spite him; deliberately it is now at twelve and
then quite suddenly at eight. It does it out of animosity as though
the devil were in it. The locksmith tries to find out the cause, and
once he plunges it in holy water.

* * * * *

Formerly the heroes in novels and stories (e.g. Petchorin, Onyeguin)
were twenty years old, but now one cannot have a hero under thirty to
thirty-five years. The same will soon happen with heroines.

* * * * *

N. is the son of a famous father; he is very nice, but, whatever he
does, every one says: "That is very well, but it is nothing to the
father." Once he gave a recitation at an evening party; all the
performers had a success, but of him they said: "That is very well,
but still it is nothing to the father." He went home and got into bed
and, looking at his father's portrait, shook his fist at him.

* * * * *

We fret ourselves to reform life, in order that posterity may be
happy, and posterity will say as usual: "In the past it used to be
better, the present is worse than the past."

* * * * *

My motto: I don't want anything.

* * * * *

When a decent working-man takes himself and his work critically,
people call him grumbler, idler, bore; but when an idle scoundrel
shouts that it is necessary to work, he is applauded.

* * * * *

When a woman destroys things like a man, people think it natural and
everybody understands it; but when like a man, she wishes or tries to
create, people think it unnatural and cannot reconcile themselves to
it.

* * * * *

When I married, I became an old woman.

* * * * *

He looked down on the world from the height of his baseness.

* * * * *

"Your fiancee is very pretty." "To me all women are alike."

* * * * *

He dreamt of winning three hundred thousand in lottery, twice in
succession, because three hundred thousand would not be enough for
him.

* * * * *

N., a retired Councillor of State, lives in the country; he is
sixty-six. He is educated, liberal-minded, reads, likes an argument.
He learns from his guests that the new coroner Z. walks about with a
slipper on one foot and a boot on the o