For, though Katerina Ivanovna is full of generous feelings, she is a spirited lady, irritable and short--tempered....

Yes.

But it's no use going over that! Sonia, as you may well fancy, has had no education.

I did make an effort four years ago to give her a course of geography and universal history, but as I was not very well up in those subjects myself and we had no suitable books, and what books we had...

hm, anyway we have not even those now, so all our instruction came to an end.