“Dear grandfather, Konstantin Makaritch,” he wrote, “I am writing you a letter.  I wish you a happy Christmas, and all blessings from God Almighty.  I have neither father nor mother, you are the only one left me.”

Vanka raised his eyes to the dark ikon on which the light of his candle was reflected, and vividly recalled his grandfather, Konstantin Makaritch, who was night watchman to a family called Zhivarev.  He was a thin but extraordinarily nimble and lively little old man of sixty-five, with an everlastingly laughing face and drunken eyes.  By day he slept in the servants’ kitchen, or made jokes with the cooks; at night, wrapped in an ample sheepskin, he walked round the grounds and tapped with his little mallet.  Old Kashtanka and Eel, so-called on account of his dark colour and his long body like a weasel’s, followed him with hanging heads.  This Eel was exceptionally polite and affectionate, and looked with equal kindness on strangers and his own masters, but had not a very good reputation.  Under his politeness and meekness was hidden the most Jesuitical cunning.  No one knew better how to creep up on occasion and snap at one’s legs, to slip into the store-room, or steal a hen from a peasant.  His hind legs had been nearly pulled off more than once, twice he had been hanged, every week he was thrashed till he was half dead, but he always revived.

At this moment grandfather was, no doubt, standing at the gate, screwing up his eyes at the red windows of the church, stamping with his high felt boots, and joking with the servants.  His little mallet was hanging on his belt.  He was clasping his hands, shrugging with the cold, and, with an aged chuckle, pinching first the housemaid, then the cook.

“How about a pinch of snuff?” he was saying, offering the women his snuff-box.

The women would take a sniff and sneeze.  Grandfather would be indescribably delighted, go off into a merry chuckle, and cry: 

“Tear it off, it has frozen on!”

They give the dogs a sniff of snuff too.  Kashtanka sneezes, wriggles her head, and walks away offended.  Eel does not sneeze, from politeness, but wags his tail.  And the weather is glorious.  The air is still, fresh, and transparent.  The night is dark, but one can see the whole village with its white roofs and coils of smoke coming from the chimneys, the trees silvered with hoar frost, the snowdrifts.  The whole sky spangled with gay twinkling stars, and the Milky Way is as distinct as though it had been washed and rubbed with snow for a holiday. . . .

Vanka sighed, dipped his pen, and went on writing: