Greens, our expedition was compelled to continue further on foot and by cart, and not in the direction of Tuapse, as I had originally intended, but to wards what is known as the White River Pass.
‘In order to reach uninhabited territory, we had to pass through populated districts and to cross the Bolshevik and White Army lines no fewer than five times.
‘Whenever I recall all those almost indescribable difficulties, even now that it is all over and only a memory of the past, there arises in me a feeling of real satisfaction that I succeeded in surmounting them. It was indeed as if, during that whole period, miracles were being performed for us.
‘The epidemic of fanaticism and mutual hatred, which had seized all the people around us, did not touch us at all: one might have said that I and my companions moved under supernatural protection.
‘Just as our attitude towards each side was impartial, as if we were not of this world, so their attitude towards us was the same—they considered us completely neutral, as in truth we were.
‘Surrounded by infuriated beasts of people, ready to tear one another apart for the slightest booty, I moved amid this chaos quite openly and fearlessly, without concealing anything or resorting to any subterfuge. And in spite of the fact that “requisitionary” pillaging was in full swing, nothing was taken from us, not even the two casks of alcohol which, on account of great scarcity, were the envy of all.
‘In telling you about this now, a feeling of justice, that very justice which comes from my understanding of the psyche of people subjected to such events, obliges me to pay a tribute to those of the Bolsheviks and White Army volunteers—most of them perhaps no longer alive—whose attitude of good will towards my activities, even though adopted unconsciously and purely instinctively, assisted the fortunate outcome of this dangerous enterprise of mine.
‘Indeed, if I did manage to get safely out of that hell, in the full sense of the word, it was not due entirely to my well-developed ability to discern and play upon the slightest changes in the weaknesses of the psyche of people in a psychosis of this kind. In the conditions in which these events were taking place I would not have been able, even by maintaining the most active vigilance day and night, to foresee all the unexpected things that happened and to take corresponding measures.
‘In my opinion, we got out safely because in the common presences of these people—al
though in the grip of a psychic state in which the last grain of reasonableness vanishes—the instinct inherent in all human beings for distinguishing good from evil in the objective sense was not completely lacking. And therefore, instinctively sensing in my activities the living germ of that sacred impulse which alone is capable of bringing genuine happiness to humanity, they furthered in whatever way they could the process of accomplishment of that which I had undertaken long before this war.
‘In all our dealings with them there was never once a situation, either with the Bolsheviks or the White Army volunteers, from which I could not find some way out.
‘Here I will add, by the way, that if at some time in the future the life of people should flow normally, and if there should then be specialists for investigating events similar to those which occurred in Russia, the various documents I have kept, which were issued to me by the two opposing sides for the protection of my interests and possessions, would furnish very instructive evidence of the extraordinary incidents that can occur during such mass psychoses.
‘For example, among these numerous documents, there is one paper on one side of which is written:The bearer, Citizen Gurdjieff, has the right to carry everywhere a revolver—calibre .... number....
Certified by signature and seal affixed:
‘On the back of this paper is written:A certain Gurdjieff is authorized to carry a revolver numbered as indicated on the reverse side.
Certified by signature and seal affixed:
‘After tremendous efforts, surmounting numerous unexpected obstacles, we went through devastated Cossack villages, and finally got to Kumichki, the last inhabited place before the wilderness of the Caucasus Mountains. Beyond this point there were no passable roads.
‘In Kumichki we made haste to procure whatever provisions were still obtainable, abandoned our carts to their fate, loaded most of our things on the horses and mules, and carrying the rest ourselves, began to climb up the everlasting mountains.
‘Only after crossing the first pass did we at last breathe freely, feeling that the greatest dangers were behind us; but it was just here that the real difficulties of the journey began.
‘About this part of the expedition from Kumichki over the White River pass to Sochi, across the wilds of the Caucasian range, a journey which lasted about two months, filled with strange and even extraordinary adventures, I will not say anything. And this is because, according to information which has reached me, a description of this escape of ours from the “centre of hell to its edge” through the almost impassable wilds of these mountains, as well as of our successful investigation of dolmens and of all the visible and hidden riches of this region, has already been written and will doubtless soon be published by certain members of this singular scientific expedition, who subsequently returned to Russia and are now cut off from the rest of the world.
‘The group of people round me on this journey happened quite unexpectedly to be of such diverse types and education as could not have been more suitable for the aims of our expedition, and they very effectively helped me to resolve the problem of the dolmens. Among them were very good technicians and specialists in various branches of science—mining and other engineers, as well as specialists in archaeology, astronomy, zoology, medicine and other fields of knowledge.
‘I will only add that, of all my impressions during this journey, the most outstanding is of the beauty of the regions between Kumichki and Sochi, especially of those from the pass down to the sea; which indeed deserve the high-sounding name of “terrestrial paradise”, often attributed to other parts of the Caucasus by the so-called intelligentsia.
‘Although these regions would be quite suitable for agriculture as well as for watering-places, and are not very far from populated centres, yet, in spite of the growing need for land of this sort, they remain, for some reason or other, uninhabited and undeveloped.
‘They were formerly populated by Cherkesses, who migrated to Turkey forty or fifty years ago; since then they have been abandoned and no man’s foot has trod them.
‘On our way we sometimes came across formerly well-cultivated lands and excellent orchards, which, though overgrown and wild, were still yielding enough fruit to feed thousands.
‘Well then, only at the end of about two months, worn out with fatigue and with our provisions almost gone, did we succeed in reaching the town of Sochi on the shores of the Black Sea.
‘Here, because certain members of the expedition, during what might be called our “Way of Golgotha”, were not equal to the situation, but manifested properties not corresponding at all to the high aim we had in view, I decided to part with them and went on with the others. We travelled now by ordinary roads to the town of Tiflis, where there was still, for that tumultuous time, a relative degree of order under the rule of the Menshevik democrats of Georgian nationality.
‘Four years had passed from the beginning of the organization of the Institute in Moscow up to the time of our arrival in Tiflis. Together with time had gone money, and all the more rapidly because, towards the end of this period, money had had to be spent not only for the work of the Institute itself, but on much else besides which had not been foreseen in the original calculations.
‘The trouble was that the catastrophic events in Russia, the colossal upheavals, the war and civil war, had shaken people out of their usual grooves, and everything was so mixed up and turned upside down that the wealthy and secure of yesterday found themselves the totally destitute of today. This was the situation of many of those who had left everything to follow my ideas, and who during this period, through their sincerity and corresponding manifestations, had become like next of kin to me; and so I had now to provide a means of livelihood for nearly two hundred people.
‘My difficulty in this respect was complicated by the fact that many of my relatives were in a still worse position than the others, and I had not only to support them financially, but to provide shelter for them and all their families, since most of them had been living in places in Transcaucasia which had been completely devastated and pillaged in the civil war and by the Turks.
‘In order that you may picture to yourselves the generally prevailing horror, I will describe one of the many scenes I witnessed.
‘This was at the time when I was in Essentuki, and life there was still relatively calm.
‘I was maintaining two “community houses” for my relatives and the followers of my ideas, one for eighty-five people in Essentuki, and the other for sixty people in Piatigorsk.
‘The already high cost of living was rising daily. It was becoming more and more difficult, even with large sums of money, to obtain food for the two houses and I barely succeeded in making both ends meet.
‘One rainy morning, while sitting at the window looking out at the street and thinking how to obtain this, that and the other, I saw two odd-looking conveyances pull up at my door, from which a number of shadowy forms slowly emerged.
‘At first it was even difficult for me to make out what they were, but, as my agitated thoughts grew a little calmer, I gradually began to realize that these were people, or more exactly skeletons of people, with only their burning eyes alive, clad in rags and tatters, their bare feet covered with wounds and sores. There were twenty-eight in all, among them eleven children between the ages of one and nine.
‘These people turned out to be relatives of mine, among them my own sister with her six little children.
‘They had been living in Alexandropol, which, among other places, had been attacked by the Turks two months before. As neither the post nor the telegraph service were working and the towns were cut off from each other, the inhabitants of Alexandropol only learned of the approaching attack when the Turks were about three miles from the city. This news gave rise to an indescribable panic.
‘Just picture to yourselves how people must feel when, worn out and strained to the extreme limit, they realize that the enemy, stronger and better armed than their own troops, will inevi
tably enter the city and will mercilessly and indiscriminately massacre not only the men, but the women, the aged and the children, as was the order of things there.
‘And so my relatives, like all the rest, learned of the approach of the Turks only about an hour beforehand, and, seized with this panic, fled in terror just as they were, without stopping to take anything with them.
‘Quite bewildered and dashing off at random, they first even ran in the wrong direction. It was only when they were too exhausted to go further that they came to themselves a little, realized their mistake and took the direction of Tiflis.
‘After twenty long, painful days of walking over the mountains through almost impassable places, sometimes even crawling on hands and knees, hungry and cold, they finally arrived in Tiflis barely alive.
‘Having learned there that I was living in Essentuki and that communications with that town were then open, they managed with the help of friends to hire two covered carts; and, barely moving along what was called the Georgian military road, they finally landed at my door, as I have just said, in such a state that they were not even recognizable.
‘Imagine the situation of a man who sees such a picture and who, in spite of the extreme difficulties of the moment, considers himself to be, and in fact is, the only one able to shelter them, clothe them, care for them and, in short, set them on their feet.
‘All these unforeseen expenses, as well as the cost of the expedition and the money left to provide for those who stayed behind in the Mineral Water towns, had used up all my reserves by the time I arrived, with a whole following, in Tiflis. Not only was my ready money gone, but also those valuables which my wife and I, during our constant moving about, had been able to carry with us.
‘As for the other valuable things I had collected for many years, although a few had been disposed of, at the very beginning of the chaotic events in Russia, by some of my pupils from the two capitals who afterwards came with their families to be near me in Essentuki, all the rest, including the two unique collections I have mentioned, remained partly in Petrograd and partly in Moscow, and I had no idea what had become of them.
Meetings With Remarkable Men Page 31