A Day In The Country

Anton Chekhov

BETWEEN eight and nine o'clock in the morning.

A dark leaden-coloured mass is creeping over the sky towards the sun. Red zigzags of

lightning gleam here and there across it. There is a sound of far-away rumbling. A warm

wind frolics over the grass, bends the trees, and stirs up the dust. In a minute there will be a

spurt of May rain and a real storm will begin.

Fyokla, a little beggar-girl of six, is running through the village, looking for Terenty the

cobbler. The white-haired, barefoot child is pale. Her eyes are wide-open, her lips are

trembling.

The beggar-girl runs behind the huts to the kitchen-gardens and there finds Terenty; the tall

old man with a thin, pock-marked face, very long legs, and bare feet, dressed in a woman's

tattered jacket, is standing near the vegetable plots, looking with drowsy, drunken eyes at

the dark storm-cloud. On his long crane-like legs he sways in the wind like a starling-cote.

"Uncle Terenty!" the white-headed beggar-girl addresses him. "Uncle, darling!"

Terenty bends down to Fyokla, and his grim, drunken face is overspread with a smile, such

as come into people's faces when they look at something little, foolish, and absurd, but

warmly loved.

"Ah! servant of God, Fyokia," he says, lisping tenderly, "where have you come from?"

"Uncle Terenty," says Fyokia, with a sob, tugging at the lapel of the cobbler's coat. "Brother

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down the village street. He walks quickly without stopping or looking from side to side, as

though he were shoved from behind or afraid of pursuit. Fyokla can hardly keep up with

him.

They come out of the village and turn along the dusty road towards the count's copse that

lies dark blue in the distance. It is about a mile and a half away. The clouds have by now

covered the sun, and soon afterwards there is not a speck of blue left in the sky. It grows

dark.

"Holy, holy, holy . . ." whispers Fyokla, hurrying after Terenty. The first rain-drops, big and

heavy, lie, dark dots on the dusty road. A big drop falls on Fyokla's cheek and glides like a

tear down her chin.

"We shall get soaked, Fyolka," mutters Terenty. "There won't be a dry spot left on us. . . .

Ho-ho, my girl! It's run down my neck! But don't be frightened, silly. . . . The grass will be

dry again, the earth will be dry again, and we shall be dry again. There is the same sun for

us all."

A flash of lightning, some fourteen feet long, gleams above their heads. There is a loud peal

of thunder, and it seems to Fyokla that something big, heavy, and round is rolling over the

sky and tearing it open, exactly over her head.

"Holy, holy, holy . . ." says Terenty, crossing himself. "Don't be afraid, little orphan! It is

not from spite that it thunders."

Terenty's and Fyokla's feet are covered with lumps of heavy, wet clay. It is slippery and

brother, a little fellow of eight, with hair as red as ochre and a pale sickly face, stands

the cobbler he gives a sickly smile and says:

"A terrible lot of thunder, Terenty. . . . I've never heard so much thunder in all my life."

"And where is your hand?"

"In the hole. . . . Pull it out, please, Terenty!"

The wood had broken at the edge of the hole and jammed Danilka's hand: he could push it

farther in, but could not pull it out. Terenty snaps off the broken piece, and the boy's hand,

red and crushed, is released.

"It's terrible how it's thundering," the boy says again, rubbing his hand. "What makes it

thunder, Terenty?"

"The ducks flew by here the other day, Terenty," says Danilka, still rubbing his hand. "They

"Don't touch it, you might disturb them," says Terenty, wringing the water out of his cap.

"The nightingale is a singing-bird, without sin. He has had a voice given him in his throat,

to praise God and gladden the heart of man. It's a sin to disturb him."

"What about the sparrow?"

"The sparrow doesn't matter, he's a bad, spiteful bird. He is like a pickpocket in his ways.

He doesn't like man to be happy. When Christ was crucified it was the sparrow brought

nails to the Jews, and called 'alive! alive!' "

A bright patch of blue appears in the sky.

"Look!" says Terenty. "An ant-heap burst open by the rain! They've been flooded, the

They bend over the ant-heap. The downpour has damaged it; the insects are scurrying to

"You needn't be in such a taking, you won't die of it!" says Terenty, grinning. "As soon as

You won't settle on low ground another time."

They go on.

The drenched and chilled bees are huddled together on the branch. There are so many of

"That's a swarm of bees," Terenty informs them. "They were flying looking for a home, and

when the rain came down upon them they settled. If a swarm is flying, you need only

sprinkle water on them to make them settle. Now if, say, you wanted to take the swarm, you

would bend the branch with them into a sack and shake it, and they all fall in."

Little Fyokla suddenly frowns and rubs her neck vigorously. Her brother looks at her neck,

and sees a big swelling on it.

"Hey-hey!" laughs the cobbler. "Do you know where you got that from, Fyokia, old girl?

There are Spanish flies on some tree in the wood. The rain has trickled off them, and a drop

has fallen on your neck -- that's what has made the swelling."

They hear a whistle and a rumble, but not such a rumble as the storm-clouds carried away.

A goods train races by before the eyes of Terenty, Danilka, and Fyokla. The engine, panting

and puffing out black smoke, drags more than twenty vans after it. Its power is tremendous.

The children are interested to know how an engine, not alive and without the help of horses,

can move and drag such weights, and Terenty undertakes to explain it to them:

"It's all the steam's doing, children. . . . The steam does the work. . . . You see, it shoves

under that thing near the wheels, and it . . . you see . . . it works. . . ."

They cross the railway line, and, going down from the embankment, walk towards the river.

They walk not with any object, but just at random, and talk all the way. . . . Danilka asks

and stones. He knows what herbs cure diseases, he has no difficulty in telling the age of a

Silitch, the innkeeper, the market-gardener, the shepherd, and all the villagers, generally

fields, in the wood, on the river bank. Their teachers have been the birds themselves, when

and wild herbs.

fragrance, who would not want to hear about the golden may-beetles, about the cranes,

The two of them, the cobbler and the orphan, walk about the fields, talk unceasingly, and

are not weary. They could wander about the world endlessly. They walk, and in their talk of

the beauty of the earth do not notice the frail little beggar-girl tripping after them. She is

breathless and moves with a lagging step. There are tears in her eyes; she would be glad to

stop these inexhaustible wanderers, but to whom and where can she go? She has no home

or people of her own; whether she likes it or not, she must walk and listen to their talk.

Towards midday, all three sit down on the river bank. Danilka takes out of his bag a piece

of bread, soaked and reduced to a mash, and they begin to eat. Terenty says a prayer when

he has eaten the bread, then stretches himself on the sandy bank and falls asleep. While he

is asleep, the boy gazes at the water, pondering. He has many different things to think of.

to a deserted barn, where the corn of the commune used to be kept, while Terenty, leaving

that he has seen in the day: the storm-clouds, the bright sunshine, the birds, the fish, lanky

Terenty. The number of his impressions, together with exhaustion and hunger, are too much

for him; he is as hot as though he were on fire, and tosses from, side to side. He longs to tell

someone all that is haunting him now in the darkness and agitating his soul, but there is no

one to tell. Fyokla is too little and could not understand.

"I'll tell Terenty to-morrow," thinks the boy.

The children fall asleep thinking of the homeless cobbler, and, in the night, Terenty comes

to them, makes the sign of the cross over them, and puts bread under their heads. And no

one sees his love. It is seen only by the moon which floats in the sky and peeps caressingly