Page:Taras Bulba. A Tale of the Cossacks. 1916.djvu/91

Rh Andríi was the terrible punishment decreed for murder. A hole was dug in the murderer's presence, he was lowered into it, and over him was placed a coffin which enclosed the corpse of the man whom he had killed, after which earth was heaped upon both. Long afterwards the frightful ceremony of this horrible execution clung to his mind, and the man who had been buried alive appeared to him with his terrible coffin.

Both the young kazáks took a good standing among the kazáks. They frequently went out on the steppe with comrades from their barrack, and sometimes with the entire barrack, or with neighbouring barracks, to shoot the innumerable steppe-birds of every sort, and deer and goats; or they went out upon the lakes, the river and its tributaries, assigned by lot to each barrack, to cast their bag-nets and drag-nets, and draw out rich prey for the enjoyment of the whole kurén. Although a kazák was not tested there by any apprenticeship, yet they were soon remarked on among the other youths for their dogged bravery, and their skill in everything. Vigorously and accurately they fired at a target; they swam across the Dnyeper against the current,—a deed for which a novice was triumphantly received into the circle of kazáks.

But old Taras had planned a different sort of