All this time Panshine was supporting the burden of the conversation.
He brought it round to the advantages of sugar making, about which he
had lately read two French pamphlets; their contents he now proceeded
to disclose, speaking with an air of great modesty, but without saying
a single word about the sources of his information.

"Why, there's Fedia!" suddenly exclaimed the voice of Marfa Timofeevna
in the next room, the door of which had been left half open.
"Actually, Fedia!" And the old lady hastily entered the room.
Lavretsky hadn't had time to rise from his chair before she had caught
him in her arms. "Let me have a look at you," she exclaimed, holding
him at a little distance from her. "Oh, how well you are looking!
You've grown a little older, but you haven't altered a bit for the
worse, that's a fact. But what makes you kiss my hand. Kiss my face,
if you please, unless you don't like the look of my wrinkled cheeks. I
dare say you never asked after me, or whether your aunt was alive or
no. And yet it was my hands received you when you first saw the light,
you good-for-nothing fellow! Ah, well, it's all one. But it was a good
idea of yours to come here. I say, my dear," she suddenly exclaimed,
turning to Maria Dmitrievna, "have you offered him any refreshment?"

"I don't want any thing," hastily said Lavretsky.

"Well, at all events, you will drink tea with us, _batyushka_.
Gracious heavens! A man comes, goodness knows from how far off, and
no one gives him so much as a cup of tea. Liza, go and see after it
quickly. I remember he was a terrible glutton when he was a boy, and
even now, perhaps, he is fond of eating and drinking."

"Allow me to pay my respects, Maria Timofeevna," said Panshine, coming