and played with him a thousand silly tricks with the childish ease so characteristic of the giddy Poles, and which added still more to the confusion of the poor collegian. His mouth wide open, his looks riveted on her brilliant eyes, he made the most laughable figure. A noise which was heard at the door, aroused her fears. She ordered him to hide himself under the bed, and as soon as the noise was over, she called for her maid, a Tartar prisoner, and ordered her to conduct him cautiously into the garden, and thence to see him over the palisade. But this time our collegian was not so fortunate in getting over the palisade. The watchman awaking, gave him a vigorous blow over the legs, and the servants assembled by the noise, beat him in the street, long before his swift feet carried him out of their reach. After this, it was very dangerous to pass near the house of the Voevoda, the more so as his servants were numerous. Andrew saw his beauty once more in a Latin Church; she noticed him, and gave him a pleasant smile as to an old acquaintance. Once more, but only _en passant,_ did he see her, and then the Voevoda left Kieff, and after that, instead of the beautiful dark-eyed Polish girl, a broad, coarse face looked out of her windows. This is what Andrew was thinking about, with his head bent down, and his eyes fixed on the mane of his horse. Meanwhile, the steppe had long ago received them in its green embrace, and its high grass, encircling them, had hidden them so that only their black Cossack's caps were now and then to be seen above it. "Eh! eh! eh! What are you about, lads? Why so silent?" said Boolba, recovering from his meditation. "Just like monks! Come now, all at the same time! All sad thoughts to the devil! Take your pipes between your teeth, light them, set spurs to your horses, and let us take such a gallop, that no bird shall get the better of us!" And the Cossacks slightly bending towards the manes of their horses, disappeared in the high grass. Not even their black caps were now to e seen; their course could only be followed by looking at the furrow in the grass, which they crushed with the rapidity of lightning. The sun had long since appeared in the sky, and poured its vivifying warm rays over the steppe. All that was perplexed or dreamy about the souls of the Cossacks fled at once, and their hearts bounded within them like birds.