When I joined them he said to me: 

“Well, Ivan Andreievitch, what’s the latest news of your splendid Revolution?”

“Why my Revolution?” I asked.  I felt an especial dislike this morning of his sneering eyes and his thick pale honey-coloured beard.  “Whose ever it was he should be proud of it.  To see thousands of people who’ve been hungry for months wandering about as I’ve seen them this morning and none of them touching a thing—­it’s stupendous!”

Semyonov smiled but said nothing.  His smile irritated me.  “Oh, of course you sneer at the whole thing, Alexei Petrovitch!” I said.  “Anything fine in human nature excites your contempt as I know of old.”

I think that that was the first time that Vera had heard me speak to him in that way, and she looked up at me with sudden surprise and I think gratitude.

Semyonov treated me with complete contempt.  He answered me slowly:  “No, Ivan Andreievitch, I don’t wish to deprive you of any kind of happiness.  I wouldn’t for worlds.  But do you know our people, that’s the question?  You haven’t been here very long; you came loaded up with romantic notions, some of which you’ve discarded but only that you may pick up others....I don’t want to insult you at all, but you simply don’t know that the Christian virtues that you are admiring just now so extravagantly are simply cowardice and apathy....Wait a little!  Wait a little! and then tell me whether I’ve not been right.”

There was a moment’s pause like the hush before the storm, and then Markovitch broke in upon us.  I can see and hear him now, standing there behind Vera with his ridiculous collar and his anxious eyes.  The words simply pouring from him in a torrent, his voice now rising into a shrill scream, now sinking into a funny broken bass like the growl of a young baby tiger.  And yet he was never ridiculous.  I’ve known other mortals, and myself one of the foremost, who, under the impulse of some sudden anger, enthusiasm, or regret, have been simply figures of fun....  Markovitch was never that.  He was like a dying man fighting for possession of the last plank.  I can’t at this distance of time remember all that he said.  He talked a great deal about Russia; while he spoke I noticed that he avoided Semyonov’s eyes, which never for a single instant left his face.

“Oh, don’t you see, don’t you see?” he cried.  “Russia’s chance has come back to her?  We can fight now a holy, patriotic war.  We can fight, not because we are told to by our masters, but because we, of our own free will, wish to defend the soil of our sacred country. Our country!  No one has thought of Russia for the last two years—­we have thought only of ourselves, our privations, our losses—­but now—­now.  O God! the world may be set free again because Russia is at last free!”

“Yes,” said Semyonov quietly (his eyes covered Markovitch’s face as a searchlight finds out the running figure of a man).  “And who has spoken of Russia during the last few days?  Russia!  Why, I haven’t heard the word mentioned once.  I may have been unlucky, I don’t know.  I’ve been out and about the streets a good deal...  I’ve listened to a great many conversations....  Democracy, yes, and Brotherhood and Equality and Fraternity and Bread and Land and Peace and Idleness—­but Russia!  Not a sound....”