Around the windows and doors red bands were painted. On
shelves in one corner stood jugs, bottles, and flasks of green and
blue glass, carved silver cups, and gilded drinking vessels of various
makes--Venetian, Turkish, Tscherkessian, which had reached Bulba's cabin
by various roads, at third and fourth hand, a thing common enough in
those bold days. There were birch-wood benches all around the room,
a huge table under the holy pictures in one corner, and a huge stove
covered with particoloured patterns in relief, with spaces between it
and the wall. All this was quite familiar to the two young men, who
were wont to come home every year during the dog-days, since they had
no horses, and it was not customary to allow students to ride afield on
horseback. The only distinctive things permitted them were long locks of
hair on the temples, which every Cossack who bore weapons was entitled
to pull. It was only at the end of their course of study that Bulba had
sent them a couple of young stallions from his stud.

Bulba, on the occasion of his sons' arrival, ordered all the sotniks or
captains of hundreds, and all the officers of the band who were of any
consequence, to be summoned; and when two of them arrived with his
old comrade, the Osaul or sub-chief, Dmitro Tovkatch, he immediately
presented the lads, saying, "See what fine young fellows they are! I
shall send them to the Setch (2) shortly." The guests congratulated
Bulba and the young men, telling them they would do well and that there
was no better knowledge for a young man than a knowledge of that same
Zaporozhian Setch.

(2) The village or, rather, permanent camp of the Zaporozhian
Cossacks.

"Come, brothers, seat yourselves, each where he likes best, at the
table; come, my sons. First of all, let's take some corn-brandy," said
Bulba. "God bless you! Welcome, lads; you, Ostap, and you, Andrii. God
grant that you may always be successful in war, that you may beat
the Musselmans and the Turks and the Tatars; and that when the Poles
undertake any expedition against our faith, you may beat the Poles.
Come, clink your glasses. How now? Is the brandy good? What's
corn-brandy in Latin? The Latins were stupid: they did not know there
was such a thing in the world as corn-brandy. What was the name of the
man who wrote Latin verses? I don't know much about reading and writing,
so I don't quite know. Wasn't it Horace?"

"What a dad!" thought the elder son Ostap. "The o