Produced by Jonathan Ingram, David Garcia, Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team. A SPORTSMAN'S SKETCHES BY IVAN TURGENEV _Translated from the Russian_ _By CONSTANCE GARNETT_ VOLUME II CONTENTS XV. TATYANA BORISSOVNA AND HER NEPHEW XVI. DEATH XVII. THE SINGERS XVIII. PIOTR PETROVITCH KARATAEV XIX. THE TRYST XX. THE HAMLET OF THE SHTCHIGRI DISTRICT XXI. TCHERTOP-HANOV AND NEDOPYUSKIN XXII. THE END OF TCHERTOP-HANOV XXIII. A LIVING RELIC XXIV. THE RATTLING OF WHEELS XXV. EPILOGUE: THE FOREST AND THE STEPPE XV TATYANA BORISSOVNA AND HER NEPHEW Give me your hand, gentle reader, and come along with me. It is glorious weather; there is a tender blue in the May sky; the smooth young leaves of the willows glisten as though they had been polished; the wide even road is all covered with that delicate grass with the little reddish stalk that the sheep are so fond of nibbling; to right and to left, over the long sloping hillsides, the green rye is softly waving; the shadows of small clouds glide in thin long streaks over it. In the distance is the dark mass of forests, the glitter of ponds, yellow patches of village; larks in hundreds are soaring, singing, falling headlong with outstretched necks, hopping about the clods; the crows on the highroad stand still, look at you, peck at the earth, let you drive close up, and with two hops lazily move aside. On a hill beyond a ravine a peasant is ploughing; a piebald colt, with a cropped tail and ruffled mane, is running on unsteady legs after its mother; its shrill whinnying reaches us. We drive on into the birch wood, and drink in the strong, sweet, fresh fragrance. Here we are at the boundaries. The coachman gets down; the horses snort; the trace-horses look round; the centre horse in the shafts switches his tail, and turns his head up towards the wooden yoke above it... the great gate opens creaking; the coachman seats himself.... Drive on! the village is before us. Passing five homesteads, and turning off to the right, we drop down into a hollow and drive along a dyke, the farther side of a small pond; behind the round tops of the lilacs and apple-trees a wooden roof, once red, with two chimneys, comes into sight; the coachman keeps along the hedge to the left, and to the spasmodic and drowsy baying of three pug dogs he drives through the wide open gates, whisks smartly round the broad courtyard past the stable and the barn, gallantly salutes the old housekeeper, who is stepping sideways over the high lintel in the open doorway of the storehouse, and pulls up at last before the steps of a dark house with light windows.... We are at Tatyana Borissovna's. And here she is herself opening the window and nodding at us.... 'Good day, ma'am!'