Letters of Anton Chekhov (Tchekhov) - Penn State University

Anton ChekhovTO N. A. LEIKIN.MOSCOW, October, 1885.… You advise me to go to Petersburg, and say that Petersburg isnot China. I know it is not, and as you are aware, I have long realizedthe necessity of going there; but what am I to do? Owing to thefact that we are a large family, I never have a ten-rouble note tospare, and to go there, even if I did it in the most uncomfortableand beggarly way, would cost at least fifty roubles. How am I to getthe money? I can’t squeeze it out of my family and don’t think Iought to. If I were to cut down our two courses at dinner to one, Ishould begin to pine away from pangs of conscience …. Allah onlyknows how difficult it is for me to keep my balance, and how easy itwould be for me to slip and lose my equilibrium. I fancy that if nextmonth I should earn twenty or thirty roubles less, my balance wouldbe gone, and I should be in difficulties. I am awfully apprehensiveabout money matters and, owing to this quite uncommercial cowardicein pecuniary affairs, I avoid loans and payments on account.I am not difficult to move. If I had money I should fly from one cityto another endlessly.35