Dead Souls - Gogol Nikolai Vasilievich.pdf - Cove Systems

departed to look after his horses, and the valet
to establish himself in the little dark anteroom
or kennel where already he had stored a
cloak, a bagful of livery, and his own peculiar
smell. Pressing the narrow bedstead back
against the wall, he covered it with the tiny
remnant of mattress--a remnant as thin and flat
(perhaps also as greasy) as a pancake--which
he had managed to beg of the landlord of the
establishment.
While the attendants had been thus setting
things straight the gentleman had repaired to
the common parlour. The appearance of
common parlours of the kind is known to every
one who travels. Always they have varnished
walls which, grown black in their upper
portions with tobacco smoke, are, in their
lower, grown shiny with the friction of
customers' backs--more especially with that of
the backs of such local tradesmen as, on
market-days, make it their regular practice to
resort to the local hostelry for a glass of tea.
Also, parlours of this kind invariably contain