the
doubtful, meditative smile of a young bride who, about to bear her
first child, is feeling at once nervous and delighted at the prospect.

* * * * *

The hour was past noon, and the third-class passengers, languid with
fatigue induced by the heat, were engaged in drinking either tea or
beer. Seated mostly on the bulwarks of the steamer, they silently
scanned the banks, while the deck quivered, crockery clattered at the
buffet, and the deck hand in the bows sighed soporifically:

Six! Six! Six-and-a-half!

From the engine-room a grimy stoker emerged. Rolling along, and
scraping his bare feet audibly against the deck, he approached the
boatswain's cabin, where the said boatswain, a fair-haired,
fair-bearded man from Kostroma was standing in the doorway. The senior
official contracted his rugged eyes quizzically, and inquired:

"Whither in such a hurry?"

"To pick a bone with Mitka."

"Good!"

With a wave of his black hand the stoker resumed his way, while the
boatswain, yawning, fell to casting his eyes about him. On a locker
near the companion of the engine-room a small man in a buff pea-jacket,
a new cap, and a pair of boots on which there were clots of dried mud,
was seated.

Through lack of diversion the boatswain began to feel inclined to
hector somebody, so cried sternly to the man in question:

"Hi there, chawbacon!"

The man on the locker turned about--turned nervously, and much as a
bullock turns. That is to say, he turned with his whole body.

"Why have you gone and put yourself THERE?" inquired the boatswain.
"Though there is a notice to tell you NOT to sit there, it is there
that you must go and sit! Can't you read?"

Rising, the passenger inspected not the notice, but the locker. Then he
replied:

"Read? Yes, I CAN read."

"Then why sit there where you oughtn't to?"

"I cannot see any notice."

"Well, it's hot there anyway, and the smell of oil comes up from the
engines.... Whence have you come?"

"From Kashira."

"Long from home?"

"Three weeks, about."

"Any rain at your place?"

"No. But why?"

"How come your boots are so muddy?"

The passenger lowered his head, extended cautiously first one foot, and
then the other, scrutinised them both, and replied:

"You see, they are not my boots."

With a roar of laughter that caused his brilliant beard to project from
his chin, the boatswain retorted:

"I think you must drink a bit."

The passen