fine morning a man called upon him, calm and
severe of aspect, distinguished, but plainly dressed. Politely, but in
dignified terms, as befitted his errand, he briefly explained the motive
for his visit. He was a lawyer of enlightened views; his client was a
young man who had consulted him in confidence. This young man was no
other than the son of P--, though he bears another name. In his youth
P--, the sensualist, had seduced a young girl, poor but respectable. She
was a serf, but had received a European education. Finding that a child
was expected, he hastened her marriage with a man of noble character who
had loved her for a long time. He helped the young couple for a time,
but he was soon obliged to give up, for the high-minded husband refused
to accept anything from him. Soon the careless nobleman forgot all about
his former mistress and the child she had borne him; then, as we know,
he died intestate. P--'s son, born after his mother's marriage, found
a true father in the generous man whose name he bore. But when he also
died, the orphan was left to provide for himself, his mother now being
an invalid who had lost the use of her limbs. Leaving her in a distant
province, he came to the capital in search of pupils. By dint of daily
toil he earned enough to enable him to follow the college courses, and
at last to enter the university. But what can one earn by teaching the
children of Russian merchants at ten copecks a lesson, especially with
an invalid mother to keep? Even her death did not much diminish the
hardships of the young man's struggle for existence. Now this is the
question: how, in the name of justice, should our scion have argued the
case? Our readers will think, no doubt, that he would say to himself:
'P--showered benefits upon me all my life; he spent tens of thousands
of roubles to educate me, to provide me with governesses, and to keep me
under treatment in Switzerland. Now I am a millionaire, and P----'s son,
a noble young man who is not responsible for the faults of his careless
and forgetful father, is wearing himself out giving ill-paid lessons.
According to justice, all that was done for me ought to have been done
for him. The enormous sums spent upon me were not really mine; they
came to me by an error of blind Fortune, when they ought to have gone to
P----'s son. They should have gone to benefit him, not me, in whom P----
interested himself by a mere caprice, instead of doing his duty as a
fathe