Page:Taras Bulba. A Tale of the Cossacks. 1916.djvu/250

244 up, Dapple'? Does the noble lord think that I can take the noble lord just as he is, without hiding him?"

"Well, hide me, then, hide me any way you like: how would a powder-cask answer?"

"Aï, aï! and the noble lord thinks, perhaps, that he can be concealed in a powder-cask? Doesn't the noble lord know that every man thinks every cask contains corn-brandy?"

"Well, let 'em think it's brandy!"

"What! Let them think it's brandy?" said the Jew, grasping his earlocks with both hands, then throwing up his arms.

"Well, and why are you so frightened?"

"And doesn't the noble lord know that God has made brandy expressly for every one to taste? They're all gluttons and fond of dainties there: a Polish noble will run five versts after a cask; he'll bore a hole, and as soon as he sees that nothing runs out, he'll say, 'The Jew isn't carrying a powder-cask; there's certainly something wrong here! Seize the Jew, bind the Jew, take away all the Jew's money; put the Jew in prison!' Because everything that is evil is blamed on the Jew, and every one takes a Jew for a dog; and they think he's not a man, because he's a Jew."

"Then lay me in the wagon with a load of fish."

"It can't be done, noble sir, it can't be done: all