"Your own, to be sure."
"Mine? Have I a history? Poverty was born, and poverty is dead."
"Ah, please! We have nothing to do this evening; I dare not go to the inn. I beg you, good father, do tell me something of your life. It is so lonely there all by myself on the raft; in this way we can while away an hour or two, and I shall have learned something from you."
The old man smiled sweetly.
"But what can I tell you? There has been nothing unusual in my life; there are a great many lives like mine in this world. I have lived all alone, without friends, without brothers. Not even one being calls me cousin; not a living soul bears my name. Moreover, my child, you know that what gives an old man most pleasure is to talk about the days of his youth; therefore, if you are wise you will not call the wolf from the forest, for you never will be able to get rid of him again."
"Never mind; only talk to me, talk to me! I shall always be glad to listen."
"Well," began the old man, "I remember that when I was a very little boy I used to run about here in this very spot, on the shores of the Horyn, with other little villagers of my age. Ah, it mattered not then whether my head was bare or my shirt torn; no other days that I can recall seem so joyous and so sweetly happy as those."
"And your parents?"
"I do not remember them. I was six years old when they died of a terrible fever; and as they had come from Wolhynia, I had no relatives here, and was entirely alone. I see as through a mist the village watchman leading me away, as we came out of the cemetery to a neighbouring hut, where an old woman who called herself my foster-mother gave me a large plate of soup which I devoured greedily. I had eaten nothing for two days except a crust of dry bread which I had concealed in the bosom of my shirt. The next day I was sent into the fields to mind the geese; after that I was made to take care of the pigs; and finally, when it was found that I was not awkward, and that I knew how to take care of cattle, I was appointed to take the village cows to the meadow. Oh, how sweet a herdsman's life is! It is true that we had to go off with the cows at daybreak through the long grass all wet with dew; but to make up for it, we had a good nap in the middle of the day under the trees, when the cattle were at a safe distance from the wheat, and when our happy band of shepherds were frolicking in the furrows or in the great clearings. Cattle are not much trouble: they are quiet and intelligent; when once they are accustomed to their pastures, they will not go out of them even though beaten with a stick. If they are driven away once or twice from the oat or wheat fields, they never will go back there again; the boy has only to look at them and call to them from time to time, and then amuse himself as he pleases."
"But what pleasure can he have when he has no companions?"