At all times there are gifted people who are able to develop and implement extraordinary ideas, to create something extraordinary and necessary for mankind. As a rule, a pronounced talent leads its owner along its own special life path, without deviating a single step from the intended path ... And there are examples of unique people in history who have mastered completely different spheres equally successfully, creating in each of them something fundamentally new and perfect. One of these outstanding representatives of mankind was Samuel Morse. Who is this Morse? What is he known for?
Formation of the artist's creative worldview
Samuel Morse, whose date of birth falls on April 27, 1791, was born in a small American town called Charlestown, located in Samuel's father was a preacher and from early childhood tried to arouse in his son a desire to learn.
As a result of parental efforts, the young man grew up inquisitive and talented. He successfully entered the university at Yale in 1805, during his studies at which his creative worldview was formed as a constantly searching person.
The study of painting
Painting evoked particular awe and interest in Morse. He diligently studied it in his student years, and after graduating from the university, he went to England to learn painting from the legendary Washington Alston. According to contemporaries, the young man demonstrated remarkable abilities in the visual arts. Already in 1813, he painted a famous painting called "The Dying Hercules", which found refuge in the London Arts. The work was highly appreciated by art lovers, and Morse was even awarded a gold medal for it. In 1815 the young artist returned to America.
Artist Success
At home, no less success awaited him - in a few years, Samuel Morse (photo) became the idol of emerging artists of that time. Many talented works that belonged to his brush, decorated the walls of museums and were highly appreciated even by the most demanding audience. He also painted a world-famous portrait of one of the US presidents, James Monroe.
Later, he became the founder of the famous National Academy of Drawing, which at first was an ordinary society of painters, but thanks to the artistic and organizational skills of Morse, it changed dramatically in a few years.
Despite the steady success, Samuel Morse did not stop there and continued to develop. In 1829 he returned to Europe. This time the goal was to study how the European art schools are organized and function.
He was going to transfer this experience to American reality and further improve his Academy.
fateful journey
Three years later, Samuel Morse boarded a ship called the Sally in Le Havre, which, under the direction of Captain Pell, was heading to New York. The journey on this sailboat was for Samuel a fateful and turning point. Among the passengers was the famous physician Charles Jackson. He was famous for his innovation in medicine - it was he who discovered anesthesia and other modern methods of anesthesia. This time he showed the rest of the passengers a kind of scientific trick: he brought a piece of wire to the compass, which was attached to the compass. As a result, the arrow began to rotate.
The idea of signaling
It should be noted that Samuel Morse's interests were not strictly limited to the world of painting, so when he witnessed this experience, one of his most wonderful ideas ignited in him, changing the world. He was aware of the experiments conducted by Faraday, as well as Schilling's experiments, when sparks were extracted from a magnet. And all this prompted him to create a kind of system for transmitting signals over wires at a distance using various combinations of sparks. The idea, so unexpected for the artist, captured his mind entirely.
The ship "Sally" sailed to the American shores for another month. During this time, Samuel Morse drew blueprints for the proposed signaling apparatus. Then for several years he worked on the creation of this device, but it was not possible to achieve the expected result. In addition to hard work, misfortune fell on Samuel - his wife died, leaving him alone with three children. However, Morse did not abandon his experiments.
First attempt to assemble a device for data transmission
Some time later, he received a position as a professor of painting at the University of New York. It was there that he first showed the public the invented apparatus for transmitting information. The result was impressive - the signal was given over a distance of more than one and a half thousand feet.
The device made a particularly vivid impression on an American entrepreneur named Steve Vail. He made a kind of deal with Morse: he allocates two thousand dollars for his experiments, and also finds a place suitable for research, and Samuel in return undertakes to take his son as his assistant. Morse happily agreed to the proposed conditions, and the result was not long in coming. In 1844, they managed to transmit the first message at a distance. His text was uncomplicated, but quite clearly reflected what was happening: “Wonderful are your works, Lord!”. It was the first in human history
Morse code
Further research and experimentation by two enthusiastic people led to the creation of the famous Morse code - a coding system using short (dot) and parcels or characters. However, historians have not come to a consensus about the authorship - many believe that his partner, the son of the tycoon Alfred Vail, who donated money, was the creator.
Be that as it may, the alphabet invented at that time was very different from the one that is currently used. It was much more complicated, and included not two, but three different lengths of messages - a dot, a dash, and an elongated dash. The combinations were very complex and inconvenient, in connection with which, in subsequent years, other inventors significantly modified the coding system, bringing it closer in content and simplicity to the one that humanity uses now. But paradoxically, the original version of the alphabet was used for quite a long time - until the middle of the twentieth century, however, it was preserved for so long only on the railway.
It was not easy to prove to the world the necessity and applicability of the telegraph. While the invention did not give a stable and obvious result, Samuel Morse, whose children were in dire need of funds for a living, did not meet with support either at home or abroad. The scientist-artist was on the verge of poverty, but did not lose hope of achieving his goal. When this happened, he had to prove his authorship, because former investors and partners pounced on his offspring, like ravens. Samuel Morse and his alphabet made a splash in scientific and public circles
Public and family life
Samuel Morse, whose biography is full of sharp turns, turned out to be a unique person who was able to prove himself in two completely different areas with amazing success. Despite the fact that the telegraph, as a method of transmitting information, was quickly replaced by telephone and radio, the information transmission system, as an idea, is still relevant today. In the nineteenth century, this invention became sensational, and brought Morse not only fame, but also material well-being - the countries that began to use the Morse device paid the inventor a significant reward, which was enough to purchase a huge estate in which Samuel's entire large family was located, and for that so that this amazing person generously endows others until the end of his life. He was actively involved in charity work, allocated money for schools, for various societies for the development of art, museums, and also supported young scientists and artists, remembering how the tycoon Vail once helped him.
The glory of Samuel Morse, as a great artist, does not fade to this day. His works are kept in various museums around the world, and are rightfully considered the brightest examples of fine art. And the telegraph device he invented has found a permanent location in the American National Museum.
Morse was married twice, with a total of seven children from both marriages. Before his death, April 2, 1872, he was surrounded by a huge number of grateful and loving family members.
Without deep knowledge of electronics, Samuel Morse, after ten years of hard work, presented the world with a telegraph writing apparatus, and after another six months, the telegraph alphabet - the famous Morse code.
Samuel Finley Breeze Morse was born April 27, 1791 years in the American town of Charlestown, Massachusetts in the family of a famous preacher.
IN 1805 he entered Yale University. At the university he excelled in physics and in particular in electricity. But, despite this, he was very drawn to the fine arts.
IN 1811 Morse, against the will of his parents, goes to Europe to study painting. IN 1813 In the year he paints the famous painting “The Dying Hercules”, for which he receives a gold medal from the London Royal Academy of Arts.
Returning to America, Samuel Morse 1925 founded the National Academy of Painters in New York.
IN 1929 In the year he again goes to Europe to study painting and the devices of drawing schools. In 1832, returning home on a steamer, he saw a trick - the rotation of the compass needle when a piece of wire connected to a battery was brought to it. This interested Morse and inspired the creation of a device for transmitting signals over a distance by wire.
For the next ten years, having no deep knowledge of electronics and a specially equipped workshop, Morse worked hard and purposefully to create his electromagnetic telegraph. Working in the attic in his brother's house, Morse used improvised, most often self-made devices.
In September 1837 Morse demonstrated his telegraph to the public in the building of New York University. The telegram was transmitted over a distance of 1,700 feet (500 meters), but was difficult to read because the words in it were indicated by combinations of zigzag lines. The merit of Morse is that he tried to design a writing telegraph, and his predecessors - pointer showing. Morse used an electromagnet and a writing instrument attached to it to record signals.
Six months later, he completely changes the signal recording code and presents it to the public. The alphabet he created displayed letters as a set of short and long signals. Morse approached the creation of his code very thoroughly. After working through a large number of texts, he calculated the frequency of repetition of all letters. He marked the most repetitive letters with simple combinations of short and long signals. The least repetitive are the more complex.
IN 1838 In the same New York University, Samuel Morse demonstrates the transmission of a telegram over 15 km. using the new code. In 1840 he received a patent for his invention.
IN 1843 Congress gave Morse a grant to build the 65-kilometer Washington-Baltimore telegraph line, which in May 1844 already entered service. After that, the inventor became a national hero, became widely known.
Morse code has since been slightly modified, but is still used around the world. For example, adopted in 1912, a single distress signal " SOS» - three dots, three dashes, three dots.
The modern version of the international Morse code was adopted in 1939.
Name Samuel Morse everyone is familiar with his most famous discovery - the famous alphabet, named after the inventor. However, few people know that Morse was also an artist, moreover, the founder and president of the National Academy of Drawing in New York. However, art critics expressed very contradictory opinions about the aesthetic value of his works, just as scientists expressed about the significance of his inventions. Who was he really - an artist, an inventor or a talented adventurer?
Samuel Finley Breeze Morse was born in America, the son of a preacher. Samuel created his first serious work at the age of 14 - he then painted a successful family portrait, and a little later - the painting "The Landing of the Pilgrims" about the arrival of the first settlers in America. This canvas attracted the attention of the then-famous artist V. Alston, who invited the young man to go with him to England to study painting. Samuel's parents did not approve of these activities, but the trip was not interfered with. And in 1811, at the age of 20, Samuel Morse began to study painting at the Royal Academy.
While studying at the Academy, Morse created two significant works - "The Dying Hercules" (for which the artist received a gold medal at the exhibition) and "Jupiter's Judgment". At the age of 24, the young man returned to America as a famous artist, but no one bought his paintings in his homeland, and he began to paint portraits to order. Among them was a portrait of former US President John Adams, as well as portraits of the Marquis de Lafayette and the fifth US President James Monroe.
In New York, Morse founded the National Academy of Drawing and became its president. At the same time, he decided to improve his skills and continued his studies in Europe. His painting classes were so diligent that no one could have imagined that he would soon take up a radically different kind of activity. Morse later admitted: “I devoted my younger years to painting only. But, as it turned out, I could not forget the phrase that struck me in my youth, heard at a lecture on natural sciences: "If an electric current meets a delay on its way, it will become visible." This thought was the first seed from which, many years later, the invention of the telegraph grew in my head.
There were several inventors of the telegraph, and Morse was not a pioneer: Schilling was the creator of a new type of communication in Russia, Gauss and Weber in Germany, Cook and Wheatstone in England. But their electromagnetic devices were of the pointer type, and Morse invented the electromechanical telegraph. He received a patent for his invention and demonstrated its work at New York University. However, pundits not only did not appreciate his find, but also called Morse an adventurer: the fact is that he essentially did not invent anything, but simply combined several successfully operating inventions of his predecessors. But Morse himself was sure that the competent application of the existing is no less important than the introduction of something new.
The revolutionary invention of Morse was not due to data transmission technology, but to the method of fixing them and the scope. At the same time, Morse did not understand not only the latest discoveries in the field of electricity, but even his basic rules and laws. He had neither special knowledge nor training, but they were replaced by perseverance and determination.
Telegraphs with magnetic needles existed before Morse, but they were inconvenient to use. And he decided to replace the arrow with a recorder, fixing the received message on a paper tape pulled through the apparatus. Significant assistance in the invention was provided by Alfred Weil, who, unlike Morse, had a technical education: he invented a scheme for printing a telegraph apparatus and improved the telegraph code. As a result, the famous Morse code appeared, which is a combination of short and long signals recorded on a paper tape in the form of dots and dashes.
Fame, wealth and recognition came to him only in his declining years. The scientific and practical value of his invention had to be recognized by many, even those who insisted on the secondary nature of these discoveries. After Morse's death in 1872, his fame as an inventor faded, but he was again talked about as an original portrait painter. These disputes continue to this day.
And for some scientists, their discoveries were fatal:
Samuel Finley Breeze Morse was born on April 27, 1791 in the family of the famous local preacher Jedid Morse in the American town of Charlestown (Massachusetts). In 1805 he entered Yale University.
In 1811, Samuel went to Europe to study painting with Washington Alston. The young man showed great promise as an artist. In 1813, he submitted to the London Royal Academy of Arts the painting "The Dying Hercules", which was awarded a gold medal. In 1815 he returned to his homeland. A few years later, Samuel was recognized as the leader and idol of young American artists (his brush belongs to the famous portrait of President Munro). In 1825, he founded a society of painters in New York (later the National Academy of Drawing) and became its president, and in 1829 he again went to Europe to study the structure of drawing schools and outstanding works of painting.
On October 1, 1832, the sailing ship "Sally" (the captain of the ship - Pell) left Le Havre for New York. The famous doctor of those times (the discoverer of anesthesia and new methods of pain relief in medicine) - Charles T. Jackson in the first class cabin demonstrated a focus experience to its passengers: the compass needle began to rotate when a piece of wire connected to a galvanic cell was brought to it. Samuel watched the experiment closely.
In Europe, at that time, the book of M. Faraday was published and the experiments given in it were repeated in many laboratories, and in early 1832 St. Petersburg witnessed the first experiments of Schilling. "Extracting sparks from a magnet" seemed a miracle to the uninitiated. The experience he saw prompted him to think about creating a system for transmitting signals over wires, using combinations of transmission of "sparks". This idea captured him. During the month-long voyage home, Morse sketched several drawings. The next three years, working in the attic in the house of his brother Richard, he devoted to the construction of the apparatus according to his drawings, but to no avail. In 1835 he was appointed professor of painting at the newly opened New York University, where in September 1837 he demonstrated his invention. The signal was sent over a 1,700-foot wire.
A prominent American industrialist Steve Weil became interested in the work of Morse and agreed to donate 2 thousand dollars and provide premises for further experiments on one condition - S. Morse would take his son Alfred as an assistant. The union of the younger Weil and Morse proved to be fruitful. The first message was sent on May 27, 1844, and the text of which read: "Wonderful are thy works, Lord!" For the transmission of parcels, a key invented by the Russian scientist B.S. Yakobi was used, and for reception, an electromagnet was used, the anchor of which controlled the movement of the ink pen across the paper.
Working on the further improvement of his telegraph apparatus, Samuel Morse in 1838 also invented a code - the telegraph alphabet. Note: The telegraph alphabet (a system for encoding characters in short and long parcels for transmitting them over communication lines, known as "Morse code" or "Morse code"), which is used now, differs significantly from the one invented in 1838 by S. Morse, although some researchers believe that its author was Alfred Weil, Samuel Morse's business partner.
It should be noted that the original table of the "Morse code" was strikingly different from those codes that sound today on amateur bands. In it, firstly, parcels of three different durations (dot, dash and em dash) were used. Secondly, some characters had pauses within their codes. The encodings of the modern and original tables match only for about half of the letters (A, B, D, E, G, H, I, K, M, N, S, T, U, V, and W) and do not match for any of the digits. Moreover, to construct a code for a number of characters in the original Morse Code, other principles were generally used. So, along with "dots" and "dashes", there were combinations of "double dash" (letter L) and even "triple dash" (number 0), and some characters included a pause .... The Latin letter C, for example, was transmitted then as "two dots-pause-dot", i.e., essentially, as the letters I and E, transmitted one after the other. This significantly complicates the reception of radiograms. That is why various versions of the telegraph alphabet soon appeared, which did not contain codes with pauses between parcels (Phillips, Baln, "sea", "continental" ...).
The modern version of the international "Morse code" (International Morse) appeared quite recently - in 1939, when the last adjustment was made (the so-called "continental" version), which mainly affected punctuation marks. It sounds even more incredible, but the fact is that the original version of the "Morse code" was used in some places on railways until the mid-60s of the XX century!
In 1851, the German "Commission for the Construction of the Telegraph" appreciated the advantages of the "Morse apparatus", and since then it has found its wide application.
In recent years, S. Morse lived in Ponchkif (near New York) and died on April 2, 1872 in wealth and honor.
According to the site www.qso.ru
Samuel Finley Breeze Morse(English) Samuel Finley Breese Morse [mɔːrs]; April 27, Charlestown, Massachusetts - April 2, New York) - American inventor and artist. The most famous inventions are the electromagnetic writing telegraph ("Morse apparatus",) and the Morse code (alphabet).
Biography
During the War of 1812 between Great Britain and the United States, who supported Napoleon, Morse showed himself to be an ardent patriot. However, in 1813, when Morse presented the painting "The Dying Hercules" to the London Royal Academy of Arts, he was awarded a gold medal.
Upon his return home in 1815, Morse found that Americans regarded him as an English painter and had little interest in painting. Therefore, he eked out a meager existence, painting portraits. For ten years he had to lead the life of an itinerant painter. Morse was very sociable and charming, he was eagerly received in the homes of intellectuals, the rich and politicians. In addition, he had a rare gift for making acquaintances. Among his friends were the politician M.-J. Lafayette, novelist J.F. Cooper, and even US President A. Lincoln. In rapidly growing New York, he created some of the most interesting portraits ever made by American artists. In 1825, Morse founded the National Academy of Design in New York, which elected him president and sent him to Europe in 1829 to study the structure of drawing schools and outstanding works of painting.
During the second trip to Europe, Morse met L. Daguerre and became interested in the latest discoveries in the field of electricity. He was inspired to invent the telegraph by a chance conversation while returning from Europe on a steamboat in 1832. A passenger, in the course of a conversation about a newly invented electromagnet, said: "If an electric current can be made visible at both ends of a wire, then I see no reason why messages cannot be transmitted to them." Although the idea of an electric telegraph was put forward before Morse, he believed that he was the first.
Morse devoted almost all of his time to painting, teaching at New York University, and politics. In 1835 Morse became professor of descriptive arts. But after he was shown a description of the telegraph model proposed by W. Weber in 1833 at the university in 1836, he completely devoted himself to invention.
Years of work and study were required to make his telegraph work. In 1837, together with A. Vail, he developed a system for transmitting letters by dots and dashes, which became known throughout the world as Morse code. He did not find support either at home, or in England, or in France, or in Russia, meeting refusal everywhere. In another attempt to interest the US Congress in the creation of telegraph lines, he acquired a congressman as a partner, and in 1843 Morse received a subsidy of $ 30,000 to build the first telegraph line from Baltimore to Washington. In the course of the work, it turned out that at this distance of about 40 kilometers, the electrical signal was too strongly attenuated and direct communication was impossible. The situation was saved by his companion Alfred Vail, who proposed using the relay as an amplifier. Finally, on May 24, 1844, the line was completed, but Morse was immediately involved in legal feuds with both partners and competitors. He fought desperately, and the Supreme Court in 1854 recognized his copyright in the telegraph.
Newspapers, railroads and banks quickly found use for his telegraph. Telegraph lines instantly entwined the whole world, Morse's fortune and fame multiplied. In 1858, Morse received 400,000 francs from ten European states for his invention. Morse bought an estate in Ponchkif, near New York, and spent the rest of his life there with a large family among children and grandchildren. Morse became a philanthropist in his old age. He patronized schools, universities, churches, bible societies, missionaries and poor artists.
After his death in 1872, Morse's fame as an inventor faded as the telegraph was replaced by telephone, radio and television, but his reputation as an artist grew. He did not consider himself a portrait painter, but many people know his paintings, which depict Lafayette and other prominent people. His 1837 telegraph is in the National Museum of the United States, and the country house is now recognized as a historical monument.
Personal life
On September 29, 1818, Morse married Lucretia Pickering Walker. Three children were born in the marriage. After the death of his first wife, Morse remarried on 10 August 1848 to Elizabeth Griswold. The marriage produced four children.
Memory
Other
On April 27, 2009, in honor of Samuel Morse's birthday, Google changed its home page to include "Google" in Morse code.
Write a review on the article "Morse, Samuel"
Notes
Literature
- Wilson M. American scientists and inventors / Per. from English. V. Ramses; ed. N. Treneva. - M .: Knowledge, 1975. - S. 27-34. - 136 p. - 100,000 copies.
Links
- // Encyclopedic Dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron: in 86 volumes (82 volumes and 4 additional). - St. Petersburg. , 1890-1907.
- A. V. Kamensky, St. Petersburg, type. Yu. N. Erlikh, 1891.
- by Samuel F. B. Morse, 1819 (White House Collection) - Broken Link
- - Link does not work
- Dmitry Bykov "Izvestia" 04/27/11
Excerpt characterizing Morse, Samuel
Prince Vasily fulfilled the promise given at the evening at Anna Pavlovna's to Princess Drubetskaya, who asked him about her only son Boris. He was reported to the sovereign, and, unlike others, he was transferred to the guards of the Semenovsky regiment as an ensign. But Boris was never appointed adjutant or under Kutuzov, despite all the troubles and intrigues of Anna Mikhailovna. Shortly after Anna Pavlovna's evening, Anna Mikhailovna returned to Moscow, directly to her wealthy relatives, the Rostovs, with whom she stayed in Moscow and with whom her adored Borenka, who had just been promoted to the army and immediately transferred to the guards warrant officers, was brought up and lived for years. The guards had already left Petersburg on August 10, and the son, who had remained in Moscow for uniforms, was supposed to catch up with her on the road to Radzivilov.
The Rostovs had Natalia's birthday girl, mother and younger daughter. In the morning, without ceasing, trains drove up and drove off, bringing congratulators to the large, well-known house of Countess Rostova on Povarskaya, all over Moscow. The countess with her beautiful eldest daughter and the guests, who did not cease to replace one another, were sitting in the drawing room.
The countess was a woman with an oriental type of thin face, about forty-five years old, apparently exhausted by her children, of whom she had twelve people. The slowness of her movements and speech, which came from the weakness of her strength, gave her a significant air that inspired respect. Princess Anna Mikhailovna Drubetskaya, like a domestic person, was sitting right there, helping in the matter of receiving and engaging in conversation with the guests. The youth were in the back rooms, not finding it necessary to participate in receiving visits. The count met and saw off the guests, inviting everyone to dinner.
“I am very, very grateful to you, ma chere or mon cher [my dear or my dear] (ma chere or mon cher he spoke to everyone without exception, without the slightest nuance, both above and below him to people standing) for himself and for dear birthday girls . Look, come and have dinner. You offend me, mon cher. I sincerely ask you on behalf of the whole family, ma chere. These words, with the same expression on his full, cheerful and clean-shaven face, and with the same firm handshake and repeated short bows, he spoke to everyone without exception or change. After seeing off one guest, the count returned to the one or the other who were still in the drawing room; pulling up an armchair and with the air of a man who loves and knows how to live, his legs valiantly spread and his hands on his knees, he swayed significantly, offered guesses about the weather, consulted about health, sometimes in Russian, sometimes in very bad, but self-confident French, and again with the air of a tired but firm man in the performance of his duties, he went to see him off, straightening his sparse gray hair on his bald head, and again called for dinner. Sometimes, returning from the hall, he would go through the flower room and the waiter's room into a large marble hall, where a table was set for eighty couverts, and, looking at the waiters, who wore silver and porcelain, arranged tables and unfolded damask tablecloths, called Dmitry Vasilyevich, a nobleman, to him, engaged in all his affairs, and said: “Well, well, Mitenka, see that everything is fine. So, so, - he said, looking with pleasure at the huge spreading table. - The main thing is serving. That's it ... ”And he left, sighing smugly, again into the living room.
- Marya Lvovna Karagina with her daughter! the huge countess, the outgoing footman, reported in a bass voice as he entered the drawing-room door.
The Countess thought for a moment and sniffed from a golden snuffbox with a portrait of her husband.
“These visits tortured me,” she said. - Well, I'll take her last. Very stiff. Ask, - she said to the footman in a sad voice, as if saying: "well, finish it off!"
A tall, stout, proud-looking lady with a chubby, smiling daughter, rustling her dresses, entered the living room.
“Chere comtesse, il y a si longtemps… elle a ete alitee la pauvre enfant… au bal des Razoumowsky… et la comtesse Apraksine… j"ai ete si heureuse…” [Dear Countess, how long ago… she should have been in bed, poor a child... at the Razumovskys' ball... and Countess Apraksina... was so happy...] animated female voices were heard, interrupting one another and merging with the noise of dresses and moving chairs. , say: "Je suis bien charmee; la sante de maman ... et la comtesse Apraksine" [I am in awe; mother's health ... and Countess Apraksina] and, again making noise with dresses, go into the hall, put on a fur coat or cloak and leave. The conversation turned about the main city news of that time - about the illness of the famous rich man and handsome man of Catherine's time, the old Count Bezukhy and about his illegitimate son Pierre, who behaved so indecently at the evening at Anna Pavlovna Scherer.
“I am very sorry for the poor count,” said the guest, “his health is already so bad, and now this chagrin from his son, this will kill him!”
- What's happened? the countess asked, as if not knowing what the guest was talking about, although she had already heard the reason for Count Bezukhy's chagrin fifteen times already.
- That's the current upbringing! While still abroad,” the guest said, “this young man was left to his own devices, and now in St. Petersburg, they say, he has done such horrors that he and the police have been expelled from there.
- Tell! said the Countess.
“He chose his acquaintances badly,” intervened Princess Anna Mikhailovna. - The son of Prince Vasily, he and one Dolokhov, they say, God knows what they were doing. And both were hurt. Dolokhov was demoted to the soldiers, and Bezukhoy's son was sent to Moscow. Anatol Kuragin - that father somehow hushed up. But they were sent out from St. Petersburg.
“What the hell did they do?” the countess asked.
“These are perfect robbers, especially Dolokhov,” said the guest. - He is the son of Marya Ivanovna Dolokhova, such a respectable lady, and what? You can imagine: the three of them got a bear somewhere, put it in a carriage with them and took it to the actresses. The police came to take them down. They caught the guard and tied him back to back to the bear and let the bear into the Moika; the bear swims, and the quarter on it.
- Good, ma chere, the figure of the quarterly, - the count shouted, dying with laughter.
- Oh, what a horror! What's there to laugh at, Count?
But the ladies involuntarily laughed themselves.
“They rescued this unfortunate man by force,” continued the guest. - And this is the son of Count Kirill Vladimirovich Bezukhov, who is so cleverly amused! she added. - And they said that he was so well educated and smart. That's all the upbringing abroad has brought. I hope that no one will accept him here, despite his wealth. I wanted to introduce him. I resolutely refused: I have daughters.
Why do you say this young man is so rich? asked the countess, bending over from the girls, who immediately pretended not to listen. “He only has illegitimate children. It seems ... and Pierre is illegal.
The guest waved her hand.
“He has twenty illegal ones, I think.
Princess Anna Mikhailovna intervened in the conversation, apparently wishing to show her connections and her knowledge of all secular circumstances.
"Here's the thing," she said significantly, and also in a whisper. - The reputation of Count Kirill Vladimirovich is known ... He lost count of his children, but this Pierre was his favorite.
“How good the old man was,” said the countess, “even last year!” I have never seen a more beautiful man.
“Now he has changed a lot,” said Anna Mikhailovna. “So I wanted to say,” she continued, “by his wife, the direct heir to the entire estate, Prince Vasily, but Pierre was very fond of his father, was engaged in his upbringing and wrote to the sovereign ... so no one knows if he dies (he is so bad that they expect it every minute, and Lorrain came from St. Petersburg), who will get this huge fortune, Pierre or Prince Vasily. Forty thousand souls and millions. I know this very well, because Prince Vasily himself told me this. Yes, and Kirill Vladimirovich is my maternal second cousin. It was he who baptized Borya, ”she added, as if not attributing any significance to this circumstance.
