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What are you pleased to command?" The "barin" is pleased to command a glass of tea, the customary order with trakteer-frequenters, and it is obeyed almost as soon as given. He proceeds to fill the glass, with scientific nicety of proportion, from both pots at once, launches into it a thin slice of lemon, and then pronounces the talismanic word "Gotovo!"
Turning into a side alley wherein the mire necessitated both the most strenuous exertions on the soroka's part and the most vigorous castigation on the part of the driver and the barin, the conveyance eventually reached the gates of a courtyard which, combined with a small fruit garden containing various bushes, a couple of apple-trees in blossom, and a mean, dirty little shed, constituted the premises attached to an antiquated-looking villa.
Next he resorted to remonstrance, but was met with the reply, "How could we not do our best for our barin? You yourself saw how well we laboured at the ploughing and the sowing, for you gave us mugs of vodka for our pains." "Then why have things turned out so badly?" the barin persisted. "Who can say? It must be that a grub has eaten the crop from below.
"Ai, ai," she said, "a barin." She looked at my coat and collar. "It will be but poor fare here." "Not a barin" I urged, "but a poor wanderer coming from far and going farther still. I generally sleep under the open sky with God as my host and the world as my home, but to-night promises storm, and I fear to take cold in the rain."
Then he went on very seriously. "That is why, Barin, I give you that paper. I have friendly feelings towards you. I don't know what it is, but I am your brother. They may come and want to rob your house. Show them that paper." "Thank you very much," I said. "But I'm not afraid. There's nothing I mind them stealing. All the same I'm very grateful." He went on very seriously.
Fellows like that drunkard lead the barin by the nose, and everything is ruled by the Committee of Management, which takes men from their proper work, and sets them to do any other it likes. Indeed, only through the Committee does ANYTHING get done."
Unfortunately that thief of a landlord has given it nothing to eat, even though I have promised him the roan filly which, as you may remember, I swopped from Khvostirev." As a matter of act, Chichikov had never in his life seen either Khvostirev or the roan filly. "Barin, do you wish for anything to eat?" inquired the landlady as she entered. "No, nothing at all.
"It is always so," commented Vasili with a resentment equal to the last speaker's. "Yes, no sooner, with us, does a man accumulate a little money than he sticks his nose in the air, and falls to thinking himself a real barin." "Why is it that you always say 'With us, and 'Among us, and so on?" "Among us Russians, then, if you like it better." "I do like it better.
Chichikov looked round, and perceived that, in the meanwhile, the barin had dressed himself and overtaken the carriage. With a pair of yellow trousers he was wearing a grass-green jacket, and his neck was as guiltless of a collar as Cupid's. Also, as he sat sideways in his drozhki, his bulk was such that he completely filled the vehicle.
Slipping from the box, he stood resting his hands against the side of the britchka, while Chichikov tumbled and floundered about in the mud, in a vain endeavour to wriggle clear of the stuff. "Ah, you!" said Selifan meditatively to the britchka. "To think of upsetting us like this!" "You are as drunk as a lord!" exclaimed Chichikov. "No, no, barin. Drunk, indeed? Why, I know my manners too well.