“The i-young cissack to the war has went,
     The i-young ladee underneath the fence lies
       spraw-aw-ling. 
     Aina, Aina, ai-na-na-na, ai-na na-na-na.”

In conclusion he took Little White Manka in his arms, wrapped her up in the skirts of his frock and, stretching out his hand and making a tearful face, began to nod his head, bent to one side, as is done by little swarthy, dirty, oriental lads who roam over all Russia in long, old, soldiers’ overcoats, with bared chest of a bronze colour, holding a coughing, moth-eaten little monkey in their bosom.

“And who may you be?” severely asked fat Kate, who knew and loved this joke.

“Me Serbian, lady-y-y,” piteously moaned the actor through his nose.  “Give me somethin’, lady-y-y.”

“And what do they call your little monkey?”

“Matreshka-a-a ...  Him ’ungry-y-y, lady ... him want eat...”

“And have you got a passport?”

“We Serbia-a-an.  Gimme something lady-y-y...”

The actor proved not superfluous on the whole.  He created at once a great deal of noise and raised the spirits of the company, which were beginning to be depressing.  And every minute he cried out in a stentorian voice: 

“Kellner!  Chompa-a-agne!”—­although Simeon, who was accustomed to his manner paid very little attention to these cries.

There began a truly Russian hubbub, noisy and senseless.  The rosy, flaxen-haired, pleasing Tolpygin was playing la SEGUIDILLE from Carmen on the piano, while Roly-Poly was dancing a Kamarinsky peasant dance to its tune.  His narrow shoulders hunched up, twisted all to one side, the fingers of his hanging hands widely spread, he intricately hopped on one spot from one long, thin leg to the other, then suddenly letting out a piercing grunt, would throw himself upward and shout out in time to his wild dance: 

    “Ugh!  Dance on, Matthew,
     Don’t spare your boots, you! ...”

“Eh, for one stunt like that a quartern of brandy isn’t enough!” he would add, shaking his long, graying hair.

“They fee-ee-eel! the tru-u-u-uth!” roared the two friends, raising with difficulty their underlids, grown heavy, beneath dull, bleary eyes.

The actor commenced to tell obscene anecdotes, pouring them out as from a bag, and the women squealed from delight, bent in two from laughter and threw themselves against the backs of their chairs.  Veltman, who had long been whispering with Pasha, inconspicuously, in the hubbub, slipped out of the cabinet, while a few minutes after him Pasha also went away, smiling with her quiet, insane and bashful smile.