eless fashion; his peasant women demanded unheard-of sums, and the
corn meanwhile went to waste; and here they were not getting on with
the mowing, and there the Council of Guardians threatened and demanded
prompt payment, in full, of interest due....

'I can do nothing!' Nikolai Petrovitch cried more than once in despair.
'I can't flog them myself; and as for calling in the police captain, my
principles don't allow of it, while you can do nothing with them
without the fear of punishment!'

'_Du calme_, _du calme_,' Pavel Petrovitch would remark upon this, but
even he hummed to himself, knitted his brows, and tugged at his
moustache.

Bazarov held aloof from these matters, and indeed as a guest it was not
for him to meddle in other people's business. The day after his arrival
at Maryino, he set to work on his frogs, his infusoria, and his
chemical experiments, and was for ever busy with them. Arkady, on the
contrary, thought it his duty, if not to help his father, at least to
make a show of being ready to help him. He gave him a patient hearing,
and once offered him some advice, not with any idea of its being acted
upon, but to show his interest. Farming details did not arouse any
aversion in him; he used even to dream with pleasure of work on the
land, but at this time his brain was swarming with other ideas. Arkady,
to his own astonishment, thought incessantly of Nikolskoe; in former
days he would simply have shrugged his shoulders if any one had told
him that he could ever feel dull under the same roof as Bazarov--and
that roof his father's! but he actually was dull and longed to get
away. He tried going long walks till he was tired, but that was no use.
In conversation with his father one day, he found out that Nikolai
Petrovitch had in his possession rather interesting letters, written by
Madame Odintsov's mother to his wife, and he gave him no rest till he
got hold of the letters, for which Nikolai Petrovitch had to rummage in
twenty drawers and boxes. Having gained possession of these
half-crumbling papers, Arkady felt, as it were, soothed, just as though
he had caught a glimpse of the goal towards which he ought now to go.
'I mean that for both of you,' he was constantly whispering--she had
added that herself! 'I'll go, I'll go, hang it all!' But he recalled
the last visit, the cold reception, and his former embarrassment, and
timidity got the better of him. The 'go-ahead' feeling of youth, the
secret desire