"Herr und Knecht" is one of Tolstoy's most popular stories: Wassili Andrejewitsch Brechunov and his servant Nikita are on their way to purchase a piece of land when they are caught in a severe snowstorm in the middle of the steppe. Normally separated by their social ranks, their shared struggle against the impending death from freezing ultimately levels the class differences. The first-person narrator and his coachman Aljoschka also lose their way in the winter steppe in "The Snowstorm." Threatened by the cold death, the narrator falls into a kind of delirium and experiences a bizarre dream.