"Well, what will keep us from getting lost? Besides, the horses will get tired in the snow. What then?"
"Well, nothing."
"But we may freeze to death."
"Of course we may, because we don't see any hayricks just now; but we may come, you know, to the Kalmucks. First thing, we must look at the snow."
"But you aren't afraid of freezing to death, are you, bárin?" asked the little old man with quavering voice.
Notwithstanding that he was making sport of me, as it were, it was plain that he was trembling all over.
"Yes: it is growing very cold," I replied.
"Ekh! bárin! You ought to do like me. No, no: stamp up and down,—that will warm you up."
"Do it the first thing when you get to the sledge," said the mentor.