Page:Tolstoy - Tales from Tolstoi.djvu/275

Rh neither sister, nor aunt, nor grandmother. I have none at all to bring up my poor orphans. Take not away my poor, wretched soul, let me but feed and nourish my little children till they can stand upon their feet. How can the children live to grow up with neither father nor mother?' And I listened to the mother. I laid one child on her breast, I put the other child in her arms, and I ascended to the Lord in Heaven. I flew up to the Lord, and I said to Him: 'I cannot take the soul away from that poor, childing mother. The father was killed by a tree, the mother has borne twins, and she prayed me not to take the soul out of her, and said: "Let me but feed and nourish my little children till they can stand upon their feet. How can the children live to grow up with neither father nor mother?" And so I did not take away the soul of the poor childing mother.' 'Go and fetch hither the soul of the childing mother, and thou shalt learn and know three words: thou shalt learn what is in the children of men, and what is not given to them, and that whereby they live. When thou hast learnt these things, thou shalt return to Heaven.' And I flew back again upon the earth, and took away the soul of the childing woman. The little ones fell from her breast. The dead body fell back upon the bed, pressed upon one of the little children, and broke her leg. I rose above the village; I would have borne the soul to God. Then a blast caught me, my wings dropped down and fell off, and the soul went alone to God; but I fell to the earth by the wayside." 225