The impression produced by these _Sketches_ was simply tremendous. All Russia talked of them. Saltykóff’s talent appeared in them in its full force, and with them was opened quite a new era in Russian literature. A great number of imitators began in their turn to dissect the Russian administration and the failure of its functionaries. Of course, something of the sort had already been done by Gógol, but Gógol, who wrote twenty years before, was compelled to confine himself to generalities, while Saltykóff was enabled to name things by their names and to describe provincial society as it was--denouncing the venal nature of the functionaries, the rottenness of the whole administration, the absence of comprehension of what was vital in the life of the country, and so on. When Saltykóff was permitted to return to St. Petersburg, after his exile, he did not abandon the service of the State, which he had been compelled to enter at Vyátka. With but a short interruption he remained a functionary till the year 1868, and twice during that time he was Vice-Governor, and even Governor of a province. It was only then that he definitely left the service, to act, with Nekrásoff, as co-editor of a monthly review, _Otéchestvennyia Zapíski_, which became after _The Contemporary_ had been suppressed, the representative of advanced democratic thought in Russia, and retained this position till 1884, when it was suppressed in its turn. By that time the health of Saltykóff was broken down, and after a very painful illness, during which he nevertheless continued to write, he died in 1889.