A.K.Tolstoy entered the 1870s as a very sick man, suffering from asthma, angina pectoris, neuralgias and severe headaches. Regular visits to European medics only temporarily alleviated his conditions. In the spring of 1875 Tolstoy started taking morphine. "Now I'm feeling much better, at least the neuralgia's gone. But never before have I been so short of breath. Asthma fits are continuous," he complained in a letter to poet Karolina Pavlova (who was also a translator of his dramas) on 8 July 1875.