tor of the Municipal Department of Medicine and to the City
Architect. Thereafter he sat thoughtfully in his britchka--plunged
in meditation on the subject of whom else it might be well to visit.
However, not a single magnate had been neglected, and in conversation
with his hosts he had contrived to flatter each separate one. For
instance to the Governor he had hinted that a stranger, on arriving
in his, the Governor's province, would conceive that he had reached
Paradise, so velvety were the roads. "Governors who appoint capable
subordinates," had said Chichikov, "are deserving of the most ample meed
of praise." Again, to the Chief of Police our hero had passed a most
gratifying remark on the subject of the local gendarmery; while in
his conversation with the Vice-Governor and the President of the Local
Council (neither of whom had, as yet, risen above the rank of State
Councillor) he had twice been guilty of the gaucherie of addressing his
interlocutors with the title of "Your Excellency"--a blunder which had
not failed to delight them. In the result the Governor had invited
him to a reception the same evening, and certain other officials had
followed suit by inviting him, one of them to dinner, a second to a
tea-party, and so forth, and so forth.

Of himself, however, the traveller had spoken little; or, if he had
spoken at any length, he had done so in a general sort of way and with
marked modesty. Indeed, at moments of the kind his discourse had assumed
something of a literary vein, in that invariably he had stated that,
being a worm of no account in the world, he was deserving of no
consideration at the hands of his fellows; that in his time he had
undergone many strange experiences; that subsequently he had suffered
much in the cause of Truth; that he had many enemies seeking his life;
and that, being desirous of rest, he was now engaged in searching for a
spot wherein to dwell--wherefore, having stumbled upon the town in which
he now found himself, he had considered it his bounden duty to evince
his respect for the chief authorities of the place. This, and no more,
was all that, for the moment, the town succeeded in learning about the
new arrival. Naturally he lost no time in presenting himself at the
Governor's evening party. First, however, his preparations for that
function occupied a space of over two hours, and necessitated an
attention to his toilet of a kind not commonly seen. That is to say,
after a brie