h had led to certain of the items being represented
merely by Christian name, patronymic, and a couple of dots;
and Sobakevitch's list was remarkable for its amplitude and
circumstantiality, in that not a single peasant had such of his peculiar
characteristics omitted as that the deceased had been "excellent at
joinery," or "sober and ready to pay attention to his work." Also, in
Sobakevitch's list there was recorded who had been the father and
the mother of each of the deceased, and how those parents had behaved
themselves. Only against the name of a certain Thedotov was there
inscribed: "Father unknown, Mother the maidservant Kapitolina, Morals
and Honesty good." These details communicated to the document a certain
air of freshness, they seemed to connote that the peasants in question
had lived but yesterday. As Chichikov scanned the list he felt softened
in spirit, and said with a sigh:

"My friends, what a concourse of you is here! How did you all pass your
lives, my brethren? And how did you all come to depart hence?"

As he spoke his eyes halted at one name in particular--that of the same
Peter Saveliev Neuvazhai Korito who had once been the property of the
window Korobotchka. Once more he could not help exclaiming:

"What a series of titles! They occupy a whole line! Peter Saveliev, I
wonder whether you were an artisan or a plain muzhik. Also, I wonder how
you came to meet your end; whether in a tavern, or whether through going
to sleep in the middle of the road and being run over by a train of
waggons. Again, I see the name, 'Probka Stepan, carpenter, very sober.'
That must be the hero of whom the Guards would have been so glad to get
hold. How well I can imagine him tramping the country with an axe in his
belt and his boots on his shoulder, and living on a few groats'-worth
of bread and dried fish per day, and taking home a couple of half-rouble
pieces in his purse, and sewing the notes into his breeches, or stuffing
them into his boots! In what manner came you by your end, Probka Stepan?
Did you, for good wages, mount a scaffold around the cupola of the
village church, and, climbing thence to the cross above, miss your
footing on a beam, and fall headlong with none at hand but Uncle
Michai--the good uncle who, scratching the back of his neck, and
muttering, 'Ah, Vania, for once you have been too clever!' straightway
lashed himself to a rope, and took your place? 'Maksim Teliatnikov,
shoemaker.' A shoemaker,