as a clerk. He lives among trifles, and has no real business in him. The old gentry were generals—the new ones are trash!”
“They're impoverished—badly,” said Meliton.
“Because God's taken their strength, that's why. You've no chance against God.”
Again Meliton stared fixedly at one point. After thinking a moment, he sighed, as sigh grave, sagacious men, shook his head, and said—
“What is the cause? We sin much. . . . We have forgotten God. . . . And now we see the result. The time draws nigh for the end of everything. The world can't last for ever . . . it, too, must have a rest.”
The shepherd sighed. He wished, it seemed, to drop a painful subject. He returned to the birches, and began to count the cattle.
“Gei, gei, gei !” he cried. “Gei, gei, gei! I can't abide you. The devil seems to drive you the wrong way.”
He glared angrily and went among the bushes to collect his herd. Meliton rose, and walked slowly by the edge of the wood. He looked at the ground, and thought and tried to remember a single thing that was not yet tainted by death. Again on the slant rain-belts slipped bright spots; they quivered in the tree-tops, and were extinguished in the wet leaves. Damka found a hedgehog under a bush, and to call her master's attention, whined.
