[The play proceeds: two men, the town busybodies, happen to find at the inn a traveler who has been living on credit and going nowhere for two weeks. The landlord is about to put his lodger in prison for debt, when these men jump to the conclusion that he is the Inspector. The Prefect and other terrified officials accept the suggestion, in spite of his plain statement as to his identity. They set about making the town presentable, entertain and bribe him, and bow down to him. He accepts their hospitality, asks loans, makes love to the Prefect's silly wife and daughter, betroths himself to the latter, receives the petitions and bribes of the oppressed townspeople,—and drives off with the best post-horses the town can furnish, ostensibly to ask the blessing of his rich old uncle on his marriage. The Postmaster intercepts a letter which he has written to a friend. Its revelations, and the ridicule which he therein casts on his hosts, open their eyes at last. At that moment a gendarme appears and announces that the Inspector has arrived. Tableau.] Translated for 'A Library of the World's Best Literature,' by Isabel F. Hapgood OLD-FASHIONED GENTRY From 'Mirgorod' I am very fond of the modest life of those isolated owners of remote estates which are generally called "old-fashioned" in Little Russia, and which, like ruinous and picturesque houses, are beautiful through their simplicity and complete contrast to a new and regular building whose walls have never yet been washed by the rain, whose roof has not yet been overgrown with moss, and whose porch, still possessed of its stucco, does not yet [Pg 6467] display its red bricks. I can still see the low-roofed little house, with its veranda of slender, blackened wooden columns, surrounding it on all sides, so that in case of a thunder-storm or a hail-storm you could close the window shutters without getting wet; behind it fragrant wild-cherry trees, row upon row of dwarf fruit-trees, overtopped by crimson cherries and a purple sea of plums, covered with a lead-colored bloom, luxuriant maples under whose shade rugs were spread for repose; in front of the house the spacious yard, with short fresh grass, through which paths had been worn from the storehouses to the kitchen, from the kitchen to the apartments of the family; a long-necked goose drinking water with her young goslings, soft as down; the picket fence festooned with bunches of dried apples and pears, and rugs hung out to air; a cart-load of melons standing near the store-house, the oxen unyoked and lying lazily beside it. All this has for me an indescribable charm,—perhaps because I no longer see it, and because anything from which we are separated pleases us.