Our aristocrat hates and loathes all the sciences and arts, and regards them as a disgrace for any noble gentleman. In his opinion a blueblood can know everything without having learned it; but philosophy, mathematics, physics and all the other sciences are trifles that are below a nobleman’s attention. Books of heraldry and letters patent that have just escaped the dust-pile and mould are the only books which he continually reads by spelling out. Alexandrian sheets, on which the names of his ancestors are written in circles, are the only pictures with which his house is adorned. But to be short; the trees by which he illustrates the descent of his family have many a dry limb, but there is no more rotten twig upon them than he himself is, and in all his family coats of arms there is not such a beast as is his Excellency. However, Mr. Lacksense thinks differently of himself, and worships himself as a great man in mind, and as a small god in his nobility. To make the whole world believe the same way, he tries to differ from all others, not by useful and glorious deeds, but by magnificent houses, carriages and liveries, though he spends on his foolishness all his income that ought to support him ten years hence. _Recipe, to cure Mr. Lacksense of his fever._--It is necessary to inoculate the sick man with a good dose of common sense and philanthropy, in order to kill in him his empty superciliousness and the lofty contempt for other people. Noble descent is, indeed, a great privilege, but it will always be dishonoured if it is not fortified by personal worth and noble services to your country. Meseems it is more laudable to be a poor yeoman or burgher and a useful member of society than a distinguished drone who is known only for his stupidity, his house, carriages and liveries. THE LAUGHING DEMOCRITOS Bah! There is the miser in his rags and tags, who has all his life been hoarding money and squandering his conscience; who is dying from hunger and cold; who teaches his servants to eat to live, that is, not more than is necessary to keep body and soul together; who is known far and wide for his unlawful usury; who has imposed upon himself and all his slave cattle a whole year’s fast; who in winter heats his miserable hut only once a week; who is ready to sell himself for a dime, and who has forty thousand roubles, in order to leave them after his death to his stupid nephew, that seventeen-year-old wretch who in miserliness and unscrupulous usury has surpassed his uncle of sixty years; who steals money from himself and takes a fine from himself for this theft; and who does not want to get married all his life, only not to spend his income on his wife and children. Oh, they deserve being laughed at. Ha, ha, ha!