closely observing the idlers that
assembled there, and gathering the drollest stories, which he would
afterward whisper in class to his laughing schoolfellows. Many were the
punishments which he incurred by this habit, which was incorrigible.

His grandfather had now become manager of an estate near Taganrog, in
the wild steppe country of the Don Cossacks, and here the boy spent his
summers, fishing in the river, and roving about the countryside as brown
as a gipsy, sowing the seeds of that love for nature which he retained
all his life. His evenings he liked best to spend in the kitchen of the
master's house among the work people and peasants who gathered there,
taking part in their games, and setting them all laughing by his witty
and telling observations.

When Tchekoff was about fourteen, his father moved the family to Moscow,
leaving Anton in Taganrog, and now, relieved of work in the shop, his
progress at school became remarkable. At seventeen he wrote a long
tragedy, which was afterward destroyed, and he already showed flashes of
the wit that was soon to blaze into genius.

He graduated from the high school at Taganrog with every honour, entered
the University of Moscow as a student of medicine, and threw himself
headlong into a double life of student and author, in the attempt to
help his struggling family.

His first story appeared in a Moscow paper in 1880, and after some
difficulty he secured a position connected with several of the smaller
periodicals, for which, during his student years, he poured forth a
succession of short stories and sketches of Russian life with incredible
rapidity. He wrote, he tells us, during every spare minute, in crowded
rooms where there was "no light and less air," and never spent more
than a day on any one story. He also wrote at this time a very stirring
blood-and-thunder play which was suppressed by the censor, and the fate
of which is not known.

His audience demanded laughter above all things, and, with his deep
sense of the ridiculous, Tchekoff asked nothing better. His stories,
though often based on themes profoundly tragic, are penetrated by the
light and subtle satire that has won him his reputation as a great
humourist. But though there was always a smile on his lips, it was a
tender one, and his sympathy with suffering often brought his laughter
near to tears.

This delicate and original genius was at first subjected to harsh
criticism, which Tchekoff felt keen