Page:Tolstoy - Tales from Tolstoi.djvu/213

 TWO OLD MEN.

Two old men agreed once upon a time to go and pray to God in old Jerusalem. One was a rich muzhik, called Efim Tarasuich, the other a poor man, called Elisyei Bodrov.

Efim was an austere muzhik; he drank no vodka, and smoked and snuffed no tobacco, never had he chided with vile black words, he was a man severe and stern. Two whole terms had Efim served as starosta, and at the end of his terms his accounts were clear and clean. His family was large. Two sons and a grandson were married, and they all lived together. He was a healthy, well-bearded, and stalwart muzhik, and in his seventh decade there was but a stripe of grey in his beard. The old man Elisyei was neither very rich nor very poor. Formerly he had been an itinerant carpenter, but since old age had come upon him he had settled down at home. He had one son

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