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and talked to a group of these unhappy people. I asked
them where they had come from, and whither they intended
to go. Before I had received any intelligible answer, I
was surrounded by men, women, and children, who all
began to talk at the same time, so that I could only catch
a few broken words: “Your high nobility”... “merciful
barin”... “benefactor”... “for Christ’s sake”. The
women cried, the children stared at me. I quieted them,
and asked what they were all doing at this place.
“What are we doing?” repeated a piping voice with
mocking accent from the crowd. “We are burying our
dead, that’s what we are doing. Only to-day two babies
have died at the station.”
Two mujiks now came forward cap in hand and began
to talk both at the same time. “Shut up, Stepan; Vanushka
came first!” interrupted the same piping voice from the
crowd.
Vanushka began again: “Your high nobility, I and my
wife and children have come from Nikolaievsk, that is to
say, my wife was born in Busuluk, her father was servant
there, and we did not get more for our izba (farmer’s hut)
and the cow than what was needed for the ticket to
Petropavlovsk; and our debt to Andreitch we have to pay
afterwards”...
“The passport, the passport! Ach, Gospodee! (oh, Lord!)
That was what you had to tell the barin about,” again
interrupted the voice, which seemed to belong to some
leading man among the emigrants.
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