_Dziads_,[12] too, now passed through the village more and more frequently; not only those of the usual kind, who went from house to house with their cavernous wallets and their lengthy prayers, and at whose approach the house-dogs always fell a-baying; but also certain others of a very different sort. These had travelled much and far, to many holy places; they knew Chenstohova, and Ostrobrama, and Kalvarya well, and in the long evenings they would willingly entertain the village folk by tales of what was going on in the world, and the strange things done in foreign parts. And there were even some who told of the Holy Land, and related such marvels about the vast seas they had crossed, and the adventures which had befallen them, that the people listened in pious amazement, and more than one could scarcely believe that such things could be. ----- Footnote 12: _Dziad_ signifies in Polish a grandfather, an old man, or an ancestor, but is now mostly used to mean a beggar of a special type.—_Translator’s Note._ Ah, it was autumn, late autumn now! Neither rollicking songs, nor merry shouts, nor even the chirruping of little birds, could be heard in the village any more: only the blast howling over the thatched roofs, the icy rain pouring glass-like films down the rattling panes, and the quick dull thudding of the flails on the threshing-floors, which grew daily louder and louder. It was indeed Autumn, the mother of Winter. One comfort there was. Hitherto the weather had not been really bad, and the roads had not yet softened into bogs; so possibly it might hold until the fair, to which, as to a village fête, all Lipka was presently going. It was to take place on St. Cordula’s day and, it being the last fair previous to Yule-tide, everybody had made preparations. Many days before, the great question, What ought to be sold? had been debated: whether cattle, or corn, or some livestock of the smaller kind. It would also be needful, since winter was coming on, to make purchases; and those to no small amount. Thence arose not a few bickerings and tiffs and jars in the families: all knew that no one had much money to spare, and cash was harder to get every day. Besides, it was just then that the taxes had to be paid, and the communal rates too, and various sums to be laid out, borrowed money to be returned in many cases, and not infrequently, the servants’ wages were due. So that more than one owner (even of seventeen acres!) was sometimes in straits to know what he had better do. And so, some took a cow out of the byre, cleansed her dung-plastered sides with straw, gave her plenty of clover for the night, or a mess of barley boiled with potatoes, and did all they could to fatten her up a little; while others experimented with some blind old jade, completely worthless, endeavouring to make it look at least something like a horse. And others in order to have their corn ready in time, were busily threshing it all day long.