A Hero of Our Time Part 35

[Footnote 2: A verst is a measure of length, about 3500 English feet.]

[Footnote 3: Ermolov, i.e. General Ermolov. Russians have three names--Christian name, patronymic and surname. They are addressed by the first two only. The surname of Maksim Maksimych (colloquial for Maksimovich) is not mentioned.]

[Footnote 4: The bell on the duga, a wooden arch joining the shafts of a Russian conveyance over the horse's neck.]

[Footnote 5: Rocky Ford.]

[Footnote 6: A kind of beer made from millet.]

[Footnote 7: i.e. acknowledging Russian supremacy.]

[Footnote 8: A kind of two-stringed or three-stringed guitar.]

[Footnote 9: "Good--very good."]

[Footnote 10: Turkish for "Black-eye."]

[Footnote 11: "No!"]

[Footnote 12: A particular kind of ancient and valued sabre.]

[Footnote 13: King--a t.i.tle of the Sultan of Turkey.]

[Footnote 14: I beg my readers' pardon for having versified Kazbich's song, which, of course, as I heard it, was in prose; but habit is second nature. (Author's note.)]

[Footnote 151: "No! Russian--bad, bad!"]

[Footnote 15: Krestov is an adjective meaning "of the cross"

(Krest=cross); and, of course, is not the Russian for "Christophe."]

[Footnote 16: A legendary Russian hero whose whistling knocked people down.]

[Footnote 17: Lezghian dance.]

[Footnote 18: In Russian--okaziya=occasion, adventure, etc.; chto za okaziya=how unfortunate!]

[Footnote 19: The duga.]

[Footnote 20: "Thou" is the form of address used in speaking to an intimate friend, etc. Pechorin had used the more formal "you."]

[Footnote 21: Team of three horses abreast.]

[Footnote 22: Desyatnik, a superintendent of ten (men or huts), i.e. an officer like the old English t.i.thing-man or headborough.]

[Footnote 23: Card-games.]

[Footnote 24: A Caucasian wine.]

[Footnote 25: Pushkin. Compare Sh.e.l.ley's Adonais, x.x.xi. 3: "as the last cloud of an expiring storm."]

[Footnote 26: The Snake, the Iron and the Bald Mountains.]

[Footnote 27: Nizhegorod is the "government" of which Nizhniy Novgorod is the capital.]

[Footnote 271: A popular phrase, equivalent to: "How should I think of doing such a thing?"]

[Footnote 272: Published by Senkovski, and under the censorship of the Government.]

[Footnote 273: Civil servants of the ninth (the lowest) cla.s.s.]

[Footnote 28: i.e. serfs.]

[Footnote 29: Pushkin: Eugene Onyegin.]

[Footnote 30: Canto XVIII, 10: ]

"Quinci al bosco t' invia, dove cotanti]

Son fantasmi inganne vole e bugiardi"...]

[Footnote 301: None of the Waverley novels, of course, bears this t.i.tle.

The novel referred to is doubtless "Old Mortality," on which Bellini's opera, "I Puritani di Scozia," is founded.]

[Footnote 31: Popular phrases, equivalent to: "Men are fools, fortune is blind, and life is not worth a straw."]