heir own use, his hopes fell, and he
greatly feared that he would be inevitably ruined.

These dark forebodings have not been by any means realised. His serfs
were emancipated and received about a half of the estate, but in return
for the land ceded they paid him annually a considerable sum, and they
were always ready to cultivate his fields for a fair remuneration. The
yearly outlay was considerably greater, but the price of grain rose,
and this counterbalanced the additional yearly expenditure. The
administration of the estate has become much less patriarchal; much that
was formerly left to custom and tacit understanding is now regulated
by express agreement on purely commercial principles; a great deal more
money is paid out and a great deal more received; there is much less
authority in the hands of the master, and his responsibilities are
proportionately diminished; but in spite of all these changes, Ivan
Ivan'itch would have great difficulty in deciding whether he is a richer
or a poorer man. He has fewer horses and fewer servants, but he has
still more than he requires, and his mode of life has undergone no
perceptible alteration. Maria Petrovna complains that she is no longer
supplied with eggs, chickens, and homespun linen by the peasants, and
that everything is three times as dear as it used to be; but somehow the
larder is still full, and abundance reigns in the house as of old.

Ivan Ivan'itch certainly does not possess transcendent qualities of any
kind. It would be impossible to make a hero out of him, even though his
own son should be his biographer. Muscular Christians may reasonably
despise him, an active, energetic man may fairly condemn him for
his indolence and apathy. But, on the other hand, he has no very
bad qualities. His vices are of the passive, negative kind. He is a
respectable if not a distinguished member of society, and appears a
very worthy man when compared with many of his neighbours who have
been brought up in similar conditions. Take, for instance, his younger
brother Dimitri, who lives a short way off.

Dimitri Ivanovitch, like his brother Ivan, had been endowed by nature
with a very decided repugnance to prolonged intellectual exertion,
but as he was a man of good parts he did not fear a Junker's
examination--especially when he could count on the colonel's
protection--and accordingly entered the army. In his regiment were a
number of jovial young officers like himself, always read