Produced by Meredith Bach and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) [Illustration: [Russian font: B. N. Nemirovitch-Dantchenko.]] PEASANT TALES OF RUSSIA BY V. I. NEMIROVITCH-DANTCHENKO TRANSLATED BY CLAUD FIELD, M.A. Editor of "Jewish Legends of the Middle Ages." [Illustration: [_Frontispiece._ "Holding his torch high, Ivan skirted the precipice."] [Illustration] PEASANT TALES OF RUSSIA [Illustration] LONDON: ROBERT SCOTT ROXBURGHE HOUSE PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C. _All rights reserved_ MCMXVII CONTENTS PAGE THE DESERTED MINE 3 MAHMOUD'S FAMILY 61 A MISUNDERSTANDING 91 THE LUCK OF IVAN THE FORGETFUL 129 _LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS_ PAGE "Holding his torch high, Ivan skirted the precipice" _Frontispiece_ "Your prediction is fulfilled. The Turk has escaped" 60 "From all directions nuns came gliding towards the lighted portal" 90 "A strange sight brought her to a standstill" 128 "At the edge of the wood lay a dead woman, with a little living creature sobbing over her" 145 _THE DESERTED MINE_ [Illustration] _THE DESERTED MINE_ I At the entrance of the Voskressensky mine stood a group of miners. All were quite silent. It was still dark, for the autumn days begin late. Heavy grey clouds glided slowly over the sky, in which the first streaks of dawn were hardly visible. These clouds glided so low that they seemed to wish to lie on the earth in order to hide this black hole, this well-like orifice which was about to swallow up the miners one by one. The air was saturated with a cloud of damp dust, particles of which fell on the men's hair and faces. The miners wore leather jerkins, and small lamps, whose light flickered fitfully, hung at their belts. An imaginative person might have thought that they trembled with fear at having to descend into the heavy dense darkness of the mine.