ildyeevs killed a sheep and ate of it in the
morning, at dinner-time, and in the evening; they ate it ravenously, and
the children got up at night to eat more. Kiryak was fearfully drunk for
three whole days; he drank up everything, even his boots and cap, and
beat Marya so terribly that they had to pour water over her. And then
they were all ashamed and sick.

However, even in Zhukovo, in this "Slaveytown," there was once an
outburst of genuine religious enthusiasm. It was in August, when
throughout the district they carried from village to village the Holy
Mother, the giver of life. It was still and overcast on the day when
they expected _Her_ at Zhukovo. The girls set off in the morning to meet
the ikon, in their bright holiday dresses, and brought Her towards the
evening, in procession with the cross and with singing, while the bells
pealed in the church across the river. An immense crowd of villagers and
strangers flooded the street; there was noise, dust, a great crush....
And the old father and Granny and Kiryak--all stretched out their hands
to the ikon, looked eagerly at it and said, weeping:

"Defender! Mother! Defender!"

All seemed suddenly to realize that there was not an empty void
between earth and heaven, that the rich and the powerful had not taken
possession of everything, that there was still a refuge from injury,
from slavish bondage, from crushing, unendurable poverty, from the
terrible vodka.

"Defender! Mother!" sobbed Marya. "Mother!"

But the thanksgiving service ended and the ikon was carried away, and
everything went on as before; and again there was a sound of coarse
drunken oaths from the tavern.

Only the well-to-do peasants were afraid of death; the richer they were
the less they believed in God, and in the salvation of souls, and only
through fear of the end of the world put up candles and had services
said for them, to be on the safe side. The peasants who were rather
poorer were not afraid of death. The old father and Granny were told
to their faces that they had lived too long, that it was time they were
dead, and they did not mind. They did not hinder Fyokla from saying in
Nikolay's presence that when Nikolay died her husband Denis would get
exemption--to return home from the army. And Marya, far from fearing
death, regretted that it was so slow in coming, and was glad when her
children died.

Death they did not fear, but of every disease they had an exaggerated
terror. The m