Many a time the old Sword had pierced men's hearts, and then their hot blood flowed along his blade. He therefore cast a shuddering and anxious look upon the fracture, expecting to see it bleed. He saw, however, nothing but stone; the whole beauty consisted of marble.... The marble was white as snow; it was irreproachably fair, but yet it was only marble, and nothing more.
'MY OWN'
(A Siberian Fairy Tale)
HE banks of the Vagaï are beautiful—very beautiful[9]—in some places at least. Steep, almost overhanging, and high as the walls of a fortress bastion, they rise frowning above the river sternly; yet they are fair with the rich verdure of the forest that crowns their heights. This forest is of many kinds. The century-old fir-trees, with trunks that three men could not gird with outstretched arms, rise in straight, dark-red columns, so high that to look up at even the lowest branches you must throw your head back till your hat falls off; beside them the gray-barked aspens quiver in every leaf, as if frightened at the twisted, snaky black trunks of the bird-cherry—the tree that smells so sweet in early spring when the white blossoms cover it like a sheet of snow. The gentle rowan is not noticeable for its height; its feathery leaves are the only thing that could attract your attention. But wait till autumn comes; then it is hung all over with clusters of scarlet berries, and brightens up the forest. The mighty cedar, with its long, grand sweeps of feathery needles, towers up higher even than its comrade the fir; here and there beneath the trees is scattered about an undergrowth of young pines, almost branchless, like bristles or long sticks standing up out of the earth. But the commonest trees in this forest are certainly silver birches. The trunks of these birches stand out sometimes straight and slender, with delicate heads of foliage, looking like cadets in their white shirts; sometimes gnarled, branchy, knotted, with the air of a burly peasant, rugged with labour.
Underneath, at the base of all these tree-trunks, so different in thickness, height, and colour, all the ground is covered with masses of bright flowers, and a carpet of grass that buries you waist-deep when you walk. And the longer you look upon this forest scene the more varied, the more exquisite, it appears to you. There are so many beautiful shades of green—pale and delicate on the birch-trees, dark on the cedars, almost black on the pikhta. Here the trees cluster together on the river-bank, pressing one against the other, forming an impassable barrier,—there they draw back, as if wearied of following the course of the river, and leave a wide, open space, where you can see the edge of the nearest bank, and the barren precipice of the opposite one, also crowned with glorious green forest; and if you advance to the edge you can see, far below, the torrent itself, swift and mighty.
Ah yes, the Vagaï is beautiful! And not only is it beautiful, but it is a merry life there—in any case it is a merry life for the birds who live there. So many joys are theirs! The woodpeckers can find in the bark of the trees (especially the old stumps of fallen trees) fat caterpillars and beetles; for the snipe and woodcocks there are endless strawberries, bilberries, cranberries, thick clumps of wild oats and other edible grasses. The great cones, with their juicy nuts, cluster on the branches of the pines and giant cedars, like candles on a Christmas-tree, then late in autumn they fall to the ground. The clear, fresh water of the Vagaï seems to call you to bathe and drink. And then the bright sunshine, the transparent, fragrant air, the green carpet of the forest, the joyous company of comrades, with whom one can sing, chirp, hop, dart about, and fly like an arrow on light wings. What more can heart desire? Living such a life, should one not rejoice in this bright world, fling away all envy and malice, and share together with one's fellow-creatures all the delights which our common mother, Nature, gives?
So thought all the birds of the forest tract we are speaking of, and so they lived. Early, very early, in the morning, when the first scarlet flush shone in the sky to herald the golden sunbeams, one little bird would wake up and open its eyes, and there beside it another would have begun fluttering its wings, drinking the bright dewdrops from the leaves, pecking seeds from the grasses. Then the first bird would look at its friend, thinking, 'There's plenty for all;' and it, too, would begin chirruping, delighted to have a companion with whom to share both its labour and its rest. And both together would dart off and fly to the Vagaï to bathe. So the little birds lived happily, neither quarrelling nor disagreeing, helping one another in their work and dangers, and sharing together all that the bright world gave them.