Yet the just Aristides was right this time too, as he was right when he gave his warning against Dostoevsky. Now that Tchekhov is no more, we may speak openly. Take Tchekhov's stories, each one separately, or better still, all together; look at him at work. He is constantly, as it were, in ambush, to watch and waylay human hopes. He will not miss a single one of them, not one of them will escape its fate. Art, science, love, inspiration, ideals--choose out all the words with which humanity is wont, or has been in the past, to be consoled or to be amused--Tchekhov has only to touch them and they instantly wither and die. And Tchekhov himself faded, withered and died before our eyes. Only his wonderful art did not die--his art to kill by a mere touch, a breath, a glance, everything whereby men live and wherein they take their pride. And in this art he was constantly perfecting himself, and he attained to a virtuosity beyond the reach of any of his rivals in European literature. Maupassant often had to strain every effort to overcome his victim. The victim often escaped from Maupassant, though crushed and broken, yet with his life. In Tchekhov's hands, nothing escaped death. II I must remind my reader, though it is a matter of general knowledge, that in his earlier work Tchekhov is most unlike the Tchekhov to whom we became accustomed in late years. The young Tchekhov is gay and careless, perhaps even like a flying bird. He published his work in the comic papers. But in 1888 and 1889, when he was only twenty-seven and twenty-eight years old, there appeared _The Tedious Story_ and the drama _Ivanov,_ two pieces of work which laid the foundations of a new creation. Obviously a sharp and sudden change had taken place in him, which was completely reflected in his works. There is no detailed biography of Tchekhov, and probably will never be, because there is no such thing as a full biography--I, at all events, cannot name one. Generally biographies tell us everything except what it is important to know. Perhaps in the future it will be revealed to us with the fullest details who was Tchekhov's tailor; but we shall never know what happened to Tchekhov in the time which elapsed between the completion of his story _The Steppe_ and the appearance of his first drama. If we would know, we must rely upon his works and our own insight. _Ivanov_ and _The Tedious Story_ seem to me the most autobiographical of all his works. In them almost every line is a sob; and it is hard to suppose that a man could sob so, looking only at another's grief. And it is plain that his grief is a new one, unexpected as though it had fallen from the sky. Here it is, it will endure for ever, and he does not know how to fight against it.