the back of my steed (I was just tall enough to see between its ears), I
proceeded to perform evolutions in the courtyard.
'Mind you don't ride over the hounds, sir,' said one of the huntsmen.
'Hold your tongue. It is not the first time I have been one of the
party.' I retorted with dignity.
Although Woloda had plenty of pluck, he was not altogether free from
apprehensions as he sat on the hunter. Indeed, he more than once asked
as he patted it, 'Is he quiet?' He looked very well on horseback--almost
a grown-up young man, and held himself so upright in the saddle that I
envied him since my shadow seemed to show that I could not compare with
him in looks.
Presently Papa's footsteps sounded on the flagstones, the whip collected
the hounds, and the huntsmen mounted their steeds. Papa's horse came up
in charge of a groom, the hounds of his particular leash sprang up from
their picturesque attitudes to fawn upon him, and Milka, in a collar
studded with beads, came bounding joyfully from behind his heels to
greet and sport with the other dogs. Finally, as soon as Papa had
mounted we rode away.
VII -- THE HUNT
AT the head of the cavalcade rode Turka, on a hog-backed roan. On his
head he wore a shaggy cap, while, with a magnificent horn slung across
his shoulders and a knife at his belt, he looked so cruel and inexorable
that one would have thought he was going to engage in bloody strife with
his fellow men rather than to hunt a small animal. Around the hind legs
of his horse the hounds gambolled like a cluster of checkered, restless
balls. If one of them wished to stop, it was only with the greatest
difficulty that it could do so, since not only had its leash-fellow
also to be induced to halt, but at once one of the huntsmen would wheel
round, crack his whip, and shout to the delinquent,
'Back to the pack, there!'
Arrived at a gate, Papa told us and the huntsmen to continue our way
along the road, and then rode off across a cornfield. The harvest was at
its height. On the further side of a large, shining, yellow stretch of
cornland lay a high purple belt of forest which always figured in my
eyes as a distant, mysterious region behind which either the world ended
or an uninhabited waste began. This expanse of corn-land was dotted with
swathes and reapers, while along the lanes where the sickle had passed
could be seen the backs of women as they stooped among the tall, thick
grain or lifted armfuls of corn and rested them against the shocks. In
one corner a woman was bending over a cradle, and the whole stubble was
studded with sheaves and cornflowers. In another direction shirt-sleeved
men were standing on waggons, shaking the soil from the stalks of
sheaves, and stacking them for carrying. As soon as the foreman (dressed
in a blouse and high boots, and carrying a tally-stick) caught sight of
Papa, he hastened to take off his lamb's-wool cap and, wiping his red
head, told the women to get up. Papa's chestnut horse went trotting
along with a prancing gait as it tossed its head and swished its tail
to and fro to drive away the gadflies and countless other insects which
tormented its flanks, while his two greyhounds--their tails curved like
sickles--went springing gracefully over the stubble. Milka was always
first, but every now and then she would halt with a shake of her head
to await the whipper-in. The chatter of the peasants; the rumbling of
horses and waggons; the joyous cries of quails; the hum of insects as
they hung suspended in the motionless air; the smell of the soil and
grain and steam from our horses; the thousand different lights and
