Cortrinkau's Blog

Excerpted from "On the High Uplands" by Stanislaw Vincenz. These two chapters address the logging industry in nineteenth-century Ukraine, and its effect on these self-described 'people of the forest.' It also provides an interesting look into the all-male environment of these logging camps and the relations between Hutsuls and Italian seasonal workers. This story addresses themes of xenophobia against Italians.

The squire's forest at Ruska had provided timber for decades. It was not a forest, but really a whole forested world. It is not surprising that at one time it separated tribes and nations. They say that the Ruska forest and the gorges of the Ruska torrent once marked the ultimate boundary, the ancient frontier of our Slavonic Rus. But farther to the south-east and somewhat lower down, the Wallachian or some other unknown tribes from somewhere or other drove their flocks and herds as far as the Czeremosz. No wonder, then, that in this vast forest, standing on the bounds of two worlds, for centuries the fiery-eyed, winged dragon had his lair.

Foka Szumej had been acquainted with forestry from his earliest childhood. His every visit to the upland was connected with the felling of trees to make a clearing, with burning down forest to make pastures and meadows. As a youngster in his teens he saw the first big tree-felling in the squire's forests. The forests were still being cut down in Ruska when he became a farmer. Whatever might be said of it, he was interested in this work, which was being performed by Italians, Southern Slavs and our own professional woodcutters. He decided to take a look at it with his own eyes.

He would have more time on his hands during the great fast.¹ He waited till the weather turned warmer.

Who does not know that towards the middle of March, round about St. Eudokia's Day (March 15), something remarkable happens in the highlands? The days are sunny, the skies azure. Like a divine butterfly, the first intoxication of spring breathes a whisper across the snowdrifts. In human beings too, in those whose eyes are open to God's world, something begins to whisper, like the first drop of young wine. But then, after a day or two, the merciless snowstorms return.

Eudokia means a good omen. Who knows whether it is not God vernally smiling across the snows or whether it is a seductive illusion, a dread evil spirit? When on that day in March the heartless stepmother, the priest's wife Odokia, drove out her orphan stepdaughter, sending her into the forest to gather raspberries, the Lord's saints gave the child a full bowl of them. The wandering, curly-haired, bearded old men were sitting somewhere far off amid the snows—where the Popadia (Priest's Wife) upland is now— beside a camp-fire, and that poor, half-frozen girl was drawn by the brightness of the fire. "What are you seeking, poor little one?" they asked. "Raspberries," she replied. They filled her bowl lavishly with coals from their fire. She said no more, but went away, warming her hands on the bowl. Then she looked: she had a full bowl of raspberries!

Sweet and scented raspberries in the middle of Lent! That enticed the stepmother also up to the highland, and a day later she was smothered there by blizzards and snowdrifts.

Jurijko Fedczukowy Hrabczuk, who lived down to our own day, used to recall that one fine day, just before Eudokia, Foka was tempted by the warmth; he saddled two horses, took various articles with him, and rode off to be the guest of the woodcutters.

On the way he called in on Tanasenko Popowycz-Urszega, who lived at Ilcia, not far from the spot where a little river falls into the Czeremosz. Though the day was bright, all Tanasenko's farm, consisting of several spacious cottages linked by courtyards, was sunk in shadow and smoke and in mud too. In the small courtyards all kinds of "small fry"—lambs, calves, kids and young pigs were wandering around perfectly at home, and even frisking and frolicking. Farther on, in spacious enclosures, numerous fully grown flocks and herds were eating hay scattered over the snow, the cows conscious of their dignity and the sheep dulled with dreams of spring. There was dung everywhere.

Tanasenko used to say: "What if it is clean round certain farmers' cottages these days, when it's overclean in the larder too, because it's empty? I agree that I'm rich with muck in my yards, but I'm rich in my chambers too." Tanasenko's storerooms were bursting with all kinds of good things.

He himself would boast that he had [provided for] his children as they should [have been], and even to excess, while now he lived anyhow. Let it be so! The next moment he would be complaining that the times were bad, he had got nothing at all. Yet he still had over a thousand sheep and several hundred cows round his cottage, and perhaps there was no one else in Zabie who knew so much about animals as he. He had an exceptional memory. He knew every calf, every lamb from the moment it was born. He was busy from dawn till night. In the course of the years Foka had learnt a good deal from him.

As soon as he saw Foka he left what he was doing, took him to the best room, then ran to his own room to change his smoke-stained clothing. He emerged a few moments later with a slow, sedate step, wearing red breeches, a fine white shirt, and a very new sheepskin jerkin. He had smeared his long, thick, white hair thoroughly with butter. Only now did he welcome his guest long and effusively. Then, saying no more for the moment, he began to make a fuss of Foka. He started by setting before him unused, very new beech-wood and plum-wood spoons; new Kosow and Pistyn wooden plates, very smooth, with a pattern in green; new knives from Riczka, with handles carved, or rather of moulded brass; and real gentry's glass, violet-tinted.

Then he set several cheeses, each the size of a millstone, on the great table, and a stout hunk of venison fat, as yellow as wax. Then he invited Foka to the table. But there still seemed to be something lacking, and he was worried. He brought out a very new wooden tub richly carved with crosses, and containing vodka flavoured with honey and mountain roots. He took a deep draught, then passed the tub to Foka. But still he was not satisfied. Hurrying more and more, going to and fro between the larder and the table, he brought out one article after another, until he had provided Foka with a table that looked as though spread for an Easter feast.

"And perhaps you'd like some fried eggs, just a few, eh?" Without waiting for Foka's assent he leaped across the larder's high threshold, came back with another leap, and rushed to the kitchen, carrying a good three-score eggs in a maple-wood trough. Foka made no attempt to resist; he knew it was useless.

Tanasenko himself waited on Foka, and did not allow any of the labourers or his family to come into the presence of his guest. The two husbandmen had not seen each other for a long time; they passed complimentary remarks from one to the other.

"I've heard you're doing well, Foka, and that for some time past. And I can see the people speak the truth."

Foka answered politely:

"You keep well and handsome, farmer Tanasenko."

"Well? What d'you mean?"

"Why, you don't look old at all, you're pretty robust."

"Well, and am I so old? My son, I don't even know when I passed my time, until one day I saw a reflection in the water. What was that? Had I got a bunch of tow on my head? Grey hair! Pah! How had I got that? Recently I asked the priest of the parish where I was christened about it. He read from the register, and said that at Pokrowa² I shall have passed my ninety-fifth year. That's not much, I know, but..."

After this preliminary skirmish they fell to talking. They talked about the tree-felling, Foka inquisitively and Tanasenko with disgust. He had not one good word to say of it, but many bad ones. He hardly gave Foka an opportunity to speak.

"You're going off to priest's wife Eudokia in the highland? Going up to see the woodcutting? Take very good care that the priest's wife doesn't make a fool of you. Have you got a sudden longing for raspberries or bilberries?" Without waiting for an answer he went on: "It's all right for a poor orphan, I don't say it isn't; but for anyone who wants to get rich, oi, it's bad, my son. You'll be bringing back coal in your breast instead of raspberries."

"But Tanasenko, I'm always drawn to the forest, and this is a new and interesting sort of work."

"D'you call it work? They dance like bears on chains. He calls it work! In any case, it's not farmer's work." Tanasenko grew more and more excited, he was carried away by his own eloquence. "It's pure slavery, it's a round-up of fools, a bait for trout. Serfdom is nothing to it. You'll see what will come of it: it will bring down woe on us like an avalanche-for all our time, for all our generation. Drunkenness and slavery." In his excitement he began to shout, like a priest declaiming against drunkards. Foka interrupted him discreetly: "But where is there so much forest that it will fetter all our generation?"

"Do they need forests? It's fools they need. And there will be enough fools. You'll see how they like it: not having to think, not having to trouble themselves, so long as they're brought food and drink, and have it set under their noses as though they were cattle."

"Well, and what harm will that do them?"

"What harm? You, Foka Szumej, ask that? Oh, they'll allow themselves to be carried off to some other parts, like these Italians. And of a surety they'll be eating snakes or frogs with them there."

"Do you really believe that, Tanasenko? Have you seen these Italians?"

Tanasenko turned sober.

"Of course I've seen them. They often come down here. They're fine lads. The nicest of them all is the one from the circus, Camio his name is. As soon as he's had a draught from the tub he begins to show off his circus tricks on the floor. He winds himself into a ball and rolls along like a bladder. He sticks his tongue out between his legs, and his eyes laugh. We get great fun out of him; we laugh till we cry. Don't tell anyone, Foka, for you know how people gossip; but I've a great mind to adopt this fellow from the circus, and make him my son; I've got enough for that, though I'm poor now. For everything belongs to my children, and there's not enough of anything. They've barely reached their sixties, and yet somehow they seem to be already old and fat. Their wealth has only brought them sorrow. But when this clown comes along he amuses himself even with the dogs, he dances about with the kids like any billy-goat, and caresses the calves. After all, he's been in a circus. All the animals like him. And somehow, with him around you grow young again. [Even though] he's really a poor, homeless vagabond; I like him. But who knows what family he's from? What blemish might come from him? He's not a farmer's child. And he'll start frying frogs in cream for me, and leaven cheese with living maggots." Tanasenko sighed. "But that's not the point," he worked himself up again. "It's not whether I believe in the frogs or not. I'll tell you how this woodcutting will do harm. It will put an end to farming everywhere. You'll have only hirelings and the children of hirelings, hirelings for ever more."

"But, Tanasenko, they'll make a little money… "

"They'll make a little, then they'll drink it all away and get head over heels in debt. Don't you know that a devil sits on money? And when a man makes a lot in a hurry it doesn't do anyone any good."

"That's true. But though the devil tempts he can't compel. They'll make some money, return to their own country and buy up the gentry's land. And then they'll become farmers."

[…] "But where is the country of these drunkards? Which of them cares about his own place? They'll get used to a crowd, to feeding in a bunch like cattle; in those warrens they'll get used to everything that's bad."

"What warrens?"

"Why, in those tree-felling warrens, in their huts."

"What is there special about them?"

"What, indeed! They're worse than a bear's hole, right in the heart of the virgin forest. The roof is lower than that of a pig-sty, and they themselves are accursed forest spirits, they crawl on their bellies or crowd in a bunch round the fire. There's no place even to hang up the holy pictures."

"Well, that's a new idea! Have you ever seen holy pictures in the upland summer huts?"

"What do you want a holy picture for where the sun is close, the world is wide, and the Holy God is breathing all around? But wait; you're continually interrupting, now listen! I was up there once in the woodcutters' hut in Ruska. Perhaps my old age was gnawing at me, or some worry. A man will often go where his nose leads him. And I felt sorry for those people, though they are fools. So I carried them up a tub of vodka bigger than this one. But not even vodka is of any help to them. I shan't go up there again. Do you know my last word to you on the subject? The worst of all is that there everything is grey, and even black. You keep that in mind, and you have a good look and see if any of them ever puts on red trousers, or a red kerchief, or changes his clothes on Sunday. In that smoke you won't even be able to tell which of them are fair and which dark. And mark this well: where there is such blackness not even if they had money in thousands, not even if they bathed in vodka, could any good come of it. We've all got to die and we only die once. Every man comes to that courtyard. But to stick around in that blackness…. no, I shan't go there again."

Tanasenko had made himself quite sad. Fortunately he recalled his earthly cares.

"But you're not drinking at all well, Foka. Oi, not at all well! You look out, poor lad! God forbid, but I fear you won't live long. Drink up, my son; drink up."

Glad of the opportunity, or in quest of oblivion from the blackness, he himself took a deep drink, a very deep drink, until Foka grew anxious for him. Then he went on:

"Now, wait, let me speak. You know that Zelenczuk fellow, the one that was taken off to the army and did his twenty-five years, and then returned... Well, he's told me that in some coal-mines somewhere, God knows where, when they send horses down under the ground to draw the coal along in wagons, they keep them down there for ever. And then the poor, unhappy beasts go blind. Well, I've got the feeling that those woodcutters will go blind too, with the forest and the hut, or they will have goggle eyes like owls. Do you know what? You go and have a good look at everything up there, and come back here to me tomorrow for the night. Or else give up the idea altogether.

"Listen, Foka; it's a sad place where there aren't any cattle, a man begins to think of death. Here, even though I am poor, I can show you young animals and fresh building, and new barrels, beautifully carved. And don't you like these carved pine tables? They're my own idea. They're inlaid with maple, plum and yew. I've got lots of yew. I've made myself some new wooden spikes for the shingles. That fool of a Buliga bought some new-fangled iron nails somewhere… and fastened down the shingles of the roof with them. That was barely thirty years since, and now those iron nails are rusting and falling out, and there are holes in the roof. But these yew spikes will last all right."

"But where did you get the yew from?"

"Ha! Now you're asking! Where does everything come from? Out of the ground, of course. I was bothered by a hundred-year-old spruce standing in the pasture. I cut it down and was getting up the root, doing the job properly, with pick, axe, and spade, when sudde suddenly … something rang like iron ron underneath it. And under the spruce root was an old yew root."

"And it wasn't rotted at all?"

"The devil would rot first! A yew root is everlasting. Leave a pasture untouched for a hundred years, with no one mowing it, and pasture a yew forest will spring up again from under the ground."

"Do you think so?" Foka desired to be reassured.

"It's absolutely sure."

"Well, then, don't you worry, Tanasenko. Our class also will grow up from under the ground. The woodcutting won't hurt it."

Tanasenko gaped, and smiled inquisitively, cunningly:

"Do you say so? Maybe, maybe… " But he grew impatient again. "You're talking and talking, Foka, and you're not having anything, neither eating nor drinking. None of that with me!"

"You've got a strong head, you're of the Urszega line. It's difficult to keep up with you," Foka pleaded.

"My drinks have never done anyone any harm, and they've made more than one man healthy. I've been giving my mind to that for thirty years. You see, it's all cunningly blended, one thing with another—herbs, honey, vodka, and various other things. It plays on all the strings like cymbals. What one weakens, the others give strength to."

"But to eat so much? I'll get stomach ache and burst," Foka said in an appealing tone.

"Look at that, there's the finest of all doctors." Tanasenko pointed to a new broad, tiled heating stove. On the cream-coloured, highly glazed tiles human figures in brilliant green presented pictures edifying and curious, as well as amusing, and at times extraordinary.

Foka looked at the stove appreciatively. Robbers were riding hard on wild horses with flowing manes, village policemen in dazzling white uniforms and armed with very long carbines gazed after them from a forest, yet others were looking stupidly at the mountains. Cows with beautiful udders were climbing about uplands, after them followed shepherds with trumpets, and shaggy dogs; the gleaming, very green upland stretched ahead of them.

And here was a wedding, with everyone on horseback. The young lady, a farmer's daughter, sturdy and broad-shouldered, was riding a broad-backed horse. The wedding crown on her head shone as radiantly as the sun. Around her the friends and guests were firing off pistols; a thick smoke covered half the scene.

In one corner a devil with a tail, dancing joyously, was scoring sins on an ox-hide. Above him was the sky. In the sky a benevolent and horrified St. Nicholas was trying to protect the sinners with the fold of his robe. But farther on St. Elijah, with lightning in his hand, was riding on a cloud-chariot harnessed to two horses. He was gazing down angrily, he was fearful to behold.

"I'll make up your bed there," Tanasenko said. "There's room for three on the stove,³ the bricks are heated through, they keep the warmth better than a hot compress. In the morning you'll get up as strong as a bear; but in the meantime, do eat."

Thus encouraged, Foka ate and drank, but he talked even less. All this conversation had made him feel rather sad.

Tanasenko himself made up his bed for the night on the stove, with four hairy blankets never used before, and new hempen sheets, never yet washed. At his head he put a red Jewish pillow.

The Death of the Forest

Despite Tanasenko's persuasions and blandishments, at dawn Foka rose and rode off into the mountains, along the Czeremosz, through Krasny Luh (the Beautiful Gorge), then up the Bystrec to Ruska. He reached the forest woodcutters' hut just before noon. There he found only the ashman.

"Ashman" literally means the man who cleans out the hut, sweeping up the dust and rubbish. While the workers are away on the job the ashman is responsible for keeping the hut in good order. He prepares the fuel, keeps the fire continually made up, changes the spruce branches used as couches. Morning and evening he prepares food for all the workers. He is the farmer of the hut. And so sometimes it happens that this office is filled by a woman. Of course it never occurs to us that women should work in the forest, felling trees, as it is said that they do in Siberia. But if some energetic and tough sort of woman, a she-bear so to speak, comes along and has a fancy for the job, then certainly she may make a good ashman.

Applied to a man, the word is not used slightingly. He allows the workers to abandon all domestic troubles. In exchange for going off to the forest and facing death you get human freedom, you fling all your troubles on to the rubbish-heap. Let the ashman struggle with them. "D'you know what, farmer?" said the ashman to Foka. "It's a fine day today, and warm; why don't you go up the mountain? They'll be sending the trees down in an hour or two. It's not a bad path." He pointed to a steep track running right at the side of the timber-lined runway down which the logs were sent. "Only keep a good look-out where the runway passes close, or where it crosses the path, and see you don't get in the way of a log coming down. For that's not so good."

Foka left his horses in the ashman's charge, and took with him only two pistols, an axe, and a sharp pick. The slippery, almost ice-coated path at first climbed parallel with the runway, but after a time it leaped across to the left-hand side. Then it returned to the right-hand side, and at last it left the runway far to one side and climbed high above it. Below and all around was still virgin forest. The old trees shot up from the dizzy depths one above another, as though trying to equal the height of the peaks. In any case they protected any wanderer along the path from falling over the precipice. Here and there a stripped log had shot off the runway, and, nestling in the snow, barring the path, forced Foka into laborious efforts to climb over it.

"You can see that sometimes a log shoots out on to the path, and then… " Foka recalled the ashman's warning.

Still higher, the path consisted mainly of steps hollowed out by feet in the snow beside each tree-trunk. Between one step and the next was an icy wall or drop. To negotiate the path Foka had to jump from step to step. The ingenious Italians had plaited lines from bark and fixed them to rings driven into the stout trunks, thus linking them together with a kind of handrail to help in the leap. As it wound this way and that the path often cut across high above the runway.

Foka leaped nimbly from step to step, occasionally resting for a moment in the hollows behind the sheltering trunks. The sun was broiling, it grew steadily hotter. Suddenly from the aerial void above flew the cry: "Ha-bu, ha-bu!" At once from the depths below, through the astonished forest the brisk reply pierced upward: "Kleh-hu, kleh-hu!" These shouts were warnings that logs would be travelling down the runway.

Foka clung to a trunk; in a minute or two the runway began to thunder. It was as though lightning had struck the forest. No! It was as though St. Elias had grown infuriated, and was thunderously raging over the abysses in pursuit of the fiery-eyed, winged dragon, was lashing and scaring his prey, the forest-demons. The runway thundered menacingly, then stormed and groaned miserably as though about to burst. All the ravines around answered with echoes. All Ruska thundered as though it had burst from its centre. Foka had heard cannon fired in exercises, he had lived through many a mountain storm, but he had never known such a cannonade.

Clinging by one foot fixed in the well-trodden step beside a stout tree, holding on to the trunk with his pick, he craned his neck upward, then glanced down, straining his body to lean out round the trunk. He laughed quietly.

"Not farmer's work? Hah, Tanasenko, maybe it's rather more. Human pride is laughable, no matter whose it is."

The mountains rumbled. The great logs careered past madly, and came to rest somewhere below. Here and there the forest sighed for a moment or two longer from the depths of the abysses. Then all was as still as in a church. A kite screamed a piercing warning from somewhere afar.

Once more Foka had to leap hurriedly across the runway, then again, and yet again. And once more the powerful, or threatening shouts came from the sky and from the depths: "Ha-bu! Kleh-hu!" And once more one mighty white log after another shot through the forest.

When still some distance from the top Foka caught sight of the Italians attacking log after log with hooks and picks. With persistent, enduring effort they sent them down. At the very last moment before the runway began to roar they leaped away like lightning, with a spring like that of a jumper or dancer. "A marvellous people!" Foka thought admiringly.

At the top, where they were despatching the logs, the sunlight reflected from the snow was so brilliant that the eyes ached. It was obvious now that the worthy Tanasenko had not climbed right to the summit. It was quite possible that he had even spent all day in the hut, for he had complained of the darkness. Foka was now close to the top, and he hastened his steps. And, whether his boots had become too slippery, or whether he took an incautious jump, suddenly he began to slip down. All the world went dark in his eyes, and he went slipping rapidly down towards the runway. But he grabbed the bark line, and with one haul was back on the step beside the trunk. From above came first a cry of alarm, then a laugh. Foka smiled, and inquisitively stared down to see what sort of path had been waiting for him. After that he made his way to the top all the more hurriedly.

"Glory to God and the blessed sun!" The Italians and the Southern Slavs and the woodcutters from Bereznyca and Ruska Polana greeted him. Smiling merrily among the workmen was none other than the innkeeper from Rozdoroze, the tall, broad-shouldered Jew Josenko… "Peace be with you, Josenko!" said Foka. "And have you climbed up here?"

"[…] Peace be with you, Foka! What sort of merchant would I be if I didn't think of my dear guests when they're sweating away up here?"

The Southern Slavs had already learnt to talk quite well in our language, and the Italians could make a shift at conversation, but they were delighted beyond measure when Foka spoke to them in the Venetian dialect. Of the workmen almost half were Bereznyca men, and many more had come from Ruska Polana in Hungary. These were famous lumbermen, experts on lumber rafts and log-floating. They were watching up at the top to see that the logs sent down together in one group, which went to form one raft, were more or less of equal size.

A large number of stripped logs were waiting all around. They lay drowsy and humble, or lurking cunningly. Where the branches had been trimmed off the knots smiled with quiet menace, like dragons' eyes—or perhaps with lust for revelry, for destruction, because they had survived up here for so many centuries?

They were all to be sent down that day: no small labour. The guests helped, and Foka helped, and Josenko [too.] When black-eyed Mario began to sing avanti-avanti-attenzione in a very even voice, quite as good as that of the sexton of Kryworiwnia, they all flung themselves on a sluggishly sprawling log like hungry hounds on a bear, bit into it with picks, and thrust it steadily towards the runway.

It was still daylight when they had sent down all the logs. They seated themselves on the smooth tree-stumps and warmed themselves in the sun. They did not talk. They listened to the pipes, smoked, sipped vodka. They returned to the hut before dusk.

Built in the shape of an octagon, the forest woodcutters' hut has low walls and a steep-sloping roof; or rather, the whole hut is one steep roof of laths, with a smoke vent-hole which is protected and masked from the wind and rain by lath wings. The walls, on which the roof rests, are made of spruce beams, and are no higher than the height of a man seated. On one side they are deeply buried in the mountain-side, and all the crevices are packed tightly with moss. In the winter the hut walls are sunk in snow, buried so completely that they are invisible. There is an honourable place for the fire, as for an altar; the smoke has the utmost freedom to pour upward; but for the human beings the hut is very low—the less room the better! That is the governing idea in its design. Only the entrance, with its porch cut into the roof, and consisting of an inner and outer door, rises high enough for a man to pass in with only a slight stoop, or at least high enough to ensure that he does not have to crawl in on all fours, like a bear into its lair. But inside the hut, apart from the central spot by the fire, it is impossible for a man to stand up straight. The closer they are to the walls, the more the men have to squat, cower, and even crawl, as Tanasenko indignantly recalled. They sit in rings radiating from the fire, and sleep in the same manner, with their feet to the fire, their heads to the cold walls.

The hut above the Ruska torrent was spacious, for it was intended to accommodate not only the woodcutters, but also carters who, according to transport requirements, sometimes spent the night with their horses in the nearby stables, which were partly cut out of the mountain slope. On such occasions they came to the hut for supper. At other times they spent the night somewhere much higher up, and then the hut was more roomy. But it was colder too.

The ashman kept the fire well made up.

When the workmen entered the hut each hastened to his own place. There he sat on a fresh litter of spruce branches, but not too close to the fire, so that others could pass.

The ashman stood by the fire. He was cooking maize-polenta. With a wooden ladle he mixed pots one after another, shifting them close to the fire or drawing them away with a strong wooden hook. He had a greeting for everybody without exception. Rather anxiously he inquired: "Well, and how goes it? All peace?" And, as though to make up for his whole day of silence, he encouraged conversation with any who felt like talking.

Only the ashman was occupied. The others rested. They lay down, shaking the day's weariness from their bodies with a preliminary doze. Then they began to eat their supper. As many as ten spoons were dipped in one pot. The guests who had come up from the villages were invited to help themselves first. They treated the workmen in turn to milk, unleavened barley cakes, and sheep's cheese. In addition to the Italians and Southern Slavs and local workmen there were carters and guests from at least six villages.

The order of the day in the hut is invariable, and more monotonous than anywhere else in the world. Except on holidays the workmen leave it early in the morning, and return at dusk. Each has his own place, and does not stir from it. The hut is a place of weariness, closeness, warmth.

"And this goes on the same every day?" Foka asked. "Always the same?"

"God grant that it is the same every day," the ashman answered, "and thank God that nothing happens. And if anything does happen, God grant that it is nothing more than guests from a village, like you, farmer. Except that on a holy day old Maksymko from Jaworec reads us something from a stout book and brings us news of the other world."

And yet, in defiance of these extremely narrow bounds of existence and in spite of their weary bodies, the men are fond of that evening fire. Afterwards they look back on it with pleasure. The fire not only warms and cooks: it draws guests from nearby settlements, brings people together, makes you glad. Of loneliness, and that often a devilish loneliness, they have enough. But here nobody is bound, every man is free, he can leave the work whenever he likes. Remoteness from human habitations, from families, and from everyday cares too, sometimes exalts one almost above the everyday. The men always have something to say to one another. They discuss things more then than at any other time.

But what do they discuss? In the early mornings, their own dreams. The dreams are like news from somewhere. In the long evenings, their grandfathers' tales, shepherds' and hunters' memories. And afterwards the stories are spread from village to village. The fire of the summer hut can transform into a kind of woven pattern thoughts and dreams that without it would fade.

At other times they talk of affairs of the day, of the news from the villages, and even of politics. What politics? Of course, not Viennese or Stanyslawow or even Kosow politics, but their own, Zabie or Kryworiwnia politics. And then they happily forget the politics. Almost every day they play and sing. And on holidays more than one song has been composed which has afterwards gone wandering through the villages, finding its way into distant hamlets, like an inquisitive trout into the smallest stream of water.

Yet it is obvious that in labour which is so closely bound up with nature, fickle and hard nature, it is nature that issues the orders.

"Do you like it here?" Foka asked the ashman. "Don't you have too much of it? What is it like when the blizzards are raging, or during a thaw or a flood? Don't you ever fall ill?"

"And what of it?" blue-eyed Jurijko broke in. "For twenty-five years my father spent every summer in the upland, and he's got such eyes that he can only see at a distance, like a bird. He says he's never known the disgrace of spending the summer in a hut and sleeping on blankets or in a bed. Oh, no. Only up there, in the summer hut, on a hard bench, or on the beaten earth floor beside the fire. Well, in that case I can spend some twelve winters here on Ruska."

"But don't you ever fall ill?" Foka repeated.

"Well, there's Czornysz, he wanted to imitate Matijko Zelenczuk, and for a wager he carried a tub full of sheep's cheese in his teeth. But he's made of other bones. He spoilt his teeth, and so he fell ill."

They all laughed, and Czornysz himself laughed, so that the gaps in his teeth were revealed by the firelight.

"You see how we fall ill? Only if a log catches us, or we have an accident… "

"May God grant otherwise," the ashman hastily interposed. "For here every day, every hour..."

But in that woodcutters' hut they remember least of all the daily dangers that lurk in the lumber trade. Or is it simply that they talk least about them? For why provoke misfortune? Sometimes an unlucky word flies out of the mouth unnecessarily, like a devilish bat, like a fiery bird.

From the moment Foka and the workmen entered the hut they were plunged into a kindly monotony, which warms everyone and bears one on like a wave of dreams to the place the soul yearns for.

But that very evening a gloomy rumour began to slip round. It passed from mouth to mouth round the fire. One of the Italians—Camio, so it was said—had not returned to the hut. It was asked: was it certain? If so, something must have happened to him. Every day he walked down testing the runway. Perhaps this time a log…

Usually Camio returned from these solitary wanderings at dusk. Now night had fallen, and he hadn't yet turned up. He was called, whistled, the ashman even sounded the trumpet in an alarm. In vain. What was to be done? A large band of workmen with torches of resinous wood, with weapons, spades, and picks, went off into the forest in search of him. Foka went with them. After a long search they found Camio, dead, not beside the runway, but deep in the snow at the bottom of a ravine. He bore no sign of a wound or any special bruises. Possibly a log had barely brushed him. Perhaps he had been startled by something, had staggered and fallen over into the depths.

The body was brought back to the hut about midnight; it was laid on a couch of spruce outside, and carefully covered with sheepskins. At the edge of the forest a fire was lit. The ashman went outside the hut again and again with the trumpet to sound a funereal note, gentle, sad, but far-reaching. The echo came back from afar, the forests answered. The forested ravines on Ruska had never heard such tones before. The forests themselves died silently.

The ashman returned to the hut, thoughtful, dreamy. He said quietly:

"Don't go and look, brothers, but high above the forest are certain stars—the Reapers (Orion). They're shining, and if you listen you can hear scythes ringing. They're reaping, reaping."

Foka turned out the provisions he had brought and handed them round to all the men.

"Look, here's something heavy," he said in amazement. "Tanasenko must have put this in unbeknown to me. It's a cheese as large as a rock—so that I shouldn't starve, which God forbid!" He laughed, and reached for the other bags, to get out the vodka. When he looked he found something heavy in the next bag too. Why, it was the very same tub from which he ich he and Tanasenko had drunk yesterday, now refilled. The old farmer had done his best! Who wouldn't recognize his hand!

Old and young tried Tanasenko's vodka. They were delighted with it.

"In this delicious vodka," said Foka, "is all Tanasenko and all Czornohora."

"Why Czornohora?" someone asked.

"Well, you try it!" Foka replied. "There's honey in it, lots of honey, and thyme, and dill, and juniper. And that's not all. There's gentian from Czornohora. So that the lungs should be healthy, so that you can carry heavy burdens easily on your shoulders. And there's arnica; you see, that's so you shouldn't get frightened in the forest."

They smacked their lips, and sipped and tasted.

"And is there mandrake too?" Jurijko Hrabczuk asked.

"There's sure to be. Here, take a good drink and you'll know."

"Lord!" Jurijko almost took fright. "We shall begin to see spirits soon, and poor Camio will be sitting down with us to drink vodka."

"Don't be afraid, don't be afraid," Foka answered. "Tanasenko's wise, he put in plenty of sweet honey, and didn't spare the bitterness and the pungency. All in right measure. And he only put in a couple of drops of mandrake—just as much as is necessary. Just for folly's sake. For without foolery this world has no taste; it might just as well be without the wind."

"God grant only that he didn't put in any love philtre, for that's unnecessary and dangerous for us. We haven't any women here, and when we begin to get fuddled we shall all start to embrace the ashman and make up to him. And it will be bad for us."

They all laughed. They relished the magic potion. Then they took a bite of smoked venison, of cheese, of barley cake.

And so, spontaneously, without anyone deciding so, or ordering, they slipped into the observance of the ancient rite of watching by the dead—the wake.

It began with jesting questions and answers, then stories, plays, amusing representations, jokes, exclamations, and even, to tell the truth, buffooneries, as always. The most amusing part was that they had to sit squatting close together, head to head, shoulder to shoulder. Josenko, who belonged to the mountains and was not used to people, did not take part in the Christian rite; but he drank with the others, he nibbled at his own bread and Tanasenko's cheese. Не laughed decorously whenever required. Then the ashman went outside again, and once more the trumpet was melancholy with memory and grief. And they were all silent, the wake was interrupted. But afterwards the hut roared again with laughter.

Only the Italians and the Southern Slavs looked on in amazement, giving one another meaning, almost terrified glances, as though in this rite there was some mockery or sacrilege. Then, weary and dispirited, they dozed. When they had had a doze they awoke again, yawning. They glanced at one another reluctantly, gloomily. Without doubt they felt more deserted than ever before, isolated in this foreign forest on the edge of the world.

Squatting down before each of the Italians in turn, Foka invited each one to take part, and regaled them with his provisions. But, seeing what they were thinking, realizing that such a celebration was not to their taste, he talked to each of them. He invited them all to visit him as his guests in Jasenowo. And he said:

"I suppose you think we aren't greatly upset about Camio, you think we don't regret him, because he's a foreigner, and that's why we're enjoying ourselves. On the contrary! This ancient Christian custom is for the true consolation of grief."

Rather embarrassed, the Italians nodded their heads reluctantly, shrugged their shoulders and glanced at one another again. To tell the truth, even they did not know very much about the dead man, except that at one time he had been a circus acrobat. He had never talked about his family, apparently he hadn't any family at all. He was a good fellow, they said, fond of jokes, and always showing off his circus tricks; but usually he went alone into the forest.

Finding Foka so courteous, and as he understood Italian, Mario talked to him rather more freely.

"You mustn't be surprised, signor, that we're low-spirited and sad. Since when has it been ordained that we should make merry at the side of a dead comrade? We too watch by the dead, but how? Among us Christians the divine gospel is read, we sing devout hymns. But here? Here there is no consolation at all. With all this noisy laughter, all this fun, we're still sadder, if anything, and our hearts ache. Is that so surprising? To us all this is impious, pagan and sinful. Don't be angry, signor, but as you have asked..."

Foka tried to explain the ancient rite.

"It is older than our fathers and grandfathers, it is the best for us. And it will outlive us. The old people used to explain that we don't need mourning songs, for people might go out of their minds with grief. You may ask: 'But why should they?' That's easy to understand.

"In your country neighbours live close to one another, you have your little street and your church and the church bells. But here every settlement is far from the world, every cottage is a long way from the next cottage, and in the old days it was still further. Death drives into the cottage like a mighty lord with a four-in-hand. Who knows whence he comes? He stamps in arrogantly, mercilessly, and he snatches away just whichever he takes a fancy to. And he lords it: I'm the master here! I'm the farmer of this world! And he bares his teeth at the other living creatures in the cottage, forces them up against the wall, humbles them to the floor, makes them of no account. But as soon as the trumpet announces that someone has died, the people pour into the cottage from all parts, like leaves, and they keep a wake, and then death huddles down in one corner, he no longer seats himself in the seat of honour. But the widows are in despair, they go crazy with sorrow; the orphans groan, and even the neighbours, the weeping women, plaintively sing their laments. And so then their friends don't leave them alone, but watch all night; they comfort them with this rite, and don't allow sorrow and death to have access to the living. For sorrow corrodes a man, it withers and chokes him, and thus it drags him half alive as he is to death. And not only that; along that road it draws him into sin, into anger, into unkindness. But these ancient, comforting feasts bring us together, they bind us, they hold us together better even than work. At such times people are loving to one another, they are friendly with one another. The dead man sees that, and without doubt he is glad to see it, for it is a human thing. God sees it, too, and He demands something more of us; so it is a godly thing too. It's just as when even one leaf is torn off and falls to the ground, all the green beech-wood sighs. It's like that with us, and here, in this forest, in this hut, just as much as anywhere else."

Mario listened closely. He gazed into vacancy, his face cleared. The Italians gave Foka friendly nods, and squeezed his hands. Then they had another drink, treating one another. The farmer Foka returned to his own people.

"And you listen, too," he said to them. "The thing that's wrong is not that we're making merry; that's quite clear, everybody understands that. The thing that's lacking is that none of us has wept. For we can be sure that this ancient custom is just as well blended as Tanasenko's delicious vodka. It contains both tears and laughter, and despair and frenzy and bitterness and joy. Without all these together the wake isn't any good. The pity is simply that we don't know Camio; we know nothing at all about him. I myself have never seen him, and even the Italians don't know much about him. And so I'll ask Andrijko to play an old death-song, a lament, on his pipe."

Out of the dusk, from one corner of the hut emerged a tall peasant, bent double. He had a pipe in his hand. He was like others of the Plytka family whom Foka knew from Kryworiwnia. His eyes were hazel, and deep with daring, like those of a vulture from the Marmarosz mountains. Among the woodcutters and in all the villages he was jokingly known as "The Forest-killer." For, as everybody knew, he was in the habit of penetrating into the most remote fastnesses of the forest, where he hewed down trees, having no companion whatever with him. Whether on the edge of a precipice or at the bottom of a ravine, he could deal with the most dangerous of forest giants. He hewed more boldly, efficiently, and swiftly than any other lumberman. You might make your way into the most impenetrable depths of the forest on Ruska, and swear you had reached the end of the world, that you were the first ever to set foot there; and then, suddenly, you would hear the sound of an axe and there you would find Andrijko, the "Forest-killer," felling a tree.

Those who did not know him might think him a morose or sluggish sort. But his companions and neighbours knew or guessed what he had fixed in his mind when he cut down and then rooted up the old trees. His one great craving was to seek out fertile soil, on slopes not too steep or secluded, and then take steps to buy it from the landlord for himself, his people, and his neighbours in Kryworiwnia. Sunny meadows, cherry and plum orchards, such were the things he dreamed of. He brought death to the ancient forests, but life for the new settlements. And perhaps for this reason, though he was not more than forty, he looked careworn or work-weary, and much older. In earlier times he had been called the "Whisperer," because he spoke quietly and weightily. Now before he began to play he whispered feelingly:

"What you said about the beech-wood was fine, Foka; it is green and [whole]. And without tears a Christian will not be [whole]. But now here's this poor fellow, our brother Camio; he was a very comforting, very pleasant sort of man, but he was just as much concealed from the world in his lifetime as he is now. He never pulled a sour face. But no one knew anything about him. I alone perhaps knew something about him... I'll tell you that later. Meanwhile, let the lament recall him."

And Andrijko began to play a "death song," a monotonous tune in the bass. He drew it out mournfully. It hung long but sure in its monotony, like a black bird watching as it hovers over the silent forest. But then with one beat of the wings it flew up far from the earth. Then again it wailed like a wandering falcon, when the woodcutters take the soft, white little fledglings from the spruce. With a monotonous groan—since no other expression is given to it—yet with the very reproach of life it challenged the gloomy forest. And from the forest it was answered by a muffled groaning, a silent fading, as the dread forests surrendered to death. Then came a talk whispered confidentially with the dead man, as though across the threshold of the hut. Here, life; there, death; you, brother, today; we, tomorrow.

When Andrijko ended his playing the hut came to life again. They turned once more to treating one another, to verbal duels and amusements. No one would have thought the men had had a long day of hard work.

"Zu-zu-zu-zu," the bass chorus hummed, and a second chorus from the opposite corner, thinner in tone and melodiously imitating women's voices, answered with "zu-zu-zu-zu."

The humming sounded above the crackle of the fire. It was the "tuning note;" with its rhythm it involuntarily aroused and drew in all the others.

The wake went on till morning. Towards dawn Foka, Matijko Zelenczuk and Jurijko Fedczukowy went off to a hamlet on the Bystrec. In those days, by a turn in the Bystrec, in a secluded spot on the high left bank, before you reached the sluice-gate at the bottom of a steep slope stood a shrine, which the old squire from Stanyslawow, Wojciech Przybylowski, had built. By the shrine was a small cemetery. There they dug a grave for Camio, and prepared a coffin of spruce. And there on the third day they buried Camio. Now there is only a wrought-iron cross where the shrine stood, and old limes and birches are growing where formerly there were graves. Below them the Bystrec roars as always.

After the funeral a snowstorm blew up. Wave upon wave, bank upon bank the blizzards marched on from Czornohora. They poured tingling granular snow into the eyes, and the world went dark. Foka's young horses were afraid of the blizzard, and on his journey back they often turned aside or shied away.

On his way home he called on Tanasenko, and found him in his carpenter's workshop. His hair dishevelled, his face and clothes begrimed with smoke, the old farmer was happily working on a new maple spade with a handle excessively carved with designs. As usual, he was delighted to see a guest, and showed Foka the new tubs, cheese-tubs, plates and small tables scattered round him. The workshop smelt of pine like perfumed oil. After greeting Foka, Tanasenko asked in his usual tart manner, and apparently with a note of triumph:

"Well, and did the ice-woman Eudokia freeze you up?"

"Not me, but Camio—"

"That clown? That sort of fellow shouldn't be crawling about our forests at all. So he got frozen, eh?"

"Frozen for ever, Tanasenko; a log sent him over a precipice."

Tanasenko gave Foka a look that cried: "Murderer!" He raised his spade as though about to strike him with it. Then his mouth gaped, he dropped the spade on the floor, and fell heavily on to a bench. But he started up swiftly and ran to his room. He came back with a coloured handkerchief, wiping away his tears. With a throttled snarl he growled from the door, while his face writhed horribly:

"You see what you've done? You ought to have your liver cut out; you ought to be hanged. Damn the woodcutting; damn the blasted, lousy woodcutting!"

He broke down quite suddenly:

"Oh, I'm a fool, a fool! Why didn't I keep him here from the first? Oh, God, God! And he could do everything. The animals loved him. He's lost! If I'd only got up to you... if only for the wake."

"Tanasenko, I'm sorry about you, too; don't take it so badly. But didn't you say he wasn't a farmer's child? And something about the Italian food… "

Tanasenko looked at Foka from under lowering brows. He turned really angry.

"What are you reminding me of my stupidity now for? Do you know who is the farmer? It's the one who gives his life to both humans and cattle, and to the grass and the wheat too. And don't be angry, Foka—the one who leaves the forests also a place in the world. Such a man recognizes God. Oh, Camio, Camio! Lord!"

Time after time Urszega got up, went out, and came back. He did not invite his guest to the best room. He brought a stout cheese-tub into the workshop. Just as he was, grimy with smoke, unkempt, he sat down beside Foka.

"Well, let's drink, Foka. I invite you. This world is stupid, and I'm the most stupid creature in it."

"But Tanasenko," Foka reminded him, "such a farmer as you?"

In a hoarse, mournful voice Tanasenko cried out:

"All this farm is empty! It's slavery! I'll fling it all on the rubbish heap. I'll leave it to the devilish devil's gossiping mother… I'll sign it all away to her officially. Let her have the use of the property, the devilish carrion, the tsaritsa of this world! And I'll pick up my stick and go wandering along the highland roads, all over the earth. Only I feel a little sorry for the animals, in case someone should do them a wrong. Hah! Old age is coming on and it's dark in the world. Let's drink."

#folklore #nature #ukraine