all dark, and we are pushing forward together into this darkness. I need not explain to you what it is we are going into, and what work we have chosen. Marianna and I are not in search of happiness; we don't want to enjoy ourselves, but to struggle on together, side by side, supporting each other. Our aim is clear to us; but what ways will lead up to it, we do not know. Shall we find, if not sympathy and help, at least freedom to work? Marianna is a splendid, honest girl; if it is decreed that we perish, I shall not reproach myself for having led her to ruin, for there is no other life possible to her now. But Vladimir, Vladimir! my heart is heavy. I am tortured by doubt, not of my feeling for her, of course, but . . . I don't know. Anyhow, it's too late to turn back. Stretch out a hand to us both from afar, and wish us patience, power of self-sacrifice, and love . . . more love. And ye, unknown of us, but loved by us with all our being, every drop of our heart's blood, Russian people, receive us not too coldly, and teach us what we are to expect from you! Farewell, Vladimir, farewell!'
After writing these few lines, Nezhdanov set off to the village. The next night, the dawn was hardly breaking in the sky when he stood on the outskirts of the birch wood at no great
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