well made. He wore a steel watch chain and
from this chain there hung a silver Geneva watch. Fool the prince might
be, still, the general's servant felt that it was not correct for him to
continue to converse thus with a visitor, in spite of the fact that the
prince pleased him somehow.

"And what time of day does the lady receive?" the latter asked,
reseating himself in his old place.

"Oh, that's not in my province! I believe she receives at any time; it
depends upon the visitors. The dressmaker goes in at eleven. Gavrila
Ardalionovitch is allowed much earlier than other people, too; he is
even admitted to early lunch now and then."

"It is much warmer in the rooms here than it is abroad at this season,"
observed the prince; "but it is much warmer there out of doors. As for
the houses--a Russian can't live in them in the winter until he gets
accustomed to them."

"Don't they heat them at all?"

"Well, they do heat them a little; but the houses and stoves are so
different to ours."

"H'm! were you long away?"

"Four years! and I was in the same place nearly all the time,--in one
village."

"You must have forgotten Russia, hadn't you?"

"Yes, indeed I had--a good deal; and, would you believe it, I often
wonder at myself for not having forgotten how to speak Russian? Even
now, as I talk to you, I keep saying to myself 'how well I am speaking
it.' Perhaps that is partly why I am so talkative this morning. I assure
you, ever since yesterday evening I have had the strongest desire to go
on and on talking Russian."

"H'm! yes; did you live in Petersburg in former years?"

This good flunkey, in spite of his conscientious scruples, really could
not resist continuing such a very genteel and agreeable conversation.

"In Petersburg? Oh no! hardly at all, and now they say so much is
changed in the place that even those who did know it well are obliged to
relearn what they knew. They talk a good deal about the new law courts,
and changes there, don't they?"

"H'm! yes, that's true enough. Well now, how is the law over there, do
they administer it more justly than here?"

"Oh, I don't know about that! I've heard much that is good about our
legal administration, too. There is no capital punishment here for one
thing."

"Is there over there?"

"Yes--I saw an execution in France--at Lyons. Schneider took me over
with him to see it."

"What, did they hang the fellow?"

"No, they cut off people's heads in France.