to his own country in the month of August to
gather the crops of hemp and rye. But winter passed away, and the heats
of June had scarcely been felt before Aphanassi had again appeared, with
an immense quantity of bales of rich _doubas_, Chinese belts, and
kaftans, and a herd of more than five hundred horses; he came, in fact,
surrounded with all his splendour, and renewed again his offers and his
entreaties. Old Michael was nearly gained by his offers, and Daria was
in despair, for she was about to be sacrificed to gain, and she detested
Aphanassi more than she had done the year before.

I listened to her with strong emotion, pitied her sorrows, which had so
easily procured me her confidence, and when she left me, she was less
afflicted than before.

The next day I returned to the spot where I had seen her, and found her
again; she received me with a smile. Aphanassi had not come that
morning, and Daria, probably thinking that I would come back to the
spot, had come to ask me what she ought to reply to him, as well as to
her father. I gave her my advice with a strong feeling of interest, and
convinced that pity would henceforward open to me the road to her heart,
I tried to become acquainted with her family. The same evening I bought
some things from old Michael, and flattering him on his judgment and
experience, endeavoured to lay the foundation of intimacy.

During several days I went regularly to the same spot, and almost always
found Daria, as if we had appointed a meeting. Her melancholy increased;
every time she saw me she asked for further advice, and although she
showed me nothing but confidence, yet the habit of seeing her, of
deploring her situation, of having near me a young and beautiful woman,
after hearing for many, many months no other voices than the rough ones
of officers, soldiers, and smiths--all these circumstances affected my
heart with unusual emotion.

The sight of Daria reminded me of the circumstances of my first love;
and these recollections, in their turn, embellished Daria with all their
charms.

One day she said to me:

"You have seen Aphanassi this morning at my father's; don't you think he
is very rough, and has an ugly, ill-natured countenance?"

"Yes," I replied.

"Well, I will show you whom I prefer to him." She smiled in saying this,
and I was powerfully affected, as if she had been about to say, "You are
the man!" She then threw back the gauze veil that flowed from her
head-