Page:The Novels of Ivan Turgenev (volume X).djvu/264

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POEMS IN PROSE

If you, for instance, are a turncoat, reproach your opponent with having no convictions!

'If you are yourself slavish at heart, tell him reproachfully that he is slavish . . . the slave of civilisation, of Europe, of Socialism!'

'One might even say, the slave of anti-slavishness,' I suggested.

'You might even do that,' assented the cunning knave.

February 1878.


THE END OF THE WORLD

A DREAM

I fancied I was somewhere in Russia, in the wilds, in a simple country house.

The room big and low pitched with three windows; the walls whitewashed; no furniture. Before the house a barren plain; gradually sloping downwards, it stretches into the distance; a grey monotonous sky hangs over it, like the canopy of a bed.

I am not alone; there are some ten persons in the room with me. All quite plain people, simply dressed. They walk up and down in silence, as it were stealthily. They avoid one

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