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The Jew and Other Stories by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
page 92 of 271 (33%)
Semyon Matveitch was ten years younger than Ivan Matveitch, and his
whole life had taken a completely different turn. He was a government
official in Petersburg, filling an important position.... He had married
and been left early a widower; he had one son. In face Semyon Matveitch
was like his brother, only he was shorter and stouter, and had a round
bald head, bright black eyes, like Ivan Matveitch's, only more
prominent, and full red lips. Unlike his brother, whom he spoke of even
after his death as a French philosopher, and sometimes bluntly as a
queer fish, Semyon Matveitch almost invariably talked Russian, loudly
and fluently, and he was constantly laughing, completely closing his
eyes as he did so and shaking all over in an unpleasant way, as though
he were shaking with rage. He looked after things very sharply, went
into everything himself, exacted the strictest account from every one.
The very first day of his arrival he ordered a service with holy water,
and sprinkled everything with water, all the rooms in the house, even
the lofts and the cellars, in order, as he put it, 'radically to expel
the Voltairean and Jacobin spirit.' In the first week several of Ivan
Matveitch's favourites were sent to the right-about, one was even
banished to a settlement, corporal punishment was inflicted on others;
the old valet--he was a Turk, knew French, and had been given to Ivan
Matveitch by the late field-marshal Kamensky--received his freedom,
indeed, but with it a command to be gone within twenty-four hours, 'as
an example to others.' Semyon Matveitch turned out to be a harsh master;
many probably regretted the late owner.

'With the old master, Ivan Matveitch,' a butler, decrepit with age,
wailed in my presence, 'our only trouble was to see that the linen put
out was clean, and that the rooms smelt sweet, and that the servants'
voices weren't heard in the passages--God forbid! For the rest, you
might do as you pleased. The old master never hurt a fly in his life!
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