This, too, was the reason why not infrequently the cattle lowed beside their empty mangers, and the swine rooted in the gardens, and the poultry wandered about the roads, and the children were left to do as they pleased—fight each other, or climb trees for birds’ nests. All the women were so absorbed in the kneading and rolling out of the dough for loaves and cakes, and all that pertained thereto, that they had forgotten nearly everything else besides. And in every home this bustle and stir was the same: Whether at the miller’s, the organist’s, or the priest’s; whether amongst the farmers or the _Komorniki_. However poor, they had—were it by a loan or even by selling their last half-bushel of wheat—to prepare the banquet of the Hallow-fare, in order to get, at least once a year, meat and other dainties in abundance. As there were not baking-ovens in every hut, makeshifts were built up in the orchards, and girls ran about, feeding them with dry faggots and logs. And from time to time there were seen women uncouthly attired and white with flour, carefully carrying dressers and kneading-troughs, full of cakes as yet unbaked and hidden from the air, as the statues of the saints are seen carried in a holy procession. There was work, too, to be done in the church. The priest-man had fetched a number of young fir-trees from the woods; and the organist, together with Roch and Ambrose, were adorning Our Lord’s Sepulchre. When Good Friday came, the work was still more absorbing, so that but few noticed the arrival of Yanek, the organist’s son, who had come over for the holidays, and was going about the village, now and then taking a peep into the cottage windows. Entering anywhere was out of the question: the passages, nay, even the orchard paths were blocked up with presses and bedsteads and all sorts of furniture; for on that day they whitewashed the cabins in all haste, scrubbed the floors, and cleaned the holy images that had been taken outside. A great hurry-scurry and confusion prevailed everywhere: people were running about, urging the others to make haste and thereby increasing the turmoil. Even the children were now employed to clear the premises of mud, and sprinkle yellow sand everywhere. It being an ancient custom to eat nothing warm from Good Friday till Easter Sunday, the people chose to suffer a little hunger in our Lord’s honour, eating only dry bread and potatoes that had been roasted. The hurry and bustle were just the same at Boryna’s, with the difference that there were more hands to work and less trouble about money, so that all was ready sooner. On Friday, at the first glimmer of dawn, Hanka had, together with Pete, finished whitewashing the cabin and outhouses, after which, and a hasty toilet, she had gone to church, where the other women were already assembled to be present at the carrying of the Lord’s Body to the Sepulchre.