There were about fifteen Cossacks.
The Tartars were frightened, and they stopped before they reached him. And Zhilín ran up to the Cossacks.
The Cossacks surrounded him, and asked:
"Who are you? Where do you come from?"
But Zhilín was beside himself, and he wept, and muttered:
"Brothers! Brothers!"
The soldiers ran out, and surrounded Zhilín: one gave him bread, another gruel, a third vódka; one covered him with a cloak, another broke off the lock.
The officers heard of it, and took him to the fortress. The soldiers were happy, and his companions came to see him.
Zhilín told them what had happened, and said:
"So I have been home, and got married! No, evidently that is not my fate."