The Collected Works of Anton Chekhov. Anton Chekhov
the Chubukovs have always had the most friendly, and I might almost say the most affectionate, regard for each other. And, as you know, my land is a near neighbour of yours. You will remember that my Oxen Meadows touch your birchwoods.
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. Excuse my interrupting you. You say, “my Oxen Meadows….” But are they yours?
LOMOV. Yes, mine.
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. What are you talking about? Oxen Meadows are ours, not yours!
LOMOV. No, mine, honoured Natalya Stepanovna.
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. Well, I never knew that before. How do you make that out?
LOMOV. How? I’m speaking of those Oxen Meadows which are wedged in between your birchwoods and the Burnt Marsh.
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. Yes, yes…. They’re ours.
LOMOV. No, you’re mistaken, honoured Natalya Stepanovna, they’re mine.
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. Just think, Ivan Vassilevitch! How long have they been yours?
LOMOV. How long? As long as I can remember.
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. Really, you won’t get me to believe that!
LOMOV. But you can see from the documents, honoured Natalya Stepanovna. Oxen Meadows, it’s true, were once the subject of dispute, but now everybody knows that they are mine. There’s nothing to argue about. You see, my aunt’s grandmother gave the free use of these Meadows in perpetuity to the peasants of your father’s grandfather, in return for which they were to make bricks for her. The peasants belonging to your father’s grandfather had the free use of the Meadows for forty years, and had got into the habit of regarding them as their own, when it happened that…
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. No, it isn’t at all like that! Both my grandfather and great-grandfather reckoned that their land extended to Burnt Marsh — which means that Oxen Meadows were ours. I don’t see what there is to argue about. It’s simply silly!
LOMOV. I’ll show you the documents, Natalya Stepanovna!
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. No, you’re simply joking, or making fun of me…. What a surprise! We’ve had the land for nearly three hundred years, and then we’re suddenly told that it isn’t ours! Ivan Vassilevitch, I can hardly believe my own ears…. These Meadows aren’t worth much to me. They only come to five dessiatins [Note: 13.5 acres], and are worth perhaps 300 roubles [Note: £30.], but I can’t stand unfairness. Say what you will, but I can’t stand unfairness.
LOMOV. Hear me out, I implore you! The peasants of your father’s grandfather, as I have already had the honour of explaining to you, used to bake bricks for my aunt’s grandmother. Now my aunt’s grandmother, wishing to make them a pleasant…
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. I can’t make head or tail of all this about aunts and grandfathers and grandmothers! The Meadows are ours, and that’s all.
LOMOV. Mine.
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. Ours! You can go on proving it for two days on end, you can go and put on fifteen dress-jackets, but I tell you they’re ours, ours, ours! I don’t want anything of yours and I don’t want to give up anything of mine. So there!
LOMOV. Natalya Ivanovna, I don’t want the Meadows, but I am acting on principle. If you like, I’ll make you a present of them.
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. I can make you a present of them myself, because they’re mine! Your behaviour, Ivan Vassilevitch, is strange, to say the least! Up to this we have always thought of you as a good neighbour, a friend: last year we lent you our threshing-machine, although on that account we had to put off our own threshing till November, but you behave to us as if we were gipsies. Giving me my own land, indeed! No, really, that’s not at all neighbourly! In my opinion, it’s even impudent, if you want to know….
LOMOV. Then you make out that I’m a land-grabber? Madam, never in my life have I grabbed anybody else’s land, and I shan’t allow anybody to accuse me of having done so…. [Quickly steps to the carafe and drinks more water] Oxen Meadows are mine!
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. It’s not true, they’re ours!
LOMOV. Mine!
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. It’s not true! I’ll prove it! I’ll send my mowers out to the Meadows this very day!
LOMOV. What?
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. My mowers will be there this very day!
LOMOV. I’ll give it to them in the neck!
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. You dare!
LOMOV. [Clutches at his heart] Oxen Meadows are mine! You understand? Mine!
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. Please don’t shout! You can shout yourself hoarse in your own house, but here I must ask you to restrain yourself!
LOMOV. If it wasn’t, madam, for this awful, excruciating palpitation, if my whole inside wasn’t upset, I’d talk to you in a different way! [Yells] Oxen Meadows are mine!
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. Ours!
LOMOV. Mine!
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. Ours!
LOMOV. Mine!
[Enter CHUBUKOV.]
CHUBUKOV. What’s the matter? What are you shouting at?
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. Papa, please tell to this gentleman who owns Oxen Meadows, we or he?
CHUBUKOV. [To LOMOV] Darling, the Meadows are ours!
LOMOV. But, please, Stepan Stepanitch, how can they be yours? Do be a reasonable man! My aunt’s grandmother gave the Meadows for the temporary and free use of your grandfather’s peasants. The peasants used the land for forty years and got as accustomed to it as if it was their own, when it happened that…
CHUBUKOV. Excuse me, my precious…. You forget just this, that the peasants didn’t pay your grandmother and all that, because the Meadows were in dispute, and so on. And now everybody knows that they’re ours. It means that you haven’t seen the plan.
LOMOV. I’ll prove to you that they’re mine!
CHUBUKOV. You won’t prove it, my darling.
LOMOV. I shall!
CHUBUKOV. Dear one, why yell like that? You won’t prove anything just by yelling. I don’t want anything of yours, and don’t intend to give up what I have. Why should I? And you know, my beloved, that if you propose to go on arguing about it, I’d much sooner give up the meadows to the peasants than to you. There!
LOMOV. I don’t understand! How have you the right to give away somebody else’s property?
CHUBUKOV. You may take it that I know whether I have the right or not. Because, young man, I’m not used to being spoken to in that tone of voice, and so on: I, young man, am twice your age, and ask you to speak to me without agitating yourself, and all that.
LOMOV. No, you just think I’m a fool and want to have me on! You call my land yours, and then you want me to talk to you calmly and politely! Good neighbours don’t behave like that, Stepan Stepanitch! You’re not a neighbour, you’re a grabber!
CHUBUKOV. What’s that? What did you say?
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. Papa, send the mowers out to the Meadows at once!
CHUBUKOV. What did you say, sir?
NATALYA STEPANOVNA. Oxen Meadows are ours, and I shan’t give them up, shan’t give them up, shan’t give them up!
LOMOV. We’ll see! I’ll have the matter taken to court, and then I’ll show you!
CHUBUKOV. To court? You can take it to court, and all that! You can! I know you; you’re just on the lookout for a chance to go to court, and all that…. You pettifogger! All your people were like that! All of them!
LOMOV.