I got a letter from you a long time ago with the photographs of Semashko,
but I haven’t answered till now, because I have been all the time trying to
formulate the great thoughts befitting my answer. All our people are alive
and well, we often talk of you, and regret that your prolificness prevents
you from coming to us here where you would be very welcome. Father, as I
have written to you already, has thrown up Ivanygortch, and is living with
us. Suvorin has been here twice; he talked about you, and caught fish. I am
up to my neck in work with Sahalin, and other things no less wearisome and
hard labour. I dream of winning forty thousand, so as to cut myself off
completely from writing, which I am sick of, to buy a little bit of land
and live like a hermit in idle seclusion, with you and Ivan in the
neighbourhood--I dream of presenting you with fifteen acres each as poor
relations. Altogether I have a dreary existence, I am sick of toiling over
lines and halfpence, and old age is creeping nearer and nearer.
Your last story, in my opinion, shared by Suvorin, is good. Why do you
write so little?
The zoologist V. A. Wagner, who took his degree with you, is staying in the
same courtyard. He is writing a very solid dissertation. Kisilyov, the
artist, is living in the same yard too. We go walks together in the
evenings and discuss philosophy....