FIRST PEASANT. We have made an offering, so to say, with our whole heart. But there,—the business don't come into action nohow.
VASÍLY LEONÍDITCH. You should not be so stingy! Land is an important matter! I told you about planting mint. Or else tobacco would also do.
FIRST PEASANT. That's just it. Every kind of producks.
THIRD PEASANT. And you help us, master. Ask your father. Or else how are we to live? There's so little land. A fowl, let's say, there's not enough room for a fowl to run about.
SAHÁTOF [having put the spoon into a bag belonging to the Third Peasant] C'est fait. Ready. Come along. [Exit].
VASÍLY LEONÍDITCH. So don't be stingy! Eh? Well, good-bye. [Exit].
THIRD PEASANT. Didn't I say, come to some lodging-house? Well, supposing we'd had to give three-pence each, then at least we'd have been in peace. As to here, the Lord be merciful! “Give us the money,” he says. What's that for?
SECOND PEASANT. He's drunk, I daresay.
Peasants turn their cups upside-down, rise, and cross themselves.
FIRST PEASANT. And d'you mind what a saying he threw out? Sowing mint! One must know how to understand them, that one must!