the conversation, but he was too busy drinking his tea and only
nodded his head approvingly. He emptied one tumbler after another and
grew warmer and warmer and more and more comfortable. The talk continued
on the same subject for a long time--the harmfulness of a household
dividing up--and it was clearly not an abstract discussion but concerned
the question of a separation in that house; a separation demanded by the
second son who sat there morosely silent.

It was evidently a sore subject and absorbed them all, but out of
propriety they did not discuss their private affairs before strangers.
At last, however, the old man could not restrain himself, and with tears
in his eyes declared that he would not consent to a break-up of the
family during his lifetime, that his house was prospering, thank God,
but that if they separated they would all have to go begging.

'Just like the Matveevs,' said the neighbour. 'They used to have a
proper house, but now they've split up none of them has anything.'

'And that is what you want to happen to us,' said the old man, turning
to his son.

The son made no reply and there was an awkward pause. The silence was
broken by Petrushka, who having harnessed the horse had returned to the
hut a few minutes before this and had been listening all the time with a
smile.

'There's a fable about that in Paulson,' he said. 'A father gave his
sons a broom to break. At first they could not break it, but when they
took it twig by twig they broke it easily. And it's the same here,' and
he gave a broad smile. 'I'm ready!' he added.

'If you're ready, let's go,' said Vasili Andreevich. 'And as to
separating, don't you allow it, Grandfather. You got everything together
and you're the master. Go to the Justice of the Peace. He'll say how
things should be done.'

'He carries on so, carries on so,' the old man continued in a whining
tone. 'There's no doing anything with him. It's as if the devil
possessed him.'

Nikita having meanwhile finished his fifth tumbler of tea laid it on
its side instead of turning it upside down, hoping to be offered a sixth
glass. But there was no more water in the samovar, so the hostess did
not fill it up for him. Besides, Vasili Andreevich was putting his
things on, so there was nothing for it but for Nikita to get up too, put
back into the sugar-basin the lump of sugar he had nibbled all round,
wipe his perspiring face with the skirt of his sheepskin, and go to put