And not in vain was
his steadfast faithfulness relied upon; he carried out everything
rapidly, exactly,--with a courageous faith in the universal
importance of the work; with a care-free smile and with a broad
contempt of possible destruction. He concealed outlawed comrades,
guarded forbidden literature and printing types, transmitted
passports and money. He had a great deal of physical strength,
black-loam amiability and elemental simple-heartedness. Not
infrequently he would receive from home, somewheres in the depth
of the Simbirskaya or Ufimskaya province, sums of money
sufficiently large for a student; but in two days he scattered and
dispersed it everywhere, with the carelessness of a French grandee
of the seventeenth century, while he himself remained during
winter in only his everyday coat, with boots restored by his own
devices.
Beside all these naive, touching, laughable, lofty and shiftless
qualities of the old Russian student, passing--and God knows if
for the better?--into the realm of historical memories, he
possessed still another amazing ability--to invent money and
arrange for credit in little restaurants and cook-shops.
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