ly that if the loutish hand of the Kvartalnue Nadziratel
had not let the frame drop, the ducats might have remained for centuries
undisturbed. It was with gratitude and complacency, rather than
aversion, that the painter now contemplated the peculiar features and
remarkable eyes of the old Asiatic.

"Whoever you are, my old boy," said Tchartkoff to himself, "I'll put you
under glass, and give you a splendid frame for this."

At this moment his hand happened to touch the heap of gold, and the
contact made his heart beat as violently as ever. "What shall I do with
it?" he thought, fixing his eyes upon the money. "Now I am at my ease
for three years at least, I can shut myself in my studio, and work. I
can buy colours, pay for a comfortable lodging and good food. I have
enough for every thing; nobody can tease or badger me now. I'll get a
first-rate lay-figure, order a plaster torso, model feet, buy a Venus,
have engravings of all the great masters. And if I work steadily for
three years, quietly, without hurry, without being obliged to sell my
pictures for my daily bread, I shall astonish the world and achieve
fame."

Such was the artist's soliloquy, prompted by conscious talent and
honourable ambition. A far different counsel was given by his twenty-two
summers and heat of youth. He now had at his command all that he had
hitherto gazed at from afar with envying eyes. How his heart bounded and
swelled within him, as he thought of the luxuries he could now command!
how he longed to exchange rags for purple and fine linen, and fare
sumptuously after his long fast, to dwell in a splendid lodging, to
visit the theatre, the cafe, the ball!

Seizing his money, the young man was in the street in a moment. His
first visit was to a tailor's shop, where he dressed himself from top to
toe, and walked down the street looking at himself in every window. He
bought a huge quantity of trinkets and perfumes, an opera-glass, and a
mountain of brilliant cravats; took, without a word of bargaining, the
first lodging that he saw, a magnificent set of rooms in the Nevsku
perspective, with immense mirrors, and each window glazed with a single
pane; had his hair curled at a coiffeur's, hired a carriage, and drove
twice, without the slightest object, from one end of the town to the
other, crammed himself with bon-bons at a confectioner's, and went to a
French _restaurant_, about which he had hitherto heard only vague and
uncertain rumours, su