“What is it? Who is it? What is it for?” he kept asking.

But the attention of the crowd⁠—officials, burghers, shopkeepers, peasants, and women in cloaks and in pelisses⁠—was so eagerly centered on what was passing in Lóbnoe Place that no one answered him. The stout man rose, frowned, shrugged his shoulders, and evidently trying to appear firm began to pull on his jacket without looking about him, but suddenly his lips trembled and he began to cry, in the way full-blooded grown-up men cry, though angry with himself for doing so. In the crowd people began talking loudly, to stifle their feelings of pity as it seemed to Pierre.

“He’s cook to some prince.”

“Eh, mounseer, Russian sauce seems to be sour to a Frenchman⁠ ⁠… sets his teeth on edge!” said a wrinkled clerk who was standing behind Pierre, when the Frenchman began to cry.