'It's all forgotten between us, isn't it?' he said in a friendly voice.

I looked at his blanched face, at the blood-stained handkerchief, and utterly confounded, put to shame, and annihilated, I pressed his hand.

'Gentlemen!' he added, turning to the seconds, 'everything, I hope, will be kept secret?'

'Of course!' cried Koloberdyaev; 'but, prince, allow me ...'

And he himself bound up his head.

The prince, as he went away, bowed to me once more. But Bizmyonkov did not even glance at me. Shattered—morally shattered—went homewards with Koloberdyaev.

'Why, what's the matter with you?' the cavalry captain asked me. 'Set your mind at rest; the wound's not serious. He'll be able to dance by to-morrow, if you like. Or are you sorry you didn't kill him? You're wrong, if you are; he's a first-rate fellow.'

'What business had he to spare me!' I muttered at last.

'Oh, so that's it!' the cavalry captain rejoined tranquilly... 'Ugh, you writing fellows are too much for me!'

I don't know what put it into his head to consider me an author.

I absolutely decline to describe my torments during the evening following upon that luckless duel. My vanity suffered indescribably. It was not my conscience that tortured me; the consciousness of my imbecility crushed me. 'I have given myself the last decisive blow by my own act!' I kept repeating, as I strode up and down my room. 'The prince, wounded by me, and forgiving me... Yes, Liza is now his. Now nothing can save her, nothing can hold her back on the edge of the abyss.' I knew very well that our duel could not be kept secret, in spite of the prince's words; in any case, it could not remain a secret for Liza.

'The prince is not such a fool,' I murmured in a frenzy of rage, 'as not to profit by it.'... But, meanwhile, I was mistaken. The whole town knew of the duel and of its real cause next day, of course. But the prince had not blabbed of it; on the contrary, when, with his head bandaged and an explanation ready, he made his appearance before Liza, she had already heard everything.... Whether Bizmyonkov had betrayed me, or the news had reached her by other channels, I cannot say. Though, indeed, can anything ever be concealed in a little town? You can fancy how Liza received him, how all the family of the Ozhogins received him! As for me, I suddenly became an object of universal indignation and loathing, a monster, a jealous bloodthirsty madman. My few acquaintances shunned me as if I were a leper. The authorities of the town promptly addressed the prince, with a proposal to punish me in a severe and befitting manner. Nothing but the persistent and urgent entreaties of the prince himself averted the calamity that menaced me. That man was fated to annihilate me in every way. By his generosity he had shut, as it were, a coffin-lid down upon me. It's needless to say that the Ozhogins' doors were at once closed against me. Kirilla Matveitch even sent me back a bit of pencil I had left in his house. In reality, he, of all people, had no reason to be angry with me. My 'insane' (that was the expression current in the town) jealousy had pointed out, defined, so to speak, the relations of the prince to Liza. Both the old Ozhogins themselves and their fellow-citizens began to look on him almost as betrothed to her. This could not, as a fact, have been quite to his liking. But he was greatly attracted by Liza; and meanwhile, he had not at that time attained his aims. With all the adroitness of a clever man of the world, he took advantage of his new position, and promptly entered, as they say, into the spirit of his new part....

But I!... For myself, for my future, I renounced all hopes, at that time. When suffering reaches the point of making our whole being creak and groan, like an overloaded cart, it ought to cease to be ridiculous ... but no! laughter not only accompanies tears to the end, to exhaustion, to the impossibility of shedding more—it even rings and echoes, where the tongue is dumb, and complaint itself is dead.... And so, as in the first place I don't intend to expose myself as ridiculous, even to myself, and secondly as I am fearfully tired, I will put off the continuation, and please God the conclusion, of my story till tomorrow....

_March 29.

A slight frost; yesterday it was thawing._

Yesterday I had not the strength to go on with my diary; like Poprishtchin, I lay, for the most part, on my bed, and talked to Terentyevna. What a woman! Sixty years ago she lost her first betrothed from the plague, she has outlived all her children, she is inexcusably old, drinks tea to her heart's desire, is well fed, and warmly clothed; and what do you suppose she was talking to me about, all day yesterday? I had sent another utterly destitute old woman the collar of an old livery, half moth-eaten, to put on her vest (she wears strips over the chest by way of vest) ... and why wasn't it given to her? 'But I'm your nurse; I should think... Oh ... oh, my good sir, it's too bad of you ... after I've looked after you as I have!' ... and so on. The merciless old woman utterly wore me out with her reproaches.... But to get back to my story.

And so, I suffered like a dog, whose hindquarters have been run over by a wheel. It was only then, only after my banishment from the Ozhogins' house, that I fully realised how much happiness a man can extract from the contemplation of his own unhappiness. O men! pitiful race, indeed!

... But, away with philosophical reflections.... I spent my days in complete solitude, and could only by the most roundabout and even humiliating methods find out what was passing in the Ozhogins' household, and what the prince was doing. My man had made friends with the cousin of the latter's coachman's wife. This acquaintance afforded me some slight relief, and my man soon guessed, from my hints and little presents, what he was to talk about to his master when he pulled his boots off every evening. Sometimes I chanced to meet some one of the Ozhogins' family, Bizmyonkov, or the prince in the street.... To the prince and to Bizmyonkov I bowed, but I did not enter into conversation with them. Liza I only saw three times: once, with her mamma, in a fashionable shop; once, in an open carriage with her father and mother and the prince; and once, in church. Of course, I was not impudent enough to approach her, and only watched her from a distance. In the shop she was very much preoccupied, but cheerful.... She was ordering something for herself, and busily matching ribbons. Her mother was gazing at her, with her hands folded on her lap, and her nose in the air, smiling with that foolish and devoted smile which is only permissible in adoring mothers. In the carriage with the prince, Liza was ... I shall never forget that meeting! The old people were sitting in the back seats of the carriage, the prince and Liza in the front. She was paler than usual; on her cheek two patches of pink could just be seen. She was half facing the prince; leaning on her straight right arm (in the left hand she was holding a sunshade), with her little head drooping languidly, she was looking straight into his face with her expressive eyes. At that instant she surrendered herself utterly to him, intrusted herself to him for ever. I had not time to get a good look at his face—the carriage galloped by too quickly,—but I fancied that he too was deeply touched.

The third time I saw her in church. Not more than ten days had passed since the day when I met her in the carriage with the prince, not more than three weeks since the day of my duel. The business upon which the prince had come to O—— was by now completed. But he still kept putting off his departure. At Petersburg, he was reported to be ill. In the town, it was expected every day that he would make a proposal in form to Kirilla Matveitch. I was myself only awaiting this final blow to go away for ever. The town of O—— had grown hateful to me. I could not stay indoors, and wandered from morning to night about the suburbs. One grey, gloomy day, as I was coming back from a walk, which had been cut short by the rain, I went into a church. The evening service had only just begun, there were very few people; I looked round me, and suddenly, near a window, caught sight of a familiar profile. For the first instant, I did not recognise it: that pale face, that spiritless glance, those sunken cheeks—could it be the same Liza I had seen a fortnight before? Wrapped in a cloak, without a hat on, with the cold light from the broad white window falling on her from one side, she was gazing fixedly at the holy image, and seemed striving to pray, striving to awake from a sort of listless stupor. A red-cheeked, fat little page with yellow trimmings on his chest was standing behind her, and, with his hands clasped behind his back, stared in sleepy bewilderment at his mistress. I trembled all over, was about to go up to her, but stopped short. I felt choked by a torturing presentiment. Till the very end of the evening service, Liza did not stir. All the people went out, a beadle began sweeping out the church, but still she did not move from her place. The page went up to her, said something to her, touched her dress; she looked round, passed her hand over her face, and went away. I followed her home at a little distance, and then returned to my lodging.

'She is lost!' I cried, when I had got into my room.

As a man, I don't know to this day what my sensations were at that moment. I flung myself, I remember, with clasped hands, on the sofa and fixed my eyes on the floor. But I don't know—in the midst of my woe I was, as it were, pleased at something.... I would not admit this for anything in the world, if I were not writing only for myself.... I had been tormented, certainly, by terrible, harassing suspicions ... and who knows, I should, perhaps, have been greatly disconcerted if they had not been fulfilled. 'Such is the heart of man!' some middle-aged Russian teacher would exclaim at this point in an expressive voice, while he raises a fat forefinger, adorned with a cornelian ring. But what have we to do with the opinion of a Russian teacher, with an expressive voice and a cornelian on his finger?

Be that as it may, my presentiment turned out to be well founded. Suddenly the news was all over the town that the prince had gone away, presumably in consequence of a summons from Petersburg; that he had gone away without making any proposal to Kirilla Matveitch or his wife, and that Liza would have to deplore his treachery till the end of her days. The prince's departure was utterly unexpected, for only the evening before his coachman, so my man assured me, had not the slightest suspicion of his master's intentions. This piece of news threw me into a perfect fever. I at once dressed, and was on the point of hastening to the Ozhogins', but on thinking the matter over I considered it more seemly to wait till the next day. I lost nothing, however, by remaining at home. The same evening, there came to see me in all haste a certain Pandopipopulo, a wandering Greek, stranded by some chance in the town of O——, a scandalmonger of the first magnitude, who had been more indignant with me than any one for my duel with the prince. He did not even give my man time to announce him; he fairly burst into my room, warmly pressed my hand, begged my pardon a thousand times, called me a paragon of magnanimity and courage, painted the prince in the darkest colours, censured the old Ozhogins, who, in his opinion, had been punished as they deserved, made a slighting reference to Liza in passing, and hurried off again, kissing me on my shoulder. Among other things, I learned from him that the prince, en vrai grand seigneur, on the eve of his departure, in response to a delicate hint from Kirilla Matveitch, had answered coldly that he had no intention of deceiving any one, and no idea of marrying, had risen, made his bow, and that was all.... Next day I set off to the Ozhogins'. The shortsighted footman leaped up from his bench on my appearance, with the rapidity of lightning. I bade him announce me; the footman hurried away and returned at once. 'Walk in,' he said; 'you are begged to go in.' I went into Kirilla Matveitch's study.... The rest to-morrow.

March 30. Frost.

And so I went into Kirilla Matveitch's study. I would pay any one handsomely, who could show me now my own face at the moment when that highly respected official, hurriedly flinging together his dressing-gown, approached me with outstretched arms. I must have been a perfect picture of modest triumph, indulgent sympathy, and boundless magnanimity.... I felt myself something in the style of Scipio Africanus. Ozhogin was visibly confused and cast down, he avoided my eyes, and kept fidgeting about. I noticed, too, that he spoke unnaturally loudly, and in general expressed himself very vaguely. Vaguely, but with warmth, he begged my forgiveness, vaguely alluded to their departed guest, added a few vague generalities about deception and the instability of earthly blessings, and, suddenly feeling the tears in his eyes, hastened to take a pinch of snuff, probably in order to deceive me as to the cause of his tearfulness.... He used the Russian green snuff, and it's well known that that article forces even old men to shed tears that make the human eye look dull and senseless for several minutes.

I behaved, of course, very cautiously with the old man, inquired after the health of his wife and daughter, and at once artfully turned the conversation on to the interesting subject of the rotation of crops. I was dressed as usual, but the feeling of gentle propriety and soft indulgence which filled me gave me a fresh and festive sensation, as though I had on a white waistcoat and a white cravat. One thing agitated me, the thought of seeing Liza.... Ozhogin, at last, proposed of his own accord to take me up to his wife. The kind-hearted but foolish woman was at first terribly embarrassed on seeing me; but her brain was not capable of retaining the same impression for long, and so she was soon at her ease. At last I saw Liza ... she came into the room....

I had expected to find in her a shamed and penitent sinner, and had assumed beforehand the most affectionate and reassuring expression of face.... Why lie about it? I really loved her and was thirsting for the happiness of forgiving her, of holding out a hand to her; but to my unutterable astonishment, in response to my significant bow, she laughed coldly, observed carelessly, 'Oh, is that you?' and at once turned away from me. It is true that her laugh struck me as forced, and in any case did not accord well with her terribly thin face ... but, all the same, I had not expected such a reception.... I looked at her with amazement ... what a change had taken place in her! Between the child she had been and the woman before me, there was nothing in common. She had, as it were, grown up, straightened out; all the features of her face, especially her lips, seemed defined ... her gaze had grown deeper, harder, and gloomier. I stayed on at the Ozhogins' till dinner-time. She got up, went out of the room, and came back again, answered questions with composure, and designedly took no notice of me. She wanted, I saw, to make me feel that I was not worth her anger, though I had been within an ace of killing her lover. I lost patience at last; a malicious allusion broke from my lips.... She started, glanced swiftly at me, got up, and going to the window, pronounced in a rather shaky voice, 'You can say anything you like, but let me tell you that I love that man, and always shall love him, and do not consider that he has done me any injury, quite the contrary.'... Her voice broke, she stopped ... tried to control herself, but could not, burst into tears, and went out of the room.... The old people were much upset.... I pressed the hands of both, sighed, turned my eyes heavenward, and withdrew.

I am too weak, I have too little time left, I am not capable of describing in the same detail the new range of torturing reflections, firm resolutions, and all the other fruits of what is called inward conflict, that arose within me after the renewal of my acquaintance with the Ozhogins. I did not doubt that Liza still loved, and would long love, the prince ... but as one reconciled to the inevitable, and anxious myself to conciliate, I did not even dream of her love. I desired only her affection, I desired to gain her confidence, her respect, which, we are assured by persons of experience, forms the surest basis for happiness in marriage.... Unluckily, I lost sight of one rather important circumstance, which was that Liza had hated me ever since the day of the duel. I found this out too late. I began, as before, to be a frequent visitor at the house of the Ozhogins. Kirilla Matveitch received me with more effusiveness and affability than he had ever done. I have even ground for believing that he would at that time have cheerfully given me his daughter, though I was certainly not a match to be coveted. Public opinion was very severe upon him and Liza, while, on the other hand, it extolled me to the skies. Liza's attitude to me was unchanged. She was, for the most part, silent; obeyed, when they begged her to eat, showed no outward signs of sorrow, but, for all that, was wasting away like a candle. I must do Kirilla Matveitch the justice to say that he spared her in every way. Old Madame Ozhogin only ruffled up her feathers like a hen, as she looked at her poor nestling. There was only one person Liza did not shun, though she did not talk much even to him, and that was Bizmyonkov. The old people were rather short, not to say rude, in their behaviour to him. They could not forgive him for having been second in the duel. But he went on going to see them, as though he did not notice their unamiability. With me he was very chilly, and—strange to say—I felt, as it were, afraid of him. This state of things went on for a fortnight. At last, after a sleepless night, I resolved to have it out with Liza, to open my heart to her, to tell her that, in spite of the past, in spite of all possible gossip and scandal, I should consider myself only too happy if she would give me her hand, and restore me her confidence. I really did seriously imagine that I was showing what they call in the school reading-books an unparalleled example of magnanimity, and that, from sheer amazement alone, she would consent. In any case, I resolved to have an explanation and to escape, at last, from suspense.

Behind the Ozhogins' house was a rather large garden, which ended in a little grove of lime-trees, neglected and overgrown. In the middle of this thicket stood an old summer-house in the Chinese style: a wooden paling separated the garden from a blind alley. Liza would sometimes walk, for hours together, alone in this garden. Kirilla Matveitch was aware of this, and forbade her being disturbed or followed; let her grief wear itself out, he said. When she could not be found indoors, they had only to ring a bell on the steps at dinner-time and she made her appearance at once, with the same stubborn silence on her lips and in her eyes, and some little leaf crushed up in her hand. So, noticing one day that she was not in the house, I made a show of going away, took leave of Kirilla Matveitch, put on my hat, and went out from the hall into the courtyard, and from the courtyard into the street, but promptly darted in at the gate again with extraordinary rapidity and hurried past the kitchen into the garden. Luckily no one noticed me. Without losing time in deliberation, I went with rapid steps into the grove. In a little path before me was standing Liza. My heart beat violently. I stood still, drew a deep sigh, and was just on the point of going up to her, when suddenly she lifted her hand without turning round, and began listening.... From behind the trees, in the direction of the blind alley, came a distinct sound of two knocks, as though some one were tapping at the paling. Liza clapped her hands together, there was heard the faint creak of the gate, and out of the thicket stepped Bizmyonkov. I hastily hid behind a tree. Liza turned towards him without speaking.... Without speaking, he drew her arm in his, and the two walked slowly along the path together. I looked after them in amazement. They stopped, looked round, disappeared behind the bushes, reappeared again, and finally went into the summer-house. This summer-house was a diminutive round edifice, with a door and one little window. In the middle stood an old one-legged table, overgrown with fine green moss; two discoloured deal benches stood along the sides, some distance from the damp and darkened walls. Here, on exceptionally hot days, in bygone times, perhaps once a year or so, they had drunk tea. The door did not quite shut, the window-frame had long ago come out of the window, and hung disconsolately, only attached at one corner, like a bird's broken wing. I stole up to the summer-house, and peeped cautiously through the chink in the window. Liza was sitting on one of the benches, with her head drooping. Her right hand lay on her knees, the left Bizmyonkov was holding in both his hands. He was looking sympathetically at her.

'How do you feel to-day?' he asked her in a low voice.

'Just the same,' she answered, 'not better, nor worse.—The emptiness, the fearful emptiness!' she added, raising her eyes dejectedly.

Bizmyonkov made her no answer.

'What do you think,' she went on: 'will he write to me once more?'

'I don't think so, Lizaveta Kirillovna!'

She was silent.

'And after all, why should he write? He told me everything in his first letter. I could not be his wife; but I have been happy ... not for long ... I have been happy ...'

Bizmyonkov looked down.

'Ah,' she went on quickly, 'if you knew how I loathe that Tchulkaturin ... I always fancy I see on that man's hands ... his blood.' (I shuddered behind my chink.) 'Though indeed,' she added, dreamily, 'who knows, perhaps, if it had not been for that duel.... Ah, when I saw him wounded I felt at once that I was altogether his.'

'Tchulkaturin loves you,' observed Bizmyonkov.

'What is that to me? I don't want any one's love.'... She stopped and added slowly, 'Except yours. Yes, my friend, your love is necessary to me; except for you, I should be lost. You have helped me to bear terrible moments ...'

She broke off ... Bizmyonkov began with fatherly tenderness stroking her hand.

'There's no help for it! What is one to do! what is one to do, Lizaveta Kirillovna!' he repeated several times.

'And now indeed,' she went on in a lifeless voice, 'I should die, I think, if it were not for you. It's you alone that keep me up; besides, you remind me of him.... You knew all about it, you see. Do you remember how fine he was that day.... But forgive me; it must be hard for you....'

'Go on, go on! Nonsense! Bless you!' Bizmyonkov interrupted her.

She pressed his hand.

'You are very good, Bizmyonkov,' she went on;' you are good as an angel. What can I do! I feel I shall love him to the grave. I have forgiven him, I am grateful to him. God give him happiness! May God give him a wife after his own heart'—and her eyes filled with tears—'if only he does not forget me, if only he will sometimes think of his Liza!—Let us go,' she added, after a brief silence.

Bizmyonkov raised her hand to his lips.

'I know,' she began again hotly, 'every one is blaming me now, every one is throwing stones at me. Let them! I wouldn't, any way, change my misery for their happiness ... no! no!... He did not love me for long, but he loved me! He never deceived me, he never told me I should be his wife; I never dreamed of it myself. It was only poor papa hoped for it. And even now I am not altogether unhappy; the memory remains to me, and however fearful the results ... I'm stifling here ... it was here I saw him the last time.... Let's go into the air.'

They got up. I had only just time to skip on one side and hide behind a thick lime-tree. They came out of the summer-house, and, as far as I could judge by the sound of their steps, went away into the thicket. I don't know how long I went on standing there, without stirring from my place, plunged in a sort of senseless amazement, when suddenly I heard steps again. I started, and peeped cautiously out from my hiding-place. Bizmyonkov and Liza were coming back along the same path. Both were greatly agitated, especially Bizmyonkov.

I fancied he was crying. Liza stopped, looked at him, and distinctly uttered the following words: 'I do consent, Bizmyonkov. I would never have agreed if you were only trying to save me, to rescue me from a terrible position, but you love me, you know everything—and you love me. I shall never find a trustier, truer friend. I will be your wife.'

Bizmyonkov kissed her hand: she smiled at him mournfully and moved away towards the house. Bizmyonkov rushed into the thicket, and I went my way. Seeing that Bizmyonkov had apparently said to Liza precisely what I had intended to say to her, and she had given him precisely the reply I was longing to hear from her, there was no need for me to trouble myself further. Within a fortnight she was married to him. The old Ozhogins were thankful to get any husband for her.

Now, tell me, am I not a superfluous man? Didn't I play throughout the whole story the part of a superfluous person? The prince's part ... of that it's needless to speak; Bizmyonkov's part, too, is comprehensible.... But I—with what object was I mixed up in it?... A senseless fifth wheel to the cart!... Ah, it's bitter, bitter for me!... But there, as the barge-haulers say, 'One more pull, and one more yet,'—one day more, and one more yet, and there will be no more bitter nor sweet for me.

March 31.

I'm in a bad way. I am writing these lines in bed. Since yesterday evening there has been a sudden change in the weather. To-day is hot, almost a summer day. Everything is thawing, breaking up, flowing away. The air is full of the smell of the opened earth, a strong, heavy, stifling smell. Steam is rising on all sides. The sun seems beating, seems smiting everything to pieces. I am very ill, I feel that I am breaking up.

I meant to write my diary, and, instead of that, what have I done? I have related one incident of my life. I gossiped on, slumbering reminiscences were awakened and drew me away. I have written, without haste, in detail, as though I had years before me. And here now, there's no time to go on. Death, death is coming. I can hear her menacing crescendo. The time is come ... the time is come!...

And indeed, what does it matter? Isn't it all the same whatever I write? In sight of death the last earthly cares vanish. I feel I have grown calm; I am becoming simpler, clearer. Too late I've gained sense!... It's a strange thing! I have grown calm—certainly, and at the same time ... I'm full of dread. Yes, I'm full of dread. Half hanging over the silent, yawning abyss, I shudder, turn away, with greedy intentness gaze at everything about me. Every object is doubly precious to me. I cannot gaze enough at my poor, cheerless room, saying farewell to each spot on my walls. Take your fill for the last time, my eyes. Life is retreating; slowly and smoothly she is flying away from me, as the shore flies from the eyes of one at sea. The old yellow face of my nurse, tied up in a dark kerchief, the hissing samovar on the table, the pot of geranium in the window, and you, my poor dog, Tresor, the pen I write these lines with, my own hand, I see you now ... here you are, here.... Is it possible ... can it be, to-day ... I shall never see you again! It's hard for a live creature to part with life! Why do you fawn on me, poor dog? why do you come putting your forepaws on the bed, with your stump of a tail wagging so violently, and your kind, mournful eyes fixed on me all the while? Are you sorry for me? or do you feel already that your master will soon be gone? Ah, if I could only keep my thoughts, too, resting on all the objects in my room! I know these reminiscences are dismal and of no importance, but I have no other. 'The emptiness, the fearful emptiness!' as Liza said.

O my God, my God! Here I am dying.... A heart capable of loving and ready to love will soon cease to beat.... And can it be it will be still for ever without having once known happiness, without having once expanded under the sweet burden of bliss? Alas! it's impossible, impossible, I know.... If only now, at least, before death—for death after all is a sacred thing, after all it elevates any being—if any kind, sad, friendly voice would sing over me a farewell song of my own sorrow, I could, perhaps, be resigned to it. But to die stupidly, stupidly....

I believe I'm beginning to rave.

Farewell, life! farewell, my garden! and you, my lime-trees! When the summer comes, do not forget to be clothed with flowers from head to foot ... and may it be sweet for people to lie in your fragrant shade, on the fresh grass, among the whispering chatter of your leaves, lightly stirred by the wind. Farewell, farewell! Farewell, everything and for ever!

Farewell, Liza! I wrote those two words, and almost laughed aloud. This exclamation strikes me as taken out of a book. It's as though I were writing a sentimental novel and ending up a despairing letter....

To-morrow is the first of April. Can I be going to die to-morrow? That would be really too unseemly. It's just right for me, though ...

How the doctor did chatter to-day.

April 1.

It is over.... Life is over. I shall certainly die to-day. It's hot outside ... almost suffocating ... or is it that my lungs are already refusing to breathe? My little comedy is played out. The curtain is falling.

Sinking into nothing, I cease to be superfluous ...

Ah, how brilliant that sun is! Those mighty beams breathe of eternity ...

Farewell, Terentyevna!... This morning as she sat at the window she was crying ... perhaps over me ... and perhaps because she too will soon have to die. I have made her promise not to kill Tresor.

It's hard for me to write.... I will put down the pen.... It's high time; death is already approaching with ever-increasing rumble, like a carriage at night over the pavement; it is here, it is flitting about me, like the light breath which made the prophet's hair stand up on end.

I am dying.... Live, you who are living,

'And about the grave May youthful life rejoice, And nature heedless Glow with eternal beauty.

Note by the Editor.—Under this last line was a head in profile with a big streak of hair and moustaches, with eyes en face, and eyelashes like rays; and under the head some one had written the following words:

'This manuscript was read And the Contents of it Not Approved By Peter Zudotyeshin My My My My dear Sir, Peter Zudotyeshin, Dear Sir.'

But as the handwriting of these lines was not in the least like the handwriting in which the other part of the manuscript was written, the editor considers that he is justified in concluding that the above lines were added subsequently by another person, especially since it has come to his (the editor's) knowledge that Mr. Tchulkaturin actually did die on the night between the 1st and 2nd of April in the year 18—, at his native place, Sheep's Springs.

* * * * *

A TOUR IN THE FOREST



FIRST DAY

The sight of the vast pinewood, embracing the whole horizon, the sight of the 'Forest,' recalls the sight of the ocean. And the sensations it arouses are the same; the same primaeval untouched force lies outstretched in its breadth and majesty before the eyes of the spectator. From the heart of the eternal forest, from the undying bosom of the waters, comes the same voice: 'I have nothing to do with thee,'—nature says to man, 'I reign supreme, while do thou bestir thyself to thy utmost to escape dying.' But the forest is gloomier and more monotonous than the sea, especially the pine forest, which is always alike and almost soundless. The ocean menaces and caresses, it frolics with every colour, speaks with every voice; it reflects the sky, from which too comes the breath of eternity, but an eternity as it were not so remote from us.... The dark, unchanging pine-forest keeps sullen silence or is filled with a dull roar—and at the sight of it sinks into man's heart more deeply, more irresistibly, the sense of his own nothingness. It is hard for man, the creature of a day, born yesterday, and doomed to death on the morrow, it is hard for him to bear the cold gaze of the eternal Isis, fixed without sympathy upon him: not only the daring hopes and dreams of youth are humbled and quenched within him, enfolded by the icy breath of the elements; no—his whole soul sinks down and swoons within him; he feels that the last of his kind may vanish off the face of the earth—and not one needle will quiver on those twigs; he feels his isolation, his feebleness, his fortuitousness;—and in hurried, secret panic, he turns to the petty cares and labours of life; he is more at ease in that world he has himself created; there he is at home, there he dares yet believe in his own importance and in his own power.

Such were the ideas that came into my mind, some years ago, when, standing on the steps of a little inn on the bank of the marshy little river Ressetta, I first gazed upon the forest. The bluish masses of fir-forest lay in long, continuous ridges before me; here and there was the green patch of a small birch-copse; the whole sky-line was hugged by the pine-wood; nowhere was there the white gleam of a church, nor bright stretches of meadow—it was all trees and trees, everywhere the ragged edge of the tree-tops, and a delicate dim mist, the eternal mist of the forest, hung over them in the distance. It was not indolent repose this immobility of life suggested; no—the absence of life, something dead, even in its grandeur, was what came to me from every side of the horizon. I remember big white clouds were swimming by, slowly and very high up, and the hot summer day lay motionless upon the silent earth. The reddish water of the stream glided without a splash among the thick reeds: at its bottom could be dimly discerned round cushions of pointed moss, and its banks sank away in the swampy mud, and sharply reappeared again in white hillocks of fine crumbling sand. Close by the little inn ran the trodden highroad.

On this road, just opposite the steps, stood a cart, loaded with boxes and hampers. Its owner, a thin pedlar with a hawk nose and mouse-like eyes, bent and lame, was putting in it his little nag, lame like himself. He was a gingerbread-seller, who was making his way to the fair at Karatchev. Suddenly several people appeared on the road, others straggled after them ... at last, quite a crowd came trudging into sight; all of them had sticks in their hands and satchels on their shoulders. From their fatigued yet swinging gait, and from their sun-burnt faces, one could see they had come from a long distance. They were leatherworkers and diggers coming back from working for hire.

An old man of seventy, white all over, seemed to be their leader. From time to time he turned round and with a quiet voice urged on those who lagged behind. 'Now, now, now, lads,' he said, 'no—ow.' They all walked in silence, in a sort of solemn hush. Only one of them, a little man with a wrathful air, in a sheepskin coat wide open, and a lambswool cap pulled right over his eyes, on coming up to the gingerbread man, suddenly inquired: 'How much is the gingerbread, you tomfool?'

'What sort of gingerbread will it be, worthy sir?' the disconcerted gingerbread—man responded in a thin, little voice. 'Some are a farthing—and others cost a halfpenny. Have you a halfpenny in your purse?'

'But I guess it will sweeten the belly too much,' retorted the sheepskin, and he retreated from the cart.

'Hurry up, lads, hurry up,' I heard the old man's voice: 'it's far yet to our night's rest.'

'An uneducated folk,' said the gingerbread-man, with a squint at me, directly all the crowd had trudged past: 'is such a dainty for the likes of them?'

And quickly harnessing his horse, he went down to the river, where a little wooden ferry could be seen. A peasant in a white felt 'schlik' (the usual headgear in the forest) came out of a low mud hut to meet him, and ferried him over to the opposite bank. The little cart, with one wheel creaking from time to time, crawled along the trodden and deeply rutted road.

I fed my horses, and I too was ferried over. After struggling for a couple of miles through the boggy prairie, I got at last on to a narrow raised wooden causeway to a clearing in the forest. The cart jolted unevenly over the round beams of the causeway: I got out and went along on foot. The horses moved in step snorting and shaking their heads from the gnats and flies. The forest took us into its bosom. On the outskirts, nearer to the prairie, grew birches, aspens, limes, maples, and oaks. Then they met us more rarely, the dense firwood moved down on us in an unbroken wall. Further on were the red, bare trunks of pines, and then again a stretch of mixed copse, overgrown with underwood of hazelnut, mountain ash, and bramble, and stout, vigorous weeds. The sun's rays threw a brilliant light on the tree-tops, and, filtering through the branches, here and there reached the ground in pale streaks and patches. Birds I scarcely heard—they do not like great forests. Only from time to time there came the doleful, thrice-repeated call of a hoopoe, and the angry screech of a nuthatch or a jay; a silent, always solitary bird kept fluttering across the clearing, with a flash of golden azure from its lovely feathers. At times the trees grew further apart, ahead of us the light broke in, the cart came out on a cleared, sandy, open space. Thin rye was growing over it in rows, noiselessly nodding its pale ears. On one side there was a dark, dilapidated little chapel, with a slanting cross over a well. An unseen brook was babbling peaceably with changing, ringing sounds, as though it were flowing into an empty bottle. And then suddenly the road was cut in half by a birch-tree recently fallen, and the forest stood around, so old, lofty, and slumbering, that the air seemed pent in. In places the clearing lay under water. On both sides stretched a forest bog, all green and dark, all covered with reeds and tiny alders. Ducks flew up in pairs—and it was strange to see those water-birds darting rapidly about among the pines. 'Ga, ga, ga, ga,' their drawn-out call kept rising unexpectedly. Then a shepherd drove a flock through the underwood: a brown cow with short, pointed horns broke noisily through the bushes and stood stockstill at the edge of the clearing, her big, dark eyes fixed on the dog running before me. A slight breeze brought the delicate, pungent smell of burnt wood. A white smoke in the distance crept in eddying rings over the pale, blue forest air, showing that a peasant was charcoal-burning for a glass-factory or for a foundry. The further we went on, the darker and stiller it became all round us. In the pine-forest it is always still; there is only, high overhead, a sort of prolonged murmur and subdued roar in the tree-tops. One goes on and on, and this eternal murmur of the forest never ceases, and the heart gradually begins to sink, and a man longs to come out quickly into the open, into the daylight; he longs to draw a full breath again, and is oppressed by the fragrant damp and decay....

For about twelve miles we drove on at a walking pace, rarely at a trot. I wanted to get by daylight to Svyatoe, a hamlet lying in the very heart of the forest. Twice we met peasants with stripped bark or long logs on carts.

'Is it far to Svyatoe?' I asked one of them.

'No, not far.'

'How far?'

'It'll be a little over two miles.'

Another hour and a half went by. We were still driving on and on. Again we heard the creak of a laden cart. A peasant was walking beside it.

'How far, brother, is it still to Svyatoe?'

'What?'

'How far to Svyatoe?'

'Six miles.'

The sun was already setting when at last I got out of the forest and saw facing me a little village. About twenty homesteads were grouped close about an old wooden church, with a single green cupola, and tiny windows, brilliantly red in the evening glow. This was Svyatoe. I drove into its outskirts. A herd returning homewards overtook my cart, and with lowing, grunting and bleating moved by us. Young girls and bustling peasant women came to meet their beasts. Whiteheaded boys with merry shrieks went in chase of refractory pigs. The dust swirled along the street in light clouds, flushed crimson as they rose higher in the air.

I stopped at the house of the village elder, a crafty and clever 'forester,' one of those foresters of whom they say he can see two yards into the ground. Early next morning, accompanied by the village elder's son, and another peasant called Yegor, I set off in a little cart with a pair of peasant's horses, to shoot woodcocks and moorhens. The forest formed a continuous bluish ring all round the sky-line; there was reckoned to be two hundred acres, no more, of ploughed land round Svyatoe; but one had to go some five miles to find good places for game. The elder's son was called Kondrat. He was a flaxen-haired, rosy-cheeked young fellow, with a good-natured, peaceable expression of face, obliging and talkative. He drove the horses. Yegor sat by my side. I want to say a few words about him.

He was considered the cleverest sportsman in the whole district. Every step of the ground for fifty miles round he had been over again and again. He seldom fired at a bird, for lack of powder and shot; but it was enough for him to decoy a moorhen or to detect the track of a grouse. Yegor had the character of being a straightforward fellow and 'no talker.' He did not care for talking and never exaggerated the number of birds he had taken—a trait rare in a sportsman. He was of medium height, thin, and had a pale, long face, and big, honest eyes. All his features, especially his straight and never-moving lips, were expressive of untroubled serenity. He gave a slight, as it were inward smile, whenever he uttered a word—very sweet was that quiet smile. He never drank spirits, and worked industriously; but nothing prospered with him. His wife was always ailing, his children didn't live; he got poorer and poorer and could never pick up again. And there is no denying that a passion for the chase is no good for a peasant, and any one who 'plays with a gun' is sure to be a poor manager of his land. Either from constantly being in the forest, face to face with the stern and melancholy scenery of that inhuman country, or from the peculiar cast and formation of his character, there was noticeable in every action of Yegor's a sort of modest dignity and stateliness—stateliness it was, and not melancholy—the stateliness of a majestic stag. He had in his time killed seven bears, lying in wait for them in the oats. The last he had only succeeded in killing on the fourth night of his ambush; the bear persisted in not turning sideways to him, and he had only one bullet. Yegor had killed him the day before my arrival. When Kondrat brought me to him, I found him in his back yard; squatting on his heels before the huge beast, he was cutting the fat out with a short, blunt knife.

'What a fine fellow you've knocked over there!' I observed.

Yegor raised his head and looked first at me, then at the dog, who had come with me.

'If it's shooting you've come after, sir, there are woodcocks at Moshnoy—three coveys, and five of moorhens,' he observed, and set to work again.

With Yegor and with Kondrat I went out the next day in search of sport. We drove rapidly over the open ground surrounding Svyatoe, but when we got into the forest we crawled along at a walking pace once more.

'Look, there's a wood-pigeon,' said Kondrat suddenly, turning to me: 'better knock it over!'

Yegor looked in the direction Kondrat pointed, but said nothing. The wood-pigeon was over a hundred paces from us, and one can't kill it at forty paces; there is such strength in its feathers. A few more remarks were made by the conversational Kondrat; but the forest hush had its influence even on him; he became silent. Only rarely exchanging a word or two, looking straight ahead, and listening to the puffing and snorting of the horses, we got at last to 'Moshnoy.' That is the name given to the older pine-forest, overgrown in places by fir saplings. We got out; Kondrat led the cart into the bushes, so that the gnats should not bite the horses. Yegor examined the cock of his gun and crossed himself: he never began anything without the sign of the cross.

The forest into which we had come was exceedingly old. I don't know whether the Tartars had wandered over it, but Russian thieves or Lithuanians, in disturbed times, might certainly have hidden in its recesses. At a respectful distance from one another stood the mighty pines with their slightly curved, massive, pale-yellow trunks. Between them stood in single file others, rather younger. The ground was covered with greenish moss, sprinkled all over with dead pine-needles; blueberries grew in dense bushes; the strong perfume of the berries, like the smell of musk, oppressed the breathing. The sun could not pierce through the high network of the pine-branches; but it was stiflingly hot in the forest all the same, and not dark; like big drops of sweat the heavy, transparent resin stood out and slowly trickled down the coarse bark of the trees. The still air, with no light or shade in it, stung the face. Everything was silent; even our footsteps were not audible; we walked on the moss as on a carpet. Yegor in particular moved as silently as a shadow; even the brushwood did not crackle under his feet. He walked without haste, from time to time blowing a shrill note on a whistle; a woodcock soon answered back, and before my eyes darted into a thick fir-tree. But in vain Yegor pointed him out to me; however much I strained my eyes, I could not make him out. Yegor had to take a shot at him. We came upon two coveys of moorhens also. The cautious birds rose at a distance with an abrupt, heavy sound. We succeeded, however, in killing three young ones.

At one meidan [Footnote 1: Meidan is the name given to a place where tar has been made.—Author's Note.] Yegor suddenly stopped and called me up.

'A bear has been trying to get water,' he observed, pointing to a broad, fresh scratch, made in the very middle of a hole covered with fine moss.

'Is that the print of his paw?' I inquired.

'Yes; but the water has dried up. That's the track of him too on that pine; he has been climbing after honey. He has cut into it with his claws as if with a knife.'

We went on making our way into the inner-most depths of the forest. Yegor only rarely looked upwards, and walked on serenely and confidently. I saw a high, round rampart, enclosed by a half-choked-up ditch.

'What's that? a meidan too?' I inquired.

'No,' answered Yegor; 'here's where the thieves' town stood.'

'Long ago?'

'Long ago; our grandfathers remember it. Here they buried their treasure. And they took a mighty oath: on human blood.'

We went on another mile and a half; I began to feel thirsty.

'Sit down a little while,' said Yegor: 'I will go for water; there is a well not far from here.'

He went away; I was left alone.

I sat down on a felled stump, leaned my elbows on my knees, and after a long stillness, raised my head and looked around me. Oh, how still and sullenly gloomy was everything around me—no, not gloomy even, but dumb, cold, and menacing at the same time! My heart sank. At that instant, at that spot, I had a sense of death breathing upon me, I felt I almost touched its perpetual closeness. If only one sound had vibrated, one momentary rustle had arisen, in the engulfing stillness of the pine-forest that hemmed me in on all sides! I let my head sink again, almost in terror; it was as though I had looked in, where no man ought to look.... I put my hand over my eyes—and all at once, as though at some mysterious bidding, I began to remember all my life....

There passed in a flash before me my childhood, noisy and peaceful, quarrelsome and good-hearted, with hurried joys and swift sorrows; then my youth rose up, vague, queer, self-conscious, with all its mistakes and beginnings, with disconnected work, and agitated indolence.... There came back, too, to my memory the comrades who shared those early aspirations ... then like lightning in the night there came the gleam of a few bright memories ... then the shadows began to grow and bear down on me, it was darker and darker about me, more dully and quietly the monotonous years ran by—and like a stone, dejection sank upon my heart. I sat without stirring and gazed, gazed with effort and perplexity, as though I saw all my life before me, as though scales had fallen from my eyes. Oh, what have I done! my lips involuntarily murmured in a bitter whisper. O life, life, where, how have you gone without a trace? How have you slipped through my clenched fingers? Have you deceived me, or was it that I knew not how to make use of your gifts? Is it possible? is this fragment, this poor handful of dusty ashes, all that is left of you? Is this cold, stagnant, unnecessary something—I, the I of old days? How? The soul was athirst for happiness so perfect, she rejected with such scorn all that was small, all that was insufficient, she waited: soon happiness would burst on her in a torrent—and has not one drop moistened the parched lips? Oh, my golden strings, you that once so delicately, so sweetly quivered,—I have never, it seems, heard your music ... you had but just sounded—when you broke. Or, perhaps, happiness, the true happiness of all my life, passed close by me, smiled a resplendent smile upon me—and I failed to recognise its divine countenance. Or did it really visit me, sit at my bedside, and is forgotten by me, like a dream? Like a dream, I repeated disconsolately. Elusive images flitted over my soul, awakening in it something between pity and bewilderment ... you too, I thought, dear, familiar, lost faces, you, thronging about me in this deadly solitude, why are you so profoundly and mournfully silent? From what abyss have you arisen? How am I to interpret your enigmatic glances? Are you greeting me, or bidding me farewell? Oh, can it be there is no hope, no turning back? Why are these heavy, belated drops trickling from my eyes? O heart, why, to what end, grieve more? try to forget if you would have peace, harden yourself to the meek acceptance of the last parting, to the bitter words 'good-bye' and 'for ever.' Do not look back, do not remember, do not strive to reach where it is light, where youth laughs, where hope is wreathed with the flowers of spring, where dovelike delight soars on azure wings, where love, like dew in the sunrise, flashes with tears of ecstasy; look not where is bliss, and faith and power—that is not our place!

'Here is water for you,' I heard Yegor's musical voice behind me: 'drink, with God's blessing.'

I could not help starting; this living speech shook me, sent a delightful tremor all through me. It was as though I had fallen into unknown, dark depths, where all was hushed about me, and nothing could be heard but the soft, persistent moan of some unending grief.... I was faint and could not struggle, and all at once there floated down to me a friendly voice, and some mighty hand with one pull drew me up into the light of day. I looked round, and with unutterable consolation saw the serene and honest face of my guide. He stood easily and gracefully before me, and with his habitual smile held out a wet flask full of clear liquid.... I got up.

'Let's go on; lead the way,' I said eagerly. We set off and wandered a long while, till evening. Directly the noonday heat was over, it became cold and dark so rapidly in the forest that one felt no desire to remain in it.

'Away, restless mortals,' it seemed whispering sullenly from each pine. We came out, but it was some time before we could find Kondrat. We shouted, called to him, but he did not answer. All of a sudden, in the profound stillness of the air, we heard his 'wo, wo,' sound distinctly in a ravine close to us.... The wind, which had suddenly sprung up, and as suddenly dropped again, had prevented him from hearing our calls. Only on the trees which stood some distance apart were traces of its onslaught to be seen; many of the leaves were blown inside out, and remained so, giving a variegated look to the motionless foliage. We got into the cart, and drove home. I sat, swaying to and fro, and slowly breathing in the damp, rather keen air; and all my recent reveries and regrets were drowned in the one sensation of drowsiness and fatigue, in the one desire to get back as soon as possible to the shelter of a warm house, to have a good drink of tea with cream, to nestle into the soft, yielding hay, and to sleep, to sleep, to sleep....



SECOND DAY

The next morning the three of us set off to the 'Charred Wood.' Ten years before, several thousand acres in the 'Forest' had been burnt down, and had not up to that time grown again; here and there, young firs and pines were shooting up, but for the most part there was nothing but moss and ashes. In this 'Charred Wood,' which is reckoned to be about nine miles from Svyatoe, there are all sorts of berries growing in great profusion, and it is a favourite haunt of grouse, who are very fond of strawberries and bilberries.

We were driving along in silence, when suddenly Kondrat raised his head.

'Ah!' he exclaimed: 'why, that's never Efrem standing yonder! 'Morning to you, Alexandritch,' he added, raising his voice, and lifting his cap.

A short peasant in a short, black smock, with a cord round the waist, came out from behind a tree, and approached the cart.

'Why, have they let you off?' inquired Kondrat.

'I should think so!' replied the peasant, and he grinned. 'You don't catch them keeping the likes of me.'

'And what did Piotr Filippitch say to it?'

'Filippov, is it? Oh, he's all right.'

'You don't say so! Why, I thought, Alexandritch—well, brother, thought I, now you 're the goose that must lie down in the frying-pan!'

'On account of Piotr Filippov, hey? Get along! We've seen plenty like him. He tries to pass for a wolf, and then slinks off like a dog.—Going shooting your honour, hey?' the peasant suddenly inquired, turning his little, screwed-up eyes rapidly upon me, and at once dropping them again.

'Yes.'

'And whereabouts, now?'

'To the Charred Wood,' said Kondrat.

'You 're going to the Charred Wood? mind you don't get into the fire.'

'Eh?'

'I've seen a lot of woodcocks,' the peasant went on, seeming all the while to be laughing, and making Kondrat no answer. 'But you'll never get there; as the crow flies it'll be fifteen miles. Why, even Yegor here—not a doubt but he's as at home in the forest as in his own back-yard, but even he won't make his way there. Hullo, Yegor, you honest penny halfpenny soul!' he shouted suddenly.

'Good morning, Efrem,' Yegor responded deliberately.

I looked with curiosity at this Efrem. It was long since I had seen such a queer face. He had a long, sharp nose, thick lips, and a scanty beard. His little blue eyes positively danced, like little imps. He stood in a free-and-easy pose, his arms akimbo, and did not touch his cap.

'Going home for a visit, eh?' Kondrat questioned him.

'Go on! on a visit! It's not the weather for that, my lad; it's set fair. It's all open and free, my dear; one may lie on the stove till winter time, not a dog will stir. When I was in the town, the clerk said: "Give us up," says he, "'Lexandritch; you just get out of the district, we'll let you have a passport, first-class one ..." but there, I'd pity on you Svyatoe fellows: you'd never get another thief like me.'

Kondrat laughed.

'You will have your joke, uncle, you will, upon my word,' he said, and he shook the reins. The horses started off.

'Wo,' said Efrem. The horses stopped. Kondrat did not like this prank.

'Enough of your nonsense, Alexandritch,' he observed in an undertone: 'don't you see we're out with a gentleman? You mind; he'll be angry.'

'Get on with you, sea-drake! What should he be angry about? He's a good-natured gentleman. You see, he'll give me something to drink. Hey, master, give a poor scoundrel a dram! Won't I drink it!' he added, shrugging his shoulder up to his ear, and grating his teeth.

I could not help smiling, gave him a copper, and told Kondrat to drive on.

'Much obliged, your honour,' Efrem shouted after us in soldierly fashion. 'And you'll know, Kondrat, for the future from whom to learn manners. Faint heart never wins; 'tis boldness gains the day. When you come back, come to my place, d'ye hear? There'll be drinking going on three days at home; there'll be some necks broken, I can tell you; my wife's a devil of a woman; our yard's on the side of a precipice.... Ay, magpie, have a good time till your tail gets pinched.' And with a sharp whistle, Efrem plunged into the bushes.

'What sort of man is he?' I questioned Kondrat, who, sitting in the front, kept shaking his head, as though deliberating with himself.

'That fellow?' replied Kondrat, and he looked down. 'That fellow?' he repeated.

'Yes. Is he of your village?'

'Yes, he's a Svyatoe man. He's a fellow.... You wouldn't find the like of him, if you hunted for a hundred miles round. A thief and cheat—good Lord, yes! Another man's property simply, as it were, takes his eye. You may bury a thing underground, and you won't hide it from him; and as to money, you might sit on it, and he'd get it from under you without your noticing it.'

'What a bold fellow he is!'

'Bold? Yes, he's not afraid of any one. But just look at him; he's a beast by his physiognomy; you can see by his nose.' (Kondrat often used to drive with gentlemen, and had been in the chief town of the province, and so liked on occasion to show off his attainments.) 'There's positively no doing anything with him. How many times they've taken him off to put him in the prison!—it's simply trouble thrown away. They start tying him up, and he'll say, "Come, why don't you fasten that leg? fasten that one too, and a little tighter: I'll have a little sleep meanwhile; and I shall get home before your escort." And lo and behold! there he is back again, yes, back again, upon my soul! Well as we all about here know the forest, being used to it from childhood, we're no match for him there. Last summer he came at night straight across from Altuhin to Svyatoe, and no one had ever been known to walk it—it'll be over thirty miles. And he steals honey too; no one can beat him at that; and the bees don't sting him. There's not a hive he hasn't plundered.'

'I expect he doesn't spare the wild bees either?'

'Well, no, I won't lay a false charge against him. That sin's never been observed in him. The wild bees' nest is a holy thing with us. A hive is shut in by fences; there's a watch kept; if you get the honey—it's your luck; but the wild bee is a thing of God's, not guarded; only the bear touches it.'

'Because he is a bear,' remarked Yegor.

'Is he married?'

'To be sure. And he has a son. And won't he be a thief too, the son! He's taken after his father. And he's training him now too. The other day he took a pot with some old coppers in it, stolen somewhere, I've no doubt, went and buried it in a clearing in the forest, and went home and sent his son to the clearing. "Till you find the pot," says he, "I won't give you anything to eat, or let you into the place." The son stayed the whole day in the forest, and spent the night there, but he found the pot. Yes, he's a smart chap, that Efrem. When he's at home, he's a civil fellow, presses every one; you may eat and drink as you will, and there'll be dancing got up at his place and merry-making of all sorts. And when he comes to the meeting—we have a parish meeting, you know, in our village—well, no one talks better sense than he does; he'll come up behind, listen, say a word as if he chopped it off, and away again; and a weighty word it'll be, too. But when he's about in the forest, ah! that means trouble! We've to look out for mischief. Though, I must say, he doesn't touch his own people unless he's in a fix. If he meets a Svyatoe man: "Go along with you, brother," he'll shout, a long way away; "the forest devil's upon me: I shall kill you!"—it's a bad business!'

'What can you all be thinking about? A whole district can't get even with one man?'

'Well, that's just how it is, any way.'

'Is he a sorcerer, then?'

'Who can say! Here, some days ago, he crept round at night to the deacon's near, after the honey, and the deacon was watching the hive himself. Well, he caught him, and in the dark he gave him a good hiding. When he'd done, Efrem, he says to him: "But d'you know who it is you've been beating?" The deacon, when he knew him by his voice, was fairly dumfoundered.

"Well, my good friend," says Efrem, "you won't get off so easily for this." The deacon fell down at his feet. "Take," says he, "what you please." "No," says he. "I'll take it from you at my own time and as I choose." And what do you think? Since that day the deacon's as though he'd been scalded; he wanders about like a ghost. "It's taken," says he, "all the heart out of me; it was a dreadful, powerful saying, to be sure, the brigand fastened upon me." That's how it is with him, with the deacon.'

'That deacon must be a fool,' I observed.

'A fool? Well, but what do you say to this? There was once an order issued to seize this fellow, Efrem. We had a police commissary then, a sharp man. And so a dozen chaps went off into the forest to take Efrem. They look, and there he is coming to meet them.... One of them shouts, "Here he is, hold him, tie him!" But Efrem stepped into the forest and cut himself a branch, two fingers' thickness, like this, and then out he skips into the road again, looking so frightful, so terrible, and gives the command like a general at a review: "On your knees!" All of them fairly fell down. "But who," says he, "shouted hold him, tie him? You, Seryoga?" The fellow simply jumped up and ran ... and Efrem after him, and kept swinging his branch at his heels.... For nearly a mile he stroked him down. And afterwards he never ceased to regret: "Ah," he'd say, "it is annoying I didn't lay him up for the confession." For it was just before St. Philip's day. Well, they changed the police commissary soon after, but it all ended the same way.'

'Why did they all give in to him?'

'Why! well, it is so....'

'He has frightened you all, and now he does as he likes with you.'

'Frightened, yes.... He'd frighten any one. And he's a wonderful hand at contrivances, my goodness, yes! I once came upon him in the forest; there was a heavy rain falling; I was for edging away.... But he looked at me, and beckoned to me with his hand like this. "Come along," says he, "Kondrat, don't be afraid. Let me show you how to live in the forest, and to keep dry in the rain." I went up to him, and he was sitting under a fir-tree, and he'd made a fire of damp twigs: the smoke hung about in the fir-tree, and kept the rain from dripping through. I was astonished at him then. And I'll tell you what he contrived one time' (and Kondrat laughed); 'he really did do a funny thing. They'd been thrashing the oats at the thrashing-floor, and they hadn't finished; they hadn't time to rake up the last heap; well, they 'd set two watch-men by it for the night, and they weren't the boldest-hearted of the chaps either. Well, they were sitting and gossiping, and Efrem takes and stuffs his shirt-sleeves full of straw, ties up the wrist-bands, and puts the shirt up over his head. And so he steals up in that shape to the thrashing-floor, and just pops out from behind the corner and gives them a peep of his horns. One chap says to the other: "Do you see?" "Yes," says the other, and didn't he give a screech all of a sudden ... and then the fences creaked and nothing more was seen of them. Efrem shovelled up the oats into a bag and dragged it off home. He told the story himself afterwards. He put them to shame, he did, the chaps.... He did really!'

Kondrat laughed again. And Yegor smiled. 'So the fences creaked and that was all?' he commented. 'There was nothing more seen of them,' Kondrat assented. 'They were simply gone in a flash.'

We were all silent again. Suddenly Kondrat started and sat up.

'Eh, mercy upon us!' he ejaculated; 'surely it's never a fire!'

'Where, where?' we asked.

'Yonder, see, in front, where we 're going.... A fire it is! Efrem there, Efrem—why, he foretold it! If it's not his doing, the damned fellow!...'

I glanced in the direction Kondrat was pointing. Two or three miles ahead of us, behind a green strip of low fir saplings, there really was a thick column of dark blue smoke slowly rising from the ground, gradually twisting and coiling into a cap-shaped cloud; to the right and left of it could be seen others, smaller and whiter.

A peasant, all red and perspiring, in nothing but his shirt, with his hair hanging dishevelled about his scared face, galloped straight towards us, and with difficulty stopped his hastily bridled horse.

'Mates,' he inquired breathlessly, 'haven't you seen the foresters?'

'No, we haven't. What is it? is the forest on fire?'

'Yes. We must get the people together, or else if it gets to Trosnoe ...'

The peasant tugged with his elbows, pounded with his heels on the horse's sides.... It galloped off.

Kondrat, too, whipped up his pair. We drove straight towards the smoke, which was spreading more and more widely; in places it suddenly grew black and rose up high. The nearer we moved to it, the more indefinite became its outlines; soon all the air was clouded over, there was a strong smell of burning, and here and there between the trees, with a strange, weird quivering in the sunshine, gleamed the first pale red tongues of flame.

'Well, thank God,' observed Kondrat, 'it seems it's an overground fire.'

'What's that?'

'Overground? One that runs along over the earth. With an underground fire, now, it's a difficult job to deal. What's one to do, when the earth's on fire for a whole yard's depth? There's only one means of safety—digging ditches,—and do you suppose that's easy? But an overground fire's nothing. It only scorches the grasses and burns the dry leaves! The forest will be all the better for it. Ouf, though, mercy on us, look how it flares!'

We drove almost up to the edge of the fire. I got down and went to meet it. It was neither dangerous nor difficult. The fire was running over the scanty pine-forest against the wind; it moved in an uneven line, or, to speak more accurately, in a dense jagged wall of curved tongues. The smoke was carried away by the wind. Kondrat had told the truth; it really was an overground fire, which only scorched the grass and passed on without finishing its work, leaving behind it a black and smoking, but not even smouldering, track. At times, it is true, when the fire came upon a hole filled with dry wood and twigs, it suddenly and with a kind of peculiar, rather vindictive roar, rose up in long, quivering points; but it soon sank down again and ran on as before, with a slight hiss and crackle. I even noticed, more than once, an oak-bush, with dry hanging leaves, hemmed in all round and yet untouched, except for a slight singeing at its base. I must own I could not understand why the dry leaves were not burned. Kondrat explained to me that it was owing to the fact that the fire was overground, 'that's to say, not angry.' 'But it's fire all the same,' I protested. 'Overground fire,' repeated Kondrat. However, overground as it was, the fire, none the less, produced its effect: hares raced up and down with a sort of disorder, running back with no sort of necessity into the neighbourhood of the fire; birds fell down in the smoke and whirled round and round; horses looked back and neighed, the forest itself fairly hummed—and man felt discomfort from the heat suddenly beating into his face....

'What are we looking at?' said Yegor suddenly, behind my back. 'Let's go on.'

'But where are we to go?' asked Kondrat.

'Take the left, over the dry bog; we shall get through.'

We turned to the left, and got through, though it was sometimes difficult for both the horses and the cart.

The whole day we wandered over the Charred Wood. At evening—the sunset had not yet begun to redden in the sky, but the shadows from the trees already lay long and motionless, and in the grass one could feel that chill that comes before the dew—I lay down by the roadside near the cart in which Kondrat, without haste, was harnessing the horses after their feed, and I recalled my cheerless reveries of the day before. Everything around was as still as the previous evening, but there was not the forest, stifling and weighing down the spirit. On the dry moss, on the crimson grasses, on the soft dust of the road, on the slender stems and pure little leaves of the young birch-trees, lay the clear soft light of the no longer scorching, sinking sun. Everything was resting, plunged in soothing coolness; nothing was yet asleep, but everything was getting ready for the restoring slumber of evening and night-time. Everything seemed to be saying to man: 'Rest, brother of ours; breathe lightly, and grieve not, thou too, at the sleep close before thee.' I raised my head and saw at the very end of a delicate twig one of those large flies with emerald head, long body, and four transparent wings, which the fanciful French call 'maidens,' while our guileless people has named them 'bucket-yokes.' For a long while, more than an hour, I did not take my eyes off her. Soaked through and through with sunshine, she did not stir, only from time to time turning her head from side to side and shaking her lifted wings ... that was all. Looking at her, it suddenly seemed to me that I understood the life of nature, understood its clear and unmistakable though, to many, still mysterious significance. A subdued, quiet animation, an unhasting, restrained use of sensations and powers, an equilibrium of health in each separate creature—there is her very basis, her unvarying law, that is what she stands upon and holds to. Everything that goes beyond this level, above or below—it makes no difference—she flings away as worthless. Many insects die as soon as they know the joys of love, which destroy the equilibrium. The sick beast plunges into the thicket and expires there alone: he seems to feel that he no longer has the right to look upon the sun that is common to all, nor to breathe the open air; he has not the right to live;—and the man who from his own fault or from the fault of others is faring ill in the world—ought, at least, to know how to keep silence.

'Well, Yegor!' cried Kondrat all at once. He had already settled himself on the box of the cart and was shaking and playing with the reins. 'Come, sit down. What are you so thoughtful about? Still about the cow?'

'About the cow? What cow?' I repeated, and looked at Yegor: calm and stately as ever, he certainly did seem thoughtful, and was gazing away into the distance towards the fields already beginning to get dark.

'Don't you know?' answered Kondrat; 'his last cow died last night. He has no luck.—What are you going to do?'....

Yegor sat down on the box, without speaking, and we drove off. 'That man knows how to bear in silence,' I thought.



YAKOV PASINKOV

I

It happened in Petersburg, in the winter, on the first day of the carnival. I had been invited to dinner by one of my schoolfellows, who enjoyed in his youth the reputation of being as modest as a maiden, and turned out in the sequel a person by no means over rigid in his conduct. He is dead now, like most of my schoolfellows. There were to be present at the dinner, besides me, Konstantin Alexandrovitch Asanov, and a literary celebrity of those days. The literary celebrity kept us waiting for him, and finally sent a note that he was not coming, and in place of him there turned up a little light-haired gentleman, one of the everlasting uninvited guests with whom Petersburg abounds.

The dinner lasted a long while; our host did not spare the wine, and by degrees our heads were affected. Everything that each of us kept hidden in his heart—and who is there that has not something hidden in his heart?—came to the surface. Our host's face suddenly lost its modest and reserved expression; his eyes shone with a brazen-faced impudence, and a vulgar grin curved his lips; the light-haired gentleman laughed in a feeble way, with a senseless crow; but Asanov surprised me more than any one. The man had always been conspicuous for his sense of propriety, but now he began by suddenly rubbing his hand over his forehead, giving himself airs, boasting of his connections, and continually alluding to a certain uncle of his, a very important personage.... I positively should not have known him; he was unmistakably jeering at us ... he all but avowed his contempt for our society. Asanov's insolence began to exasperate me.

'Listen,' I said to him; 'if we are such poor creatures to your thinking, you'd better go and see your illustrious uncle. But possibly he's not at home to you.'

Asanov made me no reply, and went on passing his hand across his forehead.

'What a set of people!' he said again; 'they've never been in any decent society, never been acquainted with a single decent woman, while I have here,' he cried, hurriedly pulling a pocket-book out of his side-pocket and tapping it with his hand, 'a whole pack of letters from a girl whom you wouldn't find the equal of in the whole world.'

Our host and the light-haired gentleman paid no attention to Asanov's last words; they were holding each other by their buttons, and both relating something; but I pricked up my ears.

'Oh, you 're bragging, Mr. nephew of an illustrious personage,' I said, going up to Asanov; 'you haven't any letters at all.'

'Do you think so?' he retorted, and he looked down loftily at me; 'what's this, then?' He opened the pocket-book, and showed me about a dozen letters addressed to him.... A familiar handwriting, I fancied.... I feel the flush of shame mounting to my cheeks ... my self-love is suffering horribly.... No one likes to own to a mean action.... But there is nothing for it: when I began my story, I knew I should have to blush to my ears in the course of it. And so, I am bound to harden my heart and confess that....

Well, this was what passed: I took advantage of the intoxicated condition of Asanov, who had carelessly dropped the letters on the champagne-stained tablecloth (my own head was dizzy enough too), and hurriedly ran my eyes over one of the letters....

My heart stood still.... Alas! I was myself in love with the girl who had written to Asanov, and I could have no doubt now that she loved him. The whole letter, which was in French, expressed tenderness and devotion....

'Mon cher ami Constantin!' so it began ... and it ended with the words: 'be careful as before, and I will be yours or no one's.'

Stunned as by a thunderbolt, I sat for a few instants motionless; at last I regained my self-possession, jumped up, and rushed out of the room.

A quarter of an hour later I was back at home in my own lodgings.

* * * * *

The family of the Zlotnitskys was one of the first whose acquaintance I made on coming to Petersburg from Moscow. It consisted of a father and mother, two daughters, and a son. The father, a man already grey, but still vigorous, who had been in the army, held a fairly important position, spent the morning in a government office, went to sleep after dinner, and in the evening played cards at his club.... He was seldom at home, spoke little and unwillingly, looked at one from under his eyebrows with an expression half surly, half indifferent, and read nothing except books of travels and geography. Sometimes he was unwell, and then he would shut himself up in his own room, and paint little pictures, or tease the old grey parrot, Popka. His wife, a sickly, consumptive woman, with hollow black eyes and a sharp nose, did not leave her sofa for days together, and was always embroidering cushion-covers in canvas. As far as I could observe, she was rather afraid of her husband, as though she had somehow wronged him at some time or other. The elder daughter, Varvara, a plump, rosy, fair-haired girl of eighteen, was always sitting at the window, watching the people that passed by. The son, who was being educated in a government school, was only seen at home on Sundays, and he, too, did not care to waste his words. Even the younger daughter, Sophia, the girl with whom I was in love, was of a silent disposition. In the Zlotnitskys' house there reigned a perpetual stillness; it was only broken by the piercing screams of Popka, but visitors soon got used to these, and were conscious again of the burden and oppression of the eternal stillness. Visitors, however, seldom looked in upon the Zlotnitskys; their house was a dull one. The very furniture, the red paper with yellow patterns in the drawing-room, the numerous rush-bottomed chairs in the dining-room, the faded wool-work cushions, embroidered with figures of girls and dogs, on the sofa, the branching lamps, and the gloomy-looking portraits on the walls—everything inspired an involuntary melancholy, about everything there clung a sense of chill and flatness. On my arrival in Petersburg, I had thought it my duty to call on the Zlotnitskys. They were relations of my mother's. I managed with difficulty to sit out an hour with them, and it was a long while before I went there again. But by degrees I took to going oftener and oftener. I was drawn there by Sophia, whom I had not cared for at first, and with whom I finally fell in love.

She was a slender, almost thin, girl of medium height, with a pale face, thick black hair, and big brown eyes, always half closed. Her severe and well-defined features, especially her tightly shut lips, showed determination and strength of will. At home they knew her to be a girl with a will of her own....

'She's like her eldest sister, like Katerina,' Madame Zlotnitsky said one day, as she sat alone with me (in her husband's presence she did not dare to mention the said Katerina). 'You don't know her; she's in the Caucasus, married. At thirteen, only fancy, she fell in love with her husband, and announced to us at the time that she would never marry any one else. We did everything we could—nothing was of any use. She waited till she was three-and-twenty, and braved her father's anger, and so married her idol. There is no saying what Sonitchka might not do! The Lord preserve her from such stubbornness! But I am afraid for her; she's only sixteen now, and there's no turning her....'

Mr. Zlotnitsky came in, and his wife was instantly silent.

What had captivated me in Sophia was not her strength of will—no; but with all her dryness, her lack of vivacity and imagination, she had a special charm of her own, the charm of straightforwardness, genuine sincerity, and purity of heart. I respected her as much as I loved her.... It seemed to me that she too looked with friendly eyes on me; to have my illusions as to her feeling for me shattered, and her love for another man proved conclusively, was a blow to me.

The unlooked-for discovery I had made astonished me the more as Asanov was not often at the Zlotnitskys' house, much less so than I, and had shown no marked preference for Sonitchka. He was a handsome, dark fellow, with expressive but rather heavy features, with brilliant, prominent eyes, with a large white forehead, and full red lips under fine moustaches. He was very discreet, but severe in his behaviour, confident in his criticisms and utterances, and dignified in his silence. It was obvious that he thought a great deal of himself. Asanov rarely laughed, and then with closed teeth, and he never danced. He was rather loosely and clumsily built. He had at one time served in the —th regiment, and was spoken of as a capable officer.

'A strange thing!' I ruminated, lying on the sofa; 'how was it I noticed nothing?' ... 'Be careful as before': those words in Sophia's letter suddenly recurred to my memory. 'Ah!' I thought: 'that's it! What a sly little hussy! And I thought her open and sincere.... Wait a bit, that's all; I'll let you know....'

But at this point, if I can trust my memory, I began weeping bitterly, and could not get to sleep all night.

* * * * *

Next day at two o'clock I set off to the Zlotnitskys'. The father was not at home, and his wife was not sitting in her usual place; after the pancake festival of the preceding day, she had a headache, and had gone to lie down in her bedroom. Varvara was standing with her shoulder against the window, looking into the street; Sophia was walking up and down the room with her arms folded across her bosom; Popka was shrieking.

'Ah! how do you do?' said Varvara lazily, directly I came into the room, and she added at once in an undertone, 'There goes a peasant with a tray on his head.' ... (She had the habit of keeping up a running commentary on the passers-by to herself.)

'How do you do?' I responded; 'how do you do, Sophia Nikolaevna? Where is Tatiana Vassilievna?'

'She has gone to lie down,' answered Sophia, still pacing the room.

'We had pancakes,' observed Varvara, without turning round. 'Why didn't you come? ... Where can that clerk be going?' 'Oh, I hadn't time.' ('Present arms!' the parrot screeched shrilly.) 'How Popka is shrieking to-day!'

'He always does shriek like that,' observed Sophia.

We were all silent for a time.

'He has gone in at the gate,' said Varvara, and she suddenly got up on the window-sill and opened the window.

'What are you about?' asked Sophia.

'There's a beggar,' responded Varvara. She bent down, picked up a five-copeck piece from the window; the remains of a fumigating pastille still stood in a grey heap of ashes on the copper coin, as she flung it into the street; then she slammed the window to and jumped heavily down to the floor....

'I had a very pleasant time yesterday,' I began, seating myself in an arm-chair. 'I dined with a friend of mine; Konstantin Alexandritch was there.... (I looked at Sophia; not an eyebrow quivered on her face.) 'And I must own,' I continued, 'we'd a good deal of wine; we emptied eight bottles between the four of us.'

'Really!' Sophia articulated serenely, and she shook her head.

'Yes,' I went on, slightly irritated at her composure: 'and do you know what, Sophia Nikolaevna, it's a true saying, it seems, that in wine is truth.'

'How so?'

'Konstantin Alexandritch made us laugh. Only fancy, he began all at once passing his hand over his forehead like this, and saying: "I'm a fine fellow! I've an uncle a celebrated man!"....'

'Ha, ha!' came Varvara's short, abrupt laugh.

....'Popka! Popka! Popka!' the parrot dinned back at her.

Sophia stood still in front of me, and looked me straight in the face.

'And you, what did you say?' she asked; 'don't you remember?'

I could not help blushing.

'I don't remember! I expect I was pretty absurd too. It certainly is dangerous to drink,' I added with significant emphasis; 'one begins chattering at once, and one's apt to say what no one ought to know. One's sure to be sorry for it afterwards, but then it's too late.'

'Why, did you let out some secret?' asked Sophia.

'I am not referring to myself.'

Sophia turned away, and began walking up and down the room again. I stared at her, raging inwardly. 'Upon my word,' I thought, 'she is a child, a baby, and how she has herself in hand! She's made of stone, simply. But wait a bit....'

'Sophia Nikolaevna ...' I said aloud.

Sophia stopped.

'What is it?'

'Won't you play me something on the piano? By the way, I've something I want to say to you,' I added, dropping my voice.

Sophia, without saying a word, walked into the other room; I followed her. She came to a standstill at the piano.

'What am I to play you?' she inquired.

'What you like ... one of Chopin's nocturnes.'

Sophia began the nocturne. She played rather badly, but with feeling. Her sister played nothing but polkas and waltzes, and even that very seldom. She would go sometimes with her indolent step to the piano, sit down, let her coat slip from her shoulders down to her elbows (I never saw her without a coat), begin playing a polka very loud, and without finishing it, begin another, then she would suddenly heave a sigh, get up, and go back again to the window. A queer creature was that Varvara!

I sat down near Sophia.

'Sophia Nikolaevna,' I began, watching her intently from one side. 'I ought to tell you a piece of news, news disagreeable to me.'

'News? what is it?'

'I'll tell you.... Up till now I have been mistaken in you, completely mistaken.'

'How was that?' she rejoined, going on playing, and keeping her eyes fixed on her fingers.

'I imagined you to be open; I imagined that you were incapable of hypocrisy, of hiding your feelings, deceiving....'

Sophia bent her face closer over the music.

'I don't understand you.'

'And what's more,' I went on; 'I could never have conceived that you, at your age, were already quite capable of acting a part in such masterly fashion.'

Sophia's hands faintly trembled above the keys. 'Why are you saying this?' she said, still not looking at me; 'I play a part?'

'Yes, you do.' (She smiled ... I was seized with spiteful fury.) ... 'You pretend to be indifferent to a man and ... and you write letters to him,' I added in a whisper.

Sophia's cheeks grew white, but she did not turn to me: she played the nocturne through to the end, got up, and closed the piano.

'Where are you going?' I asked her in some perplexity. 'You have no answer to make me?'

'What answer can I make you? I don't know what you 're talking about.... And I am not good at pretending....'

She began putting by the music.

The blood rushed to my head. 'No; you know what I am talking about,' I said, and I too got up from my seat; 'or if you like, I will remind you directly of some of your expressions in one letter: "be as careful as before"....'

Sophia gave a faint start.

'I never should have expected this of you,' she said at last.

'I never should have expected,' I retorted, 'that you, Sophia Nikolaevna, would have deigned to notice a man who ...'

Sophia turned with a rapid movement to me; I instinctively stepped back a little from her; her eyes, always half closed, were so wide open that they looked immense, and they glittered wrathfully under her frowning brows.

'Oh! if that's it,' she said, 'let me tell you that I love that man, and that it's absolutely no consequence to me what you think about him or about my love for him. And what business is it of yours? ... What right have you to speak of this? If I have made up my mind ...'

She stopped speaking, and went hurriedly out of the room. I stood still. I felt all of a sudden so uncomfortable and so ashamed that I hid my face in my hands. I realised all the impropriety, all the baseness of my behaviour, and, choked with shame and remorse, I stood as it were in disgrace. 'Mercy,' I thought, 'what I've done!'

'Anton Nikititch,' I heard the maid-servant saying in the outer-room, 'get a glass of water, quick, for Sophia Nikolaevna.'

'What's wrong?' answered the man.

'I fancy she's crying....'

I started up and went into the drawing-room for my hat.

'What were you talking about to Sonitchka?' Varvara inquired indifferently, and after a brief pause she added in an undertone, 'Here's that clerk again.'

I began saying good-bye.

'Why are you going? Stay a little; mamma is coming down directly.'

'No; I can't now,' I said: 'I had better call and see her another time.'

At that instant, to my horror, to my positive horror, Sophia walked with resolute steps into the drawing-room. Her face was paler than usual, and her eyelids were a little red. She never even glanced at me.

'Look, Sonia,' observed Varvara; 'there's a clerk keeps continually passing our house.'

'A spy, perhaps...' Sophia remarked coldly and contemptuously.

This was too much. I went away, and I really don't know how I got home.

I felt very miserable, wretched and miserable beyond description. In twenty-four hours two such cruel blows! I had learned that Sophia loved another man, and I had for ever forfeited her respect. I felt myself so utterly annihilated and disgraced that I could not even feel indignant with myself. Lying on the sofa with my face turned to the wall, I was revelling in the first rush of despairing misery, when I suddenly heard footsteps in the room. I lifted my head and saw one of my most intimate friends, Yakov Pasinkov.

I was ready to fly into a rage with any one who had come into my room that day, but with Pasinkov I could never be angry. Quite the contrary; in spite of the sorrow devouring me, I was inwardly rejoiced at his coming, and I nodded to him. He walked twice up and down the room, as his habit was, clearing his throat, and stretching out his long limbs; then he stood a minute facing me in silence, and in silence he seated himself in a corner.

I had known Pasinkov a very long while, almost from childhood. He had been brought up at the same private school, kept by a German, Winterkeller, at which I had spent three years. Yakov's father, a poor major on the retired list, a very honest man, but a little deranged mentally, had brought him, when a boy of seven, to this German; had paid for him for a year in advance, and had then left Moscow and been lost sight of completely.... From time to time there were dark, strange rumours about him. Eight years later it was known as a positive fact that he had been drowned in a flood when crossing the Irtish. What had taken him to Siberia, God knows. Yakov had no other relations; his mother had long been dead. He was simply left stranded on Winterkeller's hands. Yakov had, it is true, a distant relation, a great-aunt; but she was so poor, that she was afraid at first to go to her nephew, for fear she should have the care of him thrust upon her. Her fears turned out to be groundless; the kind-hearted German kept Yakov with him, let him study with his other pupils, fed him (dessert, however, was not offered him except on Sundays), and rigged him out in clothes cut out of the cast-off morning-gowns—usually snuff-coloured—of his mother, an old Livonian lady, still alert and active in spite of her great age. Owing to all these circumstances, and owing generally to Yakov's inferior position in the school, his schoolfellows treated him in rather a casual fashion, looked down upon him, and used to call him 'mammy's dressing-gown,' the 'nephew of the mob-cap' (his aunt invariably wore a very peculiar mob-cap with a bunch of yellow ribbons sticking straight upright, like a globe artichoke, upon it), and sometimes the 'son of Yermak' (because his father had, like that hero, been drowned in the Irtish). But in spite of those nicknames, in spite of his ridiculous garb, and his absolute destitution, every one was fond of him, and indeed it was impossible not to be fond of him; a sweeter, nobler nature, I imagine, has never existed upon earth. He was very good at lessons too.

When I saw him first, he was sixteen years old, and I was only just thirteen. I was an exceedingly selfish and spoilt boy; I had grown up in a rather wealthy house, and so, on entering the school, I lost no time in making friends with a little prince, an object of special solicitude to Winterkeller, and with two or three other juvenile aristocrats; while I gave myself great airs with all the rest. Pasinkov I did not deign to notice at all. I regarded the long, gawky lad, in a shapeless coat and short trousers, which showed his coarse thread stockings, as some sort of page-boy, one of the house-serfs—at best, a person of the working class. Pasinkov was extremely courteous and gentle to everybody, though he never sought the society of any one. If he were rudely treated, he was neither humiliated nor sullen; he simply withdrew and held himself aloof, with a sort of regretful look, as it were biding his time. This was just how he behaved with me. About two months passed. One bright summer day I happened to go out of the playground after a noisy game of leap-frog, and walking into the garden I saw Pasinkov sitting on a bench under a high lilac-bush. He was reading. I glanced at the cover of the book as I passed, and read Schiller's Werke on the back. I stopped short.

'Do you mean to say you know German?' I questioned Pasinkov....

I feel ashamed to this day as I recall all the arrogance there was in the very sound of my voice.... Pasinkov softly raised his small but expressive eyes and looked at me.

'Yes,' he answered; 'do you?'

'I should hope so!' I retorted, feeling insulted at the question, and I was about to go on my way, but something held me back.

'What is it you are reading of Schiller?' I asked, with the same haughty insolence.

'At this moment I am reading "Resignation," a beautiful poem. Would you like me to read it to you? Come and sit here by me on the bench.'

I hesitated a little, but I sat down. Pasinkov began reading. He knew

German far better than I did. He had to explain the meaning of several lines for me. But already I felt no shame at my ignorance and his superiority to me. From that day, from the very hour of our reading together in the garden, in the shade of the lilac-bush, I loved Pasinkov with my whole soul, I attached myself to him and fell completely under his sway.

I have a vivid recollection of his appearance in those days. He changed very little, however, later on. He was tall, thin, and rather awkwardly built, with a long back, narrow shoulders, and a hollow chest, which made him look rather frail and delicate, although as a fact he had nothing to complain of on the score of health. His large, dome-shaped head was carried a little on one side; his soft, flaxen hair straggled in lank locks about his slender neck. His face was not handsome, and might even have struck one as absurd, owing to the long, full, and reddish nose, which seemed almost to overhang his wide, straight mouth. But his open brow was splendid; and when he smiled, his little grey eyes gleamed with such mild and affectionate goodness, that every one felt warmed and cheered at heart at the very sight of him. I remember his voice too, soft and even, with a peculiar sort of sweet huskiness in it. He spoke, as a rule, little, and with noticeable difficulty. But when he warmed up, his words flowed freely, and—strange to say!—his voice grew still softer, his glance seemed turned inward and lost its fire, while his whole face faintly glowed. On his lips the words 'goodness,' 'truth,' 'life,' 'science,' 'love,' however enthusiastically they were uttered, never rang with a false note. Without strain, without effort, he stepped into the realm of the ideal; his pure soul was at any moment ready to stand before the 'holy shrine of beauty'; it awaited only the welcoming call, the contact of another soul.... Pasinkov was an idealist, one of the last idealists whom it has been my lot to come across. Idealists, as we all know, are all but extinct in these days; there are none of them, at any rate, among the young people of to day. So much the worse for the young people of to-day!

About three years I spent with Pasinkov, 'soul in soul,' as the saying is.

I was the confidant of his first love. With what grateful sympathy and intentness I listened to his avowal! The object of his passion was a niece of Winterkeller's, a fair-haired, pretty little German, with a chubby, almost childish little face, and confidingly soft blue eyes. She was very kind and sentimental: she loved Mattison, Uhland, and Schiller, and repeated their verses very sweetly in her timid, musical voice. Pasinkov's love was of the most platonic. He only saw his beloved on Sundays, when she used to come and play at forfeits with the Winterkeller children, and he had very little conversation with her. But once, when she said to him, 'mein lieber, lieber Herr Jacob!' he did not sleep all night from excess of bliss. It never even struck him at the time that she called all his schoolfellows 'mein lieber.' I remember, too, his grief and dejection when the news suddenly reached us that Fraeulein Frederike—that was her name—was going to be married to Herr Kniftus, the owner of a prosperous butcher's shop, a very handsome man, and well educated too; and that she was marrying him, not simply in submission to parental authority, but positively from love. It was a bitter blow for Pasinkov, and his sufferings were particularly severe on the day of the young people's first visit. The former Fraeulein, now Frau, Frederike presented him, once more addressing him as 'lieber Herr Jacob,' to her husband, who was all splendour from top to toe; his eyes, his black hair brushed up into a tuft, his forehead and his teeth, and his coat buttons, and the chain on his waistcoat, everything, down to the boots on his rather large, turned-out feet, shone brilliantly. Pasinkov pressed Herr Kniftus's hand, and wished him (and the wish was sincere, that I am certain) complete and enduring happiness. This took place in my presence. I remember with what admiration and sympathy I gazed at Yakov. I thought him a hero!.... And afterwards, what mournful conversations passed between us. 'Seek consolation in art,' I said to him. 'Yes,' he answered me; 'and in poetry.' 'And in friendship,' I added. 'And in friendship,' he repeated. Oh, happy days!...