has made everything for
the joy of man. There is no sin in any of it. Take example from an
animal. It lives in the Tartar's reeds or in ours. Wherever it happens
to go, there is its home! Whatever God gives it, that it eats! But our
people say we have to lick red-hot plates in hell for that. And I think
it's all a fraud,' he added after a pause.

'What is a fraud?' asked Olenin.

'Why, what the preachers say. We had an army captain in Chervlena who
was my kunak: a fine fellow just like me. He was killed in Chechnya.
Well, he used to say that the preachers invent all that out of their
own heads. "When you die the grass will grow on your grave and that's
all!"' The old man laughed. 'He was a desperate fellow.'

'And how old are you?' asked Olenin.

'The Lord only knows! I must be about seventy. When a Tsaritsa reigned
in Russia I was no longer very small. So you can reckon it out. I must
be seventy.'

'Yes you must, but you are still a fine fellow.'

'Well, thank Heaven I am healthy, quite healthy, except that a woman, a
witch, has harmed me....'

'How?'

'Oh, just harmed me.'

'And so when you die the grass will grow?' repeated Olenin.

Eroshka evidently did not wish to express his thought clearly. He was
silent for a while.

'And what did you think? Drink!' he shouted suddenly, smiling and
handing Olenin some wine.

Chapter XV

'Well, what was I saying?' he continued, trying to remember. 'Yes,
that's the sort of man I am. I am a hunter. There is no hunter to equal
me in the whole army. I will find and show you any animal and any bird,
and what and where. I know it all! I have dogs, and two guns, and nets,
and a screen and a hawk. I have everything, thank the Lord! If you are
not bragging but are a real sportsman, I'll show you everything. Do you
know what a man I am? When I have found a track--I know the animal. I
know where he will lie down and where he'll drink or wallow. I make
myself a perch and sit there all night watching. What's the good of
staying at home? One only gets into mischief, gets drunk. And here
women come and chatter, and boys shout at me--enough to drive one mad.
It's a different matter when you go out at nightfall, choose yourself a
place, press down the reeds and sit there and stay waiting, like a
jolly fellow. One knows everything that goes on in the woods. One looks
up at the sky: the stars move, you look at them and find out from them
how the time goes. One looks round