Russia in 1839 -Empire of the Czar: A Journey Through Eternal Russia

THE HISTORY OF THELENEF.101

be like them ? His education was from the first as much cared for as mine."

"` He ought to be so much the better, and he is all the worse; such are the effects of education ; but it is your fault, you and your nurse would constantly bring him to the castle, and I in my kind wish to please you, forgot, and allowed him to forget, that he was not born to live with us."

" You cruelly reminded him of it afterwards,'' answered Xenie, with a sigh.

" Your ideas are not Eussian : sooner or later, you will learn to your cost, to know how peasants must be governed." He then continued, muttering between his teeth, " `Wbat is this devil of a Fedor doing, to come back here, after my letters to the prince. The prince cannot have read them, and the steward down there is jealous of me ! "

Xenie heard the self-communings of Thelenef, and anxiously watched the progress of the resentful feelings of the steward, who considered that he had been braved in his own house by an intractable serf. She hoped to appease him by these reasonable words : — " It is now two years since you had my poor foster-brother almost beaten to death. What have you gained by your severity ? Nothing; his lips did not utter one word of excuse, he would have expired under the torture, rather than have humbled himself before you : for he knew that lñs punishment was too severe for his fault. I confess he had disobeyed you, but he was in love with Catharine. The cause of the offence lessened its importance; this you would not take into consideration. Since that scene, and the marriage and departure which followed it, the hatred