where and why, and for how long a time you were going! But no! Pray, brother, how can you behave so? And God knows what things I have been fancying all these days!”

“Well, what is to be done about it? I forgot,” answered Platon. “We went to Konstantin Feodorovitch’s. He salutes you, and our sister also greets you. Pavel Ivanovitch, let me introduce you: my brother, Vasiliy; brother Vasiliy, this is Pavel Ivanovitch Tchitchikoff.” The men thus invited to mutual acquaintance shook hands and took off their caps.

“Who can this Tchitchikoff be?” thought brother Vasiliy. “Brother Platon is not very choice in his acquaintances.” He scrutinised Tchitchikoff as closely as politeness would permit, and perceived that our hero was a very respectable-looking person.

Tchitchikoff also stared, as much as propriety allowed, at brother Vasiliy, and perceived that the latter was shorter of stature than Platon, that his hair was darker, and that his face was far from being as handsome, but that there was much more life and animation, more heartfelt kindness in his features. It was evident that he was less given to dreaming. However, to this Pavel Ivanovitch paid little heed.

“I have made up my mind, Vasya, to travel through Holy Russia with Pavel Ivanovitch. Perhaps that will cure me of my hypochondria.”

“How could you make up your mind so quickly?” said brother Vasiliy, taken aback; and he came near adding, “and go off with a man whom you see for the first time, and who may be a worthless fellow, and the Devil knows who?” Quite incredulous, he glanced askance at Tchitchikoff, and observed his remarkable respectability.

They turned into a gateway on the right. The courtyard was old-fashioned: the house also was old-fashioned, of a sort which is not built now, with sheds beneath the lofty roof. Two gigantic lime-trees grew in the middle of the yard, and covered nearly half of it with shade. Beneath them stood several wooden benches. Syringas and wild cherry-trees in blossom surrounded the place, covering the walls completely with their flowers and leaves. The manor-house was almost wholly concealed: only the doors and windows peered prettily out beneath and between the boughs. Through the forest-trees, straight as arrows, the kitchen, the storerooms, and the cellars were visible.

Moreover, one could hear the nightingales gaily warbling, and the whole grove gave back a loud echo. A feeling of peace and pleasantness stole into the soul. Everything smacked of those untroubled times when men lived in amity, and when all was simple and plain. Brother Vasiliy invited Tchitchikoff to take a seat. They all sat down on the benches under the lime-trees.

A lad of seventeen, in a handsome blouse of pink cotton, brought some decanters filled with all sorts of fruit kvas, of various colours, some thick like butter, others foaming like carbonated lemonade, and placed them before the gentlemen. After setting the decanters on the table, he picked up a spade which was leaning against a tree, and went off to the garden. All the servants of the Platonoff brothers, like those of their brother-in-law, Kostanzhoglo, were gardeners; or, to speak more accurately, all the house- servants took turns at garden duties.

Brother Vasiliy insisted that servants were not a separate class; that, if needed, one could entirely dispense with them; that everybody was capable of handing things, and that it was not necessary to appoint certain people to do so; that the Russian is a fine, alert fellow, and no sluggard, so long as he goes about in blouse and peasant coat; but that as soon as he dons a foreign surtout he instantly becomes awkward, dull, lazy; no longer changes his shirt; entirely ceases to take baths; sleeps in his coat, and beneath it raises a crop of foreign fleas, and an innumerable multitude of other insects. And on this point, he may have been right. In Platonoff village the people were dressed in a particularly dainty manner: the head- dresses of the women were covered with gold, and the sleeves of their blouses were made of the borders of genuine Turkish shawls.