Soon, however, the weather changed; the sky became dappled and mottled with blue; swallows, pioneers of sunshine, began to dart about; and the crows, leaving the house-tops, came flapping low over the land. The women, bent down and stooping, delved on, looking for all the world like heaps of sodden tatters. They did their work leisurely, with long rests, and talking among themselves. After a time, Yagustynka, who was sowing haricot beans between the rows of potatoes, called out, as she gazed around: “To-day there are but few goodwives to be seen out of doors!” “Ah, no! their men are coming; ’tis not work they are thinking of!” “No, indeed: only cooking fat dishes and warming feather-beds!” “Oh, ye laugh!” said Kozlova; “yet ye are yourselves all of a twitter because of them!” “Lipka, without the boys, is no place to live in: that’s sure.—Old as I am, I tell you plainly—rascals and betrayers and bullies though they are—let but the ugliest lout amongst them all show himself, the world at once grows merrier and lighter to bear. And whoso says No to this, is a liar!” “Yes,” one of them sighed, “we women have been pining for our men, as the kite is pining for a rainy day!” “Ah, more than one will pay dear for her pining; and the lasses most of all!” “Before next spring, the priest will have no end of christenings!” “Old woman, ye are talking nonsense. What did our Lord create women for? Is it a sin to bear a child?” Thus spoke the wife of Gregory the Wrymouth, who always contradicted. “Ever the same, you! What? standing up for bastards!” “Surely, and till my dying day I’ll tell anyone this to his face: bastards or no bastards, the little ones are of our own blood, and have as much right to live as any. And the Lord Jesus will judge them all justly and only according to the good or the evil they do!” They shouted her down, and jeered at her; but she only smote her hands together, and nodded her head. “God speed your work!” Hanka cried to them from the stile. “How goes it?” “Thanks: well, but somewhat damp.” “Are the potatoes sufficient?” She seated herself on the cross-bar of the stile. “Quite; but cut into too few parts, I think.” “Nay, they are halved; and at the miller’s, all the smaller potatoes are planted whole. Roch tells me that this gives twice as good crops.” “That must be a German fashion,” Gulbasova cried peevishly. “Ever since Lipka has been Lipka, we have always made as many bits as there were eyes.” “My good woman, folk are not more stupid now than they were of old.” “No, indeed! the egg would fain teach the hens, and rule the poultry-yard.” “Ye say true. But ’tis also a truth that years do not bring wisdom to some,” Hanka said, as she left the stile. Kozlova looked askance after her, and growled: “Cocksure, as if she were really mistress at Boryna’s!”