ied when very young and settled, a long time
ago, in the little wooden ancestral house at the very end of the town.
Time seemed to have stood still for them, and nothing "modern" ever
crossed the boundaries of their "oasis." Their means were not great,
but their peasants supplied them several times a year with all the live
stock and provisions they needed, just as in the days of serfdom,
and their bailiff appeared once a year with the rents and a couple of
woodcocks, supposed to have been shot in the master's forests, of which,
in reality, not a trace remained. They regaled him with tea at the
drawing-room door, made him a present of a sheep-skin cap, a pair of
green leather mittens, and sent him away with a blessing.

The Subotchevs' house was filled with domestics and menials just as
in days gone by. The old man-servant Kalliopitch, clad in a jacket
of extraordinarily stout cloth with a stand-up collar and small steel
buttons, announced, in a sing-song voice, "Dinner is on the table,"
and stood dozing behind his mistress's chair as in days of old. The
sideboard was under his charge, and so were all the groceries and
pickles. To the question, had he not heard of the emancipation, he
invariably replied: "How can one take notice of every idle piece of
gossip? To be sure the Turks were emancipated, but such a dreadful thing
had not happened to him, thank the Lord!" A girl, Pufka, was kept in the
house for entertainment, and the old nurse Vassilievna used to come in
during dinner with a dark kerchief on her head, and would relate all
the news in her deep voice--about Napoleon, about the war of 1812, about
Antichrist and white niggers--or else, her chin propped on her hand,
with a most woeful expression on her face, she would tell of a dream she
had had, explaining what it meant, or perhaps how she had last read her
fortune at cards. The Subotchevs' house was different from all other
houses in the town. It was built entirely of oak, with perfectly square
windows, the double casements for winter use were never removed all the
year round. It contained numerous little ante-rooms, garrets, closets,
and box-rooms, little landings with balustrades, little statues on
carved wooden pillars, and all kinds of back passages and sculleries.
There was a hedge right in front and a garden at the back, in which
there was a perfect nest of out-buildings: store rooms and cold-store
rooms, barns, cellars and ice-cellars; not that there were ma