es brought it there to show us that
spring has come to stay."

Together they turned and walked to the mantel. Big Ivan took up the
earthenware pot, carried it to the table, and spilled its contents
upon the well-scrubbed boards. He counted while Anna stood beside him,
her fingers clutching his coarse blouse. It was a slow business, because
Ivan's big blunt fingers were not used to such work, but it was over at
last. He stacked the coins into neat piles, then he straightened himself
and turned to the woman at his side.

"It is enough," he said quietly. "We will go at once. If it was not
enough, we would have to go because the Dream is upon me and I hate
this place."

"As you say," murmured Anna. "The wife of Littin, the butcher, will buy
our chairs and our bed. I spoke to her yesterday."

Poborino, the smith; his crippled son; Yanansk, the baker; Dankov, the
tailor, and a score of others were out upon the village street on the
morning that Big Ivan and Anna set out. They were inclined to jeer at
Ivan, but something upon the face of the giant made them afraid. Hand
in hand the big man and his wife walked down the street, their faces
turned toward Bobruisk, Ivan balancing upon his head a heavy trunk that
no other man in the village could have lifted.

At the end of the street a stripling with bright eyes and yellow curls
clutched the hand of Ivan and looked into his face.

"I know what is sending you," he cried.

"Ay, _you_ know," said Ivan, looking into the eyes of the other.

"It came to me yesterday," murmured the stripling. "I got it from the
breezes. They are free, so are the birds and the little clouds and the
river. I wish I could go."

"Keep your dream," said Ivan softly. "Nurse it, for it is the dream of a
man."

Anna, who was crying softly, touched the blouse of the boy. "At the
back of our cottage, near the bush that bears the red berries, a pot
is buried," she said. "Dig it up and take it home with you and when
you have a kopeck drop it in. It is a good pot."

The stripling understood. He stooped and kissed the hand of Anna, and
Big Ivan patted him upon the back. They were brother dreamers and they
understood each other.

Boris Lugan has sung the song of the versts that eat up one's courage as
well as the leather of one's shoes.

"Versts! Versts! Scores and scores of them!
Versts! Versts! A million or more of them!
Dust! Dust! And the devils who play in it
Blinding us fools who