a Russian baby has a very much finer cradle than an English baby. A
long fir pole is fastened in the middle and at one end to the beams in
the ceiling of the hut, so that the other end swings free, just below
the rafters. From this end is hung a big basket, and on the ropes by
which the basket hangs are fastened shawls of bright colours. The baby
is tucked in the basket, the shawls closed round it; and as the mother
or the nurse sits at her spinning, she just kicks the basket gently
now and again, and it swings up and down from the end of the pole, as
if it were hung from the branch of a tree.
This baby had a fine new basket and a larch pole, newly fixed, white
and shining, under the dark beams of the ceiling. It had presents
besides old Peter's gun. It had a fine wooden spoon with a picture on
it of a cottage and a fish. It had a wooden bowl and a painted mug,
bought from one of the peddling barges that go up and down the rivers
selling chairs and crockery, just like the caravans that travel our
English roads. And also, although it was so young, it had a little
sacred picture, made of metal, a picture of St. Nikolai; because this
was St. Nikolai's day, and the baby was called Nikolai.
There was a samovar already steaming in the cottage, and a great cake
of pastry, and cabbage and egg and fish. And there were cabbage soup
with sour cream, and black bread and a little white bread, and red
kisel jelly and a huge jug of milk.
And everybody ate and drank and talked as if they were never going to
stop. The sun was warm, and presently the men went outside and sat on
a log, leaning their backs against the wall of the hut and making
cigarettes and smoking, or eating sunflower seeds, cracking the husks
with their teeth, taking out the white kernels, and blowing the husks
away. And the women sat in the hut, and now and then brought out
glasses of hot tea to the men, and then went back again to talk of
what a fine man the baby would be, and to remember other babies. And
the old women looked at the young mothers and laughed, and said that
they could remember the days when they were christened--when they were
babies themselves, no bigger than the little Nikolai who swung in the
basket and squalled, or slept proudly, just as if he knew that all the
world belonged to him because he was so very young. And Vanya and
Maroosia ate sunflower seeds too, and sometimes played outside the
cottage and sometimes inside; but mostly stood v
|