institution
Ugaro-Debosherskaya Railway
the Ugaro-Debosherskaya Railway
also: Угаро-Дебоширская железная дорога, Fumes-and-Riot Railway
A fictitious Petersburg railway company on whose board Shchepotkin serves as secretary; the invented name puns on "ugar" (carbon-monoxide fumes, or by extension a drunken binge) and "debosh" (a row, a disorderly scene) -- a comic non-existent line named, in effect, "Fumes-and-Riot Railway."
Reading notes
- Up the Staircase §9 Угаро-Дебоширской железной дороги
The invented railway name puns on 'ugar' (carbon-monoxide fumes, or by extension a drunken binge) and 'debosh' (a row, a disorderly scene) -- in effect a 'Fumes-and-Riot Railway,' one of Chekhov's many comic joint-stock-company names satirizing the era's railway-concession boom.