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Alexis was walking along one of the side alleys, which led from the large lake in the direction of the Neva. He was accompanied by a funny, hobbling, bow-legged creature, who wore a shabby foreign-cut coat, a huge wig and a flurried confused expression, like some one suddenly aroused from his sleep. He was the head of the Armoury department and of the new Printing Works, the first master-printer in Petersburg—Michael Avrámoff.

The son of a deacon, at the age of seventeen, Avrámoff had been taken straight from the Breviary and Psalms to a trading vessel at Kronslot; the vessel was bound for Amsterdam with a cargo of tar, skins, leather, and a dozen “Russian youths,” who had been selected by Peter’s command from “sharp youngsters,” for instruction abroad. After some study of geometry and more at classic mythology, Avrámoff had received commendations and a diploma from his teachers. Not stupid by nature, he seemed to have been stunned and baffled by a too sudden transition from the Psalms and Breviary to the Fables of Ovid and Virgil, and never to have recovered. His mind had undergone something like a fit of convulsions to which little children are subject, when suddenly startled from their sleep, and ever since his face had retained that expression of stupefaction.