This chapter is not one of old Peter's stories, though there are,
doubtless, some stories in it. It tells how Vanya and Maroosia drove
to the village to see a new baby.
Old Peter had a sister who lived in the village not so very far away
from the forest. And she had a plump daughter, and the daughter was
called Nastasia, and she was married to a handsome peasant called
Sergie, who had three cows, a lot of pigs, and a flock of fat geese.
And one day when old Peter had gone to the village to buy tobacco and
sugar and sunflower seeds, he came back in the evening, and said to
the children,--
"There's something new in the village."
"What sort of a something?" asked Vanya.
"Alive," said old Peter.
"Is there a lot of it?" asked Vanya.
"No, only one."
"Then it can't be pigs," said Vanya, in a melancholy voice. "I thought
it was pigs."
"Perhaps it is a little calf," said Maroosia.
"I know what it is," said Vanya.
"Well?"
"It's a foal. It's brown all over with white on its nose, and a lot of
white hairs in its tail."
"No."
"What is it then, grandfather?"
"I'll tell you, little pigeons. It's small and red, and it's got a
bumpy head with hair on it like the fluff of a duckling. It has blue
eyes, and ten fingers to its fore paws, and ten toes to its hind
feet--five to each."
"It's a baby," said Maroosia.
"Yes. Nastasia has got a little son, Aunt Sofia has got a grandson,
you have got a new cousin, and I have got a new great-nephew. Think of
that! Already it's a son, and a cousin, and a grandson, and a
great-nephew, and he's only been alive twelve hours. He lost no time
in taking a position for himself. He'll be a great man one of these
days if he goes on as fast as that."
The children had jumped up as soon as they knew it was a baby.
"When is the christening?"
"The day after to-morrow."
"O grandfather!"
"Well?"
"Who is going to the christening?"
"The baby, of course."
"Yes; but other people?"
"All the village."
"And us?"
"I have to go, and I suppose there'll be room in the cart for two
little bear cubs like you."
And so it was settled that Vanya and Maroosia were to go to the
christening of their new cousin, who was only twelve hours old. All
the next day they could think of nothing else, and early on the
morning of the christening they were up and about, Maroosia seeing
that Vanya had on a clean shirt, and herself putting a green ribbon in
her hair. The sun shone, and the leaves on the trees were all new and
bright, and the sky was pale blue through the flickering green leaves.
Old Peter was up early too, harnessing the little yellow horse into
the old cart. The cart was of rough wood, without springs, like a big
box fixed on long larch poles between two pairs of wheels. The larch
poles did instead of springs, bending and creaking, as the cart moved
over the forest track. The shafts came from the front wheels upwards
to the horse's shoulders, and between the ends of them there was a
tall strong hoop of wood, called a douga, which rose high over the
shoulders of the horse, above his collar, and had two little bells
hanging from it at the top. The wooden hoop was painted green with
little red flowers. The harness was mostly of ropes, but that did not
matter so long as it held together. The horse had a long tail and
mane, and looked as untidy as a little boy; but he had a green ribbon
in his forelock in honour of the christening, and he could go like
anything, and never got tired.
When all was ready, old Peter arranged a lot of soft fresh hay in the
cart for the children to sit in. Hay is the best thing in the world to
sit in when you drive in a jolting Russian cart. Old Peter put in a
tremendous lot, so that the horse could eat some of it while waiting
in the village, and yet leave them enough to make them comfortable on
the journey back. Finally, old Peter took a gun that he had spent all
the evening before in cleaning, and laid it carefully in the hay.
"What is the gun for?" asked Vanya.
"I am to be a godparent," said old Peter, "and I want to give him a
present. I could not give him a better present than a gun, for he
shall be a forester, and a good shot, and you cannot begin too early."
Presently Vanya and Maroosia were tucked into the hay, and old Peter
climbed in with the plaited reins, and away they went along the narrow
forest track, where the wheels followed the ruts and splashed through
the deep holes; for the spring was young, and the roads had not yet
dried. Some of the deepest holes had a few pine branches laid in them,
but that was the only road-mending that ever was done. Overhead were
the tall firs and silver birches with their little pale round leaves;
and somewhere, not far away, a cuckoo was calling, while the murmur of
the wild pigeons never stopped for a moment.
They drove on and on through the forest, and at last came out from
among the trees into the open country, a broad, flat plain stretching
to the river. Far away they could see the big square sail of a boat,
swelled out in the light wind, and they knew that there was the river,
on the banks of which stood the village. They could see a small clump
of trees, and, as they came nearer, the pale green cupolas of the
white village church rising above the tops of the birches.
Presently they came to a rough wooden bridge, and crossed over a
little stream that was on its way to join the big river.
Vanya looked at it.
"Grandfather," he asked, "when the frost went, which was water
first--the big river or the little river?"
"Why, the little river, of course," said old Peter. "It's always the
little streams that wake first in the spring, and running down to the
big river make it swell and flood and break up the ice. It's always
been so ever since the quarrel between the Vazouza and the Volga."
"What was that?" said Vanya.
"It was like this," said old Peter.
* * * * *
The Vazouza and the Volga flow for a long way side by side, and then
they join and flow together. And the Vazouza is a little river; but
the Volga is the mother of all Russia, and the greatest river in the
world.
And the little Vazouza was jealous of the Volga.
"You are big and noisy," she says to the Volga, "and terribly strong;
but as for brains," says she, "why, I have more brains in a single
ripple than you in all that lump of water."
Of course the Volga told her not to be so rude, and said that little
rivers should know their place and not argue with the great.
But the Vazouza would not keep quiet, and at last she said to the
Volga: "Look here, we will lie down and sleep, and we will agree that
the one of us who wakes first and comes first to the sea is the wiser
of the two."