KATERINA (_sighs_).
How I used to love play and frolic! But in your house I'm growing old and
spiritless.

VARVARA.
Do you suppose I don't see it?

KATERINA.
How different I used to be! I lived without a care in my heart, as free as
a bird. Mother adored me, dressed me up like a doll, and never forced me
to work; I could do just as I liked. Do you know how I passed my days as a
girl? I'll tell you. I used to get up early; if it was summer I used to go
to the spring, and bathe, and bring back water with me, and water all the
flowers in the house, every one of them. Then mother and I used to go to
church, and all the pilgrim women--our house was simply full of pilgrims
and holy women. We used to come back from church, and sit down to some
work, often embroidery in gold on velvet, while the pilgrim women would
tell us where they had been, what they had seen, and the different ways of
living in the world, or else they would sing songs. And so the time would
pass till dinner. Then the older women lay down for a nap, while I would
run about in the garden. Then evensong, and in the evening, stories and
singing again. Ah, those were happy days!

VARVARA.
But it's pretty much the same with us, if you come to that.

KATERINA.
Yes, but here one feels somehow in a cage. And how passionately I loved
being in church! It was like stepping into Paradise, and I saw no one and