count them: it was as difficult for them to believe this, as for
hares to believe that dogs have come, not to chase but to count them.
But the gates were locked, and the startled lodgers returned: and
we, breaking up into groups, entered also. With me were the two
society men and two students. In front of us, in the dark, went
Vanya, in his coat and white trousers, with a lantern, and we
followed. We went to quarters with which I was familiar. I knew all
the establishments, and some of the people; but the majority of the
people were new, and the spectacle was new, and more dreadful than
the one which I had witnessed in the Lyapinsky house. All the
lodgings were full, all the bunks were occupied, not by one person
only, but often by two. The sight was terrible in that narrow space
into which the people were huddled, and men and women were mixed
together. All the women who were not dead drunk slept with men; and
women with two children did the same. The sight was terrible, on
account of the poverty, dirt, rags, and terror of the people. And it
was chiefly dreadful on account of the vast numbers of people who
were in this situation. One lodging, and then a second like it, and
a third, and a tenth, and a twentieth, and still there was no end to
them. And everywhere there was the same foul odor, the same close
atmosphere, the same crowding, the same mingling of the sexes, the
same men and women intoxicated to stupidity, and the same terror,
submission and guilt on all faces; and again I was overwhelmed with
shame and pain, as in the Lyapinsky house, and I understood that what
I had undertaken was abominable and foolish and therefore
impracticable. And I no longer took notes of anybody, and I asked no
questions, knowing that nothing would come of this.

I was deeply pained. In the Lyapinsky house I had been like a man
who has seen a fearful wound, by chance, on the body of another man.