We do not know if the stories collected in this volume[7] stand together in the Russian edition of Tchehov’s works, or if the selection is due to Mrs Constance Garnett.  It is also possible that the juxtaposition is fortuitous.  But the stories are united by a similarity of material.  Whereas in the former volumes of this admirable series Tchehov is shown as preoccupied chiefly with the life of the intelligentsia, here he finds his subjects in priests and peasants, or (in the story Uprooted) in the half-educated.

   [Footnote 7:  The Bishop; and Other Stories.  By Anton Tchehov. 
   Translated by Constance Garnett. (Chatto & Windus.)]

Such a distinction is, indeed, irrelevant.  As Tchehov presents them to our minds, the life of the country and the life of the town produce the same final impression, arouse in us an awareness of an identical quality; and thus, the distinction, by its very irrelevance, points us the more quickly to what is essential in Tchehov.  It is that his attitude, to which he persuades us, is complete, not partial.  His comprehension radiates from a steady centre, and is not capriciously kindled by a thousand accidental contacts.  In other words, Tchehov is not what he is so often assumed to be, an impressionist.  Consciously or unconsciously he had taken the step—­the veritable salto mortale—­by which the great literary artist moves out of the ranks of the minor writers.  He had slowly shifted his angle of vision until he could discern a unity in multiplicity.  Unity of this rare kind cannot be imposed as, for instance, Zola attempted to impose it.  It is an emanation from life which can be distinguished only by the most sensitive contemplation.

The problem is to define this unity in the case of each great writer in whom it appears.  To apprehend it is not so difficult.  The mere sense of unity is so singular and compelling that it leaves room for few hesitations.  The majority of writers, however excellent in their peculiar virtues, are not concerned with it:  at one moment they represent, at another they may philosophise, but the two activities have no organic connection, and their work, if it displays any evolution at all, displays it only in the minor accidents of the craft, such as style in the narrower and technical sense, or the obvious economy of construction.  There is no danger of mistaking these for great writers.  Nor, in the more peculiar case of writers who attempt to impose the illusion of unity, is the danger serious.  The apparatus is always visible; they cannot afford to do without the paraphernalia of argument which supplies the place of what is lacking in their presentation.  The obvious instance of this legerdemain is Zola; a less obvious, and therefore more interesting example is Balzac.