'Beneath this stone there rests Ivan Yegoriev;
A tanner by trade, he always wetted hides.
His work was honest, his heart good, but, behold,
He passed away, leaving his business to his wife.
He was not yet old and might still have done a lot of work.
But God took him away to the life of paradise on the night
Friday to Saturday in Passion week ...'
and something like that...." He was silent, and then, nodding his head and smiling faintly, added: "In human stupidity when it is not malicious, there is something very touching, even beautiful.... There always is."
They called us to come to dinner.
XXXVI
"I do not like people when they are drunk, but I know some who become interesting when they are tipsy, who acquire what is not natural to them in their sober state—wit, beauty of thought, alertness, and richness of language. In such cases I am ready to bless wine."
Suler tells how he was once walking with Leo Nicolayevitch in Tverskaya Street when Tolstoi noticed in the distance two soldiers of the Guards. The metal of their accoutrements shone in the sun; their spurs jingled; they kept step like one man; their faces, too, shone with the self-assurance of strength and youth.
Tolstoi began to grumble at them: "What pompous stupidity! Like animals trained by the whip...."
But when the guardsmen came abreast with him, he stopped, followed them caressingly with his eyes, and said enthusiastically: "How handsome! Old Romans, eh, Liovushka? Their strength and beauty! O Lord! How charming it is when man is handsome, how very charming!"
A LETTER
I have just posted a letter to you—telegrams have arrived telling of "Tolstoi's flight," and now once more one with you in thought I write again.