But even these made no complaint at the time; they smiled, in fact.
I remember that a fairly large circle came into existence, as it were, spontaneously, the centre of which perhaps was really to be found in Yulia Mihailovna's drawing-room.

In this intimate circle which surrounded her, among the younger members of it, of course, it was considered admissible to play all sorts of pranks, sometimes rather free-and-easy ones, and, in fact, such conduct became a principle among them.

In this circle there were even some very charming ladies.

The young people arranged picnics, and even parties, and sometimes went about the town in a regular cavalcade, in carriages and on horseback.
They sought out adventures, even got them up themselves, simply for the sake of having an amusing story to tell.

They treated our town as though it were a sort of Glupov.