No More Learning

From five years old I was given over to the care of the huntsman,
Saveliitch,[2] who from his steadiness and sobriety was considered
worthy of becoming my attendant. Thanks to his care, at twelve years old
I could read and write, and was considered a good judge of the points of
a greyhound. At this time, to complete my education, my father hired a
Frenchman, M. Beaupre, who was imported from Moscow at the same time as
the annual provision of wine and Provence oil. His arrival displeased
Saveliitch very much.

"It seems to me, thank heaven," murmured he, "the child was washed,
combed, and fed. What was the good of spending money and hiring a
'_moussie_,' as if there were not enough servants in the house? "

Beaupre, in his native country, had been a hairdresser, then a soldier
in Prussia, and then had come to Russia to be "_outchitel_," without
very well knowing the meaning of this word. [3] He was a good creature,
but wonderfully absent and hare-brained. His greatest weakness was a
love of the fair sex. Neither, as he said himself, was he averse to the
bottle, that is, as we say in Russia, that his passion was drink. But,
as in our house the wine only appeared at table, and then only in
_liqueur_ glasses, and as on these occasions it somehow never came to
the turn of the "_outchitel_" to be served at all, my Beaupre soon
accustomed himself to the Russian brandy, and ended by even preferring
it to all the wines of his native country as much better for the
stomach. We became great friends, and though, according to the contract,
he had engaged himself to teach me _French, German, and all the
sciences_, he liked better learning of me to chatter Russian
indifferently. Each of us busied himself with our own affairs; our
friendship was firm, and I did not wish for a better mentor. But Fate
soon parted us, and it was through an event which I am going to relate.
The washerwoman, Polashka, a fat girl, pitted with small-pox, and the
one-eyed cow-girl, Akoulka, came one fine day to my mother with such
stories against the "_moussie_," that she, who did not at all like these
kind of jokes, in her turn complained to my father, who, a man of hasty
temperament, instantly sent for that _rascal of a Frenchman_. He was
answered humbly that the "_moussie_" was giving me a lesson. My father
ran to my room. Beaupre was sleeping on his bed the sleep of the just.
As for me, I was absorbed in a deeply interesting occupation. A map had
been procured for me from Moscow, which hung against the wall without
ever being used, and which had been tempting me for a long time from the
size and strength of its paper. I had at last resolved to make a kite of
it, and, taking advantage of Beaupre's slumbers, I had set to work.

My father came in just at the very moment when I was tying a tail to the
Cape of Good Hope.

At the sight of my geographical studies he boxed my ears sharply, sprang
forward to Beaupre's bed, and, awaking him without any consideration, he
began to assail him with reproaches. In his trouble and confusion
Beaupre vainly strove to rise; the poor "_outchitel_" was dead drunk.
My father pulled him up by the collar of his coat, kicked him out of the
room, and dismissed him the same day, to the inexpressible joy of
Saveliitch.

Thus was my education finished.

I lived like a stay-at-home son (_nedoross'l_),[4] amusing myself by
scaring the pigeons on the roofs, and playing leapfrog with the lads of
the courtyard,[5] till I was past the age of sixteen. But at this age my
life underwent a great change.

One autumn day, my mother was making honey jam in her parlour, while,
licking my lips, I was watching the operations, and occasionally tasting
the boiling liquid. My father, seated by the window, had just opened the
_Court Almanack_, which he received every year.