Page:Three stories by Vítězslav Hálek (1886).pdf/328

 vanquished and subjugated. Learn it ye aged! ye are vanquished and subjugated! Here every shadow of tenderer feeling was out of place, Barushka and Joseph had won a preconcerted game, and the player who has won is always the only one who laughs.

Even Kmoch, Barushka’s father, had already received intelligence that they were shifting into the farm house, and already betook himself thither and helped the young folks to laugh. He went to old Loyka and with a sleek smile expatiated on the wisdom his friend had shown in this step. “You know,” says Kmoch, “the hospodarship should always belong to the young folk who have energy and versatility; but old people, you know, ought to rest, they deserve a brief breathing space before they go hence” and more to the same effect.

Old Loyka at this speech collected a few words as we collect out of our pockets a few spare kreutzers wherewith to rid ourselves of a beggar. “I had already firmly decided upon this,” said he, “and, what is more, I never alter my mind.”

“I trust not, indeed,” said Kmoch, “for what end will it serve to change your mind yet again.”

“He thinks, I beg his pardon, pantata Kmoch thinks that only from to-day you have grown wise enough to know from its beak where the chaffinch is sitting and how to sprinkle salt on the hare’s tail,” put in Vena. “It is dearly bought praise, pantata, when you must deprive yourself of a farm house to