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Updated: June 18, 2025
"Indeed, he is a man worthy of the greatest respect. And how thoroughly he performs his duty according to his lights! Would that we had more like him!" "And the tactfulness with which he greets every one!" added Manilov, smiling, and half-closing his eyes, like a cat which is being tickled behind the ears. "Quite so," assented Chichikov.
"And the Vice-Governor, too he is a nice man, is he not?" inquired Manilov with renewed blinkings of the eyes. "Who? The Vice-Governor? Yes, a most worthy fellow!" replied Chichikov. "And what of the Chief of Police? Is it not a fact that he too is in the highest degree agreeable?" "Very agreeable indeed. And what a clever, well-read individual!
Well, my purpose in wanting it is this that I desire to purchase a few peasants." And he broke off in a gulp. "But may I ask HOW you desire to purchase those peasants?" asked Manilov. "With land, or merely as souls for transferment that is to say, by themselves, and without any land?" "I want the peasants themselves only," replied Chichikov. "And I want dead ones at that." "What?
With him and the Public Prosecutor and the President of the Local Council I played whist until the cocks uttered their last morning crow. He is a most excellent fellow." "And what of his wife?" queried Madame Manilov. "Is she not a most gracious personality?" "One of the best among my limited acquaintance," agreed Chichikov.
Do not forget what I have requested you to do." "Rest assured that I will not," responded Manilov. "Only for a couple of days will you and I be parted from one another." With that the party moved into the drawing-room. "Farewell, dearest children," Chichikov went on as he caught sight of Alkid and Themistocleus, who were playing with a wooden hussar which lacked both a nose and one arm.
Not without a sense of pleasure did Chichikov take her hand as, lisping a little, she declared that she and her husband were equally gratified by his coming, and that, of late, not a day had passed without her husband recalling him to mind. "Yes," affirmed Manilov; "and every day SHE has said to ME: 'Why does not your friend put in an appearance? 'Wait a little dearest, I have always replied.
By way of answer, he fell to sucking at his pipe with such vehemence that at length the pipe began to gurgle like a bassoon. It was as though he had been seeking of it inspiration in the present unheard-of juncture. But the pipe only gurgled, et praeterea nihil. "Perhaps you feel doubtful about the proposal?" said Chichikov. "Not at all," replied Manilov.
In this jar I have some of the scented kind." "Excellent, good mother! Then I will take that." Probably the reader will have noticed that, for all his expressions of solicitude, Chichikov's tone towards his hostess partook of a freer, a more unceremonious, nature than that which he had adopted towards Madam Manilov.
Never do I permit myself to step outside the civil law, great though has been the harm which that rule has wrought me in my career. In my eyes an obligation is a sacred thing. In the presence of the law I am dumb." These last words reassured Manilov not a little: yet still the meaning of the affair remained to him a mystery.
Yes, the two friends who had just been discussing the joys of camaraderie sat staring at one another like the portraits which, of old, used to hang on opposite sides of a mirror. At length Manilov picked up his pipe, and, while doing so, glanced covertly at Chichikov to see whether there was any trace of a smile to be detected on his lips whether, in short, he was joking.
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