stratagem in which she had assisted
in order to procure money, and that the ever-present consciousness
thereof would betray itself to the sharp eyes of her husband. Certain it
is, that the demeanor of the latter towards her and his household began
to change about the end of the summer. He seemed to have a haunting
suspicion, that, in some way, he had been, or was about to be,
overreached. He grew peevish, suspicious, and more violent than ever in
his excesses.

When Mishka, the dissipated bear already described, bit off one of the
ears of Basil, a hunter belonging to the castle, and Basil drew his
knife and plunged it into Mishka's heart, Prince Alexis punished the
hunter by cutting off his other ear, and sending him away to a distant
estate. A serf, detected in eating a few of the pickled cherries
intended for the Prince's _botvinia_, was placed in a cask, and pickled
cherries packed around him up to the chin. There he was kept until
almost flayed by the acid. It was ordered that these two delinquents
should never afterwards be called by any other names than "Crop-Ear" and
"Cherry."

But the Prince's severest joke, which, strange to say, in no wise
lessened his popularity among the serfs, occurred a month or two later.
One of his leading passions was the chase,--especially the chase in his
own forests, with from one to two hundred men, and no one to dispute his
Lordship. On such occasions, a huge barrel of wine, mounted upon a sled,
always accompanied the crowd, and the quantity which the hunters
received depended upon the satisfaction of Prince Alexis with the game
they collected.

Winter had set in early and suddenly, and one day, as the Prince and his
retainers emerged from the forest with their forenoon's spoil, and found
themselves on the bank of the Volga, the water was already covered with
a thin sheet of ice. Fires were kindled, a score or two of hares and a
brace of deer were skinned, and the flesh placed on sticks to broil;
skins of mead foamed and hissed into the wooden bowls, and the cask of
unbroached wine towered in the midst. Prince Alexis had a good appetite;
the meal was after his heart; and by the time he had eaten a hare and
half a flank of venison, followed by several bowls of fiery wine, he was
in the humor for sport. He ordered a hole cut in the upper side of the
barrel, as it lay; then, getting astride of it, like a grisly Bacchus,
he dipped out the liquor with a ladle, and plied his thirsty