monotonously from the roofs, and damp, weary exhalations
emanated from the gray walls of the houses. Toward night whitish
icicles glistened everywhere in dim outline. The sun appeared in the
heavens more frequently, and the brooks began to murmur hesitatingly on
their way to the marsh. At noon the throbbing song of spring hopes
hung tremblingly and caressingly over the village.

They were preparing to celebrate the first of May. Leaflets appeared
in the factory explaining the significance of this holiday, and even
the young men not affected by the propaganda said, as they read them:

"Yes, we must arrange a holiday!"

Vyesovshchikov exclaimed with a sullen grin:

"It's time! Time we stopped playing hide and seek!"

Fedya Mazin was in high spirits. He had grown very thin. With his
nervous, jerky gestures, and the trepidation in his speech, he was like
a caged lark. He was always with Yakob Somov, taciturn and serious
beyond his years.

Samoylov, who had grown still redder in prison, Vasily Gusev,
curly-haired Dragunov, and a number of others argued that it was
necessary to come out armed, but Pavel and the Little Russian, Somov,
and others said it was not.

Yegor always came tired, perspiring, short of breath, but always joking.

"The work of changing the present order of things, comrades, is a great
work, but in order to advance it more rapidly, I must buy myself a pair
of boots!" he said, pointing to his wet, torn shoes. "My overshoes,
too, are torn beyond the hope of redemption, and I get my feet wet
every day. I have no intention of migrating from the earth even to the
nearest planet before we have publicly and openly renounced the old
order of things; and I am therefore absolutely opposed to comrade
Samoylov's motion for an armed demonstration. I amend the motion to
read that I be armed with a pair of strong boots, inasmuch as I am
profoundly convinced that this will be of greater service for the
ultimate triumph of socialism than even a grand exhibition of
fisticuffs and black eyes!"

In the same playfully pretentious language, he told the workingmen the
story of how in various foreign countries the people strove to lighten
the burden of their lives. The mother loved to listen to his tales,
and carried away a strange impression from them. She conceived the
shrewdest enemies of the people, those who deceived them most
frequently and most cruelly, as little, big-bellied, red-faced
creatures, u