Page:Dead Souls - A Poem by Nikolay Gogol - vol1.djvu/38

26 the sides of the chaise two or three times more, Tchitchikov glided at last over the soft earth. As soon as the town was left behind, all sorts of wild rubbish and litter made its appearance on both sides of the road, as is usually the case in Russia: mounds of earth, firwoods, low scanty thickets of young pines, the charred stumps of old ones, wild heather and such stuff. They came upon villages consisting of a string of huts, looking like old timber stacks, covered with grey roofs with carvings under them, that resembled embroidered towels. As usual a few peasants sat gaping on benches in front of their gates, dressed in their sheepskins; peasant women, tightly girt above the bosom, showed their fat faces at the upper windows; from the lower ones a calf stared or a pig poked out its small-eyed snout. In short, there were the familiar sights.

After driving about ten miles our hero remembered that from Manilov's account his village ought to be here, but the eleventh mile was passed and still the village was not to be seen, and if they had not happened to meet two peasants they could hardly have reached their destination. To the question, 'Is the village of Zamanilovka far from here?' the peasants took off their hats and one of them with a wedge-shaped beard, somewhat more intelligent than the other, answered: 'Manilovka perhaps, not Zamanilovka?'

'Yes, I suppose, Manilovka.'

'Manilovka! Well, if you go on another half mile then you turn straight off to the right.'