Page:The Kiss and Other Stories by Anton Tchekhoff, 1908.pdf/127

 in all the village, I am the last muzhik. But all the same, lad, I have strength. I am a strong man. Look at me! Seventy years I've lived; and I watch these flocks day after day, yes, and by night—I watch them for twenty kopecks and never sleep and never catch cold! My son is a cleverer man; but put him in my place, and next day he'll come and ask for higher wages, or go into hospital. So it is! Beyond bread I ask for nothing; it's written, give us this day our daily bread; but your muzhik nowadays must have tea and vodka, and white bread, and he sleeps from sundown to dawn, and drinks medicines, and is spoilt all round. And why? Because he's weak, he has no strength to endure. He would like to do without sleep, but his eyes shut—he's no good for anything!”

“That's true,” said Meliton. “The muzhik nowadays is good for nothing.”

“There's no use hiding it; we get worse every year. And as for the gentry, they're weaker still than the muzhiks. Your gentleman of to-day learns everything that's no good for him to know. And what use is it? . . . Skinny, weak, like some Hungarian or Frenchman; no dignity, nothing to look at; only one thing to boast of—he knows he's a gentleman. He sits with a rod and catches fish, or lies on his back reading books, or goes among the muzhiks and talks to them, and when he sees some one hungry hires him