survive her long, not more than five years. In the winter
of the year 1819, he died peacefully in Moscow, where he had moved with
Glafira and his grandson, and left instructions that he should be buried
beside Anna Pavlovna and "Malasha." Ivan Petrovitch was then in Paris
amusing himself; he had retired from service soon after 1815. When
he heard of his father's death he decided to return to Russia. It was
necessary to make arrangements for the management of the property.
Fedya, according to Glafira's letter, had reached his twelfth year, and
the time had come to set about his education in earnest.
Chapter X
Ivan Petrovitch returned to Russia an Anglomaniac. His short-cropped
hair, his starched shirt-front, his long-skirted pea-green overcoat
with its multitude of capes, the sour expression of his face, something
abrupt and at the same time indifferent in his behaviour, his way of
speaking through his teeth, his sudden wooden laugh, the absence of
smiles, his exclusively political or politic-economical conversation,
his passion for roast beef and port wine--everything about him breathed,
so to speak, of Great Britain. But, marvelous to relate, while he had
been transformed into an Anglomaniac, Ivan Petrovitch had at the same
time become a patriot, at least he called himself a patriot, though
he knew Russia little, had not retained a single Russian habit, and
expressed himself in Russian rather queerly; in ordinary conversation,
his language was spiritless and inanimate and constantly interspersed
with Gallicisms.
Ivan Petrovitch brought with him a few schemes in manuscript, relating
to the administration and reform of the government; he was much
displeased with everything he saw; the lack of system especially
aroused his spleen. On his meeting with his sister, at the first word
he announced to her that he was determined to introduce radical reforms,
that henceforth everything to do with him would be on a different
system. Glafira Petrovna made no reply to Ivan Petrovitch; she only
ground her teeth and thought: "Where am I to take refuge?" After she
was back in the country, however, with her brother and nephew, her fears
were soon set at rest. In the house, certainly, some changes were made;
idlers and dependants met with summary dismissal; among them two old
women were made to suffer, one blind, another broken down by paralysis;
and also a decrepit major of the days of Catherine, who, on account of
his reall
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