Do I not offer thee my gifts,
(For I have gifts)—my brown eyes—
My young strength, bought by the rich?
... Perchance they have mated my sweetheart to another.
Teach me, O Fortune, how to forget,
How to drown my grief in drink and song.”
And as he journeyed over the steppes, lonesome, unhappy, he wept—
And out on the steppes, on a grave, a grey owl hooted.
The Tchumaki,[[46]] greatly troubled, entreated:
“Bless us, Ataman, that we may reach the village,