“Come, listen. The day after the wedding, though I was drunk, I got away from my visitors and I escaped and ran away. ‘Bring me that wretch Filka Morozov,’ says I, ‘bring him here, the scoundrel!’ I shouted all over the market. Well, I was drunk too; I was beyond the Vlasov’s when they caught me, and three men brought me home by force. And the talk was all over the town. The wenches in the marketplace were talking to each other: ‘Girls, darlings, have you heard? Akulka is proved innocent.’ ”

“Not long after, Filka says to me before folks, ‘Sell your wife and you can drink. Yashka the soldier got married just for that,’ says he. ‘He didn’t sleep with his wife, but he was drunk for three years.’ I said to him, ‘You are a scoundrel.’ ‘And you,’ says he, ‘a fool. Why, you weren’t sober when you were married,’ says he, ‘how could you tell about it when you were drunk?’ I came home and shouted, ‘You married me when I was drunk,’ said I. My mother began scolding me, ‘Your ears are stopped with gold, mother. Give me Akulka.’ Well, I began beating her. I beat her, my lad, beat her for two hours, till I couldn’t stand up. She didn’t get up from her bed for three weeks.”