“Few of the Russian poets, perhaps few of the poets in general, had to grow, be educated and develop their talent under such favorable conditions as the late gr. A.K. Tolstoy. In his famous autobiographical letter to the Florentine professor A. De-Gubernatis, he says that his childhood left him with the brightest memories and, in fact, how perfectly his poetic nature was developed: a reasonable and careful upbringing, life among the fertile south, and at the same time native, nature; the world of art, which was open to him from a very tender age...”