Everybody--officials, the police, literary people, merchants--attacked the author.

They raged at this comedy, refused to recognize their too lifelike portraits, and still endeavored to have the play prohibited.

Gogol's health and spirits failed under this persecution, and he fled abroad, whence thereafter he returned to Russia only at long intervals and for brief visits, chiefly to Moscow, where most of his faithful friends resided.

He traveled a great deal, but spent most of his time in Rome, where his lavish charities kept him perennially poor despite the eventual and complete success, both artistically and financially, of "The Inspector," and of Part I.of "Dead Souls," which would have enabled him to live in comfort.

He was wont to say that he could see Russia plainly only when he was at a distance from her, and in a measure, he proved the truth of his contention in the first volume of "Dead Souls." Thereby he justified Pushkin's expectations in giving him the subject of that work, which he hoped would enable Gogol to depict the classes and localities of the fatherland in the concentrated form of types.