Already we were driving our enemy back to their village, and depriving them of their cudgels and sticks, and our battle would have been at an end, if a monk had not appeared to their aid. This new Balaam was urging on his beast and beating it with a stick for its sluggishness; but all his beating of his dobbin moved her not a step ahead. He somehow managed to reach the top of the hill, and there his holy lips uttered curses against us. But neither these, nor the wooden arms, kept us back, and we flew against our enemy, and did our work among them. That worthy man, seeing our stubbornness, leaped from his horse, and showed the swiftness of his feet, which was greater than when he first had come, and, showing us his back, fled to his house. Dark night had already put out its veil, when all were worn out with fighting. The Valdáyans being vanquished, we all went from the field, and reached home, though hungry, yet alive. THE COOK AND THE TAILOR ’Tis easier for a cook to roast and stew than for a tailor to talk of cookery. It was, I know not where, in Lithuania or Poland,--he knows of it who knows more than I; all I know is that a lord was travelling, and as he was returning from a visit he was, naturally, drunk. A man came from the opposite direction, and he met the lord, phiz to phiz. The lord was blown up with conceit and liquor, and two servants led his horse for him. The horse strutted proudly along, and the lord was steeped in arrogance like a cock. The man that met him was poorly clad. The lord interrogated him, like a man of sense: “What handicraft have you?” “A cook, my lord, stands before you.” “If so, then answer me, before I spit into your face: you are a cook, so you know what dainties are; what then is the greatest dainty?” “A roast pig’s hide,” the cook answered without hesitation. “You, cook, are not a fool,” the lord said to him, “and gave me readily an answer, from which I conclude that you know your business.” With these words, the lord gave him a generous reward, just like a father, though he had begot no children. My cook, for joy, tripped lightly along and was soon out of sight. Whom should he meet but a tailor, an old acquaintance, nay, a friend,--not to the grave, yet a friend. “Whither do you hurry so fast, friend Ilyá?” The other replied: “Now, my friend, I can boldly assure you that the cook’s profession is better than yours. You, drunken Petrúshka, do not even guess that Ilyá is going to have a big celebration! Look at my pocket. I and my wife will be satisfied with what we now have; we cannot unto our deaths spend all the lord, who just passed me drunk upon the road, has given me.” And he pulled out his purse that was filled with gold coins: “That’s what I got for a pig!”