.

PYOTR STEPANOVITCH IS BUSY.
The date of the fete was definitely fixed, and Von Lembke became more and more depressed.

He was full of strange and sinister forebodings, and this made Yulia Mihailovna seriously uneasy.

Indeed, things were not altogether satisfactory.

Our mild governor had left the affairs of the province a little out of gear; at the moment we were threatened with cholera; serious outbreaks of cattle plague had appeared in several places; fires were prevalent that summer in towns and villages; whilst among the peasantry foolish rumours of incendiarism grew stronger and stronger.