Hunting in Many Lands 



skill comes from long experience, indifference 

 to pain and, of course, pride in his profession. 

 Having hunted foxes and hares, and having 

 been shooting as often as the environs of Pes- 

 chalkino and our time allowed, we changed 

 our base to a village twenty-two versts distant 

 over the border in the government of Yaros- 

 lav. It was a village like all others of this 

 grain and flax district, where the live stock 

 and poultry shared the same roof with their 

 owners. A family of eleven wolves had been 

 located about three versts from it by a pair of 

 huntsmen sent some days in advance ; this ex- 

 plained our arrival. In making this change, I 

 do not now recall that we saw a single house 

 other than those of the peasant villages and 

 the churches. I fancy that in the course of 

 time these peasants may have more enlight- 

 enment, a greater ownership in the land, and 

 may possibly form a yeoman class. At the 

 present the change, slow as it is, seems to 

 point in that direction. With their limited 

 possessions, they are happy and devoted sub- 

 jects. The total of the interior decorations of 

 every house consists of icons, of cheap colored 

 pictures of the imperial family and of samo- 

 vars. In our lodgings, the house of the village 



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