you,
and never will desert you!"

And the last, and also the best, recollection of things seen before the
night of which I speak was the recollection of an occasion when, one
late autumn, I had been crossing the Caspian Sea on an old two-masted
schooner laden with dried apricots, plums, and peaches. Sailing on her
also she had had some hundred fishermen from the Bozhi Factory, men
who, originally forest peasants of the Upper Volga, had been
well-built, bearded, healthy, goodhumoured, animal-spirited young
fellows, youngsters tanned with the wind, and salted with the sea
water; youngsters who, after working hard at their trade, had been
rejoicing at the prospect of returning home. And careering about the
deck like youthful bears as ever and anon lofty, sharp-pointed waves
had seized and tossed aloft the schooner, and the yards had cracked,
and the taut-run rigging had whistled, and the sails had bellied into
globes, and the howling wind had shaved off the white crests of
billows, and partially submerged the vessel in clouds of foam.

And seated on the deck with his broad back resting against the mainmast
there had been one young giant in particular. Clad in a white linen
shirt and a pair of blue serge trousers, and innocent alike of beard
and moustache, this young fellow had had full, red lips, blue, boyish,
and exceedingly translucent eyes, and a face intoxicated in excelsis
with the happiness of youth; while leaning across his knees as they had
rested sprawling over the deck there had been a young female trimmer of
fish, a wench as massive and tall as the young man himself, and a wench
whose face had become tanned to roughness with the sun and wind,
eyebrows dark, full, and as large as the wings of a swallow, breasts as
firm as stone, and teats around which, as they projected from the folds
of a red bodice, there had lain a pattern of blue veins.

The broad, iron-black palm of the young fellow's long, knotted hand had
been resting on the woman's left breast, with the arm bare to the
elbow; while in his right hand, as he had sat gazing pensively at the
woman's robust figure, there had been grasped a tin mug from which some
of the red liquor had scattered stains over the front of his linen
shirt.

Meanwhile, around the pair there had been hovering some of the
youngster's comrades, who, with coats buttoned to the throat, and caps
gripped to prevent their being blown away by the wind, had employed
themselves with sca