er of excitement, made haste to read. I ran
through one newspaper--nothing. I ran through a second--nothing either;
my God! At last, in the fourth, I lighted upon the following paragraph:
'Yesterday the well-known provincial actress so-and-so arrived by
express in Petersburg. We note with pleasure that the climate of the
South has had a beneficial effect on our fair friend; her charming stage
appearance...' and I don't remember the rest! Much lower down than
that paragraph I found, printed in the smallest type: first prize in the
competition was adjudged to an engineer called so-and-so.' That was
all! And to make things better, they even misspelt my name: instead of
Krikunov it was Kirkutlov. So much for your intellectual center! But
that was not all.... By the time I left Petersburg, a month later,
all the newspapers were vying with one another in discussing our
incomparable, divine, highly talented actress, and my mistress was
referred to, not by her surname, but by her Christian name and her
father's....

"Some years later I was in Moscow. I was summoned there by a letter, in
the mayor's own handwriting, to undertake a work for which Moscow, in
its newspapers, had been clamoring for over a hundred years. In
the intervals of my work I delivered five public lectures, with a
philanthropic object, in one of the museums there. One would have
thought that was enough to make one known to the whole town for three
days at least, wouldn't one? But, alas! not a single Moscow gazette
said a word about me There was something about houses on fire, about
an operetta, sleeping town councilors, dr unken shop keepers--about
everything; but about my work, my plans, my lectures--mum. And a nice
set they are in Moscow! I got into a tram.... It was packed full;
there were ladies and military men and students of both sexes, creatures
of all sorts in couples.

"'I am told the town council has sent for an engineer to plan such and
such a work!' I said to my neighbor, so loudly that all the tram could
hear. 'Do you know the name of the engineer?'

"My neighbor shook his head. The rest of the public took a cursory
glance at me, and in all their eyes I read: 'I don't know.'

"'I am told that there is someone giving lectures in such and such a
museum?' I persisted, trying to get up a conversation. 'I hear it is
interesting.'

"No one even nodded. Evidently they had not all of them heard of the
lectures, and the ladies were not even aware o