it brought to me--visions which still come back
to me like a dear, familiar tale.

I thought of a student of Kazan whom I had known in the days of the
past, of a young fellow from Viatka who, pale-browed, and sententious
of diction, might almost have been brother to the ex-soldier himself.
And once again I heard him declare that "before all things must I learn
whether or not there exists a God; pre-eminently must I make a
beginning there."

And I thought, too, of a certain accoucheuse named Velikova who had
been a comely, but reputedly gay, woman. And I remembered a certain
occasion when, on a hill overlooking the river Kazan and the Arski
Plain, she had stood contemplating the marshes below, and the far blue
line of the Volga; until suddenly turning pale, she had, with tears of
joy sparkling in her fine eyes, cried under her breath, but
sufficiently loudly for all present to hear her:

"Ah, friends, how gracious and how fair is this land of ours! Come, let
us salute that land for having deemed us worthy of residence therein!"

Whereupon all present, including a deacon-student from the
Ecclesiastical School, a Morduine from the Foreign College, a student
of veterinary science, and two of our tutors, had done obeisance. At
the same time I recalled the fact that subsequently one of the party
had gone mad, and committed suicide.

Again, I recalled how once, on the Piani Bor [Liquor Wharf] by the
river Kama, a tall, sandy young fellow with intelligent eyes and the
face of a ne'er-do-well had caught my attention. The day had been a
hot, languorous Sunday on which all things had seemed to be exhibiting
their better side, and telling the sun that it was not in vain that he
was pouring out his brilliant potency, and diffusing his living gold;
while the man of whom I speak had, dressed in a new suit of blue serge,
a new cap cocked awry, and a pair of brilliantly polished boots, been
standing at the edge of the wharf, and gazing at the brown waters of
the Kama, the emerald expanse beyond them and the silver-scaled pools
left behind by the tide. Until, as the sun had begun to sink towards
the marshes on the other side of the river, and to become dissolved
into streaks, the man had smiled with increasing rapture, and his face
had glowed with creasing eagerness and delight; until finally he had
snatched the cap from his head, flung it, with a powerful throw far out
into the russet waters, and shouted: "Kama, O my mother, I love