bells. Parcels, trunks, dressing-cases, and boxes were replaced, and we
set about taking our seats. Yet, every time that we got in, the mountain
of luggage in the britchka seemed to have grown larger than before, and
we had much ado to understand how things had been arranged yesterday,
and how we should sit now. A tea-chest, in particular, greatly
inconvenienced me, but Vassili declared that "things will soon right
themselves," and I had no choice but to believe him.
The sun was just rising, covered with dense white clouds, and every
object around us was standing out in a cheerful, calm sort of radiance.
The whole was beautiful to look at, and I felt comfortable and light of
heart.
Before us the road ran like a broad, sinuous ribbon through cornfields
glittering with dew. Here and there a dark bush or young birch-tree cast
a long shadow over the ruts and scattered grass-tufts of the track. Yet
even the monotonous din of our carriage-wheels and collar-bells could
not drown the joyous song of soaring larks, nor the combined odour of
moth-eaten cloth, dust, and sourness peculiar to our britchka overpower
the fresh scents of the morning. I felt in my heart that delightful
impulse to be up and doing which is a sign of sincere enjoyment.
As I had not been able to say my prayers in the courtyard of the inn,
but had nevertheless been assured once that on the very first day when
I omitted to perform that ceremony some misfortune would overtake me,
I now hastened to rectify the omission. Taking off my cap, and stooping
down in a corner of the britchka, I duly recited my orisons, and
unobtrusively signed the sign of the cross beneath my coat. Yet all the
while a thousand different objects were distracting my attention, and
more than once I inadvertently repeated a prayer twice over.
Soon on the little footpath beside the road became visible some slowly
moving figures. They were pilgrims. On their heads they had dirty
handkerchiefs, on their backs wallets of birch-bark, and on their feet
bundles of soiled rags and heavy bast shoes. Moving their staffs in
regular rhythm, and scarcely throwing us a glance, they pressed onwards
with heavy tread and in single file.
"Where have they come from?" I wondered to myself, "and whither are they
bound? Is it a long pilgrimage they are making?" But soon the shadows
they cast on the road became indistinguishable from the shadows of the
bushes which they passed.
Next a carriage-and-four could be seen approaching us. In two seconds
the faces which looked out at us from it with smiling curiosity had
vanished. How strange it seemed that those faces should have nothing
in common with me, and that in all probability they would never meet my
eyes again!
Next came a pair of post-horses, with the traces looped up to their
collars. On one of them a young postillion-his lamb's wool cap cocked to
one side-was negligently kicking his booted legs against the flanks
of his steed as he sang a melancholy ditty. Yet his face and attitude
seemed to me to express such perfect carelessness and indolent ease that
I imagined it to be the height of happiness to be a postillion and to
sing melancholy songs.
Far off, through a cutting in the road, there soon stood out against
the light-blue sky, the green roof of a village church. Presently the
village itself became visible, together with the roof of the manor-house
and the garden attached to it. Who lived in that house? Children,
parents, teachers? Why should we not call there and make the
acquaintance of its inmates?
Next we overtook a file of loaded waggons--a procession to which our
vehicles had to yield the road.
"What have you got in there?" asked Vassili of one waggoner who was
dangling his legs lazily over the splashboard of his conveyance and
flicking his whip about as he gazed at us with a stolid, vacant look;
but he only made answer when we were too far off to catch what he said.
"And what have YOU got?" asked Vassili of a second waggoner who was
lying at full length under a new rug on the driving-seat of his vehicle.
The red poll and red face beneath it lifted themselves up for a
second from the folds of the rug, measured our britchka with a cold,
contemptuous look, and lay down again; whereupon I concluded that the
driver was wondering to himself who we were, whence we had come, and
whither we were going.
These various objects of interest had absorbed so much of my time that,
as yet, I had paid no attention to the crooked figures on the verst
posts as we passed them in rapid succession; but in time the sun began
to burn my head and back, the road to become increasingly dusty, the
impedimenta in the carriage to grow more and more uncomfortable, and
myself to feel more and more cramped. Consequently, I relapsed into
devoting my whole faculties to the distance-posts and their numerals,
and to solving difficult mathematical problems for reckoning the time
when we should arrive at the next posting-house.
"Twelve versts are a third of thirty-six, and in all there are forty-one
to Lipetz. We have done a third and how much, then?", and so forth, and
so forth.
"Vassili," was my next remark, on observing that he was beginning to nod
on the box-seat, "suppose we change seats? Will you?" Vassili agreed,
and had no sooner stretched himself out in the body of the vehicle than
he began to snore. To me on my new perch, however, a most interesting
spectacle now became visible--namely, our horses, all of which were
familiar to me down to the smallest detail.
"Why is Diashak on the right today, Philip, not on the left?" I asked
knowingly. "And Nerusinka is not doing her proper share of the pulling."
"One could not put Diashak on the left," replied Philip, altogether
ignoring my last remark. "He is not the kind of horse to put there at
all. A horse like the one on the left now is the right kind of one for
the job."
After this fragment of eloquence, Philip turned towards Diashak and
began to do his best to worry the poor animal by jogging at the reins,
in spite of the fact that Diashak was doing well and dragging the
vehicle almost unaided. This Philip continued to do until he found it
convenient to breathe and rest himself awhile and to settle his cap
askew, though it had looked well enough before.
I profited by the opportunity to ask him to let me have the reins
to hold, until, the whole six in my hand, as well as the whip, I had
attained complete happiness. Several times I asked whether I was doing
things right, but, as usual, Philip was never satisfied, and soon
destroyed my felicity.
The heat increased until a hand showed itself at the carriage window,
and waved a bottle and a parcel of eatables; whereupon Vassili leapt
briskly from the britchka, and ran forward to get us something to eat
and drink.
When we arrived at a steep descent, we all got out and ran down it to
a little bridge, while Vassili and Jakoff followed, supporting the
carriage on either side, as though to hold it up in the event of its
threatening to upset.
After that, Mimi gave permission for a change of seats, and sometimes
Woloda or myself would ride in the carriage, and Lubotshka or Katenka
in the britchka. This arrangement greatly pleased the girls, since much