is wife.

But at the same time, while she was washing the boy, she felt how big,
coarse and clumsy his face and body were, compared to the two delicate
ones she was accustomed to. She saw now for the first time how
impossible it would be to keep him herself.

But he should go to the blockmaker's, poor boy! Her name wasn't Barbara
if she didn't get her mistress to see to that at once--as early as
to-morrow.

She returned home with a face red and swollen with crying, and was
inconsolable the whole evening until her mistress came down from the
office with the promise that the matter should be arranged.

And thus it was that Nikolai came to blockmaker Holman's.

CHAPTER II

A STRICT DISCIPLINARIAN

It is in some ways a blessing that those who have suffered hardship and
been neglected in their babyhood, do not remember anything about it--and
yet perhaps something clings to them.

So, at any rate, Mrs. Holman declared. From the very first day the boy
came into the house, she could see he had been brought up in a thieves'
nest. His eyes were so wise and watchful, and he could be so craftily
cunning and refractory, long before he could speak. She declared that he
was positively malicious, so drowsy and quiet as he would be until she
had just fallen asleep, when he would begin to shout as loud as a
watchman.

But every one who knew anything about the Holmans, said that if they had
not been fortunate in getting the boy, he had at any rate been fortunate
in having found his way to them. There were not two opinions as to what
an orderly woman Mrs. Holman was, and how strict in the fulfilment of
her duty. Tall, thin and neat in her person, even her small,
liver-coloured face, with the pale blue expressionless eyes, told you at
once that she was not the woman to allow herself to be carried away by
rash impetuosity.

And on the few occasions in the year that Barbara visited the boy--it
was not so easy for her to come now that the Veyergangs lived in their
country house all the year round--she could see for herself how
well-cared-for and clean he was, and how strictly he was kept. From the
time she got there to the time she left, she heard nothing except how
difficult it was to straighten out all the tinsmith's dents, all that
had been wrongly and improperly dealt with from the very first,
especially his obstinate temper! Now he really could walk quite a good
way, but he would do nothing but crawl, and so quickly,