Hania

Among those cabins, and compared with children of the village peasants, and all that common surrounding, they seemed like beings from another planet. It was even pleasant to think that there was no bond, at least no spiritual bond, between that splendid, that developed and poetical couple, and the prosaic life of the village, full of gray reality, and half animal.

They passed on, side by side, and conversed of poetry and literature as ordinarily a polite cavalier and a polite lady do. Those people in homespun, those peasants, those women, did not understand even their words and their language. It was dear to think of it! – confess that to me, O ye petty nobility!

In the conversation of this splendid couple there was nothing which had not been heard a hundred times before. They flitted from book to book, as butterflies flit from one flower to another. But such a conversation does not seem empty and commonplace when one is speaking with a dear little soul; when the conversation is simply the canvas on which that soul fastens the golden flowers of its own thoughts and feelings, and when, from time to time, its interior is disclosed, like the opening interior of a white rose. And, besides, such a conversation flies up in every case, like a bird in the air, to cerulean spheres, attaches itself to the world of mind, and rises like a climbing plant on a pole. There in the village inn, rude people were drinking and talking in peasant words of peasant things; but that couple were sailing in another region, and on a ship which had, as Gounod's song says, —

"Masts of ivory
With a banner of satin,
A rudder of pure ruddy gold."

Moreover, it is proper to add that Panna Yadviga had, for purposes of self-training, turned the head of her cousin. In these conditions poetry is more frequently mentioned.

"Have you read the last edition of Eli?" asked the cavalier.

"You know, Pan Victor, that I am dying about Eli. When I read him, it seems to me that I hear music; and involuntarily I apply to myself that verse of Uyeiski, —

"'I lie on a cloud,
Melted in calm,
With a dreamy tear in my eye:
I hear no breath.
A sea of violet odor
Surrounds me;
With palm placed in palm,
I sail – I fly – '

"Ah!" exclaimed she, suddenly, "if I knew him, I am sure that I should be in love with him. We should understand each other to a certainty."

"Happily he is married," answered Pan Victor, dryly.

Panna Yadviga inclined her head a little, repressed a half smile on her lips, till the dimples appeared in her cheeks, and, looking askance at Pan Victor, she inquired, —

"Why do you say, happily?"

"Happily for all those for whom life would have no attraction in the case you have just mentioned."

When he said this, Pan Victor was very tragic.

"Oh, you attribute too much to me!"

Pan Victor passed into lyric poetry, "You are an angel —

"Oh, that is all well enough – but let us talk of something else."

"Then you do not like Eli?"

"A moment ago I began to hate him."

"Oh, you put on ugly faces! I ask you to become serene, and tell me your favorite poet."

"Sovinski," muttered Pan Victor, gloomily.

"But I simply fear him. Irony, blood, fire – wild outbursts."

"Such things do not terrify me at all," said Pan Victor; then he looked so valiant, that a dog, which had run out from a cottage, hid its tail under its belly and withdrew in fright.

Now they arrived at the house of four tenements; in the window appeared an upturned nose, a goatee, and a bright-green cravat; they halted before a pretty cottage covered with wild grapevines, and looking with its rear windows on a pond.

"You see what a nice little house this is; it is the only poetical place in Barania-Glova."

"What house is it?"

"Formerly, it was an asylum. Here village children learned to read, when their parents were in the field. Papa had this house built purposely."

"And what is in it now?"

"Now, kegs of brandy are in it – "

But they did not finish their thoughts, for they came to a great puddle in which lay a number of pigs, "justly so-called for their filth." To pass around that puddle, they had to go near Repa's cottage; so they turned in that direction.

Repa's wife was sitting on a log before the gate, with her elbows on her knees, and her chin on one hand. Her face was pale, and, as it were, turned to stone; her eyes were red; her look dull, and fixed on the distance without thought. She had not even heard the passers-by; but the young woman saw her, and said, —

"Good-evening!"

Marysia stood up, and, approaching, seized the feet of Panna Yadviga and Pan Victor, and began to weep in silence.

"What is the matter?" asked the young lady.

"Oh, thou my golden berry, my dawn! perhaps God has sent thee to me! Take thou my part, our consolation!"

Here the woman narrated the whole affair, interrupting the story with kissing the young lady's hands, or rather her gloves, which she stained with tears; the young lady became greatly confused; anxiety was clearly evident on her pretty, important little face, and she knew not what to say; but at last she said, with hesitation, —

"What can I advise you, my woman? I am very sorry for you. Indeed – what can I advise? – go to papa – maybe papa – But farewell."

Then Panna Yadviga raised her almond-colored robe till the stripes of her blue-and-white stockings were visible above her boots; and she and Pan Victor passed on.

"May God bless thee, most beautiful flower!" called Repa's wife, after her.

Panna Yadviga grew sad; and it seemed to Pan Victor that he saw tears in her eyes; so, to drive away sadness, he began to talk of Krashevski and other smaller fish in the literary sea; and in that conversation, which became gradually more lively, both of them soon forgot that "disagreeable incident."

"To the mansion!" said Repa's wife, meanwhile. "And that is where I ought to have gone first. Ei! I am a stupid woman!"

CHAPTER VIII

THE mansion had a porch covered with grapevines, and a view on the yard as well as on a road lined with poplars. In summer Pan and Pani Skorabevski drank coffee on this porch after dinner. They were sitting there now, and with them Father Ulanovski, Father Chyzik, and Stolbitski, the inspector of mines. Pan Skorabevski was a man of rather full habit, and ruddy, with large mustaches. He sat in an armchair, smoking a pipe; Pani Skorabevski was pouring tea; the inspector, who was a sceptic, was jesting with the old canon.

"Now, reverend benefactor, just tell us of that famous battle," said he.

The canon put his hand to his ear, and inquired, —