is collar, and had two little bells
hanging from it at the top. The wooden hoop was painted green with
little red flowers. The harness was mostly of ropes, but that did not
matter so long as it held together. The horse had a long tail and
mane, and looked as untidy as a little boy; but he had a green ribbon
in his forelock in honour of the christening, and he could go like
anything, and never got tired.

When all was ready, old Peter arranged a lot of soft fresh hay in the
cart for the children to sit in. Hay is the best thing in the world to
sit in when you drive in a jolting Russian cart. Old Peter put in a
tremendous lot, so that the horse could eat some of it while waiting
in the village, and yet leave them enough to make them comfortable on
the journey back. Finally, old Peter took a gun that he had spent all
the evening before in cleaning, and laid it carefully in the hay.

"What is the gun for?" asked Vanya.

"I am to be a godparent," said old Peter, "and I want to give him a
present. I could not give him a better present than a gun, for he
shall be a forester, and a good shot, and you cannot begin too early."

Presently Vanya and Maroosia were tucked into the hay, and old Peter
climbed in with the plaited reins, and away they went along the narrow
forest track, where the wheels followed the ruts and splashed through
the deep holes; for the spring was young, and the roads had not yet
dried. Some of the deepest holes had a few pine branches laid in them,
but that was the only road-mending that ever was done. Overhead were
the tall firs and silver birches with their little pale round leaves;
and somewhere, not far away, a cuckoo was calling, while the murmur of
the wild pigeons never stopped for a moment.

They drove on and on through the forest, and at last came out from
among the trees into the open country, a broad, flat plain stretching
to the river. Far away they could see the big square sail of a boat,
swelled out in the light wind, and they knew that there was the river,
on the banks of which stood the village. They could see a small clump
of trees, and, as they came nearer, the pale green cupolas of the
white village church rising above the tops of the birches.

Presently they came to a rough wooden bridge, and crossed over a
little stream that was on its way to join the big river.

Vanya looked at it.

"Grandfather," he asked, "when the frost went, which was water
first--the big river or the littl