"I am very grateful for the honour you do me and my daughter, but let me speak to you as a friend. I will speak to you, not as a father, but as one gentleman to another. Tell me, why do you want to be married so young? Only peasants are married so young, and that, of course, is loutishness. But why should you? Where's the satisfaction of putting on the fetters at your age?" "I am not young!" said Nikitin, offended. "I am in my twenty-seventh year." "Papa, the farrier has come!" cried Varya from the other room. And the conversation broke off. Varya, Masha, and Polyansky saw Nikitin home. When they reached his gate, Varya said: "Why is it your mysterious Metropolit Metropolititch never shows himself anywhere? He might come and see us." The mysterious Ippolit Ippolititch was sitting on his bed, taking off his trousers, when Nikitin went in to him. "Don't go to bed, my dear fellow," said Nikitin breathlessly. "Stop a minute; don't go to bed!" Ippolit Ippolititch put on his trousers hurriedly and asked in a flutter: "What is it?" "I am going to be married." Nikitin sat down beside his companion, and looking at him wonderingly, as though surprised at himself, said: "Only fancy, I am going to be married! To Masha Shelestov! I made an offer today." "Well? She seems a good sort of girl. Only she is very young." "Yes, she is young," sighed Nikitin, and shrugged his shoulders with a careworn air. "Very, very young!" "She was my pupil at the high school. I know her. She wasn't bad at geography, but she was no good at history. And she was inattentive in class, too." Nikitin for some reason felt suddenly sorry for his companion, and longed to say something kind and comforting to him. "My dear fellow, why don't you get married?" he asked. "Why don't you marry Varya, for instance? She is a splendid, first-rate girl! It's true she is very fond of arguing, but a heart . . . what a heart! She was just asking about you. Marry her, my dear boy! Eh?" He knew perfectly well that Varya would not marry this dull, snub-nosed man, but still persuaded him to marry her--why? "Marriage is a serious step," said Ippolit Ippolititch after a moment's thought. "One has to look at it all round and weigh things thoroughly; it's not to be done rashly. Prudence is always a good thing, and especially in marriage, when a man, ceasing to be a bachelor, begins a new life." And he talked of what every one has known for ages. Nikitin did not stay to listen, said goodnight, and went to his own room. He undressed quickly and quickly got into bed, in order to be able to think the sooner of his happiness, of Masha, of the future; he smiled, then suddenly recalled that he had not read Lessing. "I must read him," he thought. "Though, after all, why should I? Bother him!" And exhausted by his happiness, he fell asleep at once and went on smiling till the morning.