Cossack

“ There an armed and mounted Cossack, on leave from the cordon, rides up to a hut and, leaning towards the window, knocks. In answer to the knock the handsome head of a young woman appears at the window and you can hear caressing, laughing voices. There a tattered Nogáy labourer, with prominent cheekbones, brings a load of reeds from the steppes, turns his creaking cart into the Cossack captain’s broad and clean courtyard, and lifts the yoke off the oxen that stand tossing their heads while he and his master shout to one another in Tartar. ”

“ Cossack children, spinning their tops wherever there is a smooth place in the street, are shrieking; women are climbing over fences to avoid going round. From every chimney rises the odorous kisyak smoke. From every homestead comes the sound of increased bustle, precursor to the stillness of night.
Granny Ulítka, the wife of the Cossack cornet who is also teacher in the regimental school, goes out to the gates of her yard like the other women, and waits for the cattle which her daughter Maryánka is driving along the street. ”

“ The Cossack has come to rob and to plunder; he spares neither friend nor foe. He is the heir of the dead and of the dying, and he has come for his inheritance. If he sees a ring sparkling upon the hand of a grinning corpse, he springs from his horse and tears it off. ”

“ The Cossacks swarm again upon the battle-field, and again they approach the groaning warrior in the open grave; he has no longer a glittering uniform, but the Cossack takes all; the poor old mantle excites his greed—he tears it from the unresisting soldier; he opens his hands and takes out the half gulden which Ewald von Kleist had received from the Russian hussar.
Again he lies naked, again the muddy water forces into his wounds, and adds cruel torture to the agonies of death. So lies he till the next day, till the enemy takes pity upon him and carries him as a prisoner to Frankfort. ”

“ But great also is the boon of such a widely and freely-scattered repose in death! No feat of valour shall perish, and the Cossack's fame shall no more be cast away than the grain of powder on the gun-lock. The time shall come when some bard with gray beard flowing down on his breast, or peradventure some white-haired man, old in years but full of manly vigour, shall with soothsaying words tell of them with mighty utterance. ”

“ Scarcely an hour had passed since this conversation, when on a sudden the kettle-drums were beaten. All the Cossacks, the slightly tipsy as well as those who had not yet recovered their senses, appeared at once. Thousands of Cossack caps all at once covered the square. A rumour arose, "What's the matter? why did they beat the call? on what account?" At last, here and there were to be heard sentences, "Why is the Cossack's strength to be lost? Why is there no war? The officials only think of fattening themselves! Righteousness seems to have left the world!" ”

“ 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. ”

“ A cloud covered my eyes, and I wished in my turn to kiss her, but she escaped like a snake, murmuring as she did so, "To-night, when everything is quiet, meet me on the shore." Then she disappeared, upsetting as she did so my tea-urn and my solitary light.
"She is the very mischief!" cried my Cossack, who had been looking out for his share of the tea.
He then lay down on his bench; and gradually my agitation subsided.
"Listen," I said to him. "If you hear a pistol-shot, hurry down as fast as you can to the shore." ”

“ The Cossacks are trained from early childhood to the use of the lance and sword, and familiarized to a horse peculiar to the country,—tractable, hardy, swift and sure-footed, beyond any breed perhaps in the world. On the actual field of battle the Cossack's mode of attack is singular; instead of acting in line, a body of them about to charge disperse at the word of command, and joining in a loud yell and hurrah, each acting individually upon the object of attack, whether infantry, cavalry or artillery, to all of which they have been in this wild way of fighting most formidable assailants. ”

“ A Cossack in a dark Circassian coat and a white sheepskin cap passed along the other side of the fence (it was Luke) , and a tall woman with a white kerchief on her head went past Olénin. “You and I have nothing to do with one another” was what Maryánka’s firm step gave him to understand. He followed her with his eyes to the porch of the hut, and he even saw her through the window take off her kerchief and sit down. And suddenly a feeling of lonely depression and some vague longings and hopes, and envy of someone or other, overcame the young man’s soul. ”

“ More than one Cossack shall be bewailed by his old mother, who shall beat her withered bosom with her bony hands; more than one woman shall be widowed in Glookhov, Nemeerov, Chernigov, and other towns! Poor widows will every day run to the market, stop every passer-by, to have a peep at his face, to see if he be not the one dearest above all; but many Cossacks shall pass the city, and yet the one dearest above all, shall not be among them. ”

“ Meanwhile from the steppe slow, ponderous grey oxen with sharp horns are drawing an endless succession of wagon-loads of threshed grain through rich, black, sootlike dust. Patiently the beasts' round eyes regard the earth, while on the top of each load there lolls a Cossack who, with face sunburnt to the last pitch of swarthiness, and eyes reddened with exposure to the wind, and beard matted, seemingly solidified, with dust and sweat, is clad in a shirt drab with grime, and has a shaggy Persian cap thrust to the back of his head. ”

“ The Cossack’s equipment is most peculiar, and it is so arranged that he can creep along, even when on horseback, quite noiselessly. A proverb in Russia runs: “One dragoon makes more noise than a regiment of Cossacks!” The Cossack’s 180claim is that what mortal man can do he will do, and a great deal more besides. As a rule he is a small man and his horse is a small horse, in fact what we should call a pony. No cavalryman is on better terms with his mount, and many and many a time a Cossack has given his life for his horse. ”

“ The air was hushed, the footfalls and the snorting of the horses were the only sounds to be heard, and even they quickly died away.
The men rode almost silently. A Cossack always carries his weapons so that they neither jingle nor rattle. Jingling weapons are a terrible disgrace to a Cossack. Two other Cossacks from the village caught the party up and exchanged a few words. Lukáshka’s horse either stumbled or caught its foot in some grass, and became restive—which is a sign of bad luck among the Cossacks, and at such a time was of special importance. ”

“ The life of officers stationed in a Cossack village has long had its own definite form. Just as every cadet or officer when in a fort regularly drinks porter, plays cards, and discusses the rewards given for taking part in the expeditions, so in the Cossack villages he regularly drinks chikhir with his hosts, treats the girls to sweet-meats and honey, dangles after the Cossack women, and falls in love, and occasionally marries there. Olénin always took his own path and had an unconscious objection to the beaten tracks. ”

“ A Cossack returning from shooting calls out in jest: “Lift it higher, shameless thing!” and points his gun at her. The woman lets down her smock and drops the wood. An old Cossack, returning home from fishing with his trousers tucked up and his hairy grey chest uncovered, has a net across his shoulder containing silvery fish that are still struggling; and to take a short cut climbs over his neighbour’s broken fence and gives a tug to his coat which has caught on the fence. There a woman is dragging a dry branch along and from round the corner comes the sound of an axe. ”

“ But he could not see far yet, from the fog, though he did see the column of unfortunates going out into the wilderness with the Cossack soldiers.
Peter rather feared the Cossacks. They were “free men”—big swaggering fellows with blue breeches and yellow stripes on their tunics and some of them with colored tops in their tall shlapkas—round caps of fuzzy wool. And though Peter feared the Cossacks, he was also proud of them, for they were a part of Holy Russia and the power of the Czar flashed from the points of their lances as they galloped over the plains. ”

“ There were merchants in front of their stores, boys who tried hard to keep step with the horses, women returning from market with baskets on their arms, all gazing with appreciation at what was a daily sight. How very desirable it seemed to me to be one of such a company. How glad I was that my brother belonged to it, and that my father was a Cossack. Hoping to impress a pretty little girl who stood near me, I took off my felt cap with its yellow cloth top, symbolic of the East Siberian Cossacks, and then having looked at it, slowly put it on again. ”

“ Balaban fled at the utmost speed of his oars, took his stand straight under the sun, so as not to be seen by the Turkish ship. All night long after this did the Cossacks bale out the water from the boats with their scoops and caps, and mend the rent planks; of their Cossack trowsers they made sails, caught the wind, and escaped from the swiftest of all the Turkish ships. And not only did they safely return to the Ssiecha, but brought a gold embroidered dress to the abbot of the monastery of Kieff, and a plate of pure silver for the church of the Ssiecha. ”

“ The two older sisters were unusually graceful on horseback, more so than Marie and I.
Cossack horses were especially fascinating to me, since they seemed to understand one’s very thoughts. Tatiana described to me how the Cossack and his horse grow up together. Training begins when the young Cossack is given a horse, a progeny of a Cossack horse, trained to the requirements of the Cossack regiment. From then on boy and horse are one, inseparable, [Pg 81] each learning to understand the other: the boy is the head and the horse is the body. ”

“ Not unlike a sack of potatoes on legs, your average Cossack, when he has dismounted, has more the clumsiness of the clown than the cut of the crack cavalry soldier about him, while his peculiar aversion to water at once negatives any notion of personal smartness, from a European point of view. ”

“ He pulled his long Cossack forelock and gave an awkward bow.
"Madam, we must strike the Vistula and make for Grodno, or Vilno."
"What? Tramp four hundred versts?" She was horrified. "We haven't as much as a horse, let alone a cart."
"Four hundred versts," he repeated. "I did not know. I don't see how we are to reach Warsaw before it is German." He turned to Ian. "Do you, sir, help me lay my little horse in its grave. Then we can decide."
Hastily they put it into a trench, and the Cossack kicked earth over it, telling his story, meanwhile, in odd, broken Polish, of which he was very proud. ”

“ The young Cossack rocked his body as if already in the saddle.
"Won't you permit me to go?"
"Muttonhead! Shall I send one on whose face are the imprints of all the Devil's ten fingers? Pick out the youngest, the handsomest and the stupidist of the sotnia and send him over. The kind that believes anything anybody tells him. Then they over there will believe him. And what we are going to do nobody but you and I will know. Well, have you any such 'steed of God?'"
The sotnik strikes his body with both hands, smiles and nods. "There is a Raskolnik here." ”

“ Often it seriously occurred to him to throw up everything, to get registered as a Cossack, to buy a hut and cattle and marry a Cossack woman (only not Maryánka, whom he conceded to Lukáshka) , and to live with Daddy Eróshka and go shooting and fishing with him, and go with the Cossacks on their expeditions. “Why ever don’t I do it? What am I waiting for?” he asked himself, and he egged himself on and shamed himself. “Am I afraid of doing what I hold to be reasonable and right? ”

“ The Cossack trio—two brothers and a young woman—gave an interesting exhibition of Cossack dancing, interspersed with dialogue in Russian, which delighted the doughboys present.
In a couple of days we put on a show of our own at the Aquarium, which General Graves, and many officers from all the Allied commands, attended as his guests. We had gymnasts, black-face comedians, vocal and stringed quartettes, and a regular vaudeville program of some dozen acts, including the Cossacks, with the regimental band of the Thirty-first Infantry. ”

“ You might have killed the horses. Why, it's only yesterday that I saw you."
"Don't be grouchy, father," said Dimitri. "We walked half of the way. I am very well aware that a Cossack's first duty is to his horse; his second to himself." And as if to demonstrate this, he turned to where I was trying to climb into his saddle and said seriously: "No, Vanka, don't worry him now. He is too tired. Better loosen his saddle girths, take off his bridle, and lead him to the stable. Don't forget to put as much straw as possible under his feet. ”