the moujik with his own hands. This operation finished, he said to
him:

"That will amount to nothing, my son. Go and sin no more."

Upon which the serf raised himself and left the room, smiling
throughout. Ivan's smile is an exotic plant which I am not
acquainted with, and which only grows in Slavonic soil, a strange
smile,--real prodigy of baseness or heroism. Which is it? I am
sure I cannot tell.

In spite of my trouble, I had been able to observe Stephane at the
beginning of the punishment. At the first blow, a flash of
triumphant joy passed over his face; but when the blood started he
became horribly pale, and pressed one of his hands to his throat as
if to arrest a cry of horror, and with the other he covered his
eyes to shut out the sight; then not being able to contain himself,
he hurried away. God be praised! compassion had triumphed in his
heart over the joy of seeing his jailer chastised. There is in
this young soul, embittered as it is by long sufferings, a fund of
generosity and goodness; but will it not in time lose the last
vestiges of its native qualities? Three years hence will Stephane
cover his eyes to avoid the sight of an enemy's punishment? Within
three years will not the habit of suffering have stifled pity in
his breast? To-morrow, to-morrow perhaps, will not his heart have
uttered its last cry!

Since you have no tender words for him, Count Kostia, would that I
could close his ears to the desolating lessons that you give him!
Do you not see that the life he leads is enough to teach him to