Chapter Part Two: II "Princess Mary" of A Hero of our Time - Study Guide by Mikhail Lermontov

Part Two: II "Princess Mary"

Note: This, the longest section of the book, taken like the previous one from Pechorin's journal, is divided up, diary-like, into entries for particular days, and this is also how the summary here is divided.

11th May:

Pechorin, having arrived in the spa-town of Pyatigorsk the day before, briefly lyricises on the beauty of the scenery around and then goes to the Elisabeth spring to see the "spa society". There he encounters an old comrade-in-arms, the uncommissioned officer cadet, Grushnitsky, who has been wounded at the front and is convalescing. Grushnitsky points out Princess Ligovskoya and her daughter Mary to Pechorin. Later, having parted company, Pechorin observes Grushnitsky by the spring deliberately dropping his glass so that Princess Mary sees and picks it up for him, thinking him much worse injured and pitiful than he in fact is. Grushnitsky and Pechorin walk back together through the town and the latter deliberately scorns Grushnitsky's praise of the young princess and then when they pass her window he presumptuously stares at her through his lorgnette, giving rise to an indignant look from her.

13th May:

Pechorin receives a visit from his sharp-witted and observant friend, Doctor Werner. They discuss the contrariness of their own natures and then speak of Grushnitsky and the princesses. Werner tells Pechorin that Mary believes that Grushnitsky wears a grey soldier's greatcoat because he has been reduced to the ranks for duelling and Pechorin asks him to leave the young princess thus disillusioned in order to provide him with the opportunity to amuse himself at Grushnitsky's expense. Further conversation about the princesses and the people they receive in their house reveals that an old love of Pechorin - Vera - is in town with her elderly husband, something that makes Pechorin rather mournful.

That evening, walking in town, Pechorin sees Mary sitting on a bench surrounded by young men. He therefore deliberately sits nearby and by telling amusing tales lures all of them away from her to him, thus neatly attracting the young princess's curiosity and pique.

16th May:

Pechorin congratulates himself that over the last two days through various subtle means he has attracted Mary's definite dislike. He also tells Grushnitsky, who is obviously much taken by Mary, that he thinks that she already loves him, trying thus to provoke him to confide his feelings.

Walking on one of the hills around the town, Pechorin encounters and kisses his former love, Vera, who is consumptive and still deeply in love with Pechorin. Pechorin promises to get an invitation to the house of Princess Ligovskaya so that the two of them can meet again there.

Out riding that evening in the costume of a native Circassian he spots Mary and Grushnitsky riding with some others and rides out from behind a bush to give them a shock (at this time people were still scared by the possibility of attacks on Russians by mountain bandits).

Later, Pechorin meets Grushnitsky, who has just been at the princesses' house, and who tells him how annoyed Mary is with him for his riding stunt earlier in the day.

21st May:

Pechorin comments that he still has not met the princesses and has been rebuked for not procuring an invitation by Vera. Grushnitsky is following Mary everywhere. He also remarks that at the subscription ball at the restaurant saloon the next day he is going to dance the mazurka with Princess Mary.

22nd May:

At the ball Pechorin dances with Mary and saves her from the advances of a very drunken dragoon captain, for which he receives the gratitude of both Mary and her mother. In the course of conversation Pechorin also reveals to Mary that Grushnitsky is in fact only a cadet and not an officer reduced to the ranks.

23rd May:

Pechorin meets Grushnitsky, who confides his love for Mary and asks him to observe her that evening for signs of her feelings, because it seems that since Pechorin's revelation about him being a cadet she is no longer interested in him. They go together to Princess Ligovskaya's house where Pechorin is implored again by Vera to curry the old princess's favour in order to facilitate their meetings. Pechorin is