So then Akím married, and transported his young wife to his inn.... They began to live. Dunyásha proved to be a bad housekeeper, a poor helpmeet for her husband. She never looked after anything, she grieved, was bored, unless some passing officer was attentive to her and paid court to her, as he sat behind the capacious samovár; she frequently absented herself, sometimes going to the town to shop, sometimes to the mistress's manor-house, which lay four versts distant from the inn. In the manor-house she refreshed herself; there people of her own sort surrounded her; the maids envied her smart attire; Kiríllovna treated her to tea; Lizavéta Prókhorovna herself chatted with her.... But even these visits did not pass off without bitter emotions for Dunyásha.... For instance, being a house-serf, she was not allowed to wear a bonnet, and was obliged to muffle her head up in a kerchief .... "like a merchant's wife," as the crafty Kiríllovna said to her.... "Like the wife of a petty burgher," thought Dunyásha to herself. More than once there recurred to Akím's mind the words of his only relative, an aged uncle, an inveterate peasant, a man without family or land: "Well, brother, Akímushka," he had said to him, when he met him in the street, "I have heard that thou 'rt a-courting...." "Well, yes, I am; what of it?" "Ekh, Akím, Akím! Thou 'rt no mate for us peasants now, there 's no denying it; neither is she a mate for thee." "But why is n't she a mate for me?" "Why, for this reason, at least,"--returned the other, pointing to Akím's beard, which he, to please his bride, had begun to clip close--he would not consent to shave it off entirely.... Akím dropped his eyes; and the old man turned away, wrapped about him the skirts of his sheepskin coat, which was ragged on the shoulders, and went his way, shaking his head. Yes, more than once did Akím grow pensive, grunt and sigh.... But his love for his pretty wife did not diminish; he was proud of her, especially when he compared her, not only with the other peasant women, or with his former wife, whom he had married at the age of sixteen, but with the other maids of the house-serf class: as much as to say: "Just see what sort of a bird we 've captured!".... Her slightest caress afforded him great pleasure... "Perhaps," he thought to himself, "she 'll get used to me, she 'll grow accustomed to her new life..." Moreover, she conducted herself very well, and no one could say an evil word concerning her.