Page:Anthology of Modern Slavonic Literature in Prose and Verse by Paul Selver.djvu/138

114 glittering in the sunshine; piles of bacon, stacks of oranges, arranged on trestles, balloons, shining gaudily against the dark background of the mob, and a plaster of mud, half-dissolved, trampled upon, stirred up, was splashed from underfoot on to the booths and the peoples' faces and oozed from the square into the gutters and on to the streets which surrounded the market on four sides, through which huge brewers' drays filled with barrels, were slowly passing, carts with meat, covered up with dirty rags, or shining from afar with reddish-yellow ribs of beef, wrenched away from the hides; carts laden with sacks of flour, carts full of fowls that were uttering shrill cries, the quacking of ducks and the cackling of geese, which thrust out their white heads through the bars of their coops and hissed at the passers-by.

From time to time, at the side of these endless rows of carts, passing one after the other, some elegant carriage would hastily slip through, bespattering with mud the people, the carts, the pavements, upon which squatted old, worn-out Jewesses with baskets full of cooked peas, sweetmeats, preserved apples and children's playthings.

In front of shops which were open and filled with people, stood tables, chairs, benches, upon which lay whole loads of fancy goods, stockings, socks, artificial flowers, cambric as stiff as sheets