grandchildren. She did this by giving music lessons to tradesmen's
daughters, giving four and sometimes five lessons a day of an hour each,
and earning in this way some sixty rubles (6 pounds) a month. So they
lived for the present, in expectation of another appointment. She had
sent letters to all her relations and acquaintances asking them to
obtain a post for her son-in-law, and among the rest she had written to
Sergius, but that letter had not reached him.

It was a Saturday, and Praskovya Mikhaylovna was herself mixing dough
for currant bread such as the serf-cook on her father's estate used
to make so well. She wished to give her grandchildren a treat on the
Sunday.

Masha, her daughter, was nursing her youngest child, the eldest boy and
girl were at school, and her son-in-law was asleep, not having slept
during the night. Praskovya Mikhaylovna had remained awake too for a
great part of the night, trying to soften her daughter's anger against
her husband.

She saw that it was impossible for her son-in-law, a weak creature, to
be other than he was, and realized that his wife's reproaches could do
no good--so she used all her efforts to soften those reproaches and to
avoid recrimination and anger. Unkindly relations between people caused
her actual physical suffering. It was so clear to her that bitter
feelings do not make anything better, but only make everything worse.
She did not in fact think about this: she simply suffered at the sight
of anger as she would from a bad smell, a harsh noise, or from blows on
her body.

She had--with a feeling of self-satisfaction--just taught Lukerya how