"You dictate, I can drink and write at the same time. . . . I must confess I was hungry." "I should think so after your walk!" "Yes, and what wretched weather! In our parts there is a scent of spring by now. . . . There are puddles everywhere; the snow is melting." "You are a southerner, I suppose?" "From the Don region. . . . It's quite spring with us by March. Here it is frosty, everyone's in a fur coat, . . . but there you can see the grass . . . it's dry everywhere, and one can even catch tarantulas." "And what do you catch tarantulas for?" "Oh! . . . to pass the time . . ." says Ivan Matveyitch, and he sighs. "It's fun catching them. You fix a bit of pitch on a thread, let it down into their hole and begin hitting the tarantula on the back with the pitch, and the brute gets cross, catches hold of the pitch with his claws, and gets stuck. . . . And what we used to do with them! We used to put a basinful of them together and drop a bihorka in with them." "What is a bihorka?" "That's another spider, very much the same as a tarantula. In a fight one of them can kill a hundred tarantulas." "H'm! . . . But we must write, . . . Where did we stop?" The man of learning dictates another twenty lines, then sits plunged in meditation. Ivan Matveyitch, waiting while the other cogitates, sits and, craning his neck, puts the collar of his shirt to rights. His tie will not set properly, the stud has come out, and the collar keeps coming apart. "H'm! . . ." says the man of learning. "Well, haven't you found a job yet, Ivan Matveyitch?" "No. And how is one to find one? I am thinking, you know, of volunteering for the army. But my father advises my going into a chemist's." "H'm! . . . But it would be better for you to go into the university. The examination is difficult, but with patience and hard work you could get through. Study, read more. . . . Do you read much?" "Not much, I must own . . ." says Ivan Matveyitch, lighting a cigarette. "Have you read Turgenev?" "N-no. . . ." "And Gogol?" "Gogol. H'm! . . . Gogol. . . . No, I haven't read him!" "Ivan Matveyitch! Aren't you ashamed? Aie! aie! You are such a nice fellow, so much that is original in you . . . you haven't even read Gogol! You must read him! I will give you his works! It's essential to read him! We shall quarrel if you don't!" Again a silence follows. The man of learning meditates, half reclining on a soft lounge, and Ivan Matveyitch, leaving his collar in peace, concentrates his whole attention on his boots. He has not till then noticed that two big puddles have been made by the snow melting off his boots on the floor. He is ashamed. "I can't get on to-day . . ." mutters the man of learning. "I suppose you are fond of catching birds, too, Ivan Matveyitch?" "That's in autumn, . . . I don't catch them here, but there at home I always did." "To be sure . . . very good. But we must write, though."