The Daughter of the Commandant

"Ah," said he, "it was but a short time Andrej Petrovitch was your age,

and now he has got a fine fellow of a son. Well, well--time, time."

He opened the letter, and began reading it half aloud, with a running

fire of remarks-"'Sir, I hope your excellency'--What's all this ceremony? For shame! I

wonder he's not ashamed of himself! Of course, discipline before

everything; but is it thus one writes to an old comrade? 'Your

excellency will not have forgotten'--Humph! 'And when under the late

Field Marshal Muenich during the campaign, as well as little

Caroline'--Eh! eh! bruder! So he still remembers our old pranks? 'Now

for business. I send you my rogue'--Hum! 'Hold him with gloves of

porcupine-skin'--What does that mean--'gloves of porcupine-skin?' It

must be a Russian proverb.

"What does it mean, 'hold with gloves of porcupine-skin?'" resumed he,

turning to me.

"It means," I answered him, with the most innocent face in the world,

"to treat someone kindly, not too strictly, to leave him plenty of

liberty; that is what holding with gloves of porcupine-skin means."

"Humph! I understand."

"'And not give him any liberty'--No; it seems that porcupine-skin gloves

means something quite different.' Enclosed is his commission'--Where is

it then? Ah! here it is!--'in the roll of the Semenofsky Regiment'--All

right; everything necessary shall be done. 'Allow me to salute you

without ceremony, and like an old friend and comrade'--Ah! he has at

last remembered it all," etc., etc.

"Well, my little father," said he, after he had finished the letter and

put my commission aside, "all shall be done; you shall be an officer in

the ----th Regiment, and you shall go to-morrow to Fort Belogorsk, where

you will serve under the orders of Commandant Mironoff, a brave and

worthy man. There you will really serve and learn discipline. There is

nothing for you to do at Orenburg; amusement is bad for a young man.

To-day I invite you to dine with me."

"Worse and worse," thought I to myself. "What good has it done me to

have been a sergeant in the Guard from my cradle? Where has it brought

me? To the ----th Regiment, and to a fort stranded on the frontier of

the Kirghiz-Kaisak Steppes!"

I dined at Andrej Karlovitch's, in the company of his old aide de camp.

Strict German economy was the rule at his table, and I think that the

dread of a frequent guest at his bachelor's table contributed not a

little to my being so promptly sent away to a distant garrison.

The next day I took leave of the General, and started for my

destination.