and had to report but once a week. You see, Peter expected to
derive some benefit from me by employing me about the house and in
the field.

Now it was surely through the merits of my ancestors that I happened
to be placed in the household of Peter Khlopov. Peter himself spent
but little of his time at home. Most of the time he was at the
office, and his free moments he liked to spend at the tavern, which
was owned by the only Jew in the village, "our Moshko" the Klopovs
used to call him. But whenever he happened to be at home, Peter was
very kind to me, especially when he was just a little tipsy.
Perhaps he dreamt of adopting me as his son: he had no sons of his
own. And he tried to make me like military service. "When you grow
up," he sued to say, "you will become an officer, and wear a sword.
Soldiers will stand at attention before you, and salute you. You
will win distinction in battle, and be found worthy of being
presented to the Czar." He also told me stories of Russian military
life. By that time I had learned some Russian. They were really
nice stories, as far as I could understand them; but they were made
nicer yet by what I could not understand of them. For then I was
free to add something to the stories myself, or change them
according to my own fancy. If you are a lover of stories, take the
advice of a plain old man like myself. Never pay any attention to
stories in which everything has been prepared from the very start,
and you can tell the end as soon as you begin to read them or listen
to them. Such stories make one yawn and fall asleep. Stories of
this kind my daughter reads to me once in a while, and I always fall
asleep over them. Stories are good only when told the way Khlopov
used to tell them to me.