The high-school boy Gregory Ziboroff condescendingly shakes hands with
little Pete Udodoff. Pete, a chubby youngster of twelve with bristling
hair, red cheeks, and a low forehead, dressed in a little grey suit,
bows and scrapes, and reaches into the cupboard for his books. The
lesson begins.
According to an agreement made with Udodoff, the father, Ziboroff is to
help Pete with his lessons for two hours each day, in return for which
he is to receive six roubles a month. He is preparing the boy for the
second grade of the high-school. He prepared him for the first grade
last year, but little Pete failed to pass his examinations.
“Very well,” begins Ziboroff lighting a cigarette. “You had the fourth
declension to study. Decline fructus!”
Peter begins to decline it.
“There, you haven’t studied again!” cries Ziboroff rising. “This is the
sixth time I have given you the fourth declension to learn, and you
can’t get it through your head! For heaven’s sake, when will you ever
begin to study your lessons?”
“What, you haven’t studied again?” exclaims a wheezing voice in the next
room and Pete’s papa, a retired civil servant, enters. “Why haven’t you
studied? Oh, you little donkey! Just think, Gregory, I had to thrash him
again yesterday!”
Sighing profoundly, Udodoff sits down beside his son and opens the boy’s
ragged grammar. Ziboroff begins examining Pete before his father,
thinking to himself: “I’ll just show that stupid father what a stupid
son he has!” The high-school boy is seized with the fury of the examiner
and is ready to beat the little red-cheeked numskull before him, he
hates and despises him so. He is even annoyed when the youngster hits on
the right answer to one of his questions. How odious this little Pete
seems to him!
“You don’t even know the second declension! You don’t even know the
first! This is the way you learn your lessons! Come, tell me, what is
the vocative of meus filius?”
“The vocative of meus filius? Why the vocative of meus filius is—it
is——”
Pete stares hard at the ceiling and moves his lips inaudibly. No answer
comes.
“What is the dative of dea?”
“Deabus—filiabus!” Pete bursts out.
Old Udodoff nods approvingly. The high-school boy, who was not expecting
a correct answer, feels annoyed.
“What other nouns have their dative in abus?” he asks.
It appears that anima, the soul, has its dative in abus, something that
is not to be found in any grammar.
“What a melodious language Latin is!” observes Udodoff.
“Alontron—bonus—anthropos—how marvellous! It is all very important!” he
concludes with a sigh.
“The old brute is interrupting the lesson,” thinks Ziboroff. “Sitting
over us like an inspector—I hate to be bossed! Now, then!” he cries to
Pete. “You must learn that same lesson over again for next time. Next
we’ll do some arithmetic. Fetch your slate! I want you to do this
problem.”
Pete spits on his slate and rubs it dry with his sleeve. His tutor picks
up the arithmetic and dictates the following problem to him.
“‘If a merchant buys 138 yards of cloth, some of which is black and some
blue, for 540 roubles, how many yards of each did he buy if the blue
cloth cost 5 roubles a yard and the black cloth 3?’ Repeat what I have
just said.”
Peter repeats the problem and instantly and silently begins to divide
540 by 138.
“What are you doing? Wait a moment! No, no, go ahead! Is there a
remainder? There ought not to be. Here, let me do it!”
Ziboroff divides 540 by 138, and finds that it goes three times and
something over. He quickly rubs out the sum.
“How queer!” he thinks, ruffling his hair and flushing. “How should it
be done? H’m—this is an indeterminate equation and not a sum in
arithmetic at all——”
The tutor looks in the back of the book and finds that the answer is 75
and 63.
“H’m—that’s queer. Ought I to add 5 and 3 and divide 540 by 8? Is that
right? No that’s not it. Come, do the sum!” he says to Pete.
“What’s the matter with you? That’s an easy problem!” cries Udodoff to
Peter. “What a goose you are, sonny! Do it for him, Mr. Ziboroff!”
Gregory takes the pencil and begins figuring. He hiccoughs and flushes
and pales.
“The fact is, this is an algebraical problem,” he says. “It ought to be
solved with _x_ and _y_. But it can be done in this way, too. Very well,
I divide this by this, do you understand? Now then, I subtract it from
this, see? Or, no, let me tell you, suppose you do this sum yourself for
to-morrow. Think it out alone!”
Pete smiles maliciously. Udodoff smiles, too. Both realize the tutor’s
perplexity. The high-school boy becomes still more violently
embarrassed, rises, and begins to walk up and down.
“That sum can be done without the help of algebra,” says Udodoff,
sighing and reaching for the counting board. “Look here!”
He rattles the counting board for a moment, and produces the answer 75
and 63, which is correct.
“That’s how we ignorant folks do it.”
The tutor falls a prey to the most unbearably painful sensations. He
looks at the clock with a sinking heart, and sees that it still lacks an
hour and a quarter to the end of the lesson. What an eternity that is!
“Now we will have some dictation,” he says.
After the dictation comes a lesson in geography; after that, Bible
study; after Bible study, Russian—there is so much to learn in this
world! At last the two hours’ lesson is over, Ziboroff reaches for his
cap, condescendingly shakes hands with little Pete, and takes his leave
of Udodoff.
“Could you let me have a little money to-day?” he asks timidly. “I must
pay my school bill to-morrow. You owe me for six months’ lessons.”
“Oh, do I really? Oh, yes, yes—” mutters Udodoff. “I would certainly let
you have the money with pleasure, but I’m sorry to say I haven’t any
just now. Perhaps in a week—or two.”
Ziboroff acquiesces, puts on his heavy goloshes, and goes out to give
his next lesson.