“Emotion has become a disease with you,” said Platon. “You seek your own

troubles, and make your own anxieties.”

“How can you say that when ready-made anxieties greet one at every

step?” exclaimed Vassili. “For example, have you heard of the trick

which Lienitsin has just played us--of his seizing the piece of vacant

land whither our peasants resort for their sports? That piece I would

not sell for all the money in the world. It has long been our peasants’

play-ground, and all the traditions of our village are bound up with it.

Moreover, for me, old custom is a sacred thing for which I would gladly

sacrifice everything else.”

“Lienitsin cannot have known of this, or he would not have seized the

land,” said Platon. “He is a newcomer, just arrived from St. Petersburg.

A few words of explanation ought to meet the case.”

“But he DOES know of what I have stated; he DOES know of it. Purposely

I sent him word to that affect, yet he has returned me the rudest of

answers.”

“Then go yourself and explain matters to him.”

“No, I will not do that; he has tried to carry off things with too high

a hand. But YOU can go if you like.”

“I would certainly go were it not that I scarcely like to interfere.

Also, I am a man whom he could easily hoodwink and outwit.”

“Would it help you if _I_ were to go?” put in Chichikov. “Pray enlighten

me as to the matter.”

Vassili glanced at the speaker, and thought to himself: “What a passion

the man has for travelling!”

“Yes, pray give me an idea of the kind of fellow,” repeated Chichikov,

“and also outline to me the affair.”

“I should be ashamed to trouble you with such an unpleasant commission,”

replied Vassili. “He is a man whom I take to be an utter rascal.

Originally a member of a family of plain dvoriane in this province, he

entered the Civil Service in St. Petersburg, then married some one’s

natural daughter in that city, and has returned to lord it with a high

hand. I cannot bear the tone he adopts. Our folk are by no means fools.

They do not look upon the current fashion as the Tsar’s ukaz any more

than they look upon St. Petersburg as the Church.”

“Naturally,” said Chichikov. “But tell me more of the particulars of the

quarrel.”

“They are these. He needs additional land and, had he not acted as he

has done, I would have given him some land elsewhere for nothing; but,

as it is, the pestilent fellow has taken it into his head to--”

“I think I had better go and have a talk with him. That might settle the

affair. Several times have people charged me with similar commissions,

and never have they repented of it. General Betristchev is an example.”

“Nevertheless I am ashamed that you should be put to the annoyance of

having to converse with such a fellow.”

[At this point there occurs a long hiatus.]

“And above all things, such a transaction would need to be carried

through in secret,” said Chichikov. “True, the law does not forbid such

things, but there is always the risk of a scandal.”

“Quite so, quite so,” said Lienitsin with head bent down.

“Then we agree!” exclaimed Chichikov. “How charming! As I say, my

business is both legal and illegal. Though needing to effect a mortgage,

I desire to put no one to the risk of having to pay the two roubles

on each living soul; wherefore I have conceived the idea of relieving

landowners of that distasteful obligation by acquiring dead and

absconded souls who have failed to disappear from the revision list.

This enables me at once to perform an act of Christian charity and

to remove from the shoulders of our more impoverished proprietors the

burden of tax-payment upon souls of the kind specified. Should you

yourself care to do business with me, we will draw up a formal purchase

agreement as though the souls in question were still alive.”

“But it would be such a curious arrangement,” muttered Lienitsin, moving

his chair and himself a little further away. “It would be an arrangement

which, er--er--”

“Would involve you in no scandal whatever, seeing that the affair

would be carried through in secret. Moreover, between friends who are

well-disposed towards one another--”

“Nevertheless--”

Chichikov adopted a firmer and more decided tone. “I repeat that there

would be no scandal,” he said. “The transaction would take place as

between good friends, and as between friends of mature age, and as

between friends of good status, and as between friends who know how

to keep their own counsel.” And, so saying, he looked his interlocutor

frankly and generously in the eyes.

Nevertheless Lienitsin’s resourcefulness and acumen in business matters

failed to relieve his mind of a certain perplexity--and the less so

since he had contrived to become caught in his own net. Yet, in general,

he possessed neither a love for nor a talent for underhand dealings,

and, had not fate and circumstances favoured Chichikov by causing

Lienitsin’s wife to enter the room at that moment, things might have

turned out very differently from what they did. Madame was a pale, thin,

insignificant-looking young lady, but none the less a lady who wore her

clothes a la St. Petersburg, and cultivated the society of persons who

were unimpeachably comme il faut. Behind her, borne in a nurse’s arms,

came the first fruits of the love of husband and wife. Adopting his

most telling method of approach (the method accompanied with a sidelong

inclination of the head and a sort of hop), Chichikov hastened to greet

the lady from the metropolis, and then the baby. At first the latter

started to bellow disapproval, but the words “Agoo, agoo, my pet!” added

to a little cracking of the fingers and a sight of a beautiful seal on a

watch chain, enabled Chichikov to weedle the infant into his arms; after

which he fell to swinging it up and down until he had contrived to raise

a smile on its face--a circumstance which greatly delighted the parents,

and finally inclined the father in his visitor’s favour. Suddenly,

however--whether from pleasure or from some other cause--the infant

misbehaved itself!

“My God!” cried Madame. “He has gone and spoilt your frockcoat!”

True enough, on glancing downwards, Chichikov saw that the sleeve of

his brand-new garment had indeed suffered a hurt. “If I could catch you

alone, you little devil,” he muttered to himself, “I’d shoot you!”

Host, hostess and nurse all ran for eau-de-Cologne, and from three sides

set themselves to rub the spot affected.

“Never mind, never mind; it is nothing,” said Chichikov as he strove to

communicate to his features as cheerful an expression as possible.

“What does it matter what a child may spoil during the golden age of its

infancy?”

To himself he remarked: “The little brute! Would it could be devoured by

wolves. It has made only too good a shot, the cussed young ragamuffin!”

How, after this--after the guest had shown such innocent affection for

the little one, and magnanimously paid for his so doing with a brand-new

suit--could the father remain obdurate? Nevertheless, to avoid setting a

bad example to the countryside, he and Chichikov agreed to carry through

the transaction PRIVATELY, lest, otherwise, a scandal should arise.

“In return,” said Chichikov, “would you mind doing me the following

favour? I desire to mediate in the matter of your difference with the

Brothers Platonov. I believe that you wish to acquire some additional

land? Is not that so?”

[Here there occurs a hiatus in the original.]

Everything in life fulfils its function, and Chichikov’s tour in search

of a fortune was carried out so successfully that not a little money

passed into his pockets. The system employed was a good one: he did not

steal, he merely used. And every one of us at times does the same: one

man with regard to Government timber, and another with regard to a sum

belonging to his employer, while a third defrauds his children for the

sake of an actress, and a fourth robs his peasantry for the sake of

smart furniture or a carriage. What can one do when one is surrounded

on every side with roguery, and everywhere there are insanely expensive

restaurants, masked balls, and dances to the music of gipsy bands? To

abstain when every one else is indulging in these things, and fashion

commands, is difficult indeed!

Chichikov was for setting forth again, but the roads had now got into a

bad state, and, in addition, there was in preparation a second fair--one

for the dvoriane only. The former fair had been held for the sale of

horses, cattle, cheese, and other peasant produce, and the buyers had

been merely cattle-jobbers and kulaks; but this time the function was

to be one for the sale of manorial produce which had been bought up by

wholesale dealers at Nizhni Novgorod, and then transferred hither. To

the fair, of course, came those ravishers of the Russian purse who, in

the shape of Frenchmen with pomades and Frenchwomen with hats, make away

with money earned by blood and hard work, and, like the locusts of Egypt

(to use Kostanzhoglo’s term) not only devour their prey, but also dig

holes in the ground and leave behind their eggs.

Although, unfortunately, the occurrence of a bad harvest retained many

landowners at their country houses, the local tchinovniks (whom the

failure of the harvest did NOT touch) proceeded to let themselves go--as

also, to their undoing, did their wives. The reading of books of the

type diffused, in these modern days, for the inoculation of humanity

with a craving for new and superior amenities of life had caused every

one to conceive a passion for experimenting with the latest luxury; and

to meet this want the French wine merchant opened a new establishment

in the shape of a restaurant as had never before been heard of in the

province--a restaurant where supper could be procured on credit as

regarded one-half, and for an unprecedentedly low sum as regarded the

other. This exactly suited both heads of boards and clerks who were

living in hope of being able some day to resume their bribes-taking from

suitors. There also developed a tendency to compete in the matter of

horses and liveried flunkeys; with the result that despite the damp and

snowy weather exceedingly elegant turnouts took to parading backwards

and forwards. Whence these equipages had come God only knows, but at

least they would not have disgraced St. Petersburg. From within them

merchants and attorneys doffed their caps to ladies, and inquired after

their health, and likewise it became a rare sight to see a bearded man

in a rough fur cap, since every one now went about clean-shaven and with

dirty teeth, after the European fashion.

“Sir, I beg of you to inspect my goods,” said a tradesman as Chichikov

was passing his establishment. “Within my doors you will find a large

variety of clothing.”

“Have you a cloth of bilberry-coloured check?” inquired the person

addressed.

“I have cloths of the finest kind,” replied the tradesman, raising his

cap with one hand, and pointing to his shop with the other. Chichikov

entered, and in a trice the proprietor had dived beneath the counter,

and appeared on the other side of it, with his back to his wares and his

face towards the customer. Leaning forward on the tips of his fingers,

and indicating his merchandise with just the suspicion of a nod, he

requested the gentleman to specify exactly the species of cloth which he

required.

“A cloth with an olive-coloured or a bottle-tinted spot in its

pattern--anything in the nature of bilberry,” explained Chichikov.

“That being so, sir, I may say that I am about to show you clothes of a

quality which even our illustrious capitals could not surpass. Hi, boy!

Reach down that roll up there--number 34. No, NOT that one, fool! Such

fellows as you are always too good for your job. There--hand it to me.

This is indeed a nice pattern!”

Unfolding the garment, the tradesman thrust it close to Chichikov’s nose

in order that he might not only handle, but also smell it.

“Excellent, but not what I want,” pronounced Chichikov. “Formerly I was

in the Custom’s Department, and therefore wear none but cloth of the

latest make. What I want is of a ruddier pattern than this--not exactly

a bottle-tinted pattern, but something approaching bilberry.”

“I understand, sir. Of course you require only the very newest thing. A

cloth of that kind I DO possess, sir, and though excessive in price, it

is of a quality to match.”

Carrying the roll of stuff to the light--even stepping into the street

for the purpose--the shopman unfolded his prize with the words, “A truly

beautiful shade! A cloth of smoked grey, shot with flame colour!”

The material met with the customer’s approval, a price was agreed upon,

and with incredible celerity the vendor made up the purchase into a

brown-paper parcel, and stowed it away in Chichikov’s koliaska.

At this moment a voice asked to be shown a black frockcoat.

“The devil take me if it isn’t Khlobuev!” muttered our hero, turning his

back upon the newcomer. Unfortunately the other had seen him.

“Come, come, Paul Ivanovitch!” he expostulated. “Surely you do not

intend to overlook me? I have been searching for you everywhere, for I

have something important to say to you.”

“My dear sir, my very dear sir,” said Chichikov as he pressed Khlobuev’s

hand, “I can assure you that, had I the necessary leisure, I should

at all times be charmed to converse with you.” And mentally he added:

“Would that the Evil One would fly away with you!”

Almost at the same time Murazov, the great landowner, entered the

shop. As he did so our hero hastened to exclaim: “Why, it is Athanasi

Vassilievitch! How ARE you, my very dear sir?”

“Well enough,” replied Murazov, removing his cap (Khlobuev and the

shopman had already done the same). “How, may I ask, are YOU?”

“But poorly,” replied Chichikov, “for of late I have been troubled with

indigestion, and my sleep is bad. I do not get sufficient exercise.”

However, instead of probing deeper into the subject of Chichikov’s

ailments, Murazov turned to Khlobuev.

“I saw you enter the shop,” he said, “and therefore followed you, for

I have something important for your ear. Could you spare me a minute or

two?”

“Certainly, certainly,” said Khlobuev, and the pair left the shop

together.

“I wonder what is afoot between them,” said Chichikov to himself.

“A wise and noble gentleman, Athanasi Vassilievitch!” remarked the

tradesman. Chichikov made no reply save a gesture.

“Paul Ivanovitch, I have been looking for you everywhere,” Lienitsin’s

voice said from behind him, while again the tradesman hastened to remove

his cap. “Pray come home with me, for I have something to say to you.”

Chichikov scanned the speaker’s face, but could make nothing of it.

Paying the tradesman for the cloth, he left the shop.

Meanwhile Murazov had conveyed Khlobuev to his rooms.

“Tell me,” he said to his guest, “exactly how your affairs stand. I take

it that, after all, your aunt left you something?”

“It would be difficult to say whether or not my affairs are improved,”

replied Khlobuev. “True, fifty souls and thirty thousand roubles came

to me from Madame Khanasarova, but I had to pay them away to satisfy my

debts. Consequently I am once more destitute. But the important point is

that there was trickery connected with the legacy, and shameful trickery

at that. Yes, though it may surprise you, it is a fact that that fellow

Chichikov--”

“Yes, Semen Semenovitch, but, before you go on to speak of Chichikov,

pray tell me something about yourself, and how much, in your opinion,

would be sufficient to clear you of your difficulties?”

“My difficulties are grievous,” replied Khlobuev. “To rid myself of

them, and also to have enough to go on with, I should need to acquire

at least a hundred thousand roubles, if not more. In short, things are

becoming impossible for me.”

“And, had you the money, what should you do with it?”

“I should rent a tenement, and devote myself to the education of my

children. Not a thought should I give to myself, for my career is over,

seeing that it is impossible for me to re-enter the Civil Service and I

am good for nothing else.”

“Nevertheless, when a man is leading an idle life he is apt to incur

temptations which shun his better-employed brother.”

“Yes, but beyond question I am good for nothing, so broken is my health,

and such a martyr I am to dyspepsia.”

“But how do you propose to live without working? How can a man like you

exist without a post or a position of any kind? Look around you at the

works of God. Everything has its proper function, and pursues its proper

course. Even a stone can be used for one purpose or another. How, then,

can it be right for a man who is a thinking being to remain a drone?”

“But I should not be a drone, for I should employ myself with the

education of my children.”

“No, Semen Semenovitch--no: THAT you would find the hardest task of

all. For how can a man educate his children who has never even educated

himself? Instruction can be imparted to children only through the medium

of example; and would a life like yours furnish them with a profitable

example--a life which has been spent in idleness and the playing of

cards? No, Semen Semenovitch. You had far better hand your children over

to me. Otherwise they will be ruined. Do not think that I am jesting.

Idleness has wrecked your life, and you must flee from it. Can a man

live with nothing to keep him in place? Even a journeyman labourer who

earns the barest pittance may take an interest in his occupation.”

“Athanasi Vassilievitch, I have tried to overcome myself, but what

further resource lies open to me? Can I who am old and incapable

re-enter the Civil Service and spend year after year at a desk with

youths who are just starting their careers? Moreover, I have lost the

trick of taking bribes; I should only hinder both myself and others;

while, as you know, it is a department which has an established caste

of its own. Therefore, though I have considered, and even attempted to

obtain, every conceivable post, I find myself incompetent for them all.

Only in a monastery should I--”

“Nay, nay. Monasteries, again, are only for those who have worked. To

those who have spent their youth in dissipation such havens say what

the ant said to the dragonfly--namely, ‘Go you away, and return to your

dancing.’ Yes, even in a monastery do folk toil and toil--they do

not sit playing whist.” Murazov looked at Khlobuev, and added: “Semen

Semenovitch, you are deceiving both yourself and me.”

Poor Khlobuev could not utter a word in reply, and Murazov began to feel

sorry for him.

“Listen, Semen Semenovitch,” he went on. “I know that you say your

prayers, and that you go to church, and that you observe both Matins and

Vespers, and that, though averse to early rising, you leave your bed at

four o’clock in the morning before the household fires have been lit.”

“Ah, Athanasi Vassilievitch,” said Khlobuev, “that is another matter

altogether. That I do, not for man’s sake, but for the sake of Him who

has ordered all things here on earth. Yes, I believe that He at least

can feel compassion for me, that He at least, though I be foul and

lowly, will pardon me and receive me when all men have cast me out, and

my best friend has betrayed me and boasted that he has done it for a

good end.”

Khlobuev’s face was glowing with emotion, and from the older man’s eyes

also a tear had started.

“You will do well to hearken unto Him who is merciful,” he said. “But

remember also that, in the eyes of the All-Merciful, honest toil is of

equal merit with a prayer. Therefore take unto yourself whatsoever task

you may, and do it as though you were doing it, not unto man, but unto

God. Even though to your lot there should fall but the cleaning of a

floor, clean that floor as though it were being cleaned for Him alone.

And thence at least this good you will reap: that there will remain to

you no time for what is evil--for card playing, for feasting, for all

the life of this gay world. Are you acquainted with Ivan Potapitch?”

“Yes, not only am I acquainted with him, but I also greatly respect

him.”

“Time was when Ivan Potapitch was a merchant worth half a million

roubles. In everything did he look but for gain, and his affairs

prospered exceedingly, so much so that he was able to send his son to be

educated in France, and to marry his daughter to a General. And whether

in his office or at the Exchange, he would stop any friend whom he

encountered and carry him off to a tavern to drink, and spend whole days

thus employed. But at last he became bankrupt, and God sent him other

misfortunes also. His son! Ah, well! Ivan Potapitch is now my steward,

for he had to begin life over again. Yet once more his affairs are in

order, and, had it been his wish, he could have restarted in business

with a capital of half a million roubles. ‘But no,’ he said. ‘A

steward am I, and a steward will I remain to the end; for, from being

full-stomached and heavy with dropsy, I have become strong and well.’

Not a drop of liquor passes his lips, but only cabbage soup and gruel.

And he prays as none of the rest of us pray, and he helps the poor as

none of the rest of us help them; and to this he would add yet further

charity if his means permitted him to do so.”

Poor Khlobuev remained silent, as before.

The elder man took his two hands in his.

“Semen Semenovitch,” he said, “you cannot think how much I pity you, or

how much I have had you in my thoughts. Listen to me. In the monastery

there is a recluse who never looks upon a human face. Of all men whom

I know he has the broadest mind, and he breaks not his silence save to

give advice. To him I went and said that I had a friend (though I

did not actually mention your name) who was in great trouble of soul.

Suddenly the recluse interrupted me with the words: ‘God’s work first,

and our own last. There is need for a church to be built, but no money

wherewith to build it. Money must be collected to that end.’ Then he

shut to the wicket. I wondered to myself what this could mean, and

concluded that the recluse had been unwilling to accord me his counsel.

Next I repaired to the Archimandrite, and had scarce reached his door

when he inquired of me whether I could commend to him a man meet to be

entrusted with the collection of alms for a church--a man who should

belong to the dvoriane or to the more lettered merchants, but who would

guard the trust as he would guard the salvation of his soul. On the

instant thought I to myself: ‘Why should not the Holy Father appoint

my friend Semen Semenovitch? For the way of suffering would benefit him

greatly; and as he passed with his ledger from landowner to peasant,

and from peasant to townsman, he would learn where folk dwell, and who

stands in need of aught, and thus would become better acquainted with

the countryside than folk who dwell in cities. And, thus become, he

would find that his services were always in demand.’ Only of late did

the Governor-General say to me that, could he but be furnished with the

name of a secretary who should know his work not only by the book but

also by experience, he would give him a great sum, since nothing is to

be learned by the former means, and, through it, much confusion arises.”

“You confound me, you overwhelm me!” said Khlobuev, staring at his

companion in open-eyed astonishment. “I can scarcely believe that your

words are true, seeing that for such a trust an active, indefatigable

man would be necessary. Moreover, how could I leave my wife and children

unprovided for?”

“Have no fear,” said Murazov, “I myself will take them under my care, as

well as procure for the children a tutor. Far better and nobler were

it for you to be travelling with a wallet, and asking alms on behalf

of God, then to be remaining here and asking alms for yourself alone.

Likewise, I will furnish you with a tilt-waggon, so that you may be

saved some of the hardships of the journey, and thus be preserved in

good health. Also, I will give you some money for the journey, in

order that, as you pass on your way, you may give to those who stand

in greater need than their fellows. Thus, if, before giving, you assure

yourself that the recipient of the alms is worthy of the same, you will

do much good; and as you travel you will become acquainted with all men

and sundry, and they will treat you, not as a tchinovnik to be feared,

but as one to whom, as a petitioner on behalf of the Church, they may

unloose their tongues without peril.”

“I feel that the scheme is a splendid one, and would gladly bear my part

in it were it not likely to exceed my strength.”

“What is there that does NOT exceed your strength?” said Murazov.

“Nothing is wholly proportionate to it--everything surpasses it. Help

from above is necessary: otherwise we are all powerless. Strength comes

of prayer, and of prayer alone. When a man crosses himself, and cries,

‘Lord, have mercy upon me!’ he soon stems the current and wins to the

shore. Nor need you take any prolonged thought concerning this matter.

All that you need do is to accept it as a commission sent of God. The

tilt-waggon can be prepared for you immediately; and then, as soon as

you have been to the Archimandrite for your book of accounts and his

blessing, you will be free to start on your journey.”

“I submit myself to you, and accept the commission as a divine trust.”

And even as Khlobuev spoke he felt renewed vigour and confidence arise

in his soul, and his mind begin to awake to a sense of hopefulness of

eventually being able to put to flight his troubles. And even as it was,

the world seemed to be growing dim to his eyes....

Meanwhile, plea after plea had been presented to the legal authorities,

and daily were relatives whom no one had before heard of putting in

an appearance. Yes, like vultures to a corpse did these good folk come

flocking to the immense property which Madam Khanasarov had left behind

her. Everywhere were heard rumours against Chichikov, rumours with

regard to the validity of the second will, rumours with regard to will

number one, and rumours of larceny and concealment of funds. Also, there

came to hand information with regard both to Chichikov’s purchase of

dead souls and to his conniving at contraband goods during his service

in the Customs Department. In short, every possible item of evidence

was exhumed, and the whole of his previous history investigated. How

the authorities had come to suspect and to ascertain all this God only

knows, but the fact remains that there had fallen into the hands of

those authorities information concerning matters of which Chichikov had

believed only himself and the four walls to be aware. True, for a

time these matters remained within the cognisance of none but the

functionaries concerned, and failed to reach Chichikov’s ears; but at

length a letter from a confidential friend gave him reason to think that

the fat was about to fall into the fire. Said the letter briefly: “Dear

sir, I beg to advise you that possibly legal trouble is pending, but

that you have no cause for uneasiness, seeing that everything will

be attended to by yours very truly.” Yet, in spite of its tenor, the

epistle reassured its recipient. “What a genius the fellow is!” thought

Chichikov to himself. Next, to complete his satisfaction, his tailor

arrived with the new suit which he had ordered. Not without a certain

sense of pride did our hero inspect the frockcoat of smoked grey shot

with flame colour and look at it from every point of view, and then

try on the breeches--the latter fitting him like a picture, and quite

concealing any deficiencies in the matter of his thighs and calves

(though, when buckled behind, they left his stomach projecting like a

drum). True, the customer remarked that there appeared to be a slight

tightness under the right armpit, but the smiling tailor only rejoined

that that would cause the waist to fit all the better. “Sir,” he said

triumphantly, “you may rest assured that the work has been executed

exactly as it ought to have been executed. No one, except in St.

Petersburg, could have done it better.” As a matter of fact, the tailor

himself hailed from St. Petersburg, but called himself on his signboard

“Foreign Costumier from London and Paris”--the truth being that by

the use of a double-barrelled flourish of cities superior to mere

“Karlsruhe” and “Copenhagen” he designed to acquire business and cut out

his local rivals.

Chichikov graciously settled the man’s account, and, as soon as he had

gone, paraded at leisure, and con amore, and after the manner of an

artist of aesthetic taste, before the mirror. Somehow he seemed to look

better than ever in the suit, for his cheeks had now taken on a still

more interesting air, and his chin an added seductiveness, while his

white collar lent tone to his neck, the blue satin tie heightened the

effect of the collar, the fashionable dickey set off the tie,

the rich satin waistcoat emphasised the dickey, and the

smoked-grey-shot-with-flame-colour frockcoat, shining like silk,

splendidly rounded off the whole. When he turned to the right he looked

well: when he turned to the left he looked even better. In short, it

was a costume worthy of a Lord Chamberlain or the species of dandy who

shrinks from swearing in the Russian language, but amply relieves his

feelings in the language of France. Next, inclining his head slightly

to one side, our hero endeavoured to pose as though he were addressing

a middle-aged lady of exquisite refinement; and the result of these

efforts was a picture which any artist might have yearned to portray.

Next, his delight led him gracefully to execute a hop in ballet fashion,

so that the wardrobe trembled and a bottle of eau-de-Cologne came

crashing to the floor. Yet even this contretemps did not upset him; he

merely called the offending bottle a fool, and then debated whom first

he should visit in his attractive guise.

Suddenly there resounded through the hall a clatter of spurred heels,

and then the voice of a gendarme saying: “You are commanded to present

yourself before the Governor-General!” Turning round, Chichikov stared

in horror at the spectacle presented; for in the doorway there was

standing an apparition wearing a huge moustache, a helmet surmounted

with a horsehair plume, a pair of crossed shoulder-belts, and a gigantic

sword! A whole army might have been combined into a single individual!

And when Chichikov opened his mouth to speak the apparition repeated,

“You are commanded to present yourself before the Governor-General,”

and at the same moment our hero caught sight both of a second apparition

outside the door and of a coach waiting beneath the window. What was

to be done? Nothing whatever was possible. Just as he stood--in his

smoked-grey-shot-with-flame-colour suit--he had then and there to enter

the vehicle, and, shaking in every limb, and with a gendarme seated by

his side, to start for the residence of the Governor-General.

And even in the hall of that establishment no time was given him to

pull himself together, for at once an aide-de-camp said: “Go inside

immediately, for the Prince is awaiting you.” And as in a dream did our

hero see a vestibule where couriers were being handed dispatches, and

then a salon which he crossed with the thought, “I suppose I am not to

be allowed a trial, but shall be sent straight to Siberia!” And at the

thought his heart started beating in a manner which the most jealous

of lovers could not have rivalled. At length there opened a door,

and before him he saw a study full of portfolios, ledgers, and

dispatch-boxes, with, standing behind them, the gravely menacing figure

of the Prince.

“There stands my executioner,” thought Chichikov to himself. “He is

about to tear me to pieces as a wolf tears a lamb.”

Indeed, the Prince’s lips were simply quivering with rage.

“Once before did I spare you,” he said, “and allow you to remain in the

town when you ought to have been in prison: yet your only return for

my clemency has been to revert to a career of fraud--and of fraud as

dishonourable as ever a man engaged in.”

“To what dishonourable fraud do you refer, your Highness?” asked

Chichikov, trembling from head to foot.

The Prince approached, and looked him straight in the eyes.

“Let me tell you,” he said, “that the woman whom you induced to witness

a certain will has been arrested, and that you will be confronted with

her.”

The world seemed suddenly to grow dim before Chichikov’s sight.

“Your Highness,” he gasped, “I will tell you the whole truth, and

nothing but the truth. I am guilty--yes, I am guilty; but I am not so

guilty as you think, for I was led away by rascals.”

“That any one can have led you away is impossible,” retorted the Prince.

“Recorded against your name there stand more felonies than even the most

hardened liar could have invented. I believe that never in your life

have you done a deed not innately dishonourable--that not a kopeck have

you ever obtained by aught but shameful methods of trickery and theft,

the penalty for which is Siberia and the knut. But enough of this! From

this room you will be conveyed to prison, where, with other rogues and

thieves, you will be confined until your trial may come on. And this

is lenient treatment on my part, for you are worse, far worse, than the

felons who will be your companions. THEY are but poor men in smocks and

sheepskins, whereas YOU--” Without concluding his words, the Prince shot

a glance at Chichikov’s smoked-grey-shot-with-flame-colour apparel.

Then he touched a bell.

“Your Highness,” cried Chichikov, “have mercy upon me! You are the

father of a family! Spare me for the sake of my aged mother!”

“Rubbish!” exclaimed the Prince. “Even as before you besought me for the

sake of a wife and children whom you did not even possess, so now you

would speak to me of an aged mother!”

“Your Highness,” protested Chichikov, “though I am a wretch and the

lowest of rascals, and though it is true that I lied when I told

you that I possessed a wife and children, I swear that, as God is my

witness, it has always been my DESIRE to possess a wife, and to fulfil

all the duties of a man and a citizen, and to earn the respect of my

fellows and the authorities. But what could be done against the force

of circumstances? By hook or by crook I have ever been forced to win

a living, though confronted at every step by wiles and temptations and

traitorous enemies and despoilers. So much has this been so that my

life has, throughout, resembled a barque tossed by tempestuous waves,

a barque driven at the mercy of the winds. Ah, I am only a man, your

Highness!”

And in a moment the tears had gushed in torrents from his eyes, and he

had fallen forward at the Prince’s feet--fallen forward just as he

was, in his smoked-grey-shot-with-flame-colour frockcoat, his velvet

waistcoat, his satin tie, and his exquisitely fitting breeches, while

from his neatly brushed pate, as again and again he struck his hand

against his forehead, there came an odorous whiff of best-quality

eau-de-Cologne.

“Away with him!” exclaimed the Prince to the gendarme who had just

entered. “Summon the escort to remove him.”

“Your Highness!” Chichikov cried again as he clasped the Prince’s knees;

but, shuddering all over, and struggling to free himself, the Prince

repeated his order for the prisoner’s removal.

“Your Highness, I say that I will not leave this room until you have

accorded me mercy!” cried Chichikov as he clung to the Prince’s leg with

such tenacity that, frockcoat and all, he began to be dragged along the

floor.

“Away with him, I say!” once more the Prince exclaimed with the sort of

indefinable aversion which one feels at the sight of a repulsive

insect which he cannot summon up the courage to crush with his boot. So

convulsively did the Prince shudder that Chichikov, clinging to his leg,

received a kick on the nose. Yet still the prisoner retained his hold;

until at length a couple of burly gendarmes tore him away and,

grasping his arms, hurried him--pale, dishevelled, and in that strange,

half-conscious condition into which a man sinks when he sees before

him only the dark, terrible figure of death, the phantom which is so

abhorrent to all our natures--from the building. But on the threshold

the party came face to face with Murazov, and in Chichikov’s heart

the circumstance revived a ray of hope. Wresting himself with almost

supernatural strength from the grasp of the escorting gendarmes, he

threw himself at the feet of the horror-stricken old man.

“Paul Ivanovitch,” Murazov exclaimed, “what has happened to you?”

“Save me!” gasped Chichikov. “They are taking me away to prison and

death!”

Yet almost as he spoke the gendarmes seized him again, and hurried him

away so swiftly that Murazov’s reply escaped his ears.

A damp, mouldy cell which reeked of soldiers’ boots and leggings, an

unvarnished table, two sorry chairs, a window closed with a grating, a

crazy stove which, while letting the smoke emerge through its cracks,

gave out no heat--such was the den to which the man who had just begun

to taste the sweets of life, and to attract the attention of his fellows

with his new suit of smoked-grey-shot-with-flame-colour, now found

himself consigned. Not even necessaries had he been allowed to bring

away with him, nor his dispatch-box which contained all his booty. No,

with the indenture deeds of the dead souls, it was lodged in the hands

of a tchinovnik; and as he thought of these things Chichikov rolled

about the floor, and felt the cankerous worm of remorse seize upon and

gnaw at his heart, and bite its way ever further and further into that

heart so defenceless against its ravages, until he made up his mind

that, should he have to suffer another twenty-four hours of this misery,

there would no longer be a Chichikov in the world. Yet over him, as over

every one, there hung poised the All-Saving Hand; and, an hour after his

arrival at the prison, the doors of the gaol opened to admit Murazov.

Compared with poor Chichikov’s sense of relief when the old man entered

his cell, even the pleasure experienced by a thirsty, dusty traveller

when he is given a drink of clear spring water to cool his dry, parched

throat fades into insignificance.

“Ah, my deliverer!” he cried as he rose from the floor, where he had

been grovelling in heartrending paroxysms of grief. Seizing the old

man’s hand, he kissed it and pressed it to his bosom. Then, bursting

into tears, he added: “God Himself will reward you for having come to

visit an unfortunate wretch!”

Murazov looked at him sorrowfully, and said no more than “Ah, Paul

Ivanovitch, Paul Ivanovitch! What has happened?”

“What has happened?” cried Chichikov. “I have been ruined by an accursed

woman. That was because I could not do things in moderation--I was

powerless to stop myself in time, Satan tempted me, and drove me from

my senses, and bereft me of human prudence. Yes, truly I have sinned, I

have sinned! Yet how came I so to sin? To think that a dvorianin--yes,

a dvorianin--should be thrown into prison without process or trial! I

repeat, a dvorianin! Why was I not given time to go home and collect my

effects? Whereas now they are left with no one to look after them! My

dispatch-box, my dispatch-box! It contained my whole property, all that

my heart’s blood and years of toil and want have been needed to acquire.

And now everything will be stolen, Athanasi Vassilievitch--everything

will be taken from me! My God!”

And, unable to stand against the torrent of grief which came rushing

over his heart once more, he sobbed aloud in tones which penetrated even

the thickness of the prison walls, and made dull echoes awake behind

them. Then, tearing off his satin tie, and seizing by the collar, the

smoked-grey-shot-with-flame-colour frockcoat, he stripped the latter

from his shoulders.

“Ah, Paul Ivanovitch,” said the old man, “how even now the property

which you have acquired is blinding your eyes, and causing you to fail

to realise your terrible position!”

“Yes, my good friend and benefactor,” wailed poor Chichikov

despairingly, and clasping Murazov by the knees. “Yet save me if you

can! The Prince is fond of you, and would do anything for your sake.”

“No, Paul Ivanovitch; however much I might wish to save you, and however

much I might try to do so, I could not help you as you desire; for it is

to the power of an inexorable law, and not to the authority of any one

man, that you have rendered yourself subject.”

“Satan tempted me, and has ended by making of me an outcast from the

human race!” Chichikov beat his head against the wall and struck the

table with his fist until the blood spurted from his hand. Yet neither

his head nor his hand seemed to be conscious of the least pain.

“Calm yourself, Paul Ivanovitch,” said Murazov. “Calm yourself, and

consider how best you can make your peace with God. Think of your

miserable soul, and not of the judgment of man.”

“I will, Athanasi Vassilievitch, I will. But what a fate is mine! Did

ever such a fate befall a man? To think of all the patience with which

I have gathered my kopecks, of all the toil and trouble which I have

endured! Yet what I have done has not been done with the intention of

robbing any one, nor of cheating the Treasury. Why, then, did I gather

those kopecks? I gathered them to the end that one day I might be able

to live in plenty, and also to have something to leave to the wife

and children whom, for the benefit and welfare of my country, I hoped

eventually to win and maintain. That was why I gathered those kopecks.

True, I worked by devious methods--that I fully admit; but what else

could I do? And even devious methods I employed only when I saw that the

straight road would not serve my purpose so well as a crooked. Moreover,

as I toiled, the appetite for those methods grew upon me. Yet what

I took I took only from the rich; whereas villains exist who, while

drawing thousands a year from the Treasury, despoil the poor, and take

from the man with nothing even that which he has. Is it not the cruelty

of fate, therefore, that, just when I was beginning to reap the harvest

of my toil--to touch it, so to speak, with the tip of one finger--there

should have arisen a sudden storm which has sent my barque to pieces on

a rock? My capital had nearly reached the sum of three hundred thousand

roubles, and a three-storied house was as good as mine, and twice over

I could have bought a country estate. Why, then, should such a tempest

have burst upon me? Why should I have sustained such a blow? Was not my

life already like a barque tossed to and fro by the billows? Where

is Heaven’s justice--where is the reward for all my patience, for my

boundless perseverance? Three times did I have to begin life afresh, and

each time that I lost my all I began with a single kopeck at a moment

when other men would have given themselves up to despair and drink. How

much did I not have to overcome. How much did I not have to bear! Every

kopeck which I gained I had to make with my whole strength; for though,

to others, wealth may come easily, every coin of mine had to be ‘forged

with a nail worth three kopecks’ as the proverb has it. With such a

nail--with the nail of an iron, unwearying perseverance--did _I_ forge

my kopecks.”

Convulsively sobbing with a grief which he could not repress, Chichikov

sank upon a chair, tore from his shoulders the last ragged, trailing

remnants of his frockcoat, and hurled them from him. Then, thrusting his

fingers into the hair which he had once been so careful to preserve, he

pulled it out by handfuls at a time, as though he hoped through physical

pain to deaden the mental agony which he was suffering.

Meanwhile Murazov sat gazing in silence at the unwonted spectacle of

a man who had lately been mincing with the gait of a worldling or a

military fop now writhing in dishevelment and despair as he poured out

upon the hostile forces by which human ingenuity so often finds itself

outwitted a flood of invective.

“Paul Ivanovitch, Paul Ivanovitch,” at length said Murazov, “what

could not each of us rise to be did we but devote to good ends the same

measure of energy and of patience which we bestow upon unworthy objects!

How much good would not you yourself have effected! Yet I do not grieve

so much for the fact that you have sinned against your fellow as I

grieve for the fact that you have sinned against yourself and the rich

store of gifts and opportunities which has been committed to your care.

Though originally destined to rise, you have wandered from the path and

fallen.”

“Ah, Athanasi Vassilievitch,” cried poor Chichikov, clasping his friend’s

hands, “I swear to you that, if you would but restore me my freedom, and

recover for me my lost property, I would lead a different life from this

time forth. Save me, you who alone can work my deliverance! Save me!”

“How can I do that? So to do I should need to procure the setting aside

of a law. Again, even if I were to make the attempt, the Prince is a

strict administrator, and would refuse on any consideration to release

you.”

“Yes, but for you all things are possible. It is not the law that

troubles me: with that I could find a means to deal. It is the fact that

for no offence at all I have been cast into prison, and treated like

a dog, and deprived of my papers and dispatch-box and all my property.

Save me if you can.”

Again clasping the old man’s knees, he bedewed them with his tears.

“Paul Ivanovitch,” said Murazov, shaking his head, “how that property

of yours still seals your eyes and ears, so that you cannot so much as

listen to the promptings of your own soul!”

“Ah, I will think of my soul, too, if only you will save me.”

“Paul Ivanovitch,” the old man began again, and then stopped. For a

little while there was a pause.

“Paul Ivanovitch,” at length he went on, “to save you does not lie

within my power. Surely you yourself see that? But, so far as I can,

I will endeavour to, at all events, lighten your lot and procure your

eventual release. Whether or not I shall succeed I do not know; but I

will make the attempt. And should I, contrary to my expectations, prove

successful, I beg of you, in return for these my efforts, to renounce

all thought of benefit from the property which you have acquired.

Sincerely do I assure you that, were I myself to be deprived of my

property (and my property greatly exceeds yours in magnitude), I should

not shed a single tear. It is not the property of which men can deprive

us that matters, but the property of which no one on earth can deprive

or despoil us. You are a man who has seen something of life--to use

your own words, you have been a barque tossed hither and thither by

tempestuous waves: yet still will there be left to you a remnant of

substance on which to live, and therefore I beseech you to settle down

in some quiet nook where there is a church, and where none but plain,

good-hearted folk abide. Or, should you feel a yearning to leave behind

you posterity, take in marriage a good woman who shall bring you,

not money, but an aptitude for simple, modest domestic life. But

this life--the life of turmoil, with its longings and its

temptations--forget, and let it forget YOU; for there is no peace in

it. See for yourself how, at every step, it brings one but hatred and

treachery and deceit.”

“Indeed, yes!” agreed the repentant Chichikov. “Gladly will I do as you

wish, since for many a day past have I been longing to amend my life,

and to engage in husbandry, and to reorder my affairs. A demon, the

tempter Satan himself, has beguiled me and led me from the right path.”

Suddenly there had recurred to Chichikov long-unknown, long-unfamiliar

feelings. Something seemed to be striving to come to life again in

him--something dim and remote, something which had been crushed out of

his boyhood by the dreary, deadening education of his youthful days, by

his desolate home, by his subsequent lack of family ties, by the poverty

and niggardliness of his early impressions, by the grim eye of fate--an

eye which had always seemed to be regarding him as through a misty,

mournful, frost-encrusted window-pane, and to be mocking at his

struggles for freedom. And as these feelings came back to the penitent

a groan burst from his lips, and, covering his face with his hands, he

moaned: “It is all true, it is all true!”

“Of little avail are knowledge of the world and experience of men unless

based upon a secure foundation,” observed Murazov. “Though you have

fallen, Paul Ivanovitch, awake to better things, for as yet there is

time.”

“No, no!” groaned Chichikov in a voice which made Murazov’s heart bleed.

“It is too late, too late. More and more is the conviction gaining upon

me that I am powerless, that I have strayed too far ever to be able to

do as you bid me. The fact that I have become what I am is due to my

early schooling; for, though my father taught me moral lessons, and beat

me, and set me to copy maxims into a book, he himself stole land from

his neighbours, and forced me to help him. I have even known him to

bring an unjust suit, and defraud the orphan whose guardian he was!

Consequently I know and feel that, though my life has been different

from his, I do not hate roguery as I ought to hate it, and that my

nature is coarse, and that in me there is no real love for what is good,

no real spark of that beautiful instinct for well-doing which becomes

a second nature, a settled habit. Also, never do I yearn to strive for

what is right as I yearn to acquire property. This is no more than the

truth. What else could I do but confess it?”

The old man sighed.

“Paul Ivanovitch,” he said, “I know that you possess will-power, and

that you possess also perseverance. A medicine may be bitter, yet the

patient will gladly take it when assured that only by its means can he

recover. Therefore, if it really be that you have no genuine love for

doing good, do good by FORCING yourself to do so. Thus you will benefit

yourself even more than you will benefit him for whose sake the act

is performed. Only force yourself to do good just once and again, and,

behold, you will suddenly conceive the TRUE love for well-doing. That

is so, believe me. ‘A kingdom is to be won only by striving,’ says the

proverb. That is to say, things are to be attained only by putting forth

one’s whole strength, since nothing short of one’s whole strength will

bring one to the desired goal. Paul Ivanovitch, within you there is a

source of strength denied to many another man. I refer to the strength

of an iron perseverance. Cannot THAT help you to overcome? Most men are

weak and lack will-power, whereas I believe that you possess the power

to act a hero’s part.”

Sinking deep into Chichikov’s heart, these words would seem to have

aroused in it a faint stirring of ambition, so much so that, if it was

not fortitude which shone in his eyes, at all events it was something

virile, and of much the same nature.

“Athanasi Vassilievitch,” he said firmly, “if you will but petition

for my release, as well as for permission for me to leave here with a

portion of my property, I swear to you on my word of honour that I will

begin a new life, and buy a country estate, and become the head of a

household, and save money, not for myself, but for others, and do good

everywhere, and to the best of my ability, and forget alike myself and

the feasting and debauchery of town life, and lead, instead, a plain,

sober existence.”

“In that resolve may God strengthen you!” cried the old man with

unbounded joy. “And I, for my part, will do my utmost to procure

your release. And though God alone knows whether my efforts will be

successful, at all events I hope to bring about a mitigation of your

sentence. Come, let me embrace you! How you have filled my heart with

gladness! With God’s help, I will now go to the Prince.”

And the next moment Chichikov found himself alone. His whole nature felt

shaken and softened, even as, when the bellows have fanned the furnace

to a sufficient heat, a plate compounded even of the hardest and most

fire-resisting metal dissolves, glows, and turns to the liquefied state.

“I myself can feel but little,” he reflected, “but I intend to use my

every faculty to help others to feel. I myself am but bad and worthless,

but I intend to do my utmost to set others on the right road. I myself

am but an indifferent Christian, but I intend to strive never to yield

to temptation, but to work hard, and to till my land with the sweat of

my brow, and to engage only in honourable pursuits, and to influence my

fellows in the same direction. For, after all, am I so very useless?

At least I could maintain a household, for I am frugal and active and

intelligent and steadfast. The only thing is to make up my mind to it.”

Thus Chichikov pondered; and as he did so his half-awakened energies of

soul touched upon something. That is to say, dimly his instinct

divined that every man has a duty to perform, and that that duty may

be performed here, there, and everywhere, and no matter what the

circumstances and the emotions and the difficulties which compass a man

about. And with such clearness did Chichikov mentally picture to himself

the life of grateful toil which lies removed from the bustle of towns

and the temptations which man, forgetful of the obligation of labour,

has invented to beguile an hour of idleness that almost our hero forgot

his unpleasant position, and even felt ready to thank Providence for

the calamity which had befallen him, provided that it should end in his

being released, and in his receiving back a portion of his property.

Presently the massive door of the cell opened to admit a tchinovnik

named Samosvitov, a robust, sensual individual who was reputed by his

comrades to be something of a rake. Had he served in the army, he

would have done wonders, for he would have stormed any point, however

dangerous and inaccessible, and captured cannon under the very noses

of the foe; but, as it was, the lack of a more warlike field for his

energies caused him to devote the latter principally to dissipation.

Nevertheless he enjoyed great popularity, for he was loyal to the point

that, once his word had been given, nothing would ever make him break

it. At the same time, some reason or another led him to regard his

superiors in the light of a hostile battery which, come what might, he

must breach at any weak or unguarded spot or gap which might be capable

of being utilised for the purpose.

“We have all heard of your plight,” he began as soon as the door had

been safely closed behind him. “Yes, every one has heard of it. But

never mind. Things will yet come right. We will do our very best for

you, and act as your humble servants in everything. Thirty thousand

roubles is our price--no more.”

“Indeed?” said Chichikov. “And, for that, shall I be completely

exonerated?”

“Yes, completely, and also given some compensation for your loss of

time.”

“And how much am I to pay in return, you say?”

“Thirty thousand roubles, to be divided among ourselves, the

Governor-General’s staff, and the Governor-General’s secretary.”

“But how is even that to be managed, for all my effects, including my

dispatch-box, will have been sealed up and taken away for examination?”

“In an hour’s time they will be within your hands again,” said

Samosvitov. “Shall we shake hands over the bargain?”

Chichikov did so with a beating heart, for he could scarcely believe his

ears.

“For the present, then, farewell,” concluded Samosvitov. “I have

instructed a certain mutual friend that the important points are silence

and presence of mind.”

“Hm!” thought Chichikov. “It is to my lawyer that he is referring.”

Even when Samosvitov had departed the prisoner found it difficult to

credit all that had been said. Yet not an hour had elapsed before a

messenger arrived with his dispatch-box and the papers and money therein

practically undisturbed and intact! Later it came out that Samosvitov

had assumed complete authority in the matter. First, he had rebuked the

gendarmes guarding Chichikov’s effects for lack of vigilance, and then

sent word to the Superintendent that additional men were required for

the purpose; after which he had taken the dispatch-box into his own

charge, removed from it every paper which could possibly compromise

Chichikov, sealed up the rest in a packet, and ordered a gendarme to

convey the whole to their owner on the pretence of forwarding him sundry

garments necessary for the night. In the result Chichikov received not

only his papers, but also some warm clothing for his hypersensitive

limbs. Such a swift recovery of his treasures delighted him beyond

expression, and, gathering new hope, he began once more to dream of such

allurements as theatre-going and the ballet girl after whom he had for

some time past been dangling. Gradually did the country estate and the

simple life begin to recede into the distance: gradually did the town

house and the life of gaiety begin to loom larger and larger in the

foreground. Oh, life, life!

Meanwhile in Government offices and chancellories there had been set

on foot a boundless volume of work. Clerical pens slaved, and brains

skilled in legal casus toiled; for each official had the artist’s liking

for the curved line in preference to the straight. And all the while,

like a hidden magician, Chichikov’s lawyer imparted driving power to

that machine which caught up a man into its mechanism before he could

even look round. And the complexity of it increased and increased, for

Samosvitov surpassed himself in importance and daring. On learning

of the place of confinement of the woman who had been arrested, he

presented himself at the doors, and passed so well for a smart young

officer of gendarmery that the sentry saluted and sprang to attention.

“Have you been on duty long?” asked Samosvitov.

“Since this morning, your Excellency.”

“And shall you soon be relieved?”

“In three hours from now, your Excellency.”

“Presently I shall want you, so I will instruct your officer to have you

relieved at once.”

“Very good, your Excellency.”

Hastening home, thereafter, at top speed, and donning the uniform of

a gendarme, with a false moustache and a pair of false whiskers--an

ensemble in which the devil himself would not have known him, Samosvitov

then made for the gaol where Chichikov was confined, and, en route,

impressed into the service the first street woman whom he encountered,

and handed her over to the care of two young fellows of like sort

with himself. The next step was to hurry back to the prison where the

original woman had been interned, and there to intimate to the sentry

that he, Samosvitov (with whiskers and rifle complete), had been sent

to relieve the said sentry at his post--a proceeding which, of course,

enabled the newly-arrived relief to ensure, while performing his

self-assumed turn of duty, that for the woman lying under arrest there

should be substituted the woman recently recruited to the plot, and that

the former should then be conveyed to a place of concealment where she

was highly unlikely to be discovered.

Meanwhile, Samosvitov’s feats in the military sphere were being rivalled

by the wonders worked by Chichikov’s lawyer in the civilian field of

action. As a first step, the lawyer caused it to be intimated to the

local Governor that the Public Prosecutor was engaged in drawing up a

report to his, the local Governor’s, detriment; whereafter the lawyer

caused it to be intimated also to the Chief of Gendarmery that a certain

confidential official was engaged in doing the same by HIM; whereafter,

again, the lawyer confided to the confidential official in question

that, owing to the documentary exertions of an official of a still

more confidential nature than the first, he (the confidential official

first-mentioned) was in a fair way to find himself in the same boat as

both the local Governor and the Chief of Gendarmery: with the result

that the whole trio were reduced to a frame of mind in which they were

only too glad to turn to him (Samosvitov) for advice. The ultimate and

farcical upshot was that report came crowding upon report, and that such

alleged doings were brought to light as the sun had never before beheld.

In fact, the documents in question employed anything and everything as

material, even to announcing that such and such an individual had an

illegitimate son, that such and such another kept a paid mistress, and

that such and such a third was troubled with a gadabout wife; whereby

there became interwoven with and welded into Chichikov’s past history

and the story of the dead souls such a crop of scandals and innuendoes

that by no manner of means could any mortal decide to which of these

rubbishy romances to award the palm, since all of them presented an equal

claim to that honour. Naturally, when, at length, the dossier reached

the Governor-General himself it simply flabbergasted the poor man; and

even the exceptionally clever and energetic secretary to whom he deputed

the making of an abstract of the same very nearly lost his reason with

the strain of attempting to lay hold of the tangled end of the skein. It

happened that just at that time the Prince had several other important

affairs on hand, and affairs of a very unpleasant nature. That is to

say, famine had made its appearance in one portion of the province, and

the tchinovniks sent to distribute food to the people had done their

work badly; in another portion of the province certain Raskolniki [51]

were in a state of ferment, owing to the spreading of a report than

an Antichrist had arisen who would not even let the dead rest, but was

purchasing them wholesale--wherefore the said Raskolniki were summoning

folk to prayer and repentance, and, under cover of capturing the

Antichrist in question, were bludgeoning non-Antichrists in batches;

lastly, the peasants of a third portion of the province had risen

against the local landowners and superintendents of police, for the

reason that certain rascals had started a rumour that the time was come

when the peasants themselves were to become landowners, and to wear

frockcoats, while the landowners in being were about to revert to the

peasant state, and to take their own wares to market; wherefore one of

the local volosts[52], oblivious of the fact that an order of things

of that kind would lead to a superfluity alike of landowners and

of superintendents of police, had refused to pay its taxes, and

necessitated recourse to forcible measures. Hence it was in a mood

of the greatest possible despondency that the poor Prince was sitting

plunged when word was brought to him that the old man who had gone bail

for Chichikov was waiting to see him.

“Show him in,” said the Prince; and the old man entered.

“A fine fellow your Chichikov!” began the Prince angrily. “You defended

him, and went bail for him, even though he had been up to business which

even the lowest thief would not have touched!”

“Pardon me, your Highness; I do not understand to what you are

referring.”

“I am referring to the matter of the fraudulent will. The fellow ought

to have been given a public flogging for it.”

“Although to exculpate Chichikov is not my intention, might I ask

you whether you do not think the case is non-proven? At all events,

sufficient evidence against him is still lacking.”

“What? We have as chief witness the woman who personated the deceased,

and I will have her interrogated in your presence.”

Touching a bell, the Prince ordered her to be sent for.

“It is a most disgraceful affair,” he went on; “and, ashamed though I am

to have to say it, some of our leading tchinovniks, including the local

Governor himself, have become implicated in the matter. Yet you tell me

that this Chichikov ought not to be confined among thieves and rascals!”

Clearly the Governor-General’s wrath was very great indeed.

“Your Highness,” said Murazov, “the Governor of the town is one of the

heirs under the will: wherefore he has a certain right to intervene.

Also, the fact that extraneous persons have meddled in the matter is

only what is to be expected from human nature. A rich woman dies, and

no exact, regular disposition of her property is made. Hence there comes

flocking from every side a cloud of fortune hunters. What else could one

expect? Such is human nature.”

“Yes, but why should such persons go and commit fraud?” asked the

Prince irritably. “I feel as though not a single honest tchinovnik were

available--as though every one of them were a rogue.”

“Your Highness, which of us is altogether beyond reproach? The

tchinovniks of our town are human beings, and no more. Some of them are

men of worth, and nearly all of them men skilled in business--though

also, unfortunately, largely inter-related.”

“Now, tell me this, Athanasi Vassilievitch,” said the Prince, “for you

are about the only honest man of my acquaintance. What has inspired in

you such a penchant for defending rascals?”

“This,” replied Murazov. “Take any man you like of the persons whom you

thus term rascals. That man none the less remains a human being. That

being so, how can one refuse to defend him when all the time one

knows that half his errors have been committed through ignorance and

stupidity? Each of us commits faults with every step that we take;

each of us entails unhappiness upon others with every breath that we

draw--and that although we may have no evil intention whatever in our

minds. Your Highness himself has, before now, committed an injustice of

the gravest nature.”

“_I_ have?” cried the Prince, taken aback by this unexpected turn given

to the conversation.

Murazov remained silent for a moment, as though he were debating

something in his thoughts. Then he said:

“Nevertheless it is as I say. You committed the injustice in the case of

the lad Dierpiennikov.”

“What, Athanasi Vassilievitch? The fellow had infringed one of the

Fundamental Laws! He had been found guilty of treason!”

“I am not seeking to justify him; I am only asking you whether you think

it right that an inexperienced youth who had been tempted and led away

by others should have received the same sentence as the man who

had taken the chief part in the affair. That is to say, although

Dierpiennikov and the man Voron-Drianni received an equal measure of

punishment, their CRIMINALITY was not equal.”

“If,” exclaimed the Prince excitedly, “you know anything further

concerning the case, for God’s sake tell it me at once. Only the other

day did I forward a recommendation that St. Petersburg should remit a

portion of the sentence.”

“Your Highness,” replied Murazov, “I do not mean that I know of

anything which does not lie also within your own cognisance, though one

circumstance there was which might have told in the lad’s favour had he

not refused to admit it, lest another should suffer injury. All that

I have in my mind is this. On that occasion were you not a little

over-hasty in coming to a conclusion? You will understand, of course,

that I am judging only according to my own poor lights, and for the

reason that on more than one occasion you have urged me to be frank. In

the days when I myself acted as a chief of gendarmery I came in contact

with a great number of accused--some of them bad, some of them good; and

in each case I found it well also to consider a man’s past career, for

the reason that, unless one views things calmly, instead of at once

decrying a man, he is apt to take alarm, and to make it impossible

thereafter to get any real confession from him. If, on the other hand,

you question a man as friend might question friend, the result will be

that straightway he will tell you everything, nor ask for mitigation of

his penalty, nor bear you the least malice, in that he will understand

that it is not you who have punished him, but the law.”

The Prince relapsed into thought; until presently there entered a young

tchinovnik. Portfolio in hand, this official stood waiting respectfully.

Care and hard work had already imprinted their insignia upon his fresh

young face; for evidently he had not been in the Service for nothing. As

a matter of fact, his greatest joy was to labour at a tangled case, and

successfully to unravel it.

[At this point a long hiatus occurs in the original.]

“I will send corn to the localities where famine is worst,” said

Murazov, “for I understand that sort of work better than do the

tchinovniks, and will personally see to the needs of each person. Also,

if you will allow me, your Highness, I will go and have a talk with the

Raskolniki. They are more likely to listen to a plain man than to an

official. God knows whether I shall succeed in calming them, but at

least no tchinovnik could do so, for officials of the kind merely draw

up reports and lose their way among their own documents--with the result

that nothing comes of it. Nor will I accept from you any money for these

purposes, since I am ashamed to devote as much as a thought to my own

pocket at a time when men are dying of hunger. I have a large stock of

grain lying in my granaries; in addition to which, I have sent orders to

Siberia that a new consignment shall be forwarded me before the coming

summer.”

“Of a surety will God reward you for your services, Athanasi

Vassilievitch! Not another word will I say to you on the subject, for

you yourself feel that any words from me would be inadequate. Yet tell

me one thing: I refer to the case of which you know. Have I the right to

pass over the case? Also, would it be just and honourable on my part to

let the offending tchinovniks go unpunished?”

“Your Highness, it is impossible to return a definite answer to those

two questions: and the more so because many rascals are at heart men of

rectitude. Human problems are difficult things to solve. Sometimes a man

may be drawn into a vicious circle, so that, having once entered it, he

ceases to be himself.”

“But what would the tchinovniks say if I allowed the case to be passed

over? Would not some of them turn up their noses at me, and declare

that they have effected my intimidation? Surely they would be the last

persons in the world to respect me for my action?”

“Your Highness, I think this: that your best course would be to call

them together, and to inform them that you know everything, and to

explain to them your personal attitude (exactly as you have explained

it to me), and to end by at once requesting their advice and asking

them what each of them would have done had he been placed in similar

circumstances.”

“What? You think that those tchinovniks would be so accessible to lofty

motives that they would cease thereafter to be venal and meticulous? I

should be laughed at for my pains.”

“I think not, your Highness. Even the baser section of humanity

possesses a certain sense of equity. Your wisest plan, your Highness,

would be to conceal nothing and to speak to them as you have just spoken

to me. If, at present, they imagine you to be ambitious and proud

and unapproachable and self-assured, your action would afford them

an opportunity of seeing how the case really stands. Why should you

hesitate? You would but be exercising your undoubted right. Speak to

them as though delivering not a message of your own, but a message from

God.”

“I will think it over,” the Prince said musingly, “and meanwhile I thank

you from my heart for your good advice.”

“Also, I should order Chichikov to leave the town,” suggested Murazov.

“Yes, I will do so. Tell him from me that he is to depart hence as

quickly as possible, and that the further he should remove himself, the

better it will be for him. Also, tell him that it is only owing to your

efforts that he has received a pardon at my hands.”

Murazov bowed, and proceeded from the Prince’s presence to that of

Chichikov. He found the prisoner cheerfully enjoying a hearty dinner

which, under hot covers, had been brought him from an exceedingly

excellent kitchen. But almost the first words which he uttered showed

Murazov that the prisoner had been having dealings with the army of

bribe-takers; as also that in those transactions his lawyer had played

the principal part.

“Listen, Paul Ivanovitch,” the old man said. “I bring you your freedom,

but only on this condition--that you depart out of the town forthwith.

Therefore gather together your effects, and waste not a moment, lest

worse befall you. Also, of all that a certain person has contrived to

do on your behalf I am aware; wherefore let me tell you, as between

ourselves, that should the conspiracy come to light, nothing on earth

can save him, and in his fall he will involve others rather then be left

unaccompanied in the lurch, and not see the guilt shared. How is it that

when I left you recently you were in a better frame of mind than you are

now? I beg of you not to trifle with the matter. Ah me! what boots that

wealth for which men dispute and cut one another’s throats? Do they

think that it is possible to prosper in this world without thinking of

the world to come? Believe me when I say that, until a man shall have

renounced all that leads humanity to contend without giving a thought to

the ordering of spiritual wealth, he will never set his temporal goods

either upon a satisfactory foundation. Yes, even as times of want and

scarcity may come upon nations, so may they come upon individuals. No

matter what may be said to the contrary, the body can never dispense

with the soul. Why, then, will you not try to walk in the right way,

and, by thinking no longer of dead souls, but only of your only living

one, regain, with God’s help, the better road? I too am leaving the town

to-morrow. Hasten, therefore, lest, bereft of my assistance, you meet

with some dire misfortune.”

And the old man departed, leaving Chichikov plunged in thought. Once

more had the gravity of life begun to loom large before him.

“Yes, Murazov was right,” he said to himself. “It is time that I were

moving.”

Leaving the prison--a warder carrying his effects in his wake--he found

Selifan and Petrushka overjoyed at seeing their master once more at

liberty.

“Well, good fellows?” he said kindly. “And now we must pack and be off.”

“True, true, Paul Ivanovitch,” agreed Selifan. “And by this time the

roads will have become firmer, for much snow has fallen. Yes, high time

is it that we were clear of the town. So weary of it am I that the sight

of it hurts my eyes.”

“Go to the coachbuilder’s,” commanded Chichikov, “and have

sledge-runners fitted to the koliaska.”

Chichikov then made his way into the town--though not with the object of

paying farewell visits (in view of recent events, that might have given

rise to some awkwardness), but for the purpose of paying an unobtrusive

call at the shop where he had obtained the cloth for his latest

suit. There he now purchased four more arshins of the same

smoked-grey-shot-with-flame-colour material as he had had before, with

the intention of having it made up by the tailor who had fashioned the

previous costume; and by promising double remuneration he induced the

tailor in question so to hasten the cutting out of the garments that,

through sitting up all night over the work, the man might have the whole

ready by break of day. True, the goods were delivered a trifle after

the appointed hour, yet the following morning saw the coat and breeches

completed; and while the horses were being put to, Chichikov tried on

the clothes, and found them equal to the previous creation, even though

during the process he caught sight of a bald patch on his head, and was

led mournfully to reflect: “Alas! Why did I give way to such despair?

Surely I need not have torn my hair out so freely?”

Then, when the tailor had been paid, our hero left the town. But no

longer was he the old Chichikov--he was only a ruin of what he had been,

and his frame of mind might have been compared to a building recently

pulled down to make room for a new one, while the new one had not yet

been erected owing to the non-receipt of the plans from the architect.

Murazov, too, had departed, but at an earlier hour, and in a tilt-waggon

with Ivan Potapitch.

An hour later the Governor-General issued to all and sundry officials

a notice that, on the occasion of his departure for St. Petersburg,

he would be glad to see the corps of tchinovniks at a private meeting.

Accordingly all ranks and grades of officialdom repaired to his

residence, and there awaited--not without a certain measure of

trepidation and of searching of heart--the Governor-General’s entry.

When that took place he looked neither clear nor dull. Yet his bearing

was proud, and his step assured. The tchinovniks bowed--some of them to

the waist, and he answered their salutations with a slight inclination

of the head. Then he spoke as follows:

“Since I am about to pay a visit to St. Petersburg, I have thought it

right to meet you, and to explain to you privately my reasons for doing

so. An affair of a most scandalous character has taken place in our

midst. To what affair I am referring I think most of those present will

guess. Now, an automatic process has led to that affair bringing about

the discovery of other matters. Those matters are no less dishonourable

than the primary one; and to that I regret to have to add that there

stand involved in them certain persons whom I had hitherto believed

to be honourable. Of the object aimed at by those who have complicated

matters to the point of making their resolution almost impossible by

ordinary methods I am aware; as also I am aware of the identity of the

ringleader, despite the skill with which he has sought to conceal his

share in the scandal. But the principal point is, that I propose to

decide these matters, not by formal documentary process, but by the

more summary process of court-martial, and that I hope, when the

circumstances have been laid before his Imperial Majesty, to receive

from him authority to adopt the course which I have mentioned. For I

conceive that when it has become impossible to resolve a case by civil

means, and some of the necessary documents have been burnt, and attempts

have been made (both through the adduction of an excess of false and

extraneous evidence and through the framing of fictitious reports)

to cloud an already sufficiently obscure investigation with an added

measure of complexity,--when all these circumstances have arisen, I

conceive that the only possible tribunal to deal with them is a military

tribunal. But on that point I should like your opinion.”

The Prince paused for a moment or two, as though awaiting a reply; but

none came, seeing that every man had his eyes bent upon the floor, and

many of the audience had turned white in the face.

“Then,” he went on, “I may say that I am aware also of a matter which

those who have carried it through believe to lie only within the

cognisance of themselves. The particulars of that matter will not be set

forth in documentary form, but only through process of myself acting as

plaintiff and petitioner, and producing none but ocular evidence.”

Among the throng of tchinovniks some one gave a start, and thereby

caused others of the more apprehensive sort to fall to trembling in

their shoes.

“Without saying does it go that the prime conspirators ought to undergo

deprivation of rank and property, and that the remainder ought to be

dismissed from their posts; for though that course would cause a certain

proportion of the innocent to suffer with the guilty, there would seem

to be no other course available, seeing that the affair is one of

the most disgraceful nature, and calls aloud for justice. Therefore,

although I know that to some my action will fail to serve as a lesson,

since it will lead to their succeeding to the posts of dismissed

officials, as well as that others hitherto considered honourable will

lose their reputation, and others entrusted with new responsibilities

will continue to cheat and betray their trust,--although all this is

known to me, I still have no choice but to satisfy the claims of justice

by proceeding to take stern measures. I am also aware that I shall be

accused of undue severity; but, lastly, I am aware that it is my duty to

put aside all personal feeling, and to act as the unconscious instrument

of that retribution which justice demands.”

Over every face there passed a shudder. Yet the Prince had spoken calmly,

and not a trace of anger or any other kind of emotion had been visible

on his features.

“Nevertheless,” he went on, “the very man in whose hands the fate of

so many now lies, the very man whom no prayer for mercy could ever have

influenced, himself desires to make a request of you. Should you grant

that request, all will be forgotten and blotted out and pardoned, for

I myself will intercede with the Throne on your behalf. That request is

this. I know that by no manner of means, by no preventive measures, and

by no penalties will dishonesty ever be completely extirpated from our

midst, for the reason that its roots have struck too deep, and that

the dishonourable traffic in bribes has become a necessity to, even the

mainstay of, some whose nature is not innately venal. Also, I know that,

to many men, it is an impossibility to swim against the stream. Yet now,

at this solemn and critical juncture, when the country is calling aloud

for saviours, and it is the duty of every citizen to contribute and to

sacrifice his all, I feel that I cannot but issue an appeal to every man

in whom a Russian heart and a spark of what we understand by the word

‘nobility’ exist. For, after all, which of us is more guilty than his

fellow? It may be to ME the greatest culpability should be assigned, in

that at first I may have adopted towards you too reserved an attitude,

that I may have been over-hasty in repelling those who desired but to

serve me, even though of their services I did not actually stand in

need. Yet, had they really loved justice and the good of their country,

I think that they would have been less prone to take offence at the

coldness of my attitude, but would have sacrificed their feelings and

their personality to their superior convictions. For hardly can it

be that I failed to note their overtures and the loftiness of their

motives, or that I would not have accepted any wise and useful advice

proffered. At the same time, it is for a subordinate to adapt himself to

the tone of his superior, rather than for a superior to adapt himself to

the tone of his subordinate. Such a course is at once more regular

and more smooth of working, since a corps of subordinates has but one

director, whereas a director may have a hundred subordinates. But let us

put aside the question of comparative culpability. The important point

is, that before us all lies the duty of rescuing our fatherland. Our

fatherland is suffering, not from the incursion of a score of alien

tongues, but from our own acts, in that, in addition to the lawful

administration, there has grown up a second administration possessed of

infinitely greater powers than the system established by law. And that

second administration has established its conditions, fixed its tariff

of prices, and published that tariff abroad; nor could any ruler, even

though the wisest of legislators and administrators, do more to correct

the evil than limit it in the conduct of his more venal tchinovniks by

setting over them, as their supervisors, men of superior rectitude. No,

until each of us shall come to feel that, just as arms were taken up

during the period of the upheaval of nations, so now each of us must

make a stand against dishonesty, all remedies will end in failure. As a

Russian, therefore--as one bound to you by consanguinity and identity of

blood--I make to you my appeal. I make it to those of you who understand

wherein lies nobility of thought. I invite those men to remember the

duty which confronts us, whatsoever our respective stations; I invite

them to observe more closely their duty, and to keep more constantly in

mind their obligations of holding true to their country, in that before

us the future looms dark, and that we can scarcely....”

*****

[Here the manuscript of the original comes abruptly to an end.]

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: Essays on Russian Novelists. Macmillan.]

[Footnote 2: Ideals and Realities in Russian Literature. Duckworth and

Co.]

[Footnote 3: This is generally referred to in the Russian criticisms of

Gogol as a quotation from Jeremiah. It appears upon investigation,

however, that it actually occurs only in the Slavonic version from the

Greek, and not in the Russian translation made direct from the Hebrew.]

[Footnote 4: An urn for brewing honey tea.]

[Footnote 5: An urn for brewing ordinary tea.]

[Footnote 6: A German dramatist (1761-1819) who also filled sundry posts

in the service of the Russian Government.]

[Footnote 7: Priest’s wife.]

[Footnote 8: In this case the term General refers to a civil grade

equivalent to the military rank of the same title.]

[Footnote 9: An annual tax upon peasants, payment of which secured to

the payer the right of removal.]

[Footnote 10: Cabbage soup.]

[Footnote 11: Three horses harnessed abreast.]

[Footnote 12: A member of the gentry class.]

[Footnote 13: Pieces equal in value to twenty-five kopecks (a quarter of

a rouble).]

[Footnote 14: A Russian general who, in 1812, stoutly opposed Napoleon

at the battle of Borodino.]

[Footnote 15: The late eighteenth century.]

[Footnote 16: Forty Russian pounds.]

[Footnote 17: To serve as blotting-paper.]

[Footnote 18: A liquor distilled from fermented bread crusts or sour

fruit.]

[Footnote 19: That is to say, a distinctively Russian name.]

[Footnote 20: A jeering appellation which owes its origin to the fact

that certain Russians cherish a prejudice against the initial character

of the word--namely, the Greek theta, or TH.]

[Footnote 21: The great Russian general who, after winning fame in the

Seven Years’ War, met with disaster when attempting to assist the

Austrians against the French in 1799.]

[Footnote 22: A kind of large gnat.]

[Footnote 23: A copper coin worth five kopecks.]

[Footnote 24: A Russian general who fought against Napoleon, and was

mortally wounded at Borodino.]

[Footnote 25: Literally, “nursemaid.”]

[Footnote 26: Village factor or usurer.]

[Footnote 27: Subordinate government officials.]

[Footnote 28: Nevertheless Chichikov would appear to have erred, since

most people would make the sum amount to twenty-three roubles, forty

kopecks. If so, Chichikov cheated himself of one rouble, fifty-six

kopecks.]

[Footnote 29: The names Kariakin and Volokita might, perhaps, be

translated as “Gallant” and “Loafer.”]

[Footnote 30: Tradesman or citizen.]

[Footnote 31: The game of knucklebones.]

[Footnote 32: A sort of low, four-wheeled carriage.]

[Footnote 33: The system by which, in annual rotation, two-thirds of a

given area are cultivated, while the remaining third is left fallow.]

[Footnote 34: Public Prosecutor.]

[Footnote 35: To reproduce this story with a raciness worthy of the

Russian original is practically impossible. The translator has not

attempted the task.]

[Footnote 36: One of the mistresses of Louis XIV. of France. In 1680 she

wrote a book called Reflexions sur la Misericorde de Dieu, par une Dame

Penitente.]

[Footnote 37: Four-wheeled open carriage.]

[Footnote 38: Silver five kopeck piece.]

[Footnote 39: A silver quarter rouble.]

[Footnote 40: In the days of serfdom, the rate of forced labour--so many

hours or so many days per week--which the serf had to perform for his

proprietor.]

[Footnote 41: The Elder.]

[Footnote 42: The Younger.]

[Footnote 43: Secondary School.]

[Footnote 44: The desiatin = 2.86 English acres.]

[Footnote 45: “One more makes five.”]

[Footnote 46: Dried spinal marrow of the sturgeon.]

[Footnote 47: Long, belted Tartar blouses.]

[Footnote 48: Village commune.]

[Footnote 49: Landowner.]

[Footnote 50: Here, in the original, a word is missing.]

[Footnote 51: Dissenters or Old Believers: i.e. members of the sect

which refused to accept the revised version of the Church Service Books

promulgated by the Patriarch Nikon in 1665.]

[Footnote 52: Fiscal districts.]