Finally, she will develop into a confirmed prevaricator, and end by marrying the devil knows whom!" Chichikov paused awhile.

Then he went on: "Yet I should like to know who she is, and who her father is, and whether he is a rich landowner of good standing, or merely a respectable man who has acquired a fortune in the service of the Government.
Should he allow her, on marriage, a dowry of, say, two hundred thousand roubles, she will be a very nice catch indeed.

She might even, so to speak, make a man of good breeding happy." Indeed, so attractively did the idea of the two hundred thousand roubles begin to dance before his imagination that he felt a twinge of self-reproach because, during the hubbub, he had not inquired of the postillion or the coachman who the travellers might be.

But soon the sight of Sobakevitch's country house dissipated his thoughts, and forced him to return to his stock subject of reflection.
Sobakevitch's country house and estate were of very fair size, and on each side of the mansion were expanses of birch and pine forest in two shades of green.

The wooden edifice itself had dark-grey walls and a red-gabled roof, for it was a mansion of the kind which Russia builds for her military settlers and for German colonists.