Page:Complete Works of Count Tolstoy - 01.djvu/98

66 me, but beginning with the third line, the ends of the verses began to turn upwards more and more, so that one could see, even from a distance, that they were written crooked, and that they were not good for anything.

The third sheet was just as crooked as the other two, but I decided not to copy it again. In my poem I congratulated grandmother, and wished her to live long, and finished as follows:

It did not look so bad, after all, only the last verse strangely offended my ear.

"And will love you like our own mother," mumbled I.

"What other rhyme could I get for mother? other? smother? Oh, well, it will pass anyway; it is not worse than the verses of Karl Ivánovich."

I wrote down the last verse. Then I read aloud my production, with feeling and expression, in the sleeping-room. There were lines without any measure, and that did not disconcert me; but the last verse struck me more unpleasantly still. I sat down on my bed, and fell to musing.

"Why did I write like our own mother? She was not here, so I ought not even to have mentioned her. It is true, I love grandmother, and I respect her, but still, it is not the same — why did I write that, why did I lie? To be sure this was a poem, still I ought not to have done so."

Just then the tailor entered, and brought the new half-frock coats.

"Well, it will have to remain that way!" said I, in great impatience, as I angrily shoved the poem under the pillow, and ran away to try on the Moscow clothes.

The Moscow clothes turned out to be a fine affair: the