MOZGOVOY. [Rising] Ladies and gentlemen! I must tell you this. ...
We are going to have a great many toasts and speeches. Don't let's
wait, but begin at once. Ladies and gentlemen, the newly married!

[The band plays a flourish. Cheers. Glasses are touched. APLOMBOV
and DASHENKA kiss each other.]

YATS. Beautiful! Beautiful! I must say, ladies and gentlemen,
giving honour where it is due, that this room and the accommodation
generally are splendid! Excellent, wonderful! Only you know,
there's one thing we haven't got--electric light, if I may say so!
Into every country electric light has already been introduced, only
Russia lags behind.

ZHIGALOV. [Meditatively] Electricity ... h'm. ... In my opinion
electric lighting is just a swindle. ... They put a live coal in
and think you don't see them! No, if you want a light, then you
don't take a coal, but something real, something special, that you
can get hold of! You must have a fire, you understand, which is
natural, not just an invention!

YATS. If you'd ever seen an electric battery, and how it's made up,
you'd think differently.

ZHIGALOV. Don't want to see one. It's a swindle, a fraud on the
public. ... They want to squeeze our last breath out of us. ... We
know then, these ... And, young man, instead of defending a
swindle, you would be much better occupied if you had another
yourself and poured out some for other people--yes!