Prónka agreed with us, but he thought rather of moral beauty: goodness. Syómka understood with his big brain, but did not acknowledge beauty apart from usefulness. He was in doubt (as often happens to men with great reasoning power): feeling Art to be a force, but not feeling in his soul the need of that force. He, like them, wished to get at Art by his reason, and tried to kindle that fire in himself. 'We'll sing _Who hath_ to-morrow. I remember my part,' said he. (He has a correct ear, but no taste or refinement in singing.) Fédka, however, fully understood that the lime tree is good when in leaf: good to look at in summer; and that that is enough. Prónka understood that it is a pity to cut it down, because it, too, has life: 'Why, when we take the sap of a lime, it's like taking blood.' Syómka, though he did not say so, evidently thought that there was little use in a lime when it was sappy. It feels strange to repeat what we then said, but it seems to me that we said all that can be said about utility, and plastic and moral beauty. We went on to the village. Fédka still clung to my hand; now, it seemed to me, from gratitude. We all were nearer one another that night than we had been for a long time. Prónka walked beside us along the broad village street. 'See, there is still a light in Mazánof's house,' said he. 'As I was going to school this morning, Gavrúka was coming from the pub, as dru-u-nk as could be! His horse all in a lather and he beating it! I am always sorry for such things. Really, why should it be beaten?' 'And the other day, coming from Toúla, my daddy gave his horse the reins,' said Syómka; 'and it took him into a snow-drift and there he slept--quite drunk.' 'And Gavrúka kept on beating his horse over the eyes, and I felt so sorry,' repeated Prónka again. 'Why should he beat it? He got down and just flogged it.' Syómka suddenly stopped. 'Our folk are already asleep,' said he, looking in at the window of his crooked, dirty hut. 'Won't you walk a little longer?' 'No.' 'Go-o-od-bye, Lyóf Nikoláyevitch!' shouted he suddenly, and tearing himself away from us, as it were with an effort, he ran to the house, lifted the latch and disappeared. 'So you will take each of us home? First one and then the other?' said Fédka. We went on. There was a light in Prónka's hut, and we looked in at the window. His mother, a tall and handsome but toil-worn woman, with black eyebrows and eyes, sat at the table, peeling potatoes. In the middle of the hut hung a cradle. Prónka's brother, the mathematician from our second class, was standing at the table, eating potatoes with salt. It was a black, tiny, and dirty hut. 'What a plague you are!' shouted the mother at Prónka. 'Where have you been?'