ound a journal and to devote my whole life to it, you looked at me
ironically at once, and suddenly became horribly supercilious."

"That was not that, not that.... we were afraid then of
persecution...."

"It was just that. And you couldn't have been afraid of persecution in
Petersburg at that time. Do you remember that in February, too, when the
news of the emancipation came, you ran to me in a panic, and demanded
that I should at once give you a written statement that the proposed
magazine had nothing to do with you; that the young people had been
coming to see me and not you; that you were only a tutor who lived in
the house, only because he had not yet received his salary. Isn't that
so? Do remember that? You have distinguished yourself all your life,
Stepan Trofimovitch."

"That was only a moment of weakness, a moment when we were alone," he
exclaimed mournfully. "But is it possible, is it possible, to break
off everything for the sake of such petty impressions? Can it be that
nothing more has been left between us after those long years?"

"You are horribly calculating; you keep trying to leave me in your debt.
When you came back from abroad you looked down upon me and wouldn't
let me utter a word, but when I came back myself and talked to you
afterwards of my impressions of the Madonna, you wouldn't hear me,
you began smiling condescendingly into your cravat, as though I were
incapable of the same feelings as you."

"It was not so. It was probably not so. _J'ai oublie!_"

"No; it was so," she answered, "and, what's more, you've nothing to
pride yourself on. That's all nonsense, and one of your fancies. Now,
there's no one, absolutely no one, in ecstasies over the Madonna; no
one wastes time over it except old men who are hopelessly out of date.
That's established."

"Established, is it?"

"It's of no use whatever. This jug's of use because one can pour water
into it. This pencil's of use because you can write anything with it.
But that woman's face is inferior to any face in nature. Try drawing
an apple, and put a real apple beside it. Which would you take? You
wouldn't make a mistake, I'm sure. This is what all our theories amount
to, now that the first light of free investigation has dawned upon
them."

"Indeed, indeed."

"You laugh ironically. And what used you to say to me about charity?
Yet the enjoyment derived from charity is a haughty and immoral
enjoyment. The rich man's enjoyment in his wea