How beautiful Mamma’s face was when she smiled!  It made her so infinitely more charming, and everything around her seemed to grow brighter!  If in the more painful moments of my life I could have seen that smile before my eyes, I should never have known what grief is.  In my opinion, it is in the smile of a face that the essence of what we call beauty lies.  If the smile heightens the charm of the face, then the face is a beautiful one.  If the smile does not alter the face, then the face is an ordinary one.  But if the smile spoils the face, then the face is an ugly one indeed.

Mamma took my head between her hands, bent it gently backwards, looked at me gravely, and said:  “You have been crying this morning?”

I did not answer.  She kissed my eyes, and said again in German:  “Why did you cry?”

When talking to us with particular intimacy she always used this language, which she knew to perfection.

“I cried about a dream, Mamma” I replied, remembering the invented vision, and trembling involuntarily at the recollection.

Karl Ivanitch confirmed my words, but said nothing as to the subject of the dream.  Then, after a little conversation on the weather, in which Mimi also took part, Mamma laid some lumps of sugar on the tray for one or two of the more privileged servants, and crossed over to her embroidery frame, which stood near one of the windows.

“Go to Papa now, children,” she said, “and ask him to come to me before he goes to the home farm.”

Then the music, the counting, and the wrathful looks from Mimi began again, and we went off to see Papa.  Passing through the room which had been known ever since Grandpapa’s time as “the pantry,” we entered the study.

III —­ PAPA

He was standing near his writing-table, and pointing angrily to some envelopes, papers, and little piles of coin upon it as he addressed some observations to the bailiff, Jakoff Michaelovitch, who was standing in his usual place (that is to say, between the door and the barometer) and rapidly closing and unclosing the fingers of the hand which he held behind his back, The more angry Papa grew, the more rapidly did those fingers twirl, and when Papa ceased speaking they came to rest also.  Yet, as soon as ever Jakoff himself began to talk, they flew here, there, and everywhere with lightning rapidity.  These movements always appeared to me an index of Jakoff’s secret thoughts, though his face was invariably placid, and expressive alike of dignity and submissiveness, as who should say, “I am right, yet let it be as you wish.”  On seeing us, Papa said, “Directly—­wait a moment,” and looked towards the door as a hint for it to be shut.