every Sunday, began to fill the apartment. The odour of the valet Petrushka attempted for a time to establish itself in the ante-room; however, Petrushka was speedily transferred to the kitchen, as was fitting.
At first Andrei Ivanovitch feared for his independence; he was alarmed lest any visitor should embarrass him with any changes in his mode of life, which was so cleverly arranged. But his fears were unfounded. Our hero, Pavel Ivanovitch, displayed a remarkable capacity for adapting himself to all circumstances. He expressed his approval of his host’s philosophical and methodical disposition, saying that it promised to prolong his life for a century. With regard to solitude, he expressed himself very happily to the effect that it promoted grand thoughts in a man. Then after glancing into the library and praising books in general, he remarked that they rescued a man from idleness. He let fall but few words, but those few were weighty. In his behaviour he displayed even more tact. He made his appearance just at the proper time, and he vanished at the very moment which was fitting; he did not worry his host with questions during the latter’s taciturn moods; he took pleasure in playing at chess with him, and he enjoyed keeping silent. While one of them was emitting curling wreaths of smoke from his pipe, the other, who did not smoke, devised an occupation which corresponded with it: for example, he pulled a snuffbox of oxidized silver from his pocket, and grasping it firmly between two fingers of his left hand, he twirled it briskly with his right fore-finger—so that it looked like the earth whirling on its axis—or else he drummed on the cover with his finger, and whistled all the while. In short, he did not incommode his entertainer in the least.
“I now behold for the first time a man with whom it is possible to live,” said Tentyotnikoff to himself. “On the whole, this is rare among us. There are plenty of people who are learned and cultivated and good, but as for people of a perfectly equable temperament, people with whom one could pass one’s life without quarrelling, I really do not know whether many such persons are to be found anywhere. At all events, this is the first man of the sort whom I have seen.” Thus did Tentyotnikoff express himself with regard to his visitor.
Tchitchikoff, on his side, felt very glad that he had quartered himself for a time at the house of this quiet and peaceable young man. He had grown tired of his gipsy life. Even from a sanitary point of view, it would prove advantageous to rest for a month in this lovely village, in sight of the meadows and the budding spring.
It would have been difficult to find a nook better suited for repose. The spring, long retarded, was suddenly bursting forth in all its beauty, and life was beginning to display itself in every direction. The fresh and early emerald verdure was dotted with yellow dandelions, while the purple anemone nodded its graceful head. Swarms of gnats and other insects made their appearance in the swamps: the water-spider was already hastening in pursuit of them, and birds of every species assembled among the dry reeds. Ducks and all other kinds of water-fowl fluttered down upon the flooded lakes and rivers. The earth all at once became populous; the forests awoke from their sleep; the meadows became vocal. How brilliant was the verdure! how fresh the air! What bird-calls rang through the gardens! what echoes, what cries of joy from everything! The village was full of harmony, and song, as though a wedding were going on. Walks were taken in every direction, and Tchitchikoff himself walked a great deal.
At one time he directed his course to the summit of the hill, which afforded a view of the spreading valleys below, where there still lingered some wide lakes formed by the inundations, with islands of still leafless forest lying darkly in their midst; or else he strolled through the wooded ravines, where the thickly clustering trees, weighed down with the nests of cawing rooks, which obscured the heavens with their fitful flittings, were beginning to deck themselves with leaves. Again he betook himself over to the wharf, whence the first boats were setting out, laden with peas and barley and wheat, while the water dashed noisily against the wheel of the mill, which was just beginning to work. He went to inspect the first spring husbandry—he watched the plough turn up black strips of earth amid the green; or saw how the dexterous sower, tapping the sieve which hung from his breast, scattered the seed evenly and in the right spot, so that not a grain fell on either one side or the other.