On this afternoon the weather was most clear, the sky was cloudless, and above the green canopy of the leaves there spread out the blue dome of the heavens—immense, limitless, transparently gray-tinted on the sides and deep blue above. In the sky stood the great golden sun; the space was flooded with light; the air was bright and serene, and far-off objects stood out distinctly, their forms clearly defined. From the height of heaven the eye of the great Creator embraced the whole earth; in the fields the grain bowed to Him with a golden wave, rustled the heavy heads of the wheat, and the delicate tasseled oats trembled like a cluster of tiny bells. In the air, filled with brightness here and there, floated the spring thread of the spider’s web, blue from the azure of the sky and golden from the sun, as if a veritable thread from the loom of the Mother of God.
In the vales between the fields of the waving grain stood dark-green meadows; here and there were crystal springs, around whose edges the grass was greener still; the whole meadows were sprinkled with yellow buttercups and dandelions which struck the eye with a profusion of golden brightness. In the wet places there thrived cypress trees, which had an air of coldness and moisture.
In the woods among the pine trees there were now both heat and silence. It seemed as if a dreamy stillness enveloped the whole world. Not a breath of wind stirred; the trees, grain, and grass were motionless. The leaves hung on the trees as if rocked to sleep; the birds had ceased their noises, and the moment of rest had come. But this rest seemed to come from an ineffable sweetness, and all nature seemed to meditate. Only the great expanse of heaven seemed to smile, and somewhere, high in the unknowable depths of its blue, the great and beneficent God was glad with the gladness of the fields, the woods, the meadows, and the waters.
Kasya and John were still busy in the woods collecting herbs, laughing gleefully and speaking to each other joyfully. Man is as artless as a bird; he will sing when he can, for this is his nature. John now began to sing a simple and touching song.
As Kasya and John sang in unison the last refrain of the song ended mournfully, and as if in accompaniment the echo repeated it in the dark depths of the woods; the pines gave resonance as the words ran between their trunks and died away in the far distance like a sigh, less distinct, light, ethereal; then silence.
Later Kasya sang a more cheerful song, beginning with the words:
This is a good song. A willful young girl quarrels with her lover and enumerates the means she intends to use to escape from him. But it is useless. When she says that she will be a golden ring and will roll away on the road, he says that he will quickly see and recover her. When she wants to be a golden fish in the water he sings to her of the silken net; when she wants to be a wild fowl on the lake he appears before her as a hunter. At last the poor maiden, seeing she is unable to hide herself from him on the earth, sings:
“I shall become a star in heaven,
Light to earth by will be given.
My love to thee I shall not render,
Nor my sweet will to thee surrender.”
But the undaunted youth answers: