To M. V. Kiseleva, 11 March 1891. Moscow.

A short, high-spirited note of 11 March 1891, from Moscow, to Maria Vladimirovna Kiseleva, mistress of the Babkino estate and a longtime family friend, written as Chekhov sets off on his first trip to western Europe (Petersburg, then Berlin, and on to France, Spain, and Italy). dateline, a mock-solemn farewell invoking Babkino’s safekeeping, a comic account of Chekhov’s seminary matchmaking errand, several one-line jokes, signature, and a closing postscript.

after the travel announcement, the letter turns to an extended joke: Chekhov went to the seminary to find a husband for Vasilisa (a young woman of the Kiselev household) and interviewed several "sensitive and responsive" seminarians, all of whom balked once he mentioned, offhand, that the local rural superintendent’s chamber holds a bed used for flogging – until one, the pockmarked "Gerasim Ivanovich," proved undeterred and will call on the household shortly. Chekhov recommends him as "a brilliant match" and warns Kiseleva to lock the liquor cabinet and keep the windows open, since seminary "inspiration" runs hot. Several short, unglossed one-liners follow (the hens pecking the rooster, an "idiotik" who has not visited, a new checked-lining overcoat), then closing greetings to the rural superintendent, Vasilisa, and Elizaveta Alexandrovna (person, distinct from Maria Vladimirovna), and a postscript asking that regards be passed to Olga Ivanovna if she has not yet left Babkino.