and that he is made after the pattern of Rudin. Drop him, for God’s sake! Keep away from the filth; don’t stir it up with both hands!”

Samoylenko thought for a minute and said resolutely:

“But I shall give him the money all the same. As you please. I can’t bring myself to refuse a man simply on an assumption.”

“Very fine, too. You can kiss him if you like.”

“Give me the hundred roubles, then,” Samoylenko asked timidly. “I won’t.”

A silence followed. Samoylenko was quite crushed; his face wore a guilty, abashed, and ingratiating expression, and it was strange to see this pitiful, childish, shamefaced countenance on a huge man wearing epaulettes and orders of merit.

“The bishop here goes the round of his diocese on horseback instead of in a carriage,” said the deacon, laying down his pen. “It’s extremely touching to see him sit on his horse. His simplicity and humility are full of Biblical grandeur.”

“Is he a good man?” asked Von Koren, who was glad to change the conversation.

“Of course! If he hadn’t been a good man, do you suppose he would have been consecrated a bishop?”

“Among the bishops are to be found good and gifted men,” said Von Koren. “The only drawback is that some of them have the weakness to imagine themselves statesmen. One busies himself with Russification, another criticises the sciences. That’s not their business. They had much better look into their consistory a little.”

“A layman cannot judge of bishops.”

“Why so, deacon? A bishop is a man just the same as you or I.”

“The same, but not the same.” The deacon was offended and took up his pen. “If you had been the same, the Divine Grace would have rested upon you, and you would have been bishop yourself; and since you are not bishop, it follows you are not the same.”

“Don’t talk nonsense, deacon,” said Samoylenko dejectedly. “Listen to what I suggest,” he said, turning to Von Koren. “Don’t give me that hundred roubles. You’ll be having your dinners with me for three months before the winter, so let me have the money beforehand for three months.”

“I won’t.”

Samoylenko blinked and turned crimson; he mechanically drew towards him the book with the spider on it and looked at it, then he got up and took his hat.

Von Koren felt sorry for him.

“What it is to have to live and do with people like this,” said the zoologist, and he kicked a paper into the corner with indignation. “You must understand that this is not kindness, it is not love, but cowardice, slackness, poison! What’s gained by reason is lost by your flabby good-for-nothing hearts! When I was ill with typhoid as a schoolboy, my aunt in her sympathy gave me pickled mushrooms to eat, and I very nearly died. You, and my aunt too, must understand that love for man is not to be found in the heart or the stomach or the bowels, but here!”

Von Koren slapped himself on the forehead.