While they raised their hands to wipe them, the dead man vanished completely, so that they positively did not know whether they had actually had him in their grip at all.

Thereafter the watchmen conceived such a terror of dead men that they were afraid even to seize the living, and only screamed from a distance, "Hey, there! go your way!" So the dead tchinovnik began to appear even beyond the Kalinkin Bridge, causing no little terror to all timid people.
But we have totally neglected that certain prominent personage who may really be considered as the cause of the fantastic turn taken by this true history.

First of all, justice compels us to say that after the departure of poor, annihilated Akakiy Akakievitch he felt something like remorse.

Suffering was unpleasant to him, for his heart was accessible to many good impulses, in spite of the fact that his rank often prevented his showing his true self.

As soon as his friend had left his cabinet, he began to think about poor Akakiy Akakievitch.