Page:Taras Bulba. A Tale of the Cossacks. 1916.djvu/246

240 charge remained unfired, in his gun, and, laying down the weapon, he sat sadly on the seashore. He sat there long, with drooping head, repeating continually, "My Ostap, my Ostap!" Before him spread the gleaming Black Sea; in the distant reeds the sea-gulls screamed. His grey moustache turned to silver, and the tears chased one another down his cheeks.

At last Taras could endure it no longer. "Whatever happens, I must go and find out what he is doing. Is he alive, or in the grave? or is he not yet in the grave? Know I will, cost what it may!" And within a week he was in the town of Uman, mounted, fully armed with spear, sword, a flat travelling-cask at his saddle-bow, his pot of oatmeal, his cartridges, cord to hobble his horse, and other accoutrements. He rode straight to a dirty, bedaubed little house, whose tiny windows were almost invisible, blackened as they were with some unknown dirt; the chimney was plugged with a rag; and the roof, which was full of holes, was covered with sparrows; a heap of all sorts of refuse lay before the very door. From the window peered the head of a Jewess, In a headdress with discoloured pearls.

"Is your husband at home?" asked Bulba, dismounting, and fastening his horse's bridle to an iron hook beside the door.