"This year my peasants have been giving me a good deal of trouble," Nikolai Petrovitch continued to his son. "Persistently do they refuse to pay their tithes. What ought to be done with them?"
"And do you find your hired workmen satisfactory?"
"Not altogether," muttered Nikolai Petrovitch. "You see, they have become spoilt, more's the pity! Any real energy seems quite to have left them, and they not only ruin my implements, but also leave the land untilled. Does estate-management interest you?"
"The thing we most lack here is shade," remarked Arkady in evasion of the question.
"Ah, but I have had an awning added to the north balcony, so that we can take our meals in the open air."
"But that will give the place rather the look of a villa, will it not? Things of that sort never prove effectual. But oh, the air here! How good it smells! Yes, in my opinion, things never smell elsewhere as they do here. And oh, the sky!"
Suddenly Arkady stopped, threw a glance of apprehension in the direction of the tarantass, and relapsed into silence.
"I quite agree with you," replied Nikolai Petrovitch. "You see, the reason is that you were born here, and that therefore the place is bound to have for you a special significance."
"But no significance can attach to the place of a man's birth, Papa."
"Indeed?"