During the summer of 1867 Tolstoy, despite the dislike and distrust of doctors--which he shares with Rousseau, and which he has again and again expressed in his works--was induced by the state of his health and by his wife's persuasion, to consult the most famous Moscow doctor of the time, Professor Zahárin, on whose advice he drank mineral water during several weeks. Writing to Fet he says: If I wrote to you, dear friend, every time I think of you, you would receive two letters a day from me. But one cannot get everything said, and sometimes one is lazy and sometimes too busy, as is the case at present. I have recently returned from Moscow and have begun a strict cure under the direction of Zahárin; and most important of all, I am printing my novel at Ris's, and have to prepare and send off MSS. and proofs every day under threat of a fine and of delayed publication. That is both pleasant and also hard, as you know. He goes on to criticise Tourgénef's novel, _Dym_ (_Smoke_), which had appeared that year: About _Smoke_ I meant to write long ago, and, of course, just what you have now written. That is why we love one another--because we think alike with the 'wisdom of the heart' as you call it. (Thank you very much for that letter also: 'the wisdom of the heart' and 'the wisdom of the mind' explain much to me.) About _Smoke_, I think that the strength of poetry lies in love; and the direction of that strength depends on character. Without strength of love there is no poetry; but strength falsely directed--the result of the poet's having an unpleasant, weak character--creates dislike. In _Smoke_ there is hardly any love of anything, and very little poetry. There is only love of light and playful adultery, and therefore the poetry of that novel is repulsive. That, as you see, is just what you write about it. Only I fear to express this opinion because I cannot look soberly at the author, whose personality I do not like; but I fancy my impression is the general one. One more writer played out! In November 1867 we find the whole family again established for a while in a lodging in Moscow, where they seem to have remained for a large part of the winter.