Page:The Kobzar of the Ukraine.pdf/130

128 Death came too soon, however, but the property served as the site of his last resting place. He died at Petrograd but in the spring his remains were carried the long distance to his old home. A mourning people lined the way.

Only a couple of days after the poet's death, appeared the ukase of the czar proclaiming the abolition of serfdom. To the common people it seemed that their peasant poet, by his songs and his sufferings, had been the prime cause of their new freedom.

No speeches were allowed at the interment on the hill above the Dnieper but there were many people and many wreaths of flowers.

One wreath, deposited by a lady, expressed more than anything else the common feeling. That wreath was a crown of thorns.