the ex-soldier, who to-day had bark shoes on.  He stood erect, holding his cap as they do at funerals, according to military regulation.  When one of them, a respectable-looking, broad-shouldered old man, with a curly, grizzly beard like that of Michael Angelo’s “Moses,” and grey hair that curled round the brown, bald forehead, put on his big cap, and, wrapping his coat round him, got in behind the table and sat down, the rest followed his example.  When all had taken their places Nekhludoff sat down opposite them, and leaning on the table over the paper on which he had drawn up his project, he began explaining it.

Whether it was that there were fewer present, or that he was occupied with the business in hand and not with himself, anyhow, this time Nekhludoff felt no confusion.  He involuntarily addressed the broad-shouldered old man with white ringlets in his grizzly beard, expecting approbation or objections from him.  But Nekhludoff’s conjecture was wrong.  The respectable-looking old patriarch, though he nodded his handsome head approvingly or shook it, and frowned when the others raised an objection, evidently understood with great difficulty, and only when the others repeated what Nekhludoff had said in their own words.  A little, almost beardless old fellow, blind in one eye, who sat by the side of the patriarch, and had a patched nankeen coat and old boots on, and, as Nekhludoff found out later, was an oven-builder, understood much better.  This man moved his brows quickly, attending to Nekhludoff’s words with an effort, and at once repeated them in his own way.  An old, thick-set man with a white beard and intelligent eyes understood as quickly, and took every opportunity to put in an ironical joke, clearly wishing to show off.  The ex-soldier seemed also to understand matters, but got mixed, being used to senseless soldiers’ talk.  A tall man with a small beard, a long nose, and a bass voice, who wore clean, home-made clothes and new bark-plaited shoes, seemed to be the one most seriously interested.  This man spoke only when there was need of it.  The two other old men, the same toothless one who had shouted a distinct refusal at the meeting the day before to every proposal of Nekhludoff’s, and a tall, white lame old man with a kind face, his thin legs tightly wrapped round with strips of linen, said little, though they listened attentively.  First of all Nekhludoff explained his views in regard to personal property in land.  “The land, according to my idea, can neither be bought nor sold, because if it could be, he who has got the money could buy it all, and exact anything he liked for the use of the land from those who have none.”

“That’s true,” said the long-nosed man, in a deep bass.

“Just so,” said the ex-soldier.

“A woman gathers a little grass for her cow; she’s caught and imprisoned,” said the white-bearded old man.

“Our own land is five versts away, and as to renting any it’s impossible; the price is raised so high that it won’t pay,” added the cross, toothless old man.  “They twist us into ropes, worse than during serfdom.”