by some wonderful means the half-skipper found the left-handed man rather speedily, only they had not yet put him to bed, but he still lay on the floor of the corridor and complained to the englishman: "i must say a couple of words to the emperor without fail."

the englishman hastened to count kleinmichel and made a row: "how can they treat him so? he has a human soul," says he, "even if he has only a sheepskin coat."

for this bit of reasoning they immediately chased the englishman away,—because he had dared to mention the human soul. and then some one said to him: "you had better go to cossack platoff—he has simple feelings."

the englishman got at platoff, who was now reclining on his couch once more. platoff listened to him and recalled the left-handed man.

[pg 91]

"certainly, my friend," says he, "i am very intimately acquainted with him—i have even tweaked him by the hair—only i know not how i can assist him in his present unhappy plight, because i am now entirely out of the service and have received full pension, so they no longer respect me; but do you run quickly to commandant skobeleff; he is in power, and also experienced in this sort of thing—he will do something."

and the half-skipper went to skobeleff, and told him everything; what the left-handed man's illness was, and how he had contracted it. says skobeleff: "i understand this complaint, only the germans cannot cure it; but some sort of a doctor of the ecclesiastical vocation is needed here, because those fellows have been reared on such examples, and they can give aid. i will immediately send thither the russian doctor, martyn-solsky."

[pg 92]

but when martyn-solsky arrived, the left-handed man was breathing his last, because he had cracked his neck on the pavement, and could utter intelligibly only these words: "tell the emperor that the english do not clean their guns with brick-dust. let them not clean their guns so among us; otherwise—god preserve us from war—they will not be fit to fire." and with this assurance the left-handed man crossed himself and died.

then martyn-solsky immediately went and reported this to count tchernyscheff in order that he might announce it to the emperor. but count tchernyscheff shouted at him: "stick to your emetics and cathartics and don't meddle in what is none of your business—we have generals in russia to attend to that!"

and so they did not tell the emperor, and this mode of cleaning continued[pg 93] down to the very date of the crimean campaign. at that time, when they began to load their guns the bullets rattled about in them, because they had been cleaned with brick-dust. then martyn-solsky reminded count tchernyscheff of the left-handed man, and count tchernyscheff said: "go to the devil, you windbag! don't meddle with what does not concern you, or i'll deny that i ever heard anything about this from you—and won't you just catch it!"

martyn-solsky reflected: "he actually will deny it," and so he held his tongue.

but if he had reported the left-handed man's words to the emperor in season, the war with the enemy in the crimea would have taken quite a different turn.