LYUBÍM KÁRPYCH. How did I live? May God never give such a life to a Tatar! I lived in roomy lodgings, between heaven and earth, with no walls and no ceiling. I was ashamed to see people. I hid from the world; and yet you have to go out into God's world, for you have nothing to eat. You go along the street, and everybody looks at you.--Every one had seen what a life I used to lead, how I rattled through the town in a first-class cab, and now went about tattered and torn and unshaven. They shook their heads and away they went. Shame, shame, shame! [_Sits and hangs his head_] There is a good business--a trade which pays--to steal. But this business didn't suit me--I had a conscience, and again I was afraid: no one approves of this business. MÍTYA. That's a last resort. LYUBÍM KÁRPYCH. They say in other countries they pay you thalers and thalers for this, but in our country good people punch your head for it. No, my boy, to steal is abominable! That's an old trick, we'll have to give it up! But, you see, hunger isn't a kind old aunty, and you have to do something! I began to go about the town as a buffoon, to get money, a kopek at a time, to make a fool of myself, to tell funny stories, and play all sorts of tricks. Often you shiver from early morn till night in the town streets; you hide somewhere behind the corner away from people, and wait for merchants. When one comes--especially if he is rather rich--you jump out and do some trick, and one gives you five kopeks, and another ten: with that you take breath for a day and so exist. MÍTYA. It would have been better, Lyubím Kárpych, to go to your brother, than to live like that.