In the gymnasium he did not succeed in learning French, and he did not go further in German than the declension of der, die, das, with few mistakes; but after he entered the medical school, Lopukhóf soon saw that he could not make great progress in science with the Russian language alone; he took a French dictionary and such French books as happened to be at hand, and those that fell into his hands were: "Télémaque" and the stories of Madame Genlis, and several livraisons of our clever journal Revue Etrangère. They were not very attractive books, but he took them; and though he was an eager reader, he said, "I shall not open a Russian book until I am able to read French fluently." And thus he learned French fluently. But he acted differently in regard to German: he rented a room in a house where there were a good many German laborers; it was a wretched hole; the Germans were tiresome; it was a long walk to the medical school, but he lived there until he had accomplished what he needed.
Kirsánof did in a different way: he learned the German through different books, with a lexicon, just as Lopukhóf learned French, but French he acquired in a peculiar fashion—through one book without a lexicon. It was the Gospels,—a very familiar book; and he took the New Testament, in the translation of Geneva; then he read it over eight times; the ninth time he understood it thoroughly; and so he mastered it. What kind of a man was Lopukhóf? This was what he was. One time he was walking in a shabby uniform on the Kammenoi-Ostrof Prospekt, on his way from his lesson, for which he got fifty kopeks (thirty cents) an hour, though he had to go a distance of three versts from the lyceum. A distinguished somebody, of imposing mien, met him, motions him out of the way in the manner of men of imposing mien, and bears straight down upon him without giving way. But Lopukhóf, at that time, had a rule, not to be the first to turn out for anybody except a woman. They bumped against each other with their shoulders, and the distinguished somebody, half turning about, said, "What a pig, what a hog you are!" but while he was preparing to continue the lesson, Lopukhóf made a full turn towards the distinguished somebody, took the distinguished somebody by the body, and deposited him in the gutter very tenderly; then he stood over him, and said, "Don't you move, else I will drag you farther where the mud is deeper."
