Page:The Novels of Ivan Turgenev (volume VI).djvu/130

Rh occasionally casting a glance at Kallomyetsev who had just returned from the town, where he had seen the governor, upon a matter rather unpleasant for him, Kallomyetsev. Upon this point he was studiously silent, though on other subjects he launched out freely.

Sipyagin, as before, pulled him up when he went too far. He laughed a great deal at his anecdotes, his bons mots, though he opined, qu'il est un affreux réactionnaire. Kallomyetsev declared among the rest that he had been thrown into perfect raptures over the name the peasants─''oui, oui! les simples moujiks!─give to the lawyers─'Loiars! loiars! he repeated in ecstasy: ce peuple russe est délicieux.''' Then he related how once when visiting a peasant-school he had put to the pupils the question: 'What is an ornithorhincus?' And as no one was able to answer, not even the teacher, then he, Kallomyetsev, put them another question: 'What is a wendaru?' quoting the line of Hemnitser: 'The senseless wendaru that apes the other beasts.' And no one had answered that either. So much for your peasant schools!

'But excuse me', remarked Valentina Mihalovna, 'I don't know myself what those animals are.'