“I have not read them myself, but I have had them read to me.”
“And is it possible that they did not please you?”
“No; none of them.”
“Not even Púshkin’s.”
“Why?”
Márya Pávlovna made no answer; but Ipátoff, twisting round across the back of his chair, remarked, with a good-natured laugh, that she not only did not like verses, but sugar also, and, in general, could not endure anything sweet.
“But, surely, there are verses which are not sweet,”—retorted Vladímir Sergyéitch.
“For example?”—Márya Pávlovna asked him.
Vladímir Sergyéitch scratched behind his ear.... He himself knew very few verses by heart, especially of the sort which were not sweet.