can I do, if I cannot cease loving her: for I
am quite sure that is above my strength?
— I heard footsteps in my chamber. It was
Matrèna. I had secluded her temporarily in
a farm which belonged to me, two versts off.

"I was alarmed at seeing her, supposing
that some one had driven her away from
thence, and I questioned her, under that
impression. 'No,' she said, 'no one has been
to disturb me at Boubnova; but things cannot
go on in this way, my dear Peotre Pétrovitch.
Your situation is deplorable; and I
cannot see you any longer in such a state as
this. My friend, you know that I can never
forget the fourteen months of happiness
which I owe to your affection; but the
moment has at last arrived when it becomes
my duty to bid you adieu.'

"' What are you talking about? What do
you mean by bidding me adieu? Why need
you bid me adieu?'— 'Think only of your
own welfare and of your own health. As for
me, I have known, though only for a little
while, a degree of happiness of which my
equals are ignorant. I must now go where
duty calls me. I mean to yield myself up to
my mistress's authority.'— 'I tell you, I'll have
you imprisoned in the attics! Do you mean
to be the death of me? Do you mean to
break my heart with grief? Speak, then.
Look at me. What is the cause of this new
idea?'— 'I will not remain with you any
longer, to be a cause of misery to you—
perhaps of ruin. I know what your sufferings
are— I witness them.'"

Here Peotre Pétrovitch burst into sobs.
As soon as he recovered himself he hastened
to finish his story.—"Well, what do you say
to that?" he continued, striking the table
with his fist, and knitting his brows, while
the tears which he could not master still ran
down his inflamed cheeks.— "The wretched
girl went and gave herself up. She went
away on foot that very night. She presented
herself as a suppliant at her lady's door,
and—"

"And what did they do to poor Matrèna?"
I asked.

M. Karataëf's only answer was the gesture
which is susceptible of a variety of interpretations,
which I have already alluded to in
the course of this narrative.

MISPRINTS.

IF the art of printing be one of the most
useful inventions which the world has known,
the art of misprinting is certainly one of the
most ingenious. Misprinting, in its best— or
worst— acceptation, does not simply consist in
mere blundering, but in blundering so
peculiarly as exactly to invert the sense of the
original, and make a writer say the reverse
of what he intended. There is one noticeable
feature beyond all the rest in errors of the
press: they occur in the very places where
they most affect the context.

Ménage accounts for this very naturally.
He says:—"If you desire that no mistakes
shall appear in the works which you publish,
never send well-written copy to the printer,
for in that case the manuscript is given to
young apprentices, who make a thousand
errors, while, on the other hand, that which
is difficult to read, is dealt with by the master
printers." This is an experience which authors
very soon acquire; many of them agree so
thoroughly with the learned Frenchman, as
to imagine, apparently, that the worse they
write, the better they will be printed; and
that the printer, like a great general or a
celebrated beauty, does not care for too easy
a conquest: give him a difficulty to overcome,
and he summons all his energies to contend
with it; but make the path easy for him, and
straightway he walks into a slough.

As to the places where misprints inevitably
occur, that is a fatality apart from all
considerations of good or bad writing. No
calligraphic precautions can guard against them.
It is a question of pure chance whether, when
you intend to be particularly clear and
emphatic, you may not be made extremely
muddy and inconclusive. Much depends,
perhaps, on the printer's opinion of your grammar
and punctuation; but, some have held that
typographical errors are fore-doomed. A
Mohammedan says:— "It is written," and
submits calmly to his fate; a Christian
author in a similar fix, exclaims:— "It is
printed," and is neither calm nor resigned.
It is of no use to tell him that "Things
without remedy should be without regard."
He belongs to an irritable race who, in
such matters, never forget nor forgive. Of
all the mistakes that are committed in this
world, a misprint is the most indelible. A
lady may make a false step; a gentleman's
memory may be treacherous, and lead him to
suppose himself (commercially and
autographically) somebody else; all sorts of moral
mishaps may chance; but these things are
retrievable; there is always a door open for
repentance, or the exercise of greater discretion. But
a misprint is a fixture that cannot be removed.
The book that contains it goes forth to the
uttermost parts of the earth: its track is lost,
though its existence be beyond a doubt. You
try to call in the present edition— and fail;
and you fail for this reason chiefly, that
thorough-going book collectors set an
additional value on an imperfect copy; it is so
pleasant to think that an author's reputation
is at their mercy. To print a list of errata is,
in nine cases out of ten, only to advertise your
misfortunes in the most conspicuous manner.
If you satisfy the public that the mistake was
another's— a result by no means certain—
you never can shut your eyes to the fact that
the disfigurement will last as long as the
paper on which it is impressed. Therefore,
your implacability against the printer.

It is a painful but natural consequence of
enormous reprinting, but in no work have so