e soldier may shoot us down with the state rifle? It would only
be a complicated form of suicide! It would be better to make an end of
yourself--you would at any rate know when and how, and choose the spot
to aim at.

I am beginning to think that if some war were to break out, some
people's war--I would go and take part in it, not so as to free others
(free others while one's own are groaning under the yoke!!), but to make
an end of myself.

Our friend Vassily, who gave us shelter here, is a lucky man. He belongs
to our camp, but is so calm and quiet. He doesn't want to hurry over
things. I should have quarrelled with another, but I can't with him. The
secret lies not in his convictions, but in the man himself. Vassily has
a character that you can't kindle, but he's all right nevertheless. He
is with us a good deal, with Mariana. What surprises me is that although
I love her and she loves me (I see you smiling at this, but the fact
remains!) we have nothing to talk about, while she is constantly
discussing and arguing with him and listening too. I am not jealous of
him; he is trying to find a place for her somewhere, at any rate, she
keeps on asking him to do so, but it makes me feel bitter to look at
them both. And would you believe it--I have only to drop a hint about
marrying and she would agree at once and the priest Zosim would put in
an appearance, "Isaiah, rejoice!" and the rest of it. But this would not
make it any easier for me and NOTHING WOULD BE CHANGED BY IT... Whatever
you do, there is no way out of it! Life has cut me short, my dear
Vladimir, as our little drunken tailor used to say, you remember, when
he used to complain about his wife.

I have a feeling that it can't go on somehow, that something is
preparing.

Have I not again and again said that the time has come for action? Well,
so here we are in the thick of it.

I can't remember if I told you anything about another friend of mine--a
relative of the Sipiagins. He will get himself into such a mess that it
won't be easy for him to get out of it.

I quite meant finishing this letter and am still going on. It seems to
me that nothing matters and yet I scribble verses. I don't read them to
Mariana and she is not very anxious to hear them, but you have sometimes
praised my poor attempts and most of all you'll keep them to yourself.
I have been struck by a common phenomenon in Russia... But, however, let
the verses speak for themselves--

SLEEP