"I will ask him for it.
What can he want with it?
I'll make an exchange with him for it.

Is your master at home, my good woman ?" "Yes." "What is he doing?
lying down ?" "Yes, lying down." "Very well, I will come to him." Ivan Ivanovitch dressed himself, took his well-seasoned stick for the benefit of the dogs, for, in Mirgorod, there are more dogs than people to be met in the street, and went out.
Although Ivan Nikiforovitch's house was next door to Ivan Ivanovitch's, so that you could have got from one to the other by climbing the fence, yet Ivan Ivanovitch went by way of the street.

From the street it was necessary to turn into an alley which was so narrow that if two one-horse carts chanced to meet they could not get out, and were forced to remain there until the drivers, seizing the hind-wheels, dragged them back in opposite directions into the street, whilst pedestrians drew aside like flowers growing by the fence on either hand.

Ivan Ivanovitch's waggon-shed adjoined this alley on one side; and on the other were Ivan Nikiforovitch's granary, gate, and pigeon-house.
Ivan Ivanovitch went up to the gate and rattled the latch.

Within arose the barking of dogs; but the motley-haired pack ran back, wagging their tails when they saw the well-known face.