skin was all covered with big pimples, a thick tendon ran down each leg, its flesh had a flavour of charcoal and lye. When he had finished his dinner, Lavretzky said that he would like some tea, if.... "This very moment, sir, I will serve it, sir,"--interrupted the old man,--and he kept his promise. A pinch of tea was hunted up, wrapped in a scrap of red paper, a small but very mettlesome and noisy samovar was searched out, also sugar, in very tiny bits, that seemed to have been melted around the edges. Lavretzky drank his tea out of a large cup; he remembered that cup in his childhood: playing-cards were depicted on it, only visitors drank out of it,--and he now drank out of it, like a visitor. Toward evening, his servants arrived; Lavretzky did not wish to sleep in his aunt's bed; he gave orders that a bed should be made up for him in the dining-room. Extinguishing the candle, he stared about him for a long time, and meditated on cheerless thoughts; he experienced the sensation familiar to every man who chances to pass the night, for the first time, in a place which has long been uninhabited; it seemed to him that the darkness which surrounded him on all sides could not accustom itself to the new inhabitant, that the very walls of the house were waxing indignant. At last he sighed, drew the coverlet up over him, and fell asleep. Anton remained afoot longer than the rest; for a long time he whispered with Apraxyeya, groaned in a low tone, and crossed himself a couple of times. Neither of them expected that the master would settle down among them at Vasilievskoe, when, near at hand, he owned such a magnificent estate, with a capitally-organised manor-house; they did not even suspect that it was precisely that manor-house which was repugnant to Lavretzky: it evoked in him oppressive memories. After having whispered his fill, Anton took his staff, and beat upon the board at the store-house which had long been hanging silent,[8] and immediately lay down for a nap in the yard, without covering up his grey head with anything. The May night was tranquil and caressing--and the old man slumbered sweetly. ----- [8] It is the duty of the night-watchman to beat upon the board at regular intervals, to show that he is vigilant.--Translator. XX