suggesting: Look here, my dear sir, you just rely upon us, and we'll put everything to rights; we know all about it, and will undoubtedly put everything to rights in one and the same way for everybody you like, no matter who he is — the whole process was just the same as it was in the Law Courts. Just as he in the Law Courts put on an impressive air with his subordinates, so also did the famous doctor put on an impressive air with him.
The doctor said: "So and so and so and so proves that so and so and so and so is the matter with your inside, but if this is not confirmed by the examination of so and so and so, then it is necessary to assume so and so and so and so. If, then, we assume so and so and so and so, then of course" — and so on and so on. So far as Ivan Il'ich was concerned, only a single question was of any importance: "Is my condition dangerous or not?" But the doctor altogether ignored this inconvenient question. From the doctor's point of view, this question was a silly one, and not under consideration; the balancing of contingencies was all that existed for him — kidney complaint, chronic catarrh, and diseases of the lower gut, for instance. It was no question of the life of Ivan Il'ich, but it was a dispute as between the kidneys and the intestines. And this dispute the doctor, in the most brilliant fashion, before Ivan Il'ich's very eyes, decided in favour of the intestines, at the same time making a reservation to the effect that an examination of his urine might furnish fresh indications, and that then the affair would be thoroughly investigated. All this was to an iota
