As to the future, especially a future outside the world in which he was now living, it did not interest him at all.

When he received letters from home, from relatives and friends, he was offended by the evident distress with which they regarded him as a lost man, while he in his village considered those as lost who did not live as he was living.

He felt sure he would never repent of having broken away from his former surroundings and of having settled down in this village to such a solitary and original life.

When out on expeditions, and when quartered at one of the forts, he felt happy too; but it was here, from under Daddy Eroshka's wing, from the forest and from his hut at the end of the village, and especially when he thought of Maryanka and Lukashka, that he seemed to see the falseness of his former life.

That falseness used to rouse his indignation even before, but now it seemed inexpressibly vile and ridiculous.