no other country estate. Chekhov was always particularly pleased at the
visits of Miss Mizinov and of Potapenko. He was particularly fond of them,
and his whole family rejoiced at their arrival. They stayed up long after
midnight on such days, and Chekhov wrote only by snatches. And every time
he wrote five or six lines, he would get up again and go back to his
visitors.

"I have written sixty kopecks' worth," he would say with a smile.

Braga's "Serenade" was the fashion at that time, and Chekhov was fond of
hearing Potapenko play it on the violin while Miss Mizinov sang it.

Having been a student at the Moscow University, Chekhov liked to celebrate
St. Tatyana's Day. He never missed making a holiday of it when he lived in
Moscow. That winter, for the first time, he chanced to be in Petersburg on
the 12th of January. He did not forget "St. Tatyana," and assembled all his
literary friends on that day in a Petersburg restaurant. They made speeches
and kept the holiday, and this festivity initiated by him was so successful
that the authors went on meeting regularly afterwards.

Though Melihovo was his permanent home, Chekhov often paid visits to Moscow
and Petersburg. He frequently stayed at hotels, and there he sometimes had
difficulties over his passport. As a landowner he had no need of
credentials from the police in the Serpuhov district, and found his
University diploma sufficient. In Petersburg and Moscow, under the old
passport regulations they would not give him a passport because he resided
permanently in the provinces. Misunderstandings arose, sometimes developing
into disagreeable incidents and compelling Chekhov to return home earlier
than he had intended. Someone suggested to Chekhov that he should enter the
Government service and immediately retire from it, as retired officials