hunter notes

Chapter 6 Berry Spring (1)
In early August, the weather is usually very hot.At this time, from noon to 8 o'clock, the most decisive and enthusiastic people can't go hunting, and the most loyal dogs begin to "lick the hunter's spurs", that is, squint their eyes in pain, stretch their tongues exaggeratedly, Slowly follow behind the master.The owner reprimanded it, but it just wagged its tail pitifully, with a look of embarrassment on its face, but it absolutely refused to walk ahead.Once, I went hunting in such weather.I longed for a shady place to rest, if only for a moment, but I endured it.My indefatigable dog continued to scout frantically through the bushes, though he knew that such frantic activity would have no effect.The suffocating heat finally made me think about saving our last strength and strength.I came at last to the Ista River, already familiar to my kind reader, and walked down the cliff, and over the wet yellow sand, to a nearby spring known as "Berry Spring."The spring flowed from a cleft in a narrowing and deep valley on the bank, and flowed into the river not far away with a pleasant, incessant murmur.On the slopes of the valley was a dense oak grove; near the spring was a short, velvety green meadow; and the sun hardly ever fell upon its cool, silvery waters.I approached the spring.There is a spoon made of birch bark on the grass, which is left by passing farmers for everyone's convenience.I drank enough of the spring water, and lay down in the shade, looking around.When the spring flowed into the river, it formed an inlet, so that the place was once a ripple.Beside this bay, sat two old men with their backs to me.One of them, a very stocky, tall figure, in a dark green, neat coat, and a pile cap, was fishing there; , holding a can of bait on his lap, stroking his gray-haired head with his hands from time to time, as if to keep it from the sun.I looked at him more seriously. It was Stabushka of Shumishino.Allow me to introduce this man to the readers.

A few versts away from my village is the large village of Shumishino, where there is a stone chapel dedicated to St. Kozima and St. Damian.Opposite this chapel, a large landowner's house formerly stood out here, with various outbuildings, lumberyards, workshops, stables, cellars, garages, baths, makeshift kitchens, guest rooms and caretaker's quarters. Wing rooms, greenhouses, swings for civilians, and other scattered and useful buildings.There used to be a wealthy landowner family living in this mansion, and they had been living a peaceful life. Suddenly, one day, all these properties were burned down.The owners moved elsewhere, and the house fell into disrepair.The vast expanse of scorched earth has been turned into a vegetable garden, with bricks everywhere.They built a hut at random out of the last logs left, with the roof of ship planks bought ten years ago for the purpose of building a Gothic pavilion, and Mitrofan the gardener took his wife Ake. Signia lives in this house with seven children.The master ordered Mitrofan to bring greens and wild vegetables to the master's house 150 versts away; let Aksinya take care of a Tyrolean cow bought at a high price from Moscow, But she couldn't have any more children, so no milk has been produced since I bought it; there is also a smoke-colored crested drake--the only "Master's" poultry--also entrusted to her care; Being young doesn't give them any tasks, but it makes them all lazy.Twice I have spent the night at the gardener's house.When passing by, I often buy cucumbers from him. Who knows why these cucumbers have grown very large in summer, tasteless, thick and yellow.It was at his house that I first met Stabushka.Only the Mitrofans and Gerasim, an old and deaf elder, lived here in the hut of the soldier's one-eyed wife; there was not a single domestic servant in Shumishino, so I will introduce the reader Don't think of him as an ordinary person, especially as a servant.

As long as you are a human being, you will have what kind of relationship you have in society; as long as you are a domestic servant, even if you don't get paid, you will at least get the so-called "ration".Stabushka never received any subsidies, he had no relatives, no one knew of his existence.He has almost no background, no one talks about him, and he is probably not in the household survey.There is an indeterminate rumor that he was someone's servant at such a time; but who was he, from what place, whose son, how came to be a resident of Shumishino, how did he get the corrugated The silk coat that he had worn since ancient times, where he lived, what he did for a living... Absolutely no one knew anything about these things, and, to tell the truth, no one wanted to know about them.Old Father Trofimitch, who knew the genealogy of all the servants through four generations, once said that he remembered the Turkish woman brought back by the dead lord Alexis Romanych's brigade commander when he returned from a campaign, and Handbushka is a relative.On holidays, when, according to the old Russian custom, it is common to give and entertain people with buckwheat pies and green wine—even on these days Stabushka does not come to the prepared table and wine barrels, and does not salute , don't come near to kiss his hand, don't drink a glass of wine from the steward's fat hand in order to wish the master's health in his presence; give him.On Easter days, he also participates in the kissing ceremony, but he does not roll up his greasy sleeves, does not take out his red egg from his back pocket, does not pant and blink, and offer it to the young gentlemen Or present it to your wife.He lived in the storage room behind the henhouse in summer, and slept in the changing room of the bathhouse in winter; when it was coldest, he spent the night in the hayloft.He was often seen, sometimes even kicked, but no one spoke to him; and he himself seemed never to speak.After the fire he lodged—“delayed,” as the Orel people say—in the house of the gardener Mitrofan.The gardener ignored him, didn't say "you stay in my house" to him, but didn't drive him out either.Stabushka didn't really live in the gardener's house either, he lived in the vegetable garden.He didn't make a sound; when he sneezed and coughed, he covered his mouth with his hand as if in fear; he was always running around quietly like an ant.And it's all about making a living, just making a living.

Indeed, Stabushka would have starved to death if he hadn't been so busy working from morning to night for his own food.The hard part is not knowing what to eat every day!Stabushka sometimes sat under the fence and gnawed turnips, or crouched and peeled a dirty cabbage; Take a few pieces of black stuff and put them in the pot; sometimes in your own storeroom, beat a piece of wood and nail it to make a shelf for bread.He does all this with care, as if in secret, and when you look at him, he hides.Sometimes, he left suddenly for two or three days, but of course no one noticed this... soon, he appeared again, and secretly put the firewood under the iron shelf by the fence again.His face was small, his eyes were yellow, his hair fell down to his eyebrows, his nose was pointed, his ears were large and transparent, like those of a bat, and his beard seemed to have been shaved off two weeks ago and had remained at this length.It was him with another old man that I met on the banks of the Ishta.

I walked up to them, greeted them, and sat next to them.I also knew Stabushka's companion, Mihailo Savelyev, a freed serf of Count Pyotr Ilyich's family, nicknamed "Mist".He lodged with a consumptive bourgeois of Bollhof, the proprietor of an inn where I often lodged.Young officials and other idlers (unseen by merchants buried in striped feather mattresses) on the Orel road can still see a completely deserted house not far from the great village of Troitsky. A two-story wooden building with a collapsed roof and sealed windows jutted out from the road.Nothing more desolate than this ruin could be conceived on a sunny noon.Here once lived Count Pyotr Ilyich, a wealthy dignitary of the old century, famous for his hospitality.Sometimes people from all over the province gather at his house, and they dance to the deafening music of the family's own band, to the crackling of fireworks and fireworks, and have fun; There may be more than one old woman who sighs and recalls old times and past youth.The count gave long banquets, and spent long periods of time circling among his many flattering guests, smiling genially.But his property is not enough for him to squander his life.Completely bankrupt, he went to Petersburg to find a job for himself, and died in a hotel without getting any solution. "Fog" is his steward, and the Earl has obtained the certificate of liberation before his death.The man was about seventy years old, and he was well-proportioned and pleasant-looking.He always smiled, and now maybe only people in Catherine's time can smile like this: kind and solemn, his lips slowly protrude and slowly retract when he speaks, his eyes are kindly squinted, and his speech is slightly nasal.He blows his nose and sniffs snuff, all calmly and calmly, as if he is doing a big job.

"Well, how is it, Mihailo Savelyev," I said, "have you caught a lot of fish?"

"Here, please look into the fish cage: I have already caught two perch and the big head, there should be five... Stobushka, take a look."

(End of this chapter)