he Crimea, and thus
make money enough to buy "souls" of his own. The book tells of the
adventures of Chichikov as he travels over Russia in search of dead
"souls," and is, like Mr. Pickwick's adventures, an Odyssey,
introducing us to every kind and manner of man and woman. The book was
to be divided in three parts. The first part appeared in 1842. Gogol
went on working at the second and third parts until 1852, when he
died. He twice threw the second part of the work into the fire when it
was finished; so that all we possess is the first part, and the second
part printed from an incomplete manuscript. The second part was
certainly finished when he destroyed it, and it is probable that the
third part was sketched. He had intended in the second part to work
out the moral regeneration of Chichikov, and to give to the world his
complete message. Persecuted by a dream he was unable to realize and
an ambition which he was not able to fulfil, Gogol was driven inwards,
and his natural religious feeling grew more intense and made him into
an ascetic and a recluse. This break in the middle of his career is
characteristic of Russia. Tolstoy, of course, furnishes the most
typical example of the same thing. But it is a common Russian
characteristic for men midway in a successful career to turn aside
from it altogether, and seek consolation in the things which are not
of this world.

Gogol's _Dead Souls_ made a deep impression upon educated Russia. It
pleased the enthusiasts for Western Europe by its reality, its
artistic conception and execution, and by its social ideas; and it
pleased the Slavophile Conservatives by its truth to life, and by its
smell of Russia. When the first chapter was read aloud to Pushkin, he
said, when Gogol had finished: "God, what a sad country Russia is!"
And it is certainly true, that amusing as the book is, inexpressibly
comic as so many of the scenes are, Gogol does not flatter his country
or his countrymen; and when Russians read it at the time it appeared,
many must have been tempted to murmur "_doux pays!_"--as they would,
indeed, now, were a writer with the genius of a Gogol to appear and
describe the adventures of a modern Chichikov; for, though
circumstances may be entirely different, although there are no more
"souls" to be bought or sold, Chichikov is still alive--and as Gogol
said, there was probably not one of his readers who after an honest
self-examination, would not wonder if he had not som