The tiger skin was sold to a passing merchant for sixty rubles, while the tiger's heart was bought by a Chinaman, who intended, it was said, to reduce it to powder and sell it to those who thought that they could thus have some of the tiger's bravery transmitted to them. The skull was given to Daria in acknowledgment of her services, and kept by her, with many other very curious things, in the front room of her little log house.
FOOTNOTE:
[12] Each district has its own doctor receiving pay from the government. His duty is to attend to all Cossacks and their families, free of charge, whenever necessary.
CHAPTER XI
A JOURNEY
One day, not long after a traveling merchant had brought us news of Dimitri, my father called me to the bench on which he sat, and putting his hands on my head, asked: "How would you like to learn to read and write?"
At first I did not know what to answer, the question was so unexpected. Glancing at my mother, I saw that it made her so uneasy that she dropped a tumbler on the floor, a very unusual happening.
Although father did not insist on my answering, the question kept coming back to me all that day and the next, until I decided that to learn to read and write would be a very good thing.