'What! Mine would carry beyond. Just wait a bit, and when their
feast comes round I'll go and visit Girey Khan and drink buza
there,' said Lukashka, angrily swishing away the mosquitoes which
attached themselves to him.

A rustling in the thicket drew the Cossack's attention. A pied
mongrel half-setter, searching for a scent and violently wagging
its scantily furred tail, came running to the cordon. Lukashka
recognized the dog as one belonging to his neighbour, Uncle
Eroshka, a hunter, and saw, following it through the thicket, the
approaching figure of the hunter himself.

Uncle Eroshka was a gigantic Cossack with a broad, snow-white
beard and such broad shoulders and chest that in the wood, where
there was no one to compare him with, he did not look particularly
tall, so well proportioned were his powerful limbs. He wore a
tattered coat and, over the bands with which his legs were
swathed, sandals made of undressed deer's hide tied on with
strings; while on his head he had a rough little white cap. He
carried over one shoulder a screen to hide behind when shooting
pheasants, and a bag containing a hen for luring hawks, and a
small falcon; over the other shoulder, attached by a strap, was a
wild cat he had killed; and stuck in his belt behind were some
little bags containing bullets, gunpowder, and bread, a horse's
tail to swish away the mosquitoes, a large dagger in a torn
scabbard smeared with old bloodstains, and two dead pheasants.
Having glanced at the cordon he stopped.

'Hy, Lyam!' he called to the dog in such a ringing bass that it