in their dress, but she gave the surplus from her own table now to one
woman, now to another.

Vassilissa drank tea immediately after her mistress; after her came the
maids in the house, and last old Yakob. On feast days, on account of the
hardness of their work, a glass of brandy was handed to the coachman,
the menservants and the Starost.

As soon as the tea was cleared away in the morning a stout, chubby-faced
woman pushed her way into the room, always smiling. She was maid to the
grandchildren, Veroshka and Marfinka. Close at her heels the
twelve-year-old assistant, and together they brought the children
to breakfast.

Never knowing which of the two to kiss first, Tatiana Markovna would
begin: "Well, my birdies, how are you? Veroshka, darling, you have
brushed your hair?"

"And me, Granny, me," Marfinka would cry.

"Why are Marfinka's eyes red? Has she been crying?" Tatiana Markovna
inquired anxiously of the maid. "The sun has dazzled her. Are her
curtains well drawn, you careless girl? I must see."

In the maid's room sat three or four young girls who sat all day long
sewing, or making bobbin lace, without once stretching their limbs all
day, because the mistress did not like to see idle hands. In the
ante-room there sat idly the melancholy Yakob, Egorka, who was sixteen
and always laughing, with two or three lackeys. Yakob did nothing but
wait at table, where he idly flicked away the flies, and as idly changed