I have come to myself, somewhat, and take a more reasonable view of our position. The newspapers say, and the fellows in the office, too, that the Germans will never get to Petrograd. I wonder if they are right? The streets are horribly dull, and if you happen to forget the Germans for a little, they seem the same dull streets as of old. There are the trams and the cabs and the shops, which are open as usual. There is more dust and dirt abroad, and a strong gust of wind nearly blinds you and chokes you with dried horse manure. Houses and palaces seem deserted and dirty too, and like clouds of dust and smoke, a thick fog hangs over the Neva, obscuring the other side of the river. + 

I read the reports of the speeches in the Duma with great agitation, but a feeling of caution prompts me not to commit my impressions to paper. I still wonder at the utter blindness that made me trust so idiotically, seeing only the outward form of things. Where was my patriotism? Any self-respecting State would have cast me out, but here I’m no worse than others, a respectable member of society, as things go, a family hen who struts about paying visits to other hens, and sets up a violent cackling over a broken egg. No more than a hen! Splendid idea! I see, now, the meaning of the phrase “chickenhearted.” My Jena is no more than a chicken. Many hens like me are to be seen in the streets with their chickens.⁠ ⁠… Stop! + 

The clerk Ilya Petrovitch Dementev is but a chickenhearted fellow. + 