[25]. Litvà: Lithuania.
[26]. Teren-bush: thorn.
[27]. Deebrova: oak forest.
[28]. Solamàkha: flour mixed with water. Cossacks on the march “travelled light” and were content, nay proud, of the meagre fare mentioned.
[29]. Yanichars: slaves of the Turks.
[30]. Zaporogians: at the mouth of the Dnieper river was an island called Hortitsa; Count Dmitro Vishnivetzki (Baida) placed there two thousand Cossacks in a fortress to protect Ukraina from the invasion of the Tartars. Then this fortress—called “Seech”—became the refuge of every kind of outlaw from Poland and the Ukraine. Later a semi-monastic order of Knights was organised to fight unbelievers. Time passed, and “Seech” became a military high school for Eastern Europe. The Cossacks fought to keep the Tartars in the Crimea and made raids on Turkey, with Constantinople as special objective. When the Town Cossacks revolted against Poland, the Zaporogian Cossacks joined them and their stronghold became the refuge of Ukrainian democracy. In 1775 Seech was destroyed by Catherine II.
[31]. I.e. his skin.
[32]. Kerchief.
[33]. In the Ukraine at the end of the eighteenth and beginning of the nineteenth century the Oprishki, or outlaws of the Carpathians, and the robbers of the Ukraine, were so famed that in several instances they have become legendary heroes. History gives us three great outlaws: In the Poltava Government, Harkusha; in Kiev, Karmeluk; and in the Carpathians, where the tongue of the Hutzuls was spoken, Alexa Dobush. These brigands were like our English Robin Hood, robbing only the rich and dividing the spoil among the poor.
[34]. Topeer: Hutzul weapon, stick with iron barb, a battle-axe.