Meanwhile, time passed and passed. Ivan Petrovitch spent the greater part of the year at Lavriki (that was the name of his paternal estate), and in the winters he went alone to Moscow, stopped at an inn, diligently frequented the club, orated and set forth his plans in drawing-rooms, and conducted himself more like an Anglomaniac, a grumbler, and a statesman than ever. But the year 1825 arrived, and brought with it much woe.[5] Ivan Petrovitch's intimate friends and acquaintances were subjected to severe trials. Ivan Petrovitch made haste to retreat to his country estate, and locked himself up in his house. Another year elapsed, and Ivan Petrovitch suddenly grew feeble, weakened, declined, his health deserted him. A free-thinker--he took to going to church, and to ordering services of prayer; a European--he began to steam himself at the bath, to dine at two o'clock, to go to bed at nine, to fall asleep to the chatter of the aged butler; a statesman--he burned all his plans, all his correspondence, trembled before the governor, and fidgeted in the presence of the rural chief of police; a man with a will of iron--he whimpered and complained when an abscess broke out on him, when he was served with a plate of cold soup. Glafira Petrovna again reigned over everything in the house; again clerks, village bailiffs, common peasants, began to creep through the back entrance to the "ill-tempered old hag,"--that was what the house-servants called her. The change in Ivan Petrovitch gave his son a great shock; he was already in his nineteenth year, and had begun to reason and to free himself from the weight of the hand which oppressed him. He had noticed, even before this, a discrepancy between his father's words and deeds, between his broad and liberal theories and his harsh, petty despotism; but he had not anticipated such a sudden break. The inveterate egoist suddenly revealed himself at full length. Young Lavretzky was getting ready to go to Moscow, to prepare himself for the university,--when an unforeseen, fresh calamity descended upon the head of Ivan Petrovitch: he became blind, and that hopelessly, in one day.