brother gentles," thus spoke Bulba, "not in honour of
your having made me hetman, however great such an honour may be, nor in
honour of our parting from our comrades. To do both would be fitting at
a fitting time; but the moment before us is not such a time. The
work before us is great both in labour and in glory for the Cossacks.
Therefore let us drink all together, let us drink before all else to the
holy orthodox faith, that the day may finally come when it may be spread
over all the world, and that everywhere there may be but one faith,
and that all Mussulmans may become Christians. And let us also drink
together to the Setch, that it may stand long for the ruin of the
Mussulmans, and that every year there may issue forth from it young men,
each better, each handsomer than the other. And let us drink to our own
glory, that our grandsons and their sons may say that there were once
men who were not ashamed of comradeship, and who never betrayed each
other. Now to the faith, brother gentles, to the faith!"

"To the faith!" cried those standing in the ranks hard by, with thick
voices. "To the faith!" those more distant took up the cry; and all,
both young and old, drank to the faith.

"To the Setch!" said Taras, raising his hand high above his head.

"To the Setch!" echoed the foremost ranks. "To the Setch!" said the
old men, softly, twitching their grey moustaches; and eagerly as young
hawks, the youths repeated, "To the Setch!" And the distant plain heard
how the Cossacks mentioned their Setch.

"Now a last draught, comrades, to the glory of all Christians now living
in the world!"

And every Cossack drank a last draught to the glory of all Christians in
the world. And among all the ranks in the kurens they long repeated, "To
all the Christians in the world!"

The pails were empty, but the Cossacks still stood with their hands
uplifted. Although the eyes of all gleamed brightly with the wine,
they were thinking deeply. Not of greed or the spoils of war were they
thinking now, nor of who would be lucky enough to get ducats, fine
weapons, embroidered caftans, and Tcherkessian horses; but they
meditated like eagles perched upon the rocky crests of mountains, from
which the distant sea is visible, dotted, as with tiny birds, with
galleys, ships, and every sort of vessel, bounded only by the scarcely
visible lines of shore, with their ports like gnats and their forests
like fine grass. Like eagles they gazed out on a