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Waldemar Karwowski
Tareq Ahram Editors
Intelligent
Human Systems
Integration
Proceedings of the 1st International
Conference on Intelligent Human
Systems Integration (IHSI 2018):
Integrating People and Intelligent
Systems, January 7–9, 2018, Dubai,
United Arab Emirates
Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing
Volume 722
Series editor
Janusz Kacprzyk, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland
e-mail: [email protected]
About this Series
The series “Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing” contains publications on theory,
applications, and design methods of Intelligent Systems and Intelligent Computing. Virtually
all disciplines such as engineering, natural sciences, computer and information science, ICT,
economics, business, e-commerce, environment, healthcare, life science are covered. The list
of topics spans all the areas of modern intelligent systems and computing.
The publications within “Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing” are primarily
textbooks and proceedings of important conferences, symposia and congresses. They cover
significant recent developments in the field, both of a foundational and applicable character.
An important characteristic feature of the series is the short publication time and world-wide
distribution. This permits a rapid and broad dissemination of research results.
Advisory Board
Chairman
Nikhil R. Pal, Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata, India
e-mail: [email protected]
Members
Rafael Bello Perez, Universidad Central “Marta Abreu” de Las Villas, Santa Clara, Cuba
e-mail: [email protected]
Emilio S. Corchado, University of Salamanca, Salamanca, Spain
e-mail: [email protected]
Hani Hagras, University of Essex, Colchester, UK
e-mail: [email protected]
László T. Kóczy, Széchenyi István University, Győr, Hungary
e-mail: [email protected]
Vladik Kreinovich, University of Texas at El Paso, El Paso, USA
e-mail: [email protected]
Chin-Teng Lin, National Chiao Tung University, Hsinchu, Taiwan
e-mail: [email protected]
Jie Lu, University of Technology, Sydney, Australia
e-mail: [email protected]
Patricia Melin, Tijuana Institute of Technology, Tijuana, Mexico
e-mail: [email protected]
Nadia Nedjah, State University of Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
e-mail: [email protected]
Ngoc Thanh Nguyen, Wroclaw University of Technology, Wroclaw, Poland
e-mail: [email protected]
Jun Wang, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, Hong Kong
e-mail: [email protected]
Editors
Intelligent
Human Systems
Integration
Proceedings of the 1st International
Conference on Intelligent Human Systems
Integration (IHSI 2018): Integrating People
and Intelligent Systems, January 7–9, 2018,
Dubai, United Arab Emirates
123
Editors
Waldemar Karwowski Tareq Ahram
University of Central Florida University of Central Florida
Orlando, FL Orlando, FL
USA USA
v
vi Preface
This book also presents many innovative studies of ambient artificial technology
and its applications, including the consideration of human–machine interfaces with
a particular emphasis on infusing intelligence into development of technology
throughout the lifecycle development process, with due consideration of user
experience and the design of interfaces for virtual, augmented, and mixed reality
applications of artificial intelligence.
Reflecting on the above-outlined perspective, the papers contained in this vol-
ume are organized into five main sections, including:
I. Intelligence, Technology, and Automation
II. Humans and Artificial Cognitive Systems
III. Computational Modeling, Simulation, and Design
IV. Ambient Intelligence and User Experience
V. Society, Governance and Smart Systems
We would like to extend our sincere thanks to Dr. Stefania Camplone,
University of Chieti-Pescara, Italy, for leading a part of the technical program that
focuses on Smart Materials and Inclusive Human Systems. Our appreciation also
goes to the members of Scientific Program Advisory Board who have reviewed the
accepted papers that are presented in this volume, including the following
individuals:
G. Di Bucchianico, Italy
S. Camplone, Italy
A. Ebert, Germany
M. Ferrara, Italy
E. Karana, Netherlands
A. Ratti, Italy
R. Rodriquez, Italy
V. Rognoli, Italy R.
We hope that this book, which presents the current state of the art in Intelligent
Human Systems Integration, will be a valuable source of both theoretical and
applied knowledge enabling the design and applications of a variety of intelligent
products, services, and systems for their safe, effective, and pleasurable collabo-
ration with people.
vii
viii Contents
Institute of Flight Systems, University of the Bundeswehr Munich, 85577 Neubiberg, Germany
{axel.schulte,diana.donath}@unibw.de
1 Introduction
of requirements and the design of the technical functions of a system. The human oper‐
ator only appears as an actor, usually located outside the system boundary. This approach
is reasonable when automation is relatively simple, in the sense that it can perform
specific clear-cut part-tasks. There, one can well describe the relationship between the
(technical) system and the human user through use cases calling for certain user-system
supervisory control interactions.
In this article, in contrast, we want to take account for the following trends. Firstly,
the automation in HAT will become much more capable in the sense of being able to
perform higher cognitive tasks. Secondly, the work share and interaction between the
user and the automated system will be much less stable (e.g. adaptive automation [3]).
Finally, the task performance of human and automation will be highly dependent on a
cognitive level [4]. In total, our approach focuses on two overarching aspects, the
description of the purpose we want to design a HAT-system for, before the actual design,
and the incorporation of the human user within the system boundary.
In a first step, we introduce the notion of the Work Process (WProc), and its graphical
representation (cf. Fig. 1), to develop an integrated view upon the purpose of a human-
machine co-action, its physical and conceptional work environment (WEnv), as well as
its desired output (WPOut) to the environment the WProc lives in. However, most crucial
is the Work Objective (WObj), i.e., the mission or the purpose of work, since it reflects
the user requirements for a system we will design. The WObj defines and initiates the
WProc. The proper definition of the WObj is of high priority and most critical for the
definition of the system boundaries and the design. Connections and dependencies
between multiple WProcs (e.g., hierarchical or networked structures) we also capture
and describe on this level. For a more detailed discussion, please refer to [5, 6].
Fig. 2. Work system as physical instance of the corresponding WProc: (a) comprising the roles
of the Worker and the Tools; (b) instantiated with a Human Worker (HumW) and Conventional
Tools (ConvT).
In the third step, we introduce “the autonomy” into the WSys, represented by one or
more Cognitive Agent(s) (CogA, little ‘R2D2’ in Fig. 3) in various roles and relationships
to the human operator(s), the conventional automation, and the machinery.
Fig. 3. (a) WSys with CogA as Tool (i.e., CogAT) in HiR; (b) WSys with CogA as Worker (i.e.,
CogAW) in HeR.
Two trends have been followed in the past two decades concerning the role such a
CogA could potentially take in system design. Firstly, so-called autonomous systems,
i.e. systems that aim at performing user-given tasks, as much as possible independent
from human intervention (see Fig. 3(a): here the CogA works as Tool in a HiR supervised
by a HumW). From a human factors stance, this design pattern will mostly serve the
design goals to increase the human’s effectiveness, to increase the human’s span of
control, to reduce the human’s taskload, and others.
6 A. Schulte and D. Donath
4 Conclusions
In this article, we briefly outlined a description language and procedure to follow for a
systematic top-down approach for the definition of Human-Autonomy Teaming (HAT)
systems. This approach tries to formalize the description of complex, highly automated
human-machine systems, in particular, in the domain of manned and unmanned vehicle
guidance and mission management applications. We used this method to describe a
number of HAT-system laboratory prototypes from various contributors to the NATO
STO Research Task Group HFM-247. The resulting system representations allow the
discussion of system characteristics on a common high level of abstraction, using only
a few descriptors. Recurring structures of human-agent collaboration can also be iden‐
tified easily. Additionally, the discovery, the discussion, and the exchange of beneficial
design patterns for HAT are facilitated. Future works will aim at a further formalization
of the language. Furthermore, we will need to strengthen the linkage between the system-
level description of HAT-systems and the characterization of individual design patterns.
References
1. Klein, G., Woods, D.D., Bradshaw, J.M., Hoffman, R.R., Feltovich, P.J.: Ten challenges for
making automation a “team player” in joint human-agent activity. IEEE Intell. Syst. 19(6),
91–95 (2004)
2. Bradshaw, J.M., Hoffman, R.R., Woods, D.D., Johnson, M.: The seven deadly myths of
“Autonomous Systems”. IEEE Intell. Syst. 28(3), 54–61 (2013)
3. Scerbo, M.: Adaptive automation. In: Neuroergonomics, pp. 239–252 (2006)
4. Hollnagel, E., Woods, D.D.: Joint Cognitive Systems: Foundations of Cognitive Systems
Engineering. CRC Press, Boca Raton (2005)
5. Schulte, A., Donath, D., Lange, D.S.: Design patterns for human-cognitive agent teaming.
Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol. 9736, pp. 231–243. Springer (2016)
6. Schulte, A., Donath, D.: Systems level design patterns approach for HAT. In: Human-
Autonomy Teaming: Supporting Dynamically Adjustable Collaboration. NATO STO Task
Group Report HFM-247. Neuilly-sur-Seine, France. (in preparation)
7. Schmitt, F., Roth, G., Barber, D., Chen, J.Y.C., Schulte, A.: Experimental validation of pilot
situation awareness enhancement through transparency design of a scalable mixed-initiative
mission planner. In: Intelligent Human Systems Integration (iHSI) (2018)
8. Brand, Y., Ebersoldt, M., Barber, D., Chen, J.Y.C., Schulte, A.: Experimental validation of
pilot situation awareness enhancement through transparency design of a scalable mixed-
initiative mission planner. In: Intelligent Human Systems Integration (iHSI) (2018)
A Design and Description Method for HAT Systems 9
9. Chen, J.Y.C., Lakhmani, S., Stowers, K., Selkowitz, A., Wright, J., Barnes, M.: Situation
awareness – based agent transparency and human-autonomy teaming effectiveness. Theoret.
Issues Ergon. Sci. (in press)
10. Uhrmann, J., Schulte, A.: Concept, design and evaluation of cognitive task-based UAV
guidance. IARIA J. 5(1–2), 145–158 (2012). ISSN-Online 1942-2679
11. Rudnick, G., Schulte, A.: Implementation of a responsive human automation interaction
concept for task-based-guidance systems. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol. 10275,
pp. 394–405. Springer (2017)
Current Insights in Human Factors of Automated Driving
and Future Outlook Towards Tele-Operated Remote
Driving Services
1 Introduction
Across the automotive industry, manufacturers have recently released various Partial
Automation systems (SAE Level 2) which allow simultaneous/combined execution of
both lateral and longitudinal vehicle control at the same time. However, at such a level
of automated driving, drivers still retain responsibility and are at high risk for losing
engagement with the driving, for example “monitoring of driving environment” and
“performing all remaining aspects of the dynamic driving task”.
First, the tutorial will begin by revealing current trends already observable out on
the roads of today. Present on-the-market reactive driver engagement strategies (for SAE
Level 2) will be reviewed across major automotive players (Volvo, GM/Cadillac, Tesla,
Audi, BMW, Infiniti, Mercedes-Benz). The review will cover differences in
All speakers were Marie Curie Research Fellows in the Human Factors of Automated
Driving project (www.hf-auto.eu) with a mission to train Early Stage Researchers and
12 C. D. D. Cabrall et al.
to generate knowledge on human factors of automated driving towards safer road trans‐
portation.
Christopher D. D. Cabrall, pursues the PhD degree from the Delft University of
Technology, Department of Cognitive Robotics - Intelligent Vehicles Group. Previ‐
ously, through SJSURF he was a contract employee at NASA in their Human Systems
Integration Division for 5+ years. He has also served as a civil servant in the Human
Factors Department at the U.S. DOT Volpe National Transportation Systems Center for
several years. He is an author on 30+ human factors scientific publications.
Alexander Eriksson, is a Researcher in the Driver and Vehicle section of VTI.
Formerly, he completed his PhD in the Transportation Research Group at the University
of Southampton. Alexander’s primary research focus is on human-automation interac‐
tion. His work draws on lessons learnt in aviation, which is then combined with experi‐
ments in driving simulators and on the road.
Zhenji Lu, is a member of the Intelligent Vehicles Group of the Cognitive Robotics
Department and pursues the PhD at the Delft University of Technology. He studies
human behavior in authority transitions between manual and highly automated driving
(i.e., Transitions of Control), situation awareness and unexpected situations, such as
system failures.
Bastiaan Petermeijer, is a Post-Doctoral Researcher on the Symbiotic Driving
Project at the Haptics Lab of Delft University of Technology. He completed his PhD at
the Technical University Munich, Department of Ergonomics, where he developed a
vibrotactile seat to support the driver during the take-over process. His Master’s thesis
research from Delft University of Technology resulted in a publication that won the
2014 Human Factors Prize in Human-Automation Interaction/Autonomy.
Dear Christopher Cabrall, We are pleased to inform you that your half-day tutorial
submission has been accepted for presentation at the 1st International Conference on
Intelligent Human Systems Integration: Integrating People and Intelligent Systems
(IHSI 2018) to be held at the JW Marriott Marquis, Dubai, United Arab Emirates,
January 7–9, 2018. From many tutorial proposals submitted this year, we were able to
accept only three! The acceptance decision for your tutorial submission is based on the
quality of the tutorial and outstanding tutorial presenter background and knowledge in
the subject field, the acceptance is based on reviews conducted by the tutorials chairs.
Tutorial ID#: 150 [T-2]. Date/Time: (8:00–12:00) Monday, January 8, 2018.
Title: Current Insights in Human Factors of Automated Driving and Future Outlook Towards
Tele-Operated Remote Driving Services.
Acknowledgments. The research presented in this tutorial was supported by the project HFAuto
– Human Factors of Automated Driving (PITN-GA-2013-605817).
Exploring the Variety of Random
Documents with Different Content
magnanimous. To-morrow I’m leaving for Kazan and I should like to
know your opinion to-day. Grant me half an hour of your attention . .
. only one half-hour . . . I implore you!”
Pavel Vassilyevitch was cotton-wool at core, and could not refuse.
When it seemed to him that the lady was about to burst into sobs
and fall on her knees, he was overcome with confusion and
muttered helplessly.
“Very well; certainly . . . I will listen . . . I will give you half an
hour.”
The lady uttered a shriek of joy, took off her hat and settling
herself, began to read. At first she read a scene in which a footman
and a house maid, tidying up a sumptuous drawing-room, talked at
length about their young lady, Anna Sergyevna, who was building a
school and a hospital in the village. When the footman had left the
room, the maidservant pronounced a monologue to the effect that
education is light and ignorance is darkness; then Mme. Murashkin
brought the footman back into the drawing-room and set him
uttering a long monologue concerning his master, the General, who
disliked his daughter’s views, intended to marry her to a rich
kammer junker, and held that the salvation of the people lay in
unadulterated ignorance. Then, when the servants had left the
stage, the young lady herself appeared and informed the audience
that she had not slept all night, but had been thinking of Valentin
Ivanovitch, who was the son of a poor teacher and assisted his sick
father gratuitously. Valentin had studied all the sciences, but had no
faith in friendship nor in love; he had no object in life and longed for
death, and therefore she, the young lady, must save him.
Pavel Vassilyevitch listened, and thought with yearning anguish of
his sofa. He scanned the lady viciously, felt her masculine tenor
thumping on his eardrums, understood nothing, and thought:
“The devil sent you . . . as though I wanted to listen to your tosh!
It’s not my fault you’ve written a play, is it? My God! what a thick
manuscript! What an infliction!”
Pavel Vassilyevitch glanced at the wall where the portrait of his
wife was hanging and remembered that his wife had asked him to
buy and bring to their summer cottage five yards of tape, a pound of
cheese, and some tooth-powder.
“I hope I’ve not lost the pattern of that tape,” he thought, “where
did I put it? I believe it’s in my blue reefer jacket. . . . Those
wretched flies have covered her portrait with spots already, I must
tell Olga to wash the glass. . . . She’s reading the twelfth scene, so
we must soon be at the end of the first act. As though inspiration
were possible in this heat and with such a mountain of flesh, too!
Instead of writing plays she’d much better eat cold vinegar hash and
sleep in a cellar. . . .”
“You don’t think that monologue’s a little too long?” the lady asked
suddenly, raising her eyes.
Pavel Vassilyevitch had not heard the monologue, and said in a
voice as guilty as though not the lady but he had written that
monologue:
“No, no, not at all. It’s very nice. . . .”
The lady beamed with happiness and continued reading:
ANNA: You are consumed by analysis. Too early you have ceased
to live in the heart and have put your faith in the intellect.
VALENTIN: What do you mean by the heart? That is a concept of
anatomy. As a conventional term for what are called the feelings, I
do not admit it.
ANNA (confused): And love? Surely that is not merely a product of
the association of ideas? Tell me frankly, have you ever loved?
VALENTIN (bitterly): Let us not touch on old wounds not yet
healed. (A pause.) What are you thinking of?
ANNA: I believe you are unhappy.
During the sixteenth scene Pavel Vassilyevitch yawned, and
accidently made with his teeth the sound dogs make when they
catch a fly. He was dismayed at this unseemly sound, and to cover it
assumed an expression of rapt attention.
“Scene seventeen! When will it end?” he thought. “Oh, my God! If
this torture is prolonged another ten minutes I shall shout for the
police. It’s insufferable.”
But at last the lady began reading more loudly and more rapidly,
and finally raising her voice she read “Curtain.”
Pavel Vassilyevitch uttered a faint sigh and was about to get up,
but the lady promptly turned the page and went on reading.
ACT II.—Scene, a village street. On right, School. On left, Hospital.
Villagers, male and female, sitting on the hospital steps.
“Excuse me,” Pavel Vassilyevitch broke in, “how many acts are
there?”
“Five,” answered the lady, and at once, as though fearing her
audience might escape her, she went on rapidly.
VALENTIN is looking out of the schoolhouse window. In the
background Villagers can be seen taking their goods to the Inn.
Like a man condemned to be executed and convinced of the
impossibility of a reprieve, Pavel Vassilyevitch gave up expecting the
end, abandoned all hope, and simply tried to prevent his eyes from
closing, and to retain an expression of attention on his face. . . . The
future when the lady would finish her play and depart seemed to
him so remote that he did not even think of it.
“Trooo—too—too—too . . .” the lady’s voice sounded in his ears.
“Troo—too—too . . . sh—sh—sh—sh . . .”
“I forgot to take my soda,” he thought. “What am I thinking
about? Oh—my soda. . . . Most likely I shall have a bilious attack. . .
. It’s extraordinary, Smirnovsky swills vodka all day long and yet he
never has a bilious attack. . . . There’s a bird settled on the window .
. . a sparrow. . . .”
Pavel Vassilyevitch made an effort to unglue his strained and
closing eyelids, yawned without opening his mouth, and stared at
Mme. Murashkin. She grew misty and swayed before his eyes,
turned into a triangle and her head pressed against the ceiling. . . .
VALENTIN No, let me depart.
ANNA (in dismay): Why?
VALENTIN (aside): She has turned pale! (To her) Do not force me
to explain. Sooner would I die than you should know the reason.
ANNA (after a pause): You cannot go away. . . .
The lady began to swell, swelled to an immense size, and melted
into the dingy atmosphere of the study—only her moving mouth was
visible; then she suddenly dwindled to the size of a bottle, swayed
from side to side, and with the table retreated to the further end of
the room . . .
VALENTIN (holding ANNA in his arms): You have given me new
life! You have shown me an object to live for! You have renewed me
as the Spring rain renews the awakened earth! But . . . it is too late,
too late! The ill that gnaws at my heart is beyond cure. . . .
Pavel Vassilyevitch started and with dim and smarting eyes stared
at the reading lady; for a minute he gazed fixedly as though
understanding nothing. . . .
SCENE XI.—The same. The BARON and the POLICE INSPECTOR
with assistants.
VALENTIN: Take me!
ANNA: I am his! Take me too! Yes, take me too! I love him, I love
him more than life!
BARON: Anna Sergyevna, you forget that you are ruining your
father . . . .
The lady began swelling again. . . . Looking round him wildly Pavel
Vassilyevitch got up, yelled in a deep, unnatural voice, snatched
from the table a heavy paper-weight, and beside himself, brought it
down with all his force on the authoress’s head. . . .
O
N the evening of Easter Sunday the actual Civil Councillor,
Navagin, on his return from paying calls, picked up the sheet
of paper on which visitors had inscribed their names in the
hall, and went with it into his study. After taking off his outer
garments and drinking some seltzer water, he settled himself
comfortably on a couch and began reading the signatures in the list.
When his eyes reached the middle of the long list of signatures, he
started, gave an ejaculation of astonishment and snapped his
fingers, while his face expressed the utmost perplexity.
“Again!” he said, slapping his knee. “It’s extraordinary! Again!
Again there is the signature of that fellow, goodness knows who he
is! Fedyukov! Again!”
Among the numerous signatures on the paper was the signature
of a certain Fedyukov. Who the devil this Fedyukov was, Navagin
had not a notion. He went over in his memory all his acquaintances,
relations and subordinates in the service, recalled his remote past
but could recollect no name like Fedyukov. What was so strange was
that this incognito, Fedyukov, had signed his name regularly every
Christmas and Easter for the last thirteen years. Neither Navagin, his
wife, nor his house porter knew who he was, where he came from or
what he was like.
“It’s extraordinary!” Navagin thought in perplexity, as he paced
about the study. “It’s strange and incomprehensible! It’s like
sorcery!”
“Call the porter here!” he shouted.
“It’s devilish queer! But I will find out who he is!”
“I say, Grigory,” he said, addressing the porter as he entered, “that
Fedyukov has signed his name again! Did you see him?”
“No, your Excellency.”
“Upon my word, but he has signed his name! So he must have
been in the hall. Has he been?”
“No, he hasn’t, your Excellency.”
“How could he have signed his name without being there?”
“I can’t tell.”
“Who is to tell, then? You sit gaping there in the hall. Try and
remember, perhaps someone you didn’t know came in? Think a
minute!”
“No, your Excellency, there has been no one I didn’t know. Our
clerks have been, the baroness came to see her Excellency, the
priests have been with the Cross, and there has been no one else. . .
.”
“Why, he was invisible when he signed his name, then, was he?”
“I can’t say: but there has been no Fedyukov here. That I will
swear before the holy image. . . .”
“It’s queer! It’s incomprehensible! It’s ex-traordinary!” mused
Navagin. “It’s positively ludicrous. A man has been signing his name
here for thirteen years and you can’t find out who he is. Perhaps it’s
a joke? Perhaps some clerk writes that name as well as his own for
fun.”
And Navagin began examining Fedyukov’s signature.
The bold, florid signature in the old-fashioned style with twirls and
flourishes was utterly unlike the handwriting of the other signatures.
It was next below the signature of Shtutchkin, the provincial
secretary, a scared, timorous little man who would certainly have
died of fright if he had ventured upon such an impudent joke.
“The mysterious Fedyukov has signed his name again!” said
Navagin, going in to see his wife. “Again I fail to find out who he is.”
Madame Navagin was a spiritualist, and so for all phenomena in
nature, comprehensible or incomprehensible, she had a very simple
explanation.
“There’s nothing extraordinary about it,” she said. “You don’t
believe it, of course, but I have said it already and I say it again:
there is a great deal in the world that is supernatural, which our
feeble intellect can never grasp. I am convinced that this Fedyukov is
a spirit who has a sympathy for you . . . If I were you, I would call
him up and ask him what he wants.”
“Nonsense, nonsense!”
Navagin was free from superstitions, but the phenomenon which
interested him was so mysterious that all sorts of uncanny devilry
intruded into his mind against his will. All the evening he was
imagining that the incognito Fedyukov was the spirit of some long-
dead clerk, who had been discharged from the service by Navagin’s
ancestors and was now revenging himself on their descendant; or
perhaps it was the kinsman of some petty official dismissed by
Navagin himself, or of a girl seduced by him. . . .
All night Navagin dreamed of a gaunt old clerk in a shabby
uniform, with a face as yellow as a lemon, hair that stood up like a
brush, and pewtery eyes; the clerk said something in a sepulchral
voice and shook a bony finger at him. And Navagin almost had an
attack of inflammation of the brain.
For a fortnight he was silent and gloomy and kept walking up and
down and thinking. In the end he overcame his sceptical vanity, and
going into his wife’s room he said in a hollow voice:
“Zina, call up Fedyukov!”
The spiritualistic lady was delighted; she sent for a sheet of
cardboard and a saucer, made her husband sit down beside her, and
began upon the magic rites.
Fedyukov did not keep them waiting long. . . .
“What do you want?” asked Navagin.
“Repent,” answered the saucer.
“What were you on earth?”
“A sinner. . . .”
“There, you see!” whispered his wife, “and you did not believe!”
Navagin conversed for a long time with Fedyukov, and then called
up Napoleon, Hannibal, Askotchensky, his aunt Klavdya Zaharovna,
and they all gave him brief but correct answers full of deep
significance. He was busy with the saucer for four hours, and fell
asleep soothed and happy that he had become acquainted with a
mysterious world that was new to him. After that he studied
spiritualism every day, and at the office, informed the clerks that
there was a great deal in nature that was supernatural and
marvellous to which our men of science ought to have turned their
attention long ago.
Hypnotism, mediumism, bishopism, spiritualism, the fourth
dimension, and other misty notions took complete possession of
him, so that for whole days at a time, to the great delight of his
wife, he read books on spiritualism or devoted himself to the saucer,
table-turning, and discussions of supernatural phenomena. At his
instigation all his clerks took up spiritualism, too, and with such
ardour that the old managing clerk went out of his mind and one
day sent a telegram: “Hell. Government House. I feel that I am
turning into an evil spirit. What’s to be done? Reply paid. Vassily
Krinolinsky.”
After reading several hundreds of treatises on spiritualism Navagin
had a strong desire to write something himself. For five months he
sat composing, and in the end had written a huge monograph,
entitled: My Opinion. When he had finished this essay he determined
to send it to a spiritualist journal.
The day on which it was intended to despatch it to the journal was
a very memorable one for him. Navagin remembers that on that
never-to-be-forgotten day the secretary who had made a fair copy of
his article and the sacristan of the parish who had been sent for on
business were in his study. Navagin’s face was beaming. He looked
lovingly at his creation, felt between his fingers how thick it was, and
with a happy smile said to the secretary:
“I propose, Filipp Sergeyitch, to send it registered. It will be safer.
. . .” And raising his eyes to the sacristan, he said: “I have sent for
you on business, my good man. I am putting my youngest son to
the high school and I must have a certificate of baptism; only could
you let me have it quickly?”
“Very good, your Excellency!” said the sacristan, bowing. “Very
good, I understand. . . .”
“Can you let me have it by to-morrow?”
“Very well, your Excellency, set your mind at rest! To-morrow it
shall be ready! Will you send someone to the church to-morrow
before evening service? I shall be there. Bid him ask for Fedyukov. I
am always there. . . .”
“What!” cried the general, turning pale.
“Fedyukov.”
“You, . . . you are Fedyukov?” asked Navagin, looking at him with
wide-open eyes.
“Just so, Fedyukov.”
“You. . . . you signed your name in my hall?”
“Yes . . .” the sacristan admitted, and was overcome with
confusion. “When we come with the Cross, your Excellency, to grand
gentlemen’s houses I always sign my name. . . . I like doing it. . . .
Excuse me, but when I see the list of names in the hall I feel an
impulse to sign mine. . . .”
In dumb stupefaction, understanding nothing, hearing nothing,
Navagin paced about his study. He touched the curtain over the
door, three times waved his hands like a jeune premier in a ballet
when he sees her, gave a whistle and a meaningless smile, and
pointed with his finger into space.
“So I will send off the article at once, your Excellency,” said the
secretary.
These words roused Navagin from his stupour. He looked blankly
at the secretary and the sacristan, remembered, and stamping, his
foot irritably, screamed in a high, breaking tenor:
“Leave me in peace! Lea-eave me in peace, I tell you! What you
want of me I don’t understand.”
The secretary and the sacristan went out of the study and reached
the street while he was still stamping and shouting:
“Leave me in peace! What you want of me I don’t understand.
Lea-eave me in peace!”
STRONG IMPRESSIONS
I
T happened not so long ago in the Moscow circuit court. The
jurymen, left in the court for the night, before lying down to
sleep fell into conversation about strong impressions. They were
led to this discussion by recalling a witness who, by his own account,
had begun to stammer and had gone grey owing to a terrible
moment. The jurymen decided that before going to sleep, each one
of them should ransack among his memories and tell something that
had happened to him. Man’s life is brief, but yet there is no man who
cannot boast that there have been terrible moments in his past.
One juryman told the story of how he was nearly drowned;
another described how, in a place where there were neither doctors
nor chemists, he had one night poisoned his own son through giving
him zinc vitriol by mistake for soda. The child did not die, but the
father nearly went out of his mind. A third, a man not old but in bad
health, told how he had twice attempted to commit suicide: the first
time by shooting himself and the second time by throwing himself
before a train.
The fourth, a foppishly dressed, fat little man, told us the following
story:
“I was not more than twenty-two or twenty-three when I fell head
over ears in love with my present wife and made her an offer. Now I
could with pleasure thrash myself for my early marriage, but at the
time, I don’t know what would have become of me if Natasha had
refused me. My love was absolutely the real thing, just as it is
described in novels—frantic, passionate, and so on. My happiness
overwhelmed me and I did not know how to get away from it, and I
bored my father and my friends and the servants, continually talking
about the fervour of my passion. Happy people are the most
sickening bores. I was a fearful bore; I feel ashamed of it even now.
...
“Among my friends there was in those days a young man who was
beginning his career as a lawyer. Now he is a lawyer known all over
Russia; in those days he was only just beginning to gain recognition
and was not rich and famous enough to be entitled to cut an old
friend when he met him. I used to go and see him once or twice a
week. We used to loll on sofas and begin discussing philosophy.
“One day I was lying on his sofa, arguing that there was no more
ungrateful profession than that of a lawyer. I tried to prove that as
soon as the examination of witnesses is over the court can easily
dispense with both the counsels for the prosecution and for the
defence, because they are neither of them necessary and are only in
the way. If a grown-up juryman, morally and mentally sane, is
convinced that the ceiling is white, or that Ivanov is guilty, to
struggle with that conviction and to vanquish it is beyond the power
of any Demosthenes. Who can convince me that I have a red
moustache when I know that it is black? As I listen to an orator I
may perhaps grow sentimental and weep, but my fundamental
conviction, based for the most part on unmistakable evidence and
fact, is not changed in the least. My lawyer maintained that I was
young and foolish and that I was talking childish nonsense. In his
opinion, for one thing, an obvious fact becomes still more obvious
through light being thrown upon it by conscientious, well-informed
people; for another, talent is an elemental force, a hurricane capable
of turning even stones to dust, let alone such trifles as the
convictions of artisans and merchants of the second guild. It is as
hard for human weakness to struggle against talent as to look at the
sun without winking, or to stop the wind. One simple mortal by the
power of the word turns thousands of convinced savages to
Christianity; Odysseus was a man of the firmest convictions, but he
succumbed to the Syrens, and so on. All history consists of similar
examples, and in life they are met with at every turn; and so it is
bound to be, or the intelligent and talented man would have no
superiority over the stupid and incompetent.
“I stuck to my point, and went on maintaining that convictions are
stronger than any talent, though, frankly speaking, I could not have
defined exactly what I meant by conviction or what I meant by
talent. Most likely I simply talked for the sake of talking.
“‘Take you, for example,’ said the lawyer. ‘You are convinced at
this moment that your fiancée is an angel and that there is not a
man in the whole town happier than you. But I tell you: ten or
twenty minutes would be enough for me to make you sit down to
this table and write to your fiancée, breaking off your engagement.
“I laughed.
“‘Don’t laugh, I am speaking seriously,’ said my friend. ‘If I choose,
in twenty minutes you will be happy at the thought that you need
not get married. Goodness knows what talent I have, but you are
not one of the strong sort.’
“‘Well, try it on!’ said I.
“‘No, what for? I am only telling you this. You are a good boy and
it would be cruel to subject you to such an experiment. And besides
I am not in good form to-day.’
“We sat down to supper. The wine and the thought of Natasha,
my beloved, flooded my whole being with youth and happiness. My
happiness was so boundless that the lawyer sitting opposite to me
with his green eyes seemed to me an unhappy man, so small, so
grey. . . .
“‘Do try!’ I persisted. ‘Come, I entreat you!
“The lawyer shook his head and frowned. Evidently I was
beginning to bore him.
“‘I know,’ he said, ‘after my experiment you will say, thank you,
and will call me your saviour; but you see I must think of your
fiancée too. She loves you; your jilting her would make her suffer.
And what a charming creature she is! I envy you.’
“The lawyer sighed, sipped his wine, and began talking of how
charming my Natasha was. He had an extraordinary gift of
description. He could knock you off a regular string of words about a
woman’s eyelashes or her little finger. I listened to him with relish.
“‘I have seen a great many women in my day,’ he said, ‘but I give
you my word of honour, I speak as a friend, your Natasha
Andreyevna is a pearl, a rare girl. Of course she has her defects—
many of them, in fact, if you like—but still she is fascinating.’
“And the lawyer began talking of my fiancée’s defects. Now I
understand very well that he was talking of women in general, of
their weak points in general, but at the time it seemed to me that he
was talking only of Natasha. He went into ecstasies over her turn-up
nose, her shrieks, her shrill laugh, her airs and graces, precisely all
the things I so disliked in her. All that was, to his thinking, infinitely
sweet, graceful, and feminine.
“Without my noticing it, he quickly passed from his enthusiastic
tone to one of fatherly admonition, and then to a light and derisive
one. . . . There was no presiding judge and no one to check the
diffusiveness of the lawyer. I had not time to open my mouth,
besides, what could I say? What my friend said was not new, it was
what everyone has known for ages, and the whole venom lay not in
what he said, but in the damnable form he put it in. It really was
beyond anything!
“As I listened to him then I learned that the same word has
thousands of shades of meaning according to the tone in which it is
pronounced, and the form which is given to the sentence. Of course
I cannot reproduce the tone or the form; I can only say that as I
listened to my friend and walked up and down the room, I was
moved to resentment, indignation, and contempt together with him.
I even believed him when with tears in his eyes he informed me that
I was a great man, that I was worthy of a better fate, that I was
destined to achieve something in the future which marriage would
hinder!
“‘My friend!’ he exclaimed, pressing my hand. ‘I beseech you, I
adjure you: stop before it is too late. Stop! May Heaven preserve you
from this strange, cruel mistake! My friend, do not ruin your youth!’
“Believe me or not, as you choose, but the long and the short of it
was that I sat down to the table and wrote to my fiancée, breaking
off the engagement. As I wrote I felt relieved that it was not yet too
late to rectify my mistake. Sealing the letter, I hastened out into the
street to post it. The lawyer himself came with me.
“‘Excellent! Capital!’ he applauded me as my letter to Natasha
disappeared into the darkness of the box. ‘I congratulate you with all
my heart. I am glad for you.’
“After walking a dozen paces with me the lawyer went on:
“‘Of course, marriage has its good points. I, for instance, belong
to the class of people to whom marriage and home life is
everything.’
“And he proceeded to describe his life, and lay before me all the
hideousness of a solitary bachelor existence.
“He spoke with enthusiasm of his future wife, of the sweets of
ordinary family life, and was so eloquent, so sincere in his ecstasies
that by the time we had reached his door, I was in despair.
“‘What are you doing to me, you horrible man?’ I said, gasping.
‘You have ruined me! Why did you make me write that cursed letter?
I love her, I love her!’
“And I protested my love. I was horrified at my conduct which
now seemed to me wild and senseless. It is impossible, gentlemen,
to imagine a more violent emotion than I experienced at that
moment. Oh, what I went through, what I suffered! If some kind
person had thrust a revolver into my hand at that moment, I should
have put a bullet through my brains with pleasure.
“‘Come, come . . .’ said the lawyer, slapping me on the shoulder,
and he laughed. ‘Give over crying. The letter won’t reach your
fiancée. It was not you who wrote the address but I, and I muddled
it so they won’t be able to make it out at the post-office. It will be a
lesson to you not to argue about what you don’t understand.’
“Now, gentlemen, I leave it to the next to speak.”
The fifth juryman settled himself more comfortably, and had just
opened his mouth to begin his story when we heard the clock strike
on Spassky Tower.
“Twelve . . .” one of the jurymen counted. “And into which class,
gentlemen, would you put the emotions that are being experienced
now by the man we are trying? He, that murderer, is spending the
night in a convict cell here in the court, sitting or lying down and of
course not sleeping, and throughout the whole sleepless night
listening to that chime. What is he thinking of? What visions are
haunting him?”
And the jurymen all suddenly forgot about strong impressions;
what their companion who had once written a letter to his Natasha
had suffered seemed unimportant, even not amusing; and no one
said anything more; they began quietly and in silence lying down to
sleep.
DRUNK
A
MANUFACTURER called Frolov, a handsome dark man with a
round beard, and a soft, velvety expression in his eyes, and
Almer, his lawyer, an elderly man with a big rough head, were
drinking in one of the public rooms of a restaurant on the outskirts
of the town. They had both come to the restaurant straight from a
ball and so were wearing dress coats and white ties. Except them
and the waiters at the door there was not a soul in the room; by
Frolov’s orders no one else was admitted.
They began by drinking a big wine-glass of vodka and eating
oysters.
“Good!” said Almer. “It was I brought oysters into fashion for the
first course, my boy. The vodka burns and stings your throat and
you have a voluptuous sensation in your throat when you swallow an
oyster. Don’t you?”
A dignified waiter with a shaven upper lip and grey whiskers put a
sauceboat on the table.
“What’s that you are serving?” asked Frolov.
“Sauce Provençale for the herring, sir. . . .”
“What! is that the way to serve it?” shouted Frolov, not looking
into the sauceboat. “Do you call that sauce? You don’t know how to
wait, you blockhead!”
Frolov’s velvety eyes flashed. He twisted a corner of the table-
cloth round his finger, made a slight movement, and the dishes, the
candlesticks, and the bottles, all jingling and clattering, fell with a
crash on the floor.
The waiters, long accustomed to pot-house catastrophes, ran up
to the table and began picking up the fragments with grave and
unconcerned faces, like surgeons at an operation.
“How well you know how to manage them!” said Almer, and he
laughed. “But . . . move a little away from the table or you will step
in the caviare.”
“Call the engineer here!” cried Frolov.
This was the name given to a decrepit, doleful old man who really
had once been an engineer and very well off; he had squandered all
his property and towards the end of his life had got into a restaurant
where he looked after the waiters and singers and carried out
various commissions relating to the fair sex. Appearing at the
summons, he put his head on one side respectfully.
“Listen, my good man,” Frolov said, addressing him. “What’s the
meaning of this disorder? How queerly you fellows wait! Don’t you
know that I don’t like it? Devil take you, I shall give up coming to
you!”
“I beg you graciously to excuse it, Alexey Semyonitch!” said the
engineer, laying his hand on his heart. “I will take steps immediately,
and your slightest wishes shall be carried out in the best and
speediest way.”
“Well, that’ll do, you can go. . . .”
The engineer bowed, staggered back, still doubled up, and
disappeared through the doorway with a final flash of the false
diamonds on his shirt-front and fingers.
The table was laid again. Almer drank red wine and ate with relish
some sort of bird served with truffles, and ordered a matelote of
eelpouts and a sterlet with its tail in its mouth. Frolov only drank
vodka and ate nothing but bread. He rubbed his face with his open
hands, scowled, and was evidently out of humour. Both were silent.
There was a stillness. Two electric lights in opaque shades flickered
and hissed as though they were angry. The gypsy girls passed the
door, softly humming.
“One drinks and is none the merrier,” said Frolov. “The more I
pour into myself, the more sober I become. Other people grow
festive with vodka, but I suffer from anger, disgusting thoughts,
sleeplessness. Why is it, old man, that people don’t invent some
other pleasure besides drunkenness and debauchery? It’s really
horrible!”
“You had better send for the gypsy girls.”
“Confound them!”
The head of an old gypsy woman appeared in the door from the
passage.
“Alexey Semyonitch, the gypsies are asking for tea and brandy,”
said the old woman. “May we order it?”
“Yes,” answered Frolov. “You know they get a percentage from the
restaurant keeper for asking the visitors to treat them. Nowadays
you can’t even believe a man when he asks for vodka. The people
are all mean, vile, spoilt. Take these waiters, for instance. They have
countenances like professors, and grey heads; they get two hundred
roubles a month, they live in houses of their own and send their girls
to the high school, but you may swear at them and give yourself airs
as much as you please. For a rouble the engineer will gulp down a
whole pot of mustard and crow like a cock. On my honour, if one of
them would take offence I would make him a present of a thousand
roubles.”
“What’s the matter with you?” said Almer, looking at him with
surprise. “Whence this melancholy? You are red in the face, you look
like a wild animal. . . . What’s the matter with you?”
“It’s horrid. There’s one thing I can’t get out of my head. It seems
as though it is nailed there and it won’t come out.”
A round little old man, buried in fat and completely bald, wearing
a short reefer jacket and lilac waistcoat and carrying a guitar, walked
into the room. He made an idiotic face, drew himself up, and saluted
like a soldier.
“Ah, the parasite!” said Frolov, “let me introduce him, he has made
his fortune by grunting like a pig. Come here!” He poured vodka,
wine, and brandy into a glass, sprinkled pepper and salt into it,
mixed it all up and gave it to the parasite. The latter tossed it off
and smacked his lips with gusto.
“He’s accustomed to drink a mess so that pure wine makes him
sick,” said Frolov. “Come, parasite, sit down and sing.”
The old man sat down, touched the strings with his fat fingers,
and began singing:
O
N the first of February every year, St. Trifon’s day, there is an
extraordinary commotion on the estate of Madame
Zavzyatov, the widow of Trifon Lvovitch, the late marshal of
the district. On that day, the nameday of the deceased marshal, the
widow Lyubov Petrovna has a requiem service celebrated in his
memory, and after the requiem a thanksgiving to the Lord. The
whole district assembles for the service. There you will see Hrumov
the present marshal, Marfutkin, the president of the Zemstvo,
Potrashkov, the permanent member of the Rural Board, the two
justices of the peace of the district, the police captain, Krinolinov,
two police-superintendents, the district doctor, Dvornyagin, smelling
of iodoform, all the landowners, great and small, and so on. There
are about fifty people assembled in all.
Precisely at twelve o’clock, the visitors, with long faces, make their
way from all the rooms to the big hall. There are carpets on the floor
and their steps are noiseless, but the solemnity of the occasion
makes them instinctively walk on tip-toe, holding out their hands to
balance themselves. In the hall everything is already prepared.
Father Yevmeny, a little old man in a high faded cap, puts on his
black vestments. Konkordiev, the deacon, already in his vestments,
and as red as a crab, is noiselessly turning over the leaves of his
missal and putting slips of paper in it. At the door leading to the
vestibule, Luka, the sacristan, puffing out his cheeks and making
round eyes, blows up the censer. The hall is gradually filled with
bluish transparent smoke and the smell of incense.
Gelikonsky, the elementary schoolmaster, a young man with big
pimples on his frightened face, wearing a new greatcoat like a sack,
carries round wax candles on a silver-plated tray. The hostess,
Lyubov Petrovna, stands in the front by a little table with a dish of
funeral rice on it, and holds her handkerchief in readiness to her
face. There is a profound stillness, broken from time to time by
sighs. Everybody has a long, solemn face. . . .
The requiem service begins. The blue smoke curls up from the
censer and plays in the slanting sunbeams, the lighted candles
faintly splutter. The singing, at first harsh and deafening, soon
becomes quiet and musical as the choir gradually adapt themselves
to the acoustic conditions of the rooms. . . . The tunes are all
mournful and sad. . . . The guests are gradually brought to a
melancholy mood and grow pensive. Thoughts of the brevity of
human life, of mutability, of worldly vanity stray through their brains.
. . . They recall the deceased Zavzyatov, a thick-set, red-cheeked
man who used to drink off a bottle of champagne at one gulp and
smash looking-glasses with his forehead. And when they sing “With
Thy Saints, O Lord,” and the sobs of their hostess are audible, the
guests shift uneasily from one foot to the other. The more emotional
begin to feel a tickling in their throat and about their eyelids.
Marfutkin, the president of the Zemstvo, to stifle the unpleasant
feeling, bends down to the police captain’s ear and whispers:
“I was at Ivan Fyodoritch’s yesterday. . . . Pyotr Petrovitch and I
took all the tricks, playing no trumps. . . . Yes, indeed. . . . Olga
Andreyevna was so exasperated that her false tooth fell out of her
mouth.”
But at last the “Eternal Memory” is sung. Gelikonsky respectfully
takes away the candles, and the memorial service is over. Thereupon
there follows a momentary commotion; there is a changing of
vestments and a thanksgiving service. After the thanksgiving, while
Father Yevmeny is disrobing, the visitors rub their hands and cough,
while their hostess tells some anecdote of the good-heartedness of
the deceased Trifon Lvovitch.
“Pray come to lunch, friends,” she says, concluding her story with
a sigh.
The visitors, trying not to push or tread on each other’s feet,
hasten into the dining-room. . . . There the luncheon is awaiting
them. The repast is so magnificent that the deacon Konkordiev
thinks it his duty every year to fling up his hands as he looks at it
and, shaking his head in amazement, say:
“Supernatural! It’s not so much like human fare, Father Yevmeny,
as offerings to the gods.”
The lunch is certainly exceptional. Everything that the flora and
fauna of the country can furnish is on the table, but the only thing
supernatural about it, perhaps, is that on the table there is
everything except . . . alcoholic beverages. Lyubov Petrovna has
taken a vow never to have in her house cards or spirituous liquors —
the two sources of her husband’s ruin. And the only bottles contain
oil and vinegar, as though in mockery and chastisement of the
guests who are to a man desperately fond of the bottle, and given to
tippling.
“Please help yourselves, gentlemen!” the marshal’s widow presses
them. “Only you must excuse me, I have no vodka. . . . I have none
in the house.”
The guests approach the table and hesitatingly attack the pie. But
the progress with eating is slow. In the plying of forks, in the cutting
up and munching, there is a certain sloth and apathy. . . . Evidently
something is wanting.
“I feel as though I had lost something,” one of the justices of the
peace whispers to the other. “I feel as I did when my wife ran away
with the engineer. . . . I can’t eat.”
Marfutkin, before beginning to eat, fumbles for a long time in his
pocket and looks for his handkerchief.
“Oh, my handkerchief must be in my greatcoat,” he recalls in a
loud voice, “and here I am looking for it,” and he goes into the
vestibule where the fur coats are hanging up.
He returns from the vestibule with glistening eyes, and at once
attacks the pie with relish.
“I say, it’s horrid munching away with a dry mouth, isn’t it?” he
whispers to Father Yevmeny. “Go into the vestibule, Father. There’s a
bottle there in my fur coat. . . . Only mind you are careful; don’t
make a clatter with the bottle.”
Father Yevmeny recollects that he has some direction to give to
Luka, and trips off to the vestibule.
“Father, a couple of words in confidence,” says Dvornyagin,
overtaking him.
“You should see the fur coat I’ve bought myself, gentlemen,”
Hrumov boasts. “It’s worth a thousand, and I gave . . . you won’t
believe it . . . two hundred and fifty! Not a farthing more.”
At any other time the guests would have greeted this information
with indifference, but now they display surprise and incredulity. In
the end they all troop out into the vestibule to look at the fur coat,
and go on looking at it till the doctor’s man Mikeshka carries five
empty bottles out on the sly. When the steamed sturgeon is served,
Marfutkin remembers that he has left his cigar case in his sledge and
goes to the stable. That he may not be lonely on this expedition, he
takes with him the deacon, who appropriately feels it necessary to
have a look at his horse. . . .
On the evening of the same day, Lyubov Petrovna is sitting in her
study, writing a letter to an old friend in Petersburg:
“To-day, as in past years,” she writes among other things, “I had a
memorial service for my dear husband. All my neighbours came to
the service. They are a simple, rough set, but what hearts! I gave
them a splendid lunch, but of course, as in previous years, without a
drop of alcoholic liquor. Ever since he died from excessive drinking I
have vowed to establish temperance in this district and thereby to
expiate his sins. I have begun the campaign for temperance at my
own house. Father Yevmeny is delighted with my efforts, and helps
me both in word and deed. Oh, ma chère, if you knew how fond my
bears are of me! The president of the Zemstvo, Marfutkin, kissed my
hand after lunch, held it a long while to his lips, and, wagging his
head in an absurd way, burst into tears: so much feeling but no
words! Father Yevmeny, that delightful little old man, sat down by
me, and looking tearfully at me kept babbling something like a child.
I did not understand what he said, but I know how to understand
true feeling. The police captain, the handsome man of whom I wrote
to you, went down on his knees to me, tried to read me some verses
of his own composition (he is a poet), but . . . his feelings were too
much for him, he lurched and fell over . . . that huge giant went into
hysterics, you can imagine my delight! The day did not pass without
a hitch, however. Poor Alalykin, the president of the judges’
assembly, a stout and apoplectic man, was overcome by illness and
lay on the sofa in a state of unconsciousness for two hours. We had
to pour water on him. . . . I am thankful to Doctor Dvornyagin: he
had brought a bottle of brandy from his dispensary and he
moistened the patient’s temples, which quickly revived him, and he
was able to be moved. . . .”
A BAD BUSINESS
“WHO goes there?”
No answer. The watchman sees nothing, but through the roar of
the wind and the trees distinctly hears someone walking along the
avenue ahead of him. A March night, cloudy and foggy, envelopes
the earth, and it seems to the watchman that the earth, the sky, and
he himself with his thoughts are all merged together into something
vast and impenetrably black. He can only grope his way.
“Who goes there?” the watchman repeats, and he begins to fancy
that he hears whispering and smothered laughter. “Who’s there?”
“It’s I, friend . . .” answers an old man’s voice.
“But who are you?”
“I . . . a traveller.”
“What sort of traveller?” the watchman cries angrily, trying to
disguise his terror by shouting. “What the devil do you want here?
You go prowling about the graveyard at night, you ruffian!”
“You don’t say it’s a graveyard here?”
“Why, what else? Of course it’s the graveyard! Don’t you see it is?”
“O-o-oh . . . Queen of Heaven!” there is a sound of an old man
sighing. “I see nothing, my good soul, nothing. Oh the darkness, the
darkness! You can’t see your hand before your face, it is dark,
friend. O-o-oh. . .”
“But who are you?”
“I am a pilgrim, friend, a wandering man.”
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