Shubin crossed his arms on his breast.

'Ah, you type of the choice element in drama,' he exclaimed, 'you
primeval force of the black earth, cornerstone of the social fabric!'

Uvar Ivanovitch's fingers began to work. 'There, there, my boy, don't
provoke me.'

'Here,' pursued Shubin, 'is a gentleman, not young to judge by
appearances, but what blissful, child-like faith is still hidden in
him! Respect! And do you know, you primitive creature, what Nikolai
Artemyevitch was in a rage with me for? Why I spent the whole of this
morning with him at his German woman's; we were singing the three of
us--"Do not leave me." You should have heard us--that would have
moved you. We sang and sang, my dear sir--and well, I got bored; I
could see something was wrong, there was an alarming tenderness in the
air. And I began to tease them both. I was very successful. First she
was angry with me, then with him; and then he got angry with her, and
told her that he was never happy except at home, and he had a paradise
there; and she told him he had no morals; and I murmured "Ach!" to
her in German. He walked off and I stayed behind; he came here, to his
paradise that's to say, and he was soon sick of paradise, so he set
to grumbling. Well now, who do you consider was to blame?'

'You, of course,' replied Uvar Ivanovitch.

Shubin stared at him. 'May I venture to ask you, most reverend
knight-errant,' he began in an obsequious voice, 'these enigmatical
words you have deigned to utter as the result of some exercise of your
reflecting faculties, or under the influence of a momentary necessity