had been home, I would not have let him go that way. What did he
take along with him? A feeling of discontent and a muddle in his head!"

"Well," said Andrey, laughing, "when a man's grown to the age of forty
and has fought so long with the bears in his heart, it's hard to make
him over."

Pavel looked at him sternly and asked:

"Do you think it's impossible for enlightenment to destroy all the
rubbish that's been crammed into a man's brains?"

"Don't fly up into the air at once, Pavel! Your flight will knock you
up against the belfry tower and break your wings," said the Little
Russian in admonition.

And they started one of those discussions in which words were used that
were unintelligible to the mother. The dinner was already at an end,
but they still continued a vehement debate, flinging at each other
veritable rattling hailstones of big words. Sometimes their language
was simpler:

"We must keep straight on our path, turning neither to the right nor to
the left!" Pavel asserted firmly.

"And run headlong into millions of people who will regard us as their
enemies!"

"You can't avoid that!"

"And what, my dear sir, becomes of your enlightenment?"

The mother listened to the dispute, and understood that Pavel did not
care for the peasants, but that the Little Russian stood up for them,
and tried to show that the peasants, too, must be taught to comprehend
the good. She understood Andrey better, and he seemed to her to be in
the right; but every time he spoke she waited with strained ears and
bated breath for her son's answer to find out whether the Little
Russian had offended Pavel. But although they shouted at the top of
their voices, they gave each other no offense.

Occasionally the mother asked:

"Is it so, Pavel?"

And he answered with a smile:

"Yes, it's so."

"Say, my dear sir," the Little Russian said with a good-natured sneer,
"you have eaten well, but you have chewed your food up badly, and a
piece has remained sticking in your throat. You had better gargle."

"Don't go fooling now!" said Pavel.

"I am as solemn as a funeral."

The mother laughed quietly and shook her head.

CHAPTER XV

Spring was rapidly drawing near; the snow melted and laid bare the mud
and the soot of the factory chimneys. Mud, mud! Wherever the
villagers looked--mud! Every day more mud! The entire village seemed
unwashed and dressed in rags and tatters. During the day the water
dripped