The novella 'The Cossacks' reflects Tolstoy's impressions of his three years of service in the Caucasus. In 1851, he went there to join his older brother, Nikolai, an officer in the active army, and lived for nearly three years in a Cossack village on the banks of the Terek. 'The Cossacks' is rightly considered Leo Tolstoy's magnum opus of the 1850s, on which he worked, intermittently, for 10 years (1853-1863). The novella's protagonist, Dmitry Olenin, shares both his spiritual experience and his moral aspirations with the author. Like Tolstoy, he finds himself in the Caucasus attempting to start a new life, 'in which there will be no more mistakes, no more remorse, but perhaps only happiness.' But instead of the imaginary scenes of Russian Romantic literature en route to the Caucasus, the novella's protagonist is destined to witness real life and experience himself as an outsider in a world untouched by civilization.