some fat face or other gazed from the window. This was what Andrii was
thinking about, as he hung his head and kept his eyes on his horse's
mane.

In the meantime the steppe had long since received them all into its
green embrace; and the high grass, closing round, concealed them, till
only their black Cossack caps appeared above it.

"Eh, eh, why are you so quiet, lads?" said Bulba at length, waking
from his own reverie. "You're like monks. Now, all thinking to the
Evil One, once for all! Take your pipes in your teeth, and let us
smoke, and spur on our horses so swiftly that no bird can overtake
us."

And the Cossacks, bending low on their horses' necks, disappeared in
the grass. Their black caps were no longer to be seen; a streak of
trodden grass alone showed the trace of their swift flight.

The sun had long since looked forth from the clear heavens and
inundated the steppe with his quickening, warming light. All that was
dim and drowsy in the Cossacks' minds flew away in a twinkling: their
hearts fluttered like birds.

The farther they penetrated the steppe, the more beautiful it became.
Then all the South, all that region which now constitutes New Russia,
even as far as the Black Sea, was a green, virgin wilderness. No
plough had ever passed over the immeasurable waves of wild growth;
horses alone, hidden in it as in a forest, trod it down. Nothing in
nature could be finer. The whole surface resembled a golden-green
ocean, upon which were sprinkled millions of different flowers.