d our wine.'

'Eh, we didn't bother,' said the old man; 'when Daddy Eroshka was your
age he already stole herds of horses from the Nogay folk and drove them
across the Terek. Sometimes we'd give a fine horse for a quart of vodka
or a cloak.'

'Why so cheap?' asked Lukashka.

'You're a fool, a fool, Mark,' said the old man contemptuously. 'Why,
that's what one steals for, so as not to be stingy! As for you, I
suppose you haven't so much as seen how one drives off a herd of
horses? Why don't you speak?'

'What's one to say. Daddy?' replied Lukashka. 'It seems we are not the
same sort of men as you were.'

'You're a fool. Mark, a fool! "Not the same sort of men!"' retorted the
old man, mimicking the Cossack lad. 'I was not that sort of Cossack at
your age.'

'How's that?' asked Lukashka.

The old man shook his head contemptuously.

'Daddy Eroshka was simple; he did not grudge anything! That's why I was
kunak with all Chechnya. A kunak would come to visit me and I'd make
him drunk with vodka and make him happy and put him to sleep with me,
and when I went to see him I'd take him a present--a dagger! That's the
way it is done, and not as you do nowadays: the only amusement lads
have now is to crack seeds and spit out the shells!' the old man
finished contemptuously, imitating the present-day Cossacks cracking
seeds and spitting out the shells.

'Yes, I know,' said Lukashka; 'that's so!'

'If you wish to be a fellow of the right sort, be a brave and not a
peasant! Because even a peasant can buy a horse--pay the money and take
the horse.'

They were silent for a while.

'Well, of course it's dull both in the village and the cordon, Daddy:
but there's nowhere one can go for a bit of sport. All our fellows are
so timid. Take Nazarka. The other day when we went to the Tartar
village, Girey Khan asked us to come to Nogay to take some horses, but
no one went, and how was I to go alone?'

'And what of Daddy? Do you think I am quite dried up? ... No, I'm not
dried up. Let me have a horse and I'll be off to Nogay at once.'

'What's the good of talking nonsense!' said Luke. 'You'd better tell me
what to do about Girey Khan. He says, "Only bring horses to the Terek,
and then even if you bring a whole stud I'll find a place for them."
You see he's also a shaven-headed Tartar--how's one to believe him?'

'You may trust Girey Khan, all his kin were good people. His father too
was a faithful kunak. But listen to Daddy an