Tales from Tolstoi/How the Little Demon Earned his Stolen Crust of Bread
A poor muzhik went out to plough before breakfast, and took with him from his hut a crust of bread. He turned over his plough and put to his horses, but before starting he placed his crust beneath a bush and covered it with his kaftan. When the horse grew tired and the muzhik began to be hungry, he stopped ploughing, unharnessed his nag to let it graze, and went back to the kaftan to have his breakfast. The muzhik raised the kaftan—there was no crust to be seen. The muzhik searched and searched, turned the kaftan over and over and shook it—still there was no crust. The muzhik was amazed. It was passing strange. No one was to be seen, yet someone had taken the crust.
Now it was a little demon, who, while the muzhik was ploughing, had filched the crust, and was now squatting behind the bush waiting to hear the muzhik curse the devil. The muzhik fretted a little, but that was all.
"Come, come!" said he, "I shan't die of hunger. No doubt he who took the crust was sorely in need of it. Let him eat it, and may it be to his health." And the muzhik went to the trough, drank some water, rested awhile, caught his horse, re-harnessed him, and went on ploughing. The little demon was grieved that he had not led the muzhik into sin, and went back to the chief of the devils, and told him how he had robbed the muzhik of his crust, and how the muzhik, instead of cursing and swearing, had said, "May it be to his health!"
The chief of the devils was very wroth.
"If the muzhik gets the better of you in this business," said he, "you won't be worth your salt. 'Twill be a pretty thing, indeed, if mere muzhiks, and old village greinnies too, for the matter of that, take to such high-flying ways! Why, then, there will be nothing more for us to live for! We cannot let the matter rest where it is. Be off, and earn the muzhik's crust. If you don't get the upper hand of this muzhik in three years, I'll douch you in holy water."
Terrified at the holy water, the little demon fell to thinking how he should earn his crust. He thought and thought, and thought again. At last he assumed the form of a good Christian man, and took service with the poor muzhik as a labourer. And he taught the muzhik in the dry season to sow grain in the marshes. The sun scorched up the crops of all the other muzhiks, but the corn of the poor muzhik grew up thick, high, full-eared, and abundant. For a whole year the poor muzhik had enough and to spare. In the spring the labourer taught the muzhik to sow corn on the hills. That year was a very wet one. The crops of the other muzihiks were washed away or rotted before the harvest; but the poor muzhik reaped a copious crop on the hills, so that after supplying all his wants he had more corn left than he knew what to do with.
And then the labourer taught the muzhik to waste grain, by letting it ferment and making spirit of it. The muzhik distilled spirit, drank of it himself, and gave to others to drink also. And the little demon returned to the chief of the devils and boasted that he had earned his crust.
The chief of the devils came to satisfy himself that it was so. He came to the muzhik's house, and saw how he had invited all the rich muzhiks, and was regaling them with spirits. His wife was carrying round the liquor, and as she went from one to the other she tripped against a stool, and spilt a whole glassful. The muzhik was very angry, and began to swear at his wife.
The little demon nudged the chief of the devils with his elbow: "Do you think he would not complain of the loss of his crust now?"
After cursing his wife to his heart's content, the host took round the drink himself. And there came in from the fields a poor, uninvited muzhik, who greeted the company and sat down. He saw all the people drinking spirit, and, in his weariness, wished for a drop of it himself. He sat and sat, and sucked his lips, but the host gave him never a drop. On the contrary, the rich muzhik muttered between his teeth: "A likely tale that we are to waste our liquor on the devil knows who!"
At this the chief of the devils was very pleased, but the little demon bragged all the more. "Wait a bit," said he, "there's more to come yet!"
The rich muzhiks sat and drank their fill, and their host drank with them. They began to praise and flatter one another, and to speak false, oily words. The chief of the devils listened and listened. With this, too, he was very well satisfied.
"If this drink makes them all so foxy that they will try to swindle each other, the whole lot of them will very soon fall into our clutches!"
"Wait a bit," chuckled the little demon; "there's more to come yet. Only let them have another glass. At present they are foxes trying to get the better of one another; but in a few moments they will be wolves trying to do one another a mischief."
The muzhiks had another glass all round, and their language became coarse and snappish. Their words were no longer oily but rasping. At last they fell foul of each other, wrestled, fought, and knocked each other about. They told even their host to go to the devil, and knocked him about also.
This, too, the chief of the devils highly approved of. "Good! very good, indeed!" said he.
"Wait a bit," replied the little demon, "there's more to come yet! Stop till they've had a third glass! At present they are like ravening wolves, but let them have a third glass and you'll see them wallow about like swine!"
The muzhiks had a third glass, and became altogether maudlin. They gabbled and howled, and all talked together at the same time without knowing what they talked about. Then they set off home, some singly, others in twos or threes, and so they all rolled helplessly about the lanes. The host went before to show his guests out, fell upon his nose into a puddle, and muddied himself from head to foot. There he lay like a pig, and squeaked.
The chief of the devils was more pleased with this than with anything else.
"Well done!" he cried; "this is indeed a good drink that you've concocted. You have well earned your crust. Tell me," said he, "how did you make this drink? I suppose you first of all mixed some fox's blood to make the muzhiks fox-like; after that some wolf's blood to make them wolf-like; and, last of all, it is quite plain that you added swine's blood to make them like veritable swine."
"No," replied the little demon, "it was not so. All I did was to give the muzhik more corn than he knew what to do with. Bestial blood is present in every man, but so long as the man has barely enough bread to nourish him, it has no outlet. When he's like that, he does not even grieve over his last crust. But let him only have food over and above his needs, and he will at once begin thinking of enjoying himself. Now I taught him an enjoyment — drunkenness. And whenever he turns the gift of God into spirits for his enjoyment, the fox-blood, the wolf-blood, and the swine-blood within him rise at once to the surface. Henceforth a beast will he become every time he touches spirit."
And the chief of the devils commended the little demon, granted him his crust of bread, and raised him high in his service.