off to get some paper, and papa makes it into boxes. Mama is
angry, but he is not afraid of her either. We have the gayest
times imaginable with him now and then. He can ride a horse
better and run faster than anybody else, and there is no one in
the world so strong as he is.

He hardly ever punishes us, but when he looks me in the eyes
he knows everything that I think, and I am frightened. You can
tell stories to mama, but not to papa, because he will see
through you at once. So nobody ever tries.

Besides papa and mama, there was also Aunt Tatyana
Alexandrovna Yergolsky. In her room she had a big eikon
with a silver mount. We were very much afraid of this eikon,
because it was very old and black.

When I was six, I remember my father teaching the village
children. They had their lessons in "the other house," [1]
where Alexey Stepanytch, the bailiff, lived, and sometimes
on the ground floor of the house we lived in.

[1] The name we gave to the stone annex.


There were a great number of village children who used to
come. When they came, the front hall smelled of sheepskin
jackets; they were taught by papa and Seryozha and
Tanya and Uncle Kostya all at once. Lesson-time
was very gay and lively.