Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - XVI. The two Worlds, Peasant and Official
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them to crowd together in this way; this packing of people in
polluted air is terrible. Still it is the only way of keeping them
from freezing to death.
“We must move at once, because to-morrow my husband is
going away,” began the young peasant woman, putting some
things into a sack, while she roused up the old people.
“Where is he going?”
“To the volost.”
“What for?”
“The stanavoi (police commissary) is coming there to collect
taxes.”
“But why does your husband go there?”
“They are driving them all together, from the whole village
district—all who have a plot of land.”
I did not believe her, and could not understand her
disconnected talk, but went to the starosta. He belonged to the
“inhabitants”; that is, he possessed a cow and two horses,
and was consequently regarded as “settled”; he had no need
to go round looking for work, a condition that is becoming
rarer every day. But his position was not enviable, for he had
a large family. He had been a soldier. When I asked if it
was true that they were driving them all together to the volost,
he answered, “Yes, it is true, your high-born nobility.”
But even he could not explain the whole matter. All he
knew was that everyone had received orders to be at the office
of the district by 8 a.m., and that the stanavoi, and perhaps the
ispravnik himself, would be there.
When I left the starosta, the evening had cleared, and it was
as light as day. The cold was more intense, and the moon
flooded the hills and valleys with her pale beams. As I went
homewards, the snow crackled under my feet with ringing
sound. After crossing the Don, I turned again to look from
my own shore at the beautiful village. It was more beautiful
still in the gleaming light of the moon. Then I recalled the
order of the village police concerning the next day’s meeting,
and determined to be there and see what would happen.
Next morning I meant to start in time to see the beginning
of the meeting, but business hindered me, and I could not leave
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