Letters of Anton Chekhov to his Family and Friends | Page 9

began to live the life of a hermit. His sister found employment
in Moscow; only his father and mother were left with him in the house,
and the hours seemed very long. They went to bed even earlier than in
the summer, but Chekhov would wake up at one in the morning, sit
down to his work and then go back to bed and sleep again. At six
o'clock in the morning all the household was up. Chekhov wrote a great
deal that winter. But as soon as visitors arrived, life was completely
transformed. There was singing, playing on the piano, laughter.

Chekhov's mother did her utmost to load the tables with dainties; his
father with a mysterious air would produce various specially prepared
cordials and liqueurs from some hidden recess; and then it seemed that
Melihovo had something of its own, peculiar to it, which could be
found in no other country estate. Chekhov was always particularly
pleased at the visits of Miss Mizinov and of Potapenko. He was
particularly fond of them, and his whole family rejoiced at their arrival.
They stayed up long after midnight on such days, and Chekhov wrote
only by snatches. And every time he wrote five or six lines, he would
get up again and go back to his visitors.
"I have written sixty kopecks' worth," he would say with a smile.
Braga's "Serenade" was the fashion at that time, and Chekhov was fond
of hearing Potapenko play it on the violin while Miss Mizinov sang it.
Having been a student at the Moscow University, Chekhov liked to
celebrate St. Tatyana's Day. He never missed making a holiday of it
when he lived in Moscow. That winter, for the first time, he chanced to
be in Petersburg on the 12th of January. He did not forget "St.
Tatyana," and assembled all his literary friends on that day in a
Petersburg restaurant. They made speeches and kept the holiday, and
this festivity initiated by him was so successful that the authors went on
meeting regularly afterwards.
Though Melihovo was his permanent home, Chekhov often paid visits
to Moscow and Petersburg. He frequently stayed at hotels, and there he
sometimes had difficulties over his passport. As a landowner he had no
need of credentials from the police in the Serpuhov district, and found
his University diploma sufficient. In Petersburg and Moscow, under the
old passport regulations they would not give him a passport because he
resided permanently in the provinces. Misunderstandings arose,
sometimes developing into disagreeable incidents and compelling
Chekhov to return home earlier than he had intended. Someone
suggested to Chekhov that he should enter the Government service and
immediately retire from it, as retired officials used at that time to
receive a permanent passport from the department in which they had
served. Chekhov sent a petition to the Department of Medicine for a

post to be assigned to him, and received an appointment as an extra
junior medical clerk in that Department, and soon afterwards sent in his
resignation, after which he had no more trouble.
Chekhov spent the whole spring of 1893 at Melihovo, planted roses,
looked after his fruit-trees, and was enthusiastic over country life. That
summer Melihovo was especially crowded with visitors. Chekhov was
visited not only by his friends, but also by people whose acquaintance
he neither sought nor desired. People were sleeping on sofas and
several in a room; some even spent the night in the passage. Young
ladies, authors, local doctors, members of the Zemstvo, distant relations
with their sons--all these people flitted through Melihovo. Life was a
continual whirl, everyone was gay; this rush of visitors and the
everlasting readiness of Chekhov's mother to regale them with food and
drink seemed like a return to the good old times of country life in the
past. Chekhov was the centre on which all attention was concentrated.
Everyone sought him, lived in him, and caught up every word he
uttered. When he was with friends he liked taking walks or making
expeditions to the neighbouring monastery. The chaise, the cart, and
the racing droshky were brought out. Chekhov put on his white tunic,
buckled a strap round his waist, and got on the racing droshky. A
young lady would sit sideways behind him, holding on to the strap. The
white tunic and strap used to make Chekhov call himself an Hussar.
The party would set off; the "Hussar" in the racing droshky would lead
the way, and then came the cart and the chaise full of visitors.
The numbers of guests necessitated more building, as the house would
not contain them all. Instead of a farm, new buildings close to the
house itself were begun. Some of the farm buildings were pulled down,
others were put up after Chekhov's own