Page:Oblomov (1915 English translation).djvu/189

Rh last night he had read both her horoscope and his own. What had since happened?

Frequently, in summer, one goes to sleep while the weather is still and cloudless, and the stars are glimmering softly. "How beautiful the countryside will look to-morrow under the bright beams of morning!" one thinks to oneself. "And how glad one will be to dive into the depths of the forest and seek refuge from the heat!" Then suddenly one awakes to the beating of rain, to the sight of grey, mournful clouds, to a sense of cold and damp.

In Oblomov's breast the poison was working swiftly and vigorously. In thought he reviewed his life, and for the hundredth time felt his heart ache with repentance and regret for what he had lost. He kept picturing to himself what, by now, he would have been had he strode boldly ahead, and lived a fuller and a broader life, and exerted his faculties; whence he passed to the question of his present condition, and of the means whereby Olga had contrived to become fond of him, and of the reason why she still was so. "Is she not making a mistake?" was a thought which suddenly flashed through his mind like lightning; and as it did so the lightning seemed to