One remembers the arguments about the brotherhood of man, public good, and work for the people, but really there were no such arguments, one only drank at the University. They write: "One feels ashamed of the men with University degrees who once fought for human rights and freedom of religion and conscience"--but they never fought. * * * * * Every day after dinner the husband threatens his wife that he will become a monk, and the wife cries. * * * * * Mordokhvostov. * * * * * Husband and wife have lived together and quarreled for eighteen years. At last he makes a confession, which was in fact untrue, of having been false to her, and they part to his great pleasure and to the wrath of the whole town. * * * * * A useless thing, an album with forgotten, uninteresting photographs, lies in the corner on a chair; it has been lying there for the last twenty years and no one makes up his mind to throw it away. * * * * * N. tells how forty years ago X., a wonderful and extraordinary man, had saved the lives of five people, and N. feels it strange that every one listened with indifference, that the history of X. is already forgotten, uninteresting.... * * * * * They fell upon the soft caviare greedily, and devoured it in a minute. * * * * * In the middle of a serious conversation he says to his little son: "Button up your trousers." * * * * * Man will only become better when you make him see what he is like. * * * * * Dove-colored face. * * * * * The squire feeds his pigeons, canaries, and fowls on pepper, acids, and all kinds of rubbish in order that the birds may change their color--and that is his sole occupation: he boasts of it to every visitor. * * * * * They invited a famous singer to recite the Acts of the Apostles at the wedding; he recited it, but they have not paid his fee. * * * * * For a farce: I have a friend by name Krivomordy (crooked face) and he's all right. Not crooked leg or crooked arm but crooked face: he was married and his wife loved him. * * * * * N. drank milk every day, and every time he put a fly in the glass and then, with the air of a victim, asked the old butler: "What's that?" He could not live a single day without that. * * * * * She is surly and smells of a vapor bath. * * * * * N. learned of his wife's adultery. He is indignant, distressed, but hesitates and keeps silent. He keeps silence and ends by borrowing money from Z., the lover, and continues to consider himself an honest man. * * * * *