MRS. POPOV. No, you don't. You are an ill-bred, vulgar person--respectable people don't speak so with ladies. SMIRNOV. Oh, how remarkable! How do you want one to speak with you? In French perhaps. Madame, je vous prie--how fortunate I am that you won't pay me my money! Pardon me for having disturbed you. What beautiful weather we are having to-day. And how this mourning becomes you. [_He makes an ironic bow._] MRS. POPOV. Not at all funny--vulgar! SMIRNOV [_imitating her_]. Not at all funny--vulgar. I don't understand how to behave in the company of ladies. Madam, in the course of my life I have seen more women than you have sparrows. Three times I have fought duels over women, twelve women I threw over and nine threw me over. There was a time when I played the fool, used honeyed language, bows and scrapings. I loved, suffered, sighed to the moon, melted in love's torments. I loved passionately, I loved to madness, in every key, chattered like a magpie on emancipation, sacrificed half my fortune in the tender passion until now the devil knows I've had enough of it. Your obedient servant will let you lead him around by the nose no more. Enough! Black eyes, passionate eyes, coral lips, dimples in cheeks, moonlight whispers, soft, modest sighs,--for all that, madam, I wouldn't pay a copper cent. I am not speaking of the present company but of women in general; from the tiniest to the greatest, they are all conceited, hypocritical, chattering, odious, deceitful from top to toe; vain, petty, cruel with a maddening logic and [_he strikes his forehead_] in this respect, please excuse my frankness, but one sparrow is worth ten of the aforementioned petticoat-philosophers. When one sees one of the romantic creatures before him he imagines that he is looking at some holy being, so wonderful that its one breath could dissolve him in a sea of a thousand charms and delights--but if one looks into the soul--it's nothing but a common crocodile. [_He seizes the arm-chair and breaks it in two._] But the worst of all is that this crocodile imagines that it is a chef-d'oeuvre and that it has a monopoly on all the tender passions. May the devil hang me upside down if there is anything to love about a woman! When she is in love all she knows is how to complain and shed tears. If the man suffers and makes sacrifices she trails her train about and tries to lead him around by the nose. You have the misfortune to be a woman and you naturally know woman's nature; tell me on your honor, have you ever in your life seen a woman who was really true and faithful? You never saw one. Only the old and the deformed are true and faithful. It's easier to find a cat with horns or a white woodcock than a faithful woman. MRS. POPOV. But just allow me to ask, who is true and faithful in love? The man, perhaps? SMIRNOV. Yes, indeed! The man!