Russian Fable
Texts For Chapbook Illustrations 1885
Russian Literature – Children Books – Russian Poetry – Leo Tolstoy – Fables for Children By Leo Tolstoy – A Fairy-Tale – Contents
II.
The old devil was vexed because the brothers had not quarrelled in dividing up, but had parted in love. And so he called up three young devils.
“You see,” he said, “there are three brothers, Semén the Warrior, Tarás the Paunch, and Iván the Fool. They ought to be quarrelling, but, instead, they live peacefully; they exchange with each other bread and salt. The fool has spoiled all my business. Go all three of you.—get hold of them, and mix them up in such a way that they shall tear out one another’s eyes. Can you do it?”
“We can,” they said.
“How are you going to do it?”
“We will do it like this,” they said: “First we will ruin them, so that they will have nothing to eat; then we will throw them all in a heap, so that they will quarrel together.”
“Very well,” he said. “I see that you know your business. Go, and do not return to me before you have muddled all three, or else I will flay all three of you.”
The three devils all went to a swamp, and considered how to take hold of the matter: they quarrelled and quarrelled, for they wanted each of them to get the easiest job, and finally they decided to cast lots for each man. If one of them got through first, he was to come and help the others. The devils cast lots, and set a time when they were to meet again in the swamp, in order to find out who was through, and who needed help.
When the time came, the devils gathered in the swamp. They began to talk about their affairs. The first devil, Semén the Warrior’s, began to speak.
“My affair,” he said, “is progressing. To-morrow my Semén will go to his father.”
His comrades asked him how he did it.
“In the first place,” he said, “I brought such bravery over Semén that he promised his king to conquer the whole world, and the king made him a commander and sent him out to fight the King of India. They came together for a fight. But that very night I wet all his powder, and I went over to the King of India and made an endless number of soldiers for him out of straw. When Semén’s soldiers saw the straw soldiers walking upon them on all sides, they lost their courage. Semén commanded them to fire their cannon and their guns, but they could not fire them. Semén’s soldiers were frightened and ran away like sheep. And the King of India vanquished them. Semén is disgraced,—they have taken his estate from him, and to-morrow he is to be beheaded. I have only one day’s work left to do: to let him out of the prison, so that he can run home. To-morrow I shall be through with him, so tell me which of you I am to aid!”
Then the other devil, Tarás’s, began to speak:
“I do not need any help,” he said, “for my affair is also progressing nicely,—Tarás will not live another week. In the first place, I have raised a belly on him, and made him envious. He is so envious of other people’s property that, no matter what he sees, he wants to buy it. He has bought up an endless lot of things and spent all his money on them and is still buying. He now buys on other people’s money. He has quite a lot on his shoulders, and is so entangled that he will never free himself. In a week the time will come for him to pay, and I will change all his wares into manure,—and he will not be able to pay his debts, and will go to his father’s.”
They began to ask the third devil, Iván’s.
“How is your business?”
“I must say, my business is not progressing at all. The first thing I did was to spit into his kvas jug, so as to give him a belly-ache, and I went to his field and made the soil so hard that he should not be able to overcome it. I thought that he would never plough it up, but he, the fool, came with his plough and began to tear up the soil. His belly-ache made him groan, but he stuck to his ploughing. I broke one plough of his, but he went home, fixed another plough, wrapped new leg-rags on him, and started once more to plough. I crept under the earth, and tried to hold the ploughshare, but I could not do it,—he pressed so hard on the plough; the ploughshares are sharp, and he has cut up my hands. He has ploughed up nearly the whole of it,—only a small strip is left. Come and help me, brothers, or else, if we do not overpower him, all our labours will be lost. If the fool is left and continues to farm, they will have no want, for he will feed them all.”
Semén’s devil promised to come on the morrow to help him, and thereupon the devils departed.
Russian Literature – Children Books – Russian Poetry – Leo Tolstoy – Fables for Children By Leo Tolstoy – A Fairy-Tale – Contents
Copyright holders – Public Domain Book
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