jumping up from his seat, laughing, cracking jokes with Sasha,
bestowing stealthy kisses upon myself, pinching my hands, and
making silent grimaces at Anna Thedorovna. At length, she turned
him out of the house. In short, his transports of joy exceeded
anything that I had yet beheld.

On the festal day he arrived exactly at eleven o'clock, direct
from Mass. He was dressed in a carefully mended frockcoat, a new
waistcoat, and a pair of new shoes, while in his arms he carried
our pile of books. Next we all sat down to coffee (the day being
Sunday) in Anna Thedorovna's parlour. The old man led off the
meal by saying that Pushkin was a magnificent poet. Thereafter,
with a return to shamefacedness and confusion, he passed suddenly
to the statement that a man ought to conduct himself properly;
that, should he not do so, it might be taken as a sign that he
was in some way overindulging himself; and that evil tendencies
of this sort led to the man's ruin and degradation. Then the
orator sketched for our benefit some terrible instances of such
incontinence, and concluded by informing us that for some time
past he had been mending his own ways, and conducting himself in
exemplary fashion, for the reason that he had perceived the
justice of his son's precepts, and had laid them to heart so well
that he, the father, had really changed for the better: in proof
whereof, he now begged to present to the said son some books for
which he had long been setting aside his savings.

As I listened to the old man I could not help laughing and crying
in a breath. Certainly he knew how to lie when the occasion
required! The books were transferred to his son's room, and
arranged upon a shelf, where Pokrovski at once guessed the truth