IV

heat, and sat on and on in his cart. It seemed as if he were overwhelmed not so much by illness as by the spectacle of the great poverty, the vast wretchedness which, from time immemorial, had reigned over this town and its whole county. Lord God, what a country! Black-loam soil over three feet deep! But⁠—what of that? Never did five years pass without a famine. The town was famous throughout all Russia as a grain mart⁠—but not more than a hundred persons in the whole town ate their fill of the grain. And the Fair? Beggars, idiots, blind men, cripples⁠—a whole regiment of them⁠—and such monstrosities as it made one frightened and sick at the stomach to behold!