Page:Rudin - a novel (IA rudinnovel00turgrich).pdf/285

RUDIN At last I succeeded in getting an appointment as professor in the gymnasium here.’

‘As professor of what?’ asked Lezhnyov.

‘Professor of literature. I can tell you I never started on any work with such zest as I did on this. The thought of producing an effect upon the young inspired me. I spent three weeks over the composition of my opening lecture.’

‘Have you got it, Dmitri?’ interrupted Lezhnyov.

‘No! I lost it somewhere. It went off fairly well, and was liked. I can see now the faces of my listeners—good young faces, with an expression of pure-souled attention and sympathy, and even of amazement. I mounted the platform and read my lecture in a fever; I thought it would fill more than an hour, but I had finished it in twenty minutes. The inspector was sitting there—a dry old man in silver spectacles and a short wig—he sometimes turned his head in my direction. When I had finished, he jumped up from his seat and said to me, “Good, but rather over their heads, obscure, and too little said about the subject.” But the pupils followed me with appreciation in 247