Complete Works of A.P. Chekhov, Vol. 1

I.

On July 5, 1890, I arrived by steamship in the city of Nikolaevsk, one of the easternmost points of our fatherland. The Amur is very wide here, with only 27 versts a Russian unit of measurement, approximately 1.06 kilometers left to the sea. The location is majestic and beautiful, but memories of the past of this region, the stories from my fellow travelers about the harsh winter and the equally harsh local customs, the proximity of the penal colony, and the very sight of the abandoned, dying city completely take away any desire to admire the landscape.

Nikolaevsk was founded not so long ago, in 1850, by the renowned Gennady Nevelskoy, and this is perhaps the only bright spot in the city's history. In the fifties and sixties, when culture was being planted along the Amur without regard for the soldiers, convicts, and settlers, the officials who governed the region had their headquarters in Nikolaevsk. Many types of Russian and foreign adventurers arrived here, and settlers took up residence, enticed by the extraordinary abundance of fish and game. Apparently, the city was not foreign to human interests, as there was even an instance where a visiting scholar found it necessary and possible to give a public lecture here at the club. Now, however, nearly half of the houses have been abandoned by their owners and are half-ruined, and the dark, frame-less windows stare at you like the eye sockets of a skull. The inhabitants lead a sleepy, drunken life and, in general,