n the sense that his Moscow
acquaintances were. The rougher the people and the fewer the signs of
civilization the freer he felt. Stavropol, through which he had to
pass, irked him. The signboards, some of them even in French, ladies in
carriages, cabs in the marketplace, and a gentleman wearing a fur cloak
and tall hat who was walking along the boulevard and staring at the
passersby, quite upset him. "Perhaps these people know some of my
acquaintances," he thought; and the club, his tailor, cards, society
... came back to his mind. But after Stavropol everything was
satisfactory--wild and also beautiful and warlike, and Olenin felt
happier and happier. All the Cossacks, post-boys, and post-station
masters seemed to him simple folk with whom he could jest and converse
simply, without having to consider to what class they belonged. They
all belonged to the human race which, without his thinking about it,
all appeared dear to Olenin, and they all treated him in a friendly way.

Already in the province of the Don Cossacks his sledge had been
exchanged for a cart, and beyond Stavropol it became so warm that
Olenin travelled without wearing his fur coat. It was already
spring--an unexpected joyous spring for Olenin. At night he was no
longer allowed to leave the Cossack villages, and they said it was
dangerous to travel in the evening. Vanyusha began to be uneasy, and
they carried a loaded gun in the cart. Olenin became still happier. At
one of the post-stations the post-master told of a terrible murder that
had been committed recently on the high road. They began to meet armed
men. "So this is where it begins!" thought Olenin, and kept expecting
to see the snowy mountains of which mention was so often made. Once,
towards evening, the Nogay driver pointed with his whip to the
mountains shrouded in clouds. Olenin looked eagerly, but it was dull
and the mountains were almost hidden by the clouds. Olenin made out
something grey and white and fleecy, but try as he would he could find
nothing beautiful in the mountains of which he had so often read and
heard. The mountains and the clouds appeared to him quite alike, and he
thought the special beauty of the snow peaks, of which he had so often
been told, was as much an invention as Bach's music and the love of
women, in which he did not believe. So he gave up looking forward to
seeing the mountains. But early next morning, being awakened in his
cart by the freshness of the air, he