world is
foolery!" and the trick's done. Young men are delighted. And, to be
sure, they were simply geese before, and now they have suddenly turned
nihilists.'

'Your praiseworthy sense of personal dignity has given way,' remarked
Bazarov phlegmatically, while Arkady was hot all over, and his eyes
were flashing. 'Our argument has gone too far; it's better to cut it
short, I think. I shall be quite ready to agree with you,' he added,
getting up, 'when you bring forward a single institution in our present
mode of life, in family or in social life, which does not call for
complete and unqualified destruction.'

'I will bring forward millions of such institutions,' cried Pavel
Petrovitch--'millions! Well--the Mir, for instance.'

A cold smile curved Bazarov's lips. 'Well, as regards the Mir,' he
commented; 'you had better talk to your brother. He has seen by now, I
should fancy, what sort of thing the Mir is in fact--its common
guarantee, its sobriety, and other features of the kind.'

'The family, then, the family as it exists among our peasants!' cried
Pavel Petrovitch.

'And that subject, too, I imagine, it will be better for yourselves not
to go into in detail. Don't you realise all the advantages of the head
of the family choosing his daughters-in-law? Take my advice, Pavel
Petrovitch, allow yourself two days to think about it; you're not
likely to find anything on the spot. Go through all our classes, and
think well over each, while I and Arkady will ...'

'Will go on turning everything into ridicule,' broke in Pavel
Petrovitch.

'No, will go on dissecting frogs. Come, Arkady; good-bye for the
present, gentlemen!'

The two friends walked off. The brothers were left alone, and at first
they only looked at one another.

'So that,' began Pavel Petrovitch, 'so that's what our young men of
this generation are! They are like that--our successors!'

'Our successors!' repeated Nikolai Petrovitch, with a dejected smile.
He had been sitting on thorns, all through the argument, and had done
nothing but glance stealthily, with a sore heart, at Arkady. 'Do you
know what I was reminded of, brother? I once had a dispute with our
poor mother; she stormed, and wouldn't listen to me. At last I said to
her, "Of course, you can't understand me; we belong," I said, "to two
different generations." She was dreadfully offended, while I thought,
"There's no help for it. It's a bitter pill, but she has to swallow
it." You see, n