I smiled in the silent darkness and feared to move, lest I drive away the unwonted joy which filled my heart to the very brim. I believed and yet did not believe this marvelous fulness of my soul, this unexpected Godsend which I found in me. It was as if a white bird, who was born long before, had slept in the shadow of my soul, and I had not known it or felt it. I stroked it accidentally and it awoke and began to sing quietly within me and flutter its light wings in my heart, and its hot song melted the ice of doubt and turned it into grateful tears. I wanted to say something, to arise, to sing, to meet human beings and to embrace them. I saw before me the shining face of Juna, the kind eyes of Mikhail, the stern wit of Ivostia. All the familiar, dear and new people became alive to me, united in my breast and broadened it with happiness till it ached. So it had happened before while saying Mass at Easter, that I loved people and myself. I sat down, and thought tremblingly: "O Lord, is it not Thou, this beauty of beauties, this joy and this happiness?" Darkness reigned about me, and in it were the shining faces of the Believers sitting quietly. But my heart sang unceasingly. I stroked the earth with my hand, I patted it with my palm, as if it were a horse, which understood my caress. I could not sit still. I arose and walked on through the night. I remembered Kostia's words. I saw before me the look of childish sternness in his eyes, and I Went on, drunk with joy, walking over the earth towards the very end of autumn, gathering up into my soul its precious new gifts. At the station in Omsk I saw emigrants, Little Russians. A great part of the earth was covered with their bodies, those friends of labor. I walked among them, heard their soft speech and asked them: "Are you not afraid to lose yourselves, so far away?" A man gray and bent by work, answered me: "As long as we have a piece of land under our feet, we do not care how far it is. It is suffocating on earth when a man has to live by his own labor." Formerly the words of pain and sorrow fell like ashes on my heart, but now they were keen sparks which lit it up, for every sorrow was my sorrow, and I too suffered from the want of liberty, as did the people. There is no time nor place for general spiritual growth, and this is bitter and dangerous to the one who outstrips the people, for he remains alone in advance of them, and the people do not see him and cannot strengthen him with their strength; and alone and uselessly he burns himself up in the fire of his desires. I spoke in Little Russian, for I knew this tender language.