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No one, looking at his white hands, with their swollen veins and

long fingers, so softly stroking the edges of the white paper

that lay before him, and at the air of weariness with which his

head drooped on one side, would have suspected that in a few

minutes a torrent of words would flow from his lips that would

arouse a fearful storm, set the members shouting and attacking

one another, and force the president to call for order. When the

report was over, Alexey Alexandrovitch announced in his subdued,

delicate voice that he had several points to bring before the

meeting in regard to the Commission for the Reorganization of the

Native Tribes. All attention was turned upon him. Alexey

Alexandrovitch cleared his throat, and not looking at his

opponent, but selecting, as he always did while he was delivering

his speeches, the first person sitting opposite him, an

inoffensive little old man, who never had an opinion of any sort

in the Commission, began to expound his views.