Page:Anthology of Modern Slavonic Literature in Prose and Verse by Paul Selver.djvu/87

Rh of his household. I leave it to your imagination to conjecture what a sacristan—a sorry drunkard, pray consider—could demand of me, and the things that with slavish humility I had to do, not possessing a single being in the world who troubled or could be expected to trouble about my condition. In spite of all this, in the course of two hard years in a so-called school, I had been through the grammar (spelling-primer), the sum-book, and, finally, the psalter. Towards the end of my school course, the sacristan used to send me in his stead to read the psalter for the souls of departed serfs, and was so gracious as to reward me, by way of encouragement, with every tenth kopeck. My help made it possible for my harsh teacher to devote himself, in a higher degree than before, to his favourite occupation, in the company of his friend Jonas Limar, so that on my return from my exploits as precentor I nearly always found the pair dead-drunk. My sacristan treated not only me, but also the rest of the pupils, with harshness, and we all hated him terribly. His senseless truculence caused us to be crafty and revengeful towards him. We used to deceive him on every occasion that offered, and did him all possible mischief. This was the first despot I ever met, and my whole life long he filled me with loathing and contempt for every kind of coercion practised by one man upon another. My childish heart was injured a thousand times