ak, make a man of good breeding happy."

Indeed, so attractively did the idea of the two hundred thousand
roubles begin to dance before his imagination that he felt a twinge of
self-reproach because, during the hubbub, he had not inquired of the
postillion or the coachman who the travellers might be. But soon the
sight of Sobakevitch's country house dissipated his thoughts, and forced
him to return to his stock subject of reflection.

Sobakevitch's country house and estate were of very fair size, and on
each side of the mansion were expanses of birch and pine forest in two
shades of green. The wooden edifice itself had dark-grey walls and a
red-gabled roof, for it was a mansion of the kind which Russia builds
for her military settlers and for German colonists. A noticeable
circumstance was the fact that the taste of the architect had differed
from that of the proprietor--the former having manifestly been a pedant
and desirous of symmetry, and the latter having wished only for comfort.
Consequently he (the proprietor) had dispensed with all windows on one
side of the mansion, and had caused to be inserted, in their place, only
a small aperture which, doubtless, was intended to light an otherwise
dark lumber-room. Likewise, the architect's best efforts had failed to
cause the pediment to stand in the centre of the building, since the
proprietor had had one of its four original columns removed. Evidently
durability had been considered throughout, for the courtyard was
enclosed by a strong and very high wooden fence, and both the stables,
the coach-house, and the culinary premises were partially constructed of
beams warranted to last for centuries. Nay, even the wooden huts of the
peasantry were wonderful in the solidity of their construction, and
not a clay wall or a carved pattern or other device was to be seen.
Everything fitted exactly into its right place, and even the draw-well
of the mansion was fashioned of the oakwood usually thought suitable
only for mills or ships. In short, wherever Chichikov's eye turned he
saw nothing that was not free from shoddy make and well and skilfully
arranged. As he approached the entrance steps he caught sight of two
faces peering from a window. One of them was that of a woman in a mobcap
with features as long and as narrow as a cucumber, and the other that
of a man with features as broad and as short as the Moldavian pumpkins
(known as gorlianki) whereof balallaiki--the species of li