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assistance. But Andreyeff says that he recollects with more pleasure his career at St. Petersburg, because there he found more congenial company.
In January, 1894, he tried to take away his life, and consequently the Church obliged him to do penance. About this time heart disease began to develop in him. It proved to be less dangerous than painful. During that time he tried to write, and with still more pleasure did he engage in painting, of which art he had been fond from his childhood. He would contrive to paint portraits at three or five roubles a piece; afterwards, displaying more dexterity, he received ten or twelve roubles each (about twenty to twenty-five shillings).
In 1897 he won his diploma, and his name was inserted in the list of barristers’ assistants. From the very beginning he was pushed out of his right place and
