And bring me a match too." Mavra departed, and Plushkin, seating himself, and taking up a pen, sat turning the sheet of paper over and over, as though in doubt whether to tear from it yet another morsel.

At length he came to the conclusion that it was impossible to do so, and therefore, dipping the pen into the mixture of mouldy fluid and dead flies which the ink bottle contained, started to indite the letter in characters as bold as the notes of a music score, while momentarily checking the speed of his hand, lest it should meander too much over the paper, and crawling from line to line as though he regretted that there was so little vacant space left on the sheet.
"And do you happen to know any one to whom a few runaway serfs would be of use ?" he asked as subsequently he folded the letter.
"What?
You have some runaways as well ?" exclaimed Chichikov, again greatly interested.
"Certainly I have.

My son-in-law has laid the necessary information against them, but says that their tracks have grown cold.

However, he is only a military man--that is to say, good at clinking a pair of spurs, but of no use for laying a plea before a court." "And how many runaways have you ?" "About seventy." "Surely not ?" "Alas, yes.

Never does a year pass without a certain number of them making off.