unned person would put on the matter.

"A hundred and fifty rubles for a cloak!" shrieked poor Akakiy
Akakievitch, perhaps for the first time in his life, for his voice had
always been distinguished for softness.

"Yes, sir," said Petrovitch, "for any kind of cloak. If you have a
marten fur on the collar, or a silk-lined hood, it will mount up to two
hundred."

"Petrovitch, please," said Akakiy Akakievitch in a beseeching tone, not
hearing, and not trying to hear, Petrovitch's words, and disregarding
all his "effects," "some repairs, in order that it may wear yet a little
longer."

"No, it would only be a waste of time and money," said Petrovitch; and
Akakiy Akakievitch went away after these words, utterly discouraged. But
Petrovitch stood for some time after his departure, with significantly
compressed lips, and without betaking himself to his work, satisfied
that he would not be dropped, and an artistic tailor employed.

Akakiy Akakievitch went out into the street as if in a dream. "Such an
affair!" he said to himself: "I did not think it had come to--" and then
after a pause, he added, "Well, so it is! see what it has come to
at last! and I never imagined that it was so!" Then followed a
long silence, after which he exclaimed, "Well, so it is! see what
already--nothing unexpected that--it would be nothing--what a strange
circumstance!" So saying, instead of going home, he went in exactly
the opposite direction without himself suspecting it. On the way, a
chimney-sweep bumped up against him, and blackened his shoulder, and a
whole hatful of rubbish landed on him from the top of a house which was
building. He did not notice it; and only when he ran against a watchman,
who, having planted his halberd beside him, was shaking some snuff from
his box into his horny hand, did he recover himself a little, and that
because the watchman said, "Why are you poking yourself into a man's
very face? Haven't you the pavement?" This caused him to look about him,
and turn towards home.

There only, he finally began to collect his thoughts, and to survey
his position in its clear and actual light, and to argue with himself,
sensibly and frankly, as with a reasonable friend with whom one can
discuss private and personal matters. "No," said Akakiy Akakievitch, "it
is impossible to reason with Petrovitch now; he is that--evidently his
wife has been beating him. I'd better go to him on Sunday morning; after
Saturday night he will be