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Updated: June 12, 2025
"Well, Woldemar," cried Marya Dmitrievna, "you used to come in unannounced!" Panshin only replied to Marya Dmitrievna by a single glance. He bowed courteously to her, but did not kiss her hand. She presented him to Varvara Pavlovna; he stepped back a pace, bowed to her with the same courtesy, but with still greater elegance and respect, and took a seat near the card-table.
Look at that peasant going to the mowing; is he contented with his fate?... What! would you care to change places with him? Remember your mother; how infinitely little she asked of life, and what a life fell to her lot. You were only bragging it seems when you said to Panshin that you had come back to Russia to cultivate the soil; you have come back to dangle after young girls in your old age.
This yawn did not escape Varvara Pavlovna; she at once turned her back on the piano, observing, "Assez de musique comme ca; let us talk," and she folded her arms. "Oui, assez de musique," repeated Panshin gaily, and at once he dropped into a chat, alert, light, and in French.
"Why, I thought you did not think much of Mr. Panshin yourself." Marfa Timofyevna pushed away the glass. "I can't drink; I shall knock my last teeth out if I try to. What's Panshin to do with it? Why bring Panshin in? You had better tell me who has taught you to make appointments at night eh? miss?" Lisa turned pale.
And, in fact, even in Petersburg Panshin was reckoned a capable official; he got through a great deal of work; he spoke of it lightly as befits a man of the world who does not attach any special importance to his labours, but he never hesitated in carrying out orders. The authorities like such subordinates; he himself had no doubt, that if he chose, he could be a minister in time.
She is not proud, high-spirited, and haughty; she does not constantly "draw herself up to her full height," a species of gymnastics in great favour with most fiction-heroines. But she draws all men unto herself. She is beloved by the two opposite extremes of manhood Panshin and Lavretsky.
"A hundred and one, a hundred and two, hearts, a hundred and three," sounded his voice in measured tones, and Lavretsky could not decide whether it had a ring of reproach or of self-satisfaction. "Can I see Marfa Timofyevna?" he inquired, observing that Panshin was setting to work to shuffle the cards with still more dignity. There was not a trace of the artist to be detected in him now.
Familiar type as he is, there are thousands of his ilk in all great centres of civilisation, Panshin is individual, and we hate him as though he had shadowed our own lives. Again, Varvara herself is the type of society woman whom Turgenev knew well, and whom he both hated and feared; yet she is as distinct an individual as any that he has given us.
Panshin turned the conversation upon literature; it seemed that, like himself, she read only French books. George Sand drove her to exasperation, Balzac she respected, but he wearied her; in Sue and Scribe she saw great knowledge of human nature, Dumas and Feval she adored. In her heart she preferred Paul de Kock to all of them, but of course she did not even mention his name.
Lavretsky more than once reproached himself for having shown Lisa the newspaper he had received; he could not but be conscious that in his spiritual condition there was something revolting to a pure nature. He imagined also that the change in Lisa was the result of her inward conflicts, her doubts as to what answer to give Panshin.
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