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Now, as he had just seen that I was not capable of writing, this offer humiliated me somewhat, and I answered: "No, thanks; I can pull through yet a while, thanking you very much, all the same. Good-day!" "Good-day!" replies the "commandor," turning at the same time to his desk again.

I took the money; I was dumb with joy, and never said a word; I didn't even thank him once. "It isn't worth while feeling put out about it," said the "Commandor" at last. "I know you can write for it." And so off he went. When he had gone a few steps, I remembered all at once that I had not thanked him for this great assistance.

My eyes by this time are filled with tears at his friendliness, and I cough with a bitter effort to regain my composure. The "Commandor" tweaks his nose and looks at me. "Have you anything to live on in the meantime?" he questions. "No," I reply. "I haven't that either; I haven't eaten anything today, but...."

That was the reason I worked on so persistently. I had, in particular, commenced a piece from which I expected great things an allegory about a fire a profound thought upon which I intended to expend all my energy, and bring it to the "Commander" in payment. The "Commandor" should see that he had helped a talent this time.

If I only had a candle I would try to fag on through the night; it would only take a couple of hours if I once warmed to my work, and then tomorrow I could call on the "commandor." I go without further ado into the Opland Cafe and look for my young acquaintance in the bank, in order to procure a penny for a candle.

I looked about the little office busts, prints, cuttings, and an enormous paper-basket, that looked as if it might swallow a man, bones and all. I felt sad at heart at the sight of this monstrous chasm, this dragon's mouth, that always stood open, always ready to receive rejected work, newly crushed hopes. "What day of the month is it?" queried the "commandor" from the table.

"On no account," I replied to myself at last; I was unfortunately not in a condition to bear food. It would only be a repetition of the same old story visions, and presentiments, and mad notions. My article would never get finished, and it was a question of going to the "Commandor" before he had time to forget me. On no account whatever! and I decided upon the candle. With that I entered the shop.

Such are the Aland archipelago, Hochland, Tütters, Dagö and Osel in the Baltic Sea; Nova Zembla, with Kolgueff and Vaigatch, in the Barents Sea; the Solovetsky Islands in the White Sea; the New Siberian archipelago and the small group of the Medvyezhii Islands off the Siberian coast; the Commandor Islands off Kamchatka; the Shantar Islands and Saghalin in the Sea of Okhotsk.

Perhaps the "Commandor" guesses that something is amiss with me. He slackens his pace a little, and I say, in order to stop him, "I would have called upon you long ago with something, but nothing has come yet!" "Indeed?" he replies in an interrogative tone. "You haven't got it finished, then?" "No, it didn't get finished."

I am standing face to face with the "Commandor." I get devil-may-care brazen. I take yet a step farther from the wall in order to make him notice me. I do not do it to awake his compassion, but to mortify myself, place myself, as it were, on the pillory. I could have flung myself down in the street and begged him to walk over me, tread on my face. I don't even bid him good-evening.