Page:Dead Souls - A Poem by Nikolay Gogol - vol2.djvu/207

Rh at them. That was to his taste. Middle-aged bachelors always like such pictures. It is said that of late years old gentlemen have acquired a taste for them excited by the ballet. There is no help for it. Man is fond of spices. When he had finished looking through this book Tchitchikov was about to pull out another of the same class, when Colonel Koshkaryov made his appearance with a beaming face, holding a paper in his hand.

'It is all finished and finished admirably. That man really does understand, he is the one that makes up for all the rest. For this I'll promote him above all the rest: I'll make a special board of control and make him president of it. This is what he writes …'

'Well, thank the Lord,' thought Tchitchikov, and prepared to listen.

'"In reference to the commission that your honour has entrusted to me I have the honour herewith to report as follows: 1. In the very petition of the collegiate councillor and cavalier, Pavel Ivanovitch Tchitchikov, there is some misunderstanding: inasmuch as souls are required that have been assailed by various sudden calamities, and died. Thereby, doubtless, he signifies those on the point of death, not actually dead; seeing that the dead cannot be obtained. How can a thing be purchased if it does not exist. Logic itself tells us that and evidently the gentleman has not gone very far in the study of the humanities."' Here for a moment