Page:Dead Souls - A Poem by Nikolay Gogol - vol1.djvu/220

in his boot. Where did you meet your death? Did you clamber up to the church cupola to earn a big fee, or perhaps you even dragged yourself up to the cross, and slipping down from a crossbeam, fell with a thud on the ground and some Uncle Mihey, standing by, simply scratched his head and said: "Ech, Vanya, you have done the trick this time!" and tying himself to the cord climbed up to take your place. "Maxim Telyatnikov, bootmaker." Hey, a bootmaker! As drunk as a cobbler, says the proverb. I know you, I know you, my dear fellow; I can tell you your whole story if you like. You were apprenticed to a German who used to feed all of you together, beat you on the back with a strap for carelessness, and wouldn't let you out into the streets to lark about, and you were a marvel, not an ordinary bootmaker; and the German couldn't say enough in your praise when he talked with his wife or his comrade. And when your apprenticeship was over: "I'll set up on my own account now!" you said, "and I won't make a farthing profit at a time like the German, I'll get rich at once." And so, sending your master a good sum in lieu of labour, you set up a little shop, took a number of orders and went to work. You got hold of cheap bits of rotten leather and made twice their value on every pair of boots, and within a week or two your boots split and you were abused in the coarsest way. And your shop began to be deserted and you took to drinking and loafing about the streets, saying: "This life's a poor look-out. There is