n about food.... _Tak oni gavoryat_--so they say.... But I
don't know. People have just come out to see what they can see...."

And so they had--women, boys, old men, little children. I could see no
signs of ill-temper anywhere, only a rather open-mouthed wonder and
sense of expectation.

A large woman near me, with a shawl over her head and carrying a large
basket, laughed a great deal. "No, I wouldn't go," she said. "You go and
get it for yourself--I'm not coming. Not I, I was too clever for that."
Then she would turn, shrilly calling for some child who was apparently
lost in the crowd. "Sacha!... Ah! Sacha!" she cried--and turning again,
"Eh! look at the Cossack!... There's a fine Cossack!"

It was then that I noticed the Cossacks. They were lined up along the
side of the pavement, and sometimes they would suddenly wheel and
clatter along the pavement itself, to the great confusion of the crowd
who would scatter in every direction.

They were fine-looking men, and their faces expressed childish and
rather worried amiability. The crowd obviously feared them not at all,
and I saw a woman standing with her hand on the neck of one of the
horses, talking in a very friendly fashion to the soldier who rode it.
"That's strange," I thought to myself; "there's something queer here."
It was then, just at the entrance of the "Malaia Koniushennaia," that a
strange little incident occurred. Some fellow--I could just see his
shaggy head, his pale face, and black beard--had been shouting
something, and suddenly a little group of Cossacks moved towards him and
he was surrounded. They turned off with him towards a yard close at
hand. I could hear his voice shrilly protesting; the crowd also moved
behind, murmuring. Suddenly a Cossack, laughing, said something. I could
not hear his words, but every one near me laughed. The little Chinovnik
at my side said to me, "That's right. They're not going to shoot,
whatever happens--not on their brothers, they say. They'll let the
fellow go in a moment. It's only just for discipline's sake. That's
right. That's the spirit!"

"But what about the police?" I asked.

"Ah, the police!" His cheery, good-natured face was suddenly dark and
scowling. "Let them try, that's all. It's Protopopoff who's our
enemy--not the Cossacks."

And a woman near him repeated.

"Yes, yes, it's Protopopoff. Hurrah for the Cossacks!"

I was squeezed now into a corner, and the crowd swirled and eddied about
me in