eking further information, to put the finishing
touch." Evgenie Pavlovitch was silent, but Hippolyte kept his eyes fixed
upon him, waiting impatiently for more.

"Well, have you finished?" said Lizabetha Prokofievna to Evgenie. "Make
haste, sir; it is time he went to bed. Have you more to say?" She was
very angry.

"Yes, I have a little more," said Evgenie Pavlovitch, with a smile. "It
seems to me that all you and your friends have said, Mr. Terentieff, and
all you have just put forward with such undeniable talent, may be summed
up in the triumph of right above all, independent of everything else, to
the exclusion of everything else; perhaps even before having discovered
what constitutes the right. I may be mistaken?"

"You are certainly mistaken; I do not even understand you. What else?"

Murmurs arose in the neighbourhood of Burdovsky and his companions;
Lebedeff's nephew protested under his breath.

"I have nearly finished," replied Evgenie Pavlovitch.

"I will only remark that from these premises one could conclude that
might is right--I mean the right of the clenched fist, and of personal
inclination. Indeed, the world has often come to that conclusion.
Prudhon upheld that might is right. In the American War some of the most
advanced Liberals took sides with the planters on the score that the
blacks were an inferior race to the whites, and that might was the right
of the white race."

"Well?"

"You mean, no doubt, that you do not deny that might is right?"

"What then?"

"You are at least logical. I would only point out that from the right
of might, to the right of tigers and crocodiles, or even Daniloff and
Gorsky, is but a step."

"I know nothing about that; what else?"

Hippolyte was scarcely listening. He kept saying "well?" and "what else?"
mechanically, without the least curiosity, and by mere force of habit.

"Why, nothing else; that is all."

"However, I bear you no grudge," said Hippolyte suddenly, and, hardly
conscious of what he was doing, he held out his hand with a smile. The
gesture took Evgenie Pavlovitch by surprise, but with the utmost gravity
he touched the hand that was offered him in token of forgiveness.

"I can but thank you," he said, in a tone too respectful to be sincere,
"for your kindness in letting me speak, for I have often noticed that
our Liberals never allow other people to have an opinion of their own,
and immediately answer their opponents with abuse, if they do n