III.
Besides Velenchúk, five other soldiers of my platoon were warming themselves at the fire.
In the best place, protected from the wind, on a cask, sat the gun-sergeant of the platoon, Maksímov, smoking a pipe. In the pose, the look, and all the motions of this man could be observed the habit of commanding and the consciousness of his personal dignity, even independently of the cask, on which he was sitting, and which, at a halt, formed the emblem of authority, and of the nankeen-covered fur half-coat.
When I came up, he turned his head toward me; but his eyes remained fixed upon the fire, and only much later did they follow the direction of his head, and rest upon me. Maksímov was a freeman; he was possessed of some means, had taken instruction in the school of the brigade, and had picked up some information. He was dreadfully rich and dreadfully learned, as the soldiers expressed themselves.
I remember how once, at gun-practice with the quadrant, he explained to the soldiers who were crowding around him that the level was "nothing else than that it originates because the atmospheric quicksilver has its motion." In reality, Maksímov was far from being stupid, and he knew his work very well, but he had an unfortunate peculiarity of speaking at times purposely in such a way that it was totally impossible to understand him, and so that, as I am convinced, he did not understand his own words. He was especially fond of the
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