Seeing that there was to be no end to his writing, we no longer listened to the scribe, but like a whirlwind swept down from all sides and, pressing forward in a mass, hastened to the fight. Neither fences nor water could keep us back, and the only salvation for the Valdáyans was in flight; but they stood out stubbornly against us, and with agility swung their wooden arms at us. We could not break asunder the order of their ranks, and from both sides there flew upon us stones and mud, the implements of war of furious men. We were bespattering and striking each other down without mercy, but ours stood like a firm wall. Forgive me for mentioning names which it would not be otherwise proper to utter here, except that without them we would not have been victorious. Even if our scribe had been much wiser, he would not have broken that wall with his skull, which we barely smashed with our clubs. We had for some time been striking each other mightily with stones, when our Stépka the intrepid (he was not very clever, but a powerful man) rushed with grim rage into the thickest fight among the Valdáyans: he struck them down with a cudgel, and they raised a cry, but Stépka hacked among them like a butcher. Then his nephew, too, took a club, flew at them, but lost courage and showed them his back, whereupon a frisky Valdáyan jumped upon it and was on top of our hero. In the very midst of the sanguinary fray he had jumped upon the hero’s shoulder, and boasted before his whole horde that he had begun with a battle and had ended with leapfrog. But the jest ended badly for him, for the Valdáyan had not yet thanked us for the ride, when Stépka’s nephew grabbed the Valdáyan by the girdle and so hurled him to the ground that he broke his nose and so flattened it that he now has to wear a plaster upon it. Then, lo, we all suddenly noticed in the distance a rider all covered with dust: that was the proud leader of the Valdáyans; that beast was a worthy likeness of our own manager. Raging with an internal fire against us, he galloped upon his steed towards our hero. All thought that they would end the terrible battle by a duel; we all stood in quiet expectancy, and terror seized us all. Already the heroes approached each other on their horses, but suddenly, it seemed, they changed their minds: they did not fight, they only cursed each other, leaving us alone to finish the battle, while their horses took them back to their homes. In the meantime, if you wish to know it, the sun shone so that it was time for us to dine; if the accursed battle had not taken place, I, no doubt, would have swallowed two or three bites by that time; but, under the circumstances, I thought neither of beet soup nor buckwheat mush.