The Cossacks by graf Tolstoy Leo (leveled readers .txt) 📖

Chapter VI

The male population of the village spend their time on military

expeditions and in the cordon—or ‘at their posts’, as the

Cossacks say. Towards evening, that same Lukashka the Snatcher,

about whom the old women had been talking, was standing on a

watch-tower of the Nizhni-Prototsk post situated on the very banks

of the Terek. Leaning on the railing of the tower and screwing up

his eyes, he looked now far into the distance beyond the Terek,

now down at his fellow Cossacks, and occasionally he addressed the

latter. The sun was already approaching the snowy range that

gleamed white above the fleecy clouds. The clouds undulating at

the base of the mountains grew darker and darker. The clearness of

evening was noticeable in the air. A sense of freshness came from

the woods, though round the post it was still hot. The voices of

the talking Cossacks vibrated more sonorously than before. The

moving mass of the Terek’s rapid brown waters contrasted more

vividly with its motionless banks. The waters were beginning to

subside and here and there the wet sands gleamed drab on the banks

and in the shallows. The other side of the river, just opposite

the cordon, was deserted; only an immense waste of low-growing

reeds stretched far away to the very foot of the mountains. On the

low bank, a little to one side, could be seen the flat-roofed clay

houses and the funnel-shaped chimneys of a Chechen village. The

sharp eyes of the Cossack who stood on the watch-tower followed,

through the evening smoke of the pro-Russian village, the tiny

moving figures of the Chechen women visible in the distance in

their red and blue garments.

 

Although the Cossacks expected abreks to cross over and attack

them from the Tartar side at any moment, especially as it was May

when the woods by the Terek are so dense that it is difficult to

pass through them on foot and the river is shallow enough in

places for a horseman to ford it, and despite the fact that a

couple of days before a Cossack had arrived with a circular from

the commander of the regiment announcing that spies had reported

the intention of a party of some eight men to cross the Terek, and

ordering special vigilance—no special vigilance was being

observed in the cordon. The Cossacks, unarmed and with their

horses unsaddled just as if they were at home, spent their time

some in fishing, some in drinking, and some in hunting. Only the

horse of the man on duty was saddled, and with its feet hobbled

was moving about by the brambles near the wood, and only the

sentinel had his Circassian coat on and carried a gun and sword.

The corporal, a tall thin Cossack with an exceptionally long back

and small hands and feet, was sitting on the earth-bank of a hut

with his beshmet unbuttoned. On his face was the lazy, bored

expression of a superior, and having shut his eyes he dropped his

head upon the palm first of one hand and then of the other. An

elderly Cossack with a broad greyish-black beard was lying in his

shirt, girdled with a black strap, close to the river and gazing

lazily at the waves of the Terek as they monotonously foamed and

swirled. Others, also overcome by the heat and half naked, were

rinsing clothes in the Terek, plaiting a fishing line, or humming

tunes as they lay on the hot sand of the river bank. One Cossack,

with a thin face much burnt by the sun, lay near the hut evidently

dead drunk, by a wall which though it had been in shadow some two

hours previously was now exposed to the sun’s fierce slanting

rays.

 

Lukashka, who stood on the watch-tower, was a tall handsome lad

about twenty years old and very like his mother. His face and

whole build, in spite of the angularity of youth, indicated great

strength, both physical and moral. Though he had only lately

joined the Cossacks at the front, it was evident from the

expression of his face and the calm assurance of his attitude that

he had already acquired the somewhat proud and warlike bearing

peculiar to Cossacks and to men generally who continually carry

arms, and that he felt he was a Cossack and fully knew his own

value. His ample Circassian coat was torn in some places, his cap

was on the back of his head Chechen fashion, and his leggings had

slipped below his knees. His clothing was not rich, but he wore it

with that peculiar Cossack foppishness which consists in imitating

the Chechen brave. Everything on a real brave is ample, ragged,

and neglected, only his weapons are costly. But these ragged

clothes and these weapons are belted and worn with a certain air

and matched in a certain manner, neither of which can be acquired

by everybody and which at once strike the eye of a Cossack or a

hillsman. Lukashka had this resemblance to a brave. With his hands

folded under his sword, and his eyes nearly closed, he kept

looking at the distant Tartar village. Taken separately his

features were not beautiful, but anyone who saw his stately

carriage and his dark-browed intelligent face would involuntarily

say, ‘What a fine fellow!’

 

‘Look at the women, what a lot of them are walking about in the

village,’ said he in a sharp voice, languidly showing his

brilliant white teeth and not addressing anyone in particular.

 

Nazarka who was lying below immediately lifted his head and

remarked:

 

‘They must be going for water.’

 

‘Supposing one scared them with a gun?’ said Lukashka, laughing,

‘Wouldn’t they be frightened?’

 

‘It wouldn’t reach.’

 

‘What! Mine would carry beyond. Just wait a bit, and when their

feast comes round I’ll go and visit Girey Khan and drink buza

there,’ said Lukashka, angrily swishing away the mosquitoes which

attached themselves to him.

 

A rustling in the thicket drew the Cossack’s attention. A pied

mongrel half-setter, searching for a scent and violently wagging

its scantily furred tail, came running to the cordon. Lukashka

recognized the dog as one belonging to his neighbour, Uncle

Eroshka, a hunter, and saw, following it through the thicket, the

approaching figure of the hunter himself.

 

Uncle Eroshka was a gigantic Cossack with a broad, snow-white

beard and such broad shoulders and chest that in the wood, where

there was no one to compare him with, he did not look particularly

tall, so well proportioned were his powerful limbs. He wore a

tattered coat and, over the bands with which his legs were

swathed, sandals made of undressed deer’s hide tied on with

strings; while on his head he had a rough little white cap. He

carried over one shoulder a screen to hide behind when shooting

pheasants, and a bag containing a hen for luring hawks, and a

small falcon; over the other shoulder, attached by a strap, was a

wild cat he had killed; and stuck in his belt behind were some

little bags containing bullets, gunpowder, and bread, a horse’s

tail to swish away the mosquitoes, a large dagger in a torn

scabbard smeared with old bloodstains, and two dead pheasants.

Having glanced at the cordon he stopped.

 

‘Hy, Lyam!’ he called to the dog in