"How was that?" asked the little boy eagerly. "Won't you tell me that story? Do! It is not supper-time." "No, it is not supper-time, and the story is a short one," said the grandmother. "So I will tell you about "THE FOX AND THE DOVE" Once upon a time there was a Dove which built her nest in a high tree. Every year, about the time when her young ones were beginning to get feathers, Reinecke would come along and say to the Dove: "Give me your young ones to eat; throw them down to me of your own accord, or I will gobble you up as well as them!" The Dove, frightened at the threat, would throw down the young birds. Thus it had happened year after year. Now one day, as the Dove sat most melancholy upon her nest, a Great Bird flew up and asked why she was so sad and down-cast. And the Dove answered that it was because Reinecke would soon come and eat up her young ones. Upon this the Great Bird replied, "Oh, you goose! Why do you throw them down to him? Just bid your good friend to please give himself the trouble to come after them. Then you'll soon see him sneak away with his tail between his legs, for Reinecke cannot climb a tree." So when the time came round and Reinecke again presented himself, the Dove said to him, "If you want meat for dinner, just be so kind as to come up and help yourself." When the Fox saw that he must go away empty he asked the Dove who had counselled her to speak thus, and she answered: "That Great Bird that has a nest yonder near the stream." Reinecke at once betook himself to the stream and remonstrated with that Great Bird for building his nest in so exposed a place, asking what he did in case of a high wind. The Great Bird answered, "When the wind blows from the right I turn to the left; when it blows from the left I turn to the right." "But what do you do when it blows from all sides?" asked the Fox. "Then I stick my head under my wing," said the Great Bird, showing how he did it. But quick as a wink, when the Great Bird stuck his head under his wing, the Master sprang upon him and seized him, saying: "You know how to give counsel to others, but not to advise yourself!" So he ate him up. The little boy pondered this story for a while. At last he said, "Grandmother, why did that Great Bird say that Reinecke could not climb a tree? He has climbed a tree a great many times." "This one was not a story of this mir," replied the grandmother. "It is a story from another mir, where my mother's mother was born. The foxes there are different." CHAPTER VIII THE ELECTION MEETING There were many men gathered in the little boy's house, for the time of the zemstvo was drawing near, and the men of the village must choose one of their number to go away to the large city which was the capital of the district to help make laws for the district. That is what the zemstvo is for. The noblemen go, of course, and every village chooses one villager to go.