THE SELF-SACRIFICING RABBIT.
By“SHCHEDRÌN” (SALTYKÒV).
By“SHCHEDRÌN” (SALTYKÒV).
By“SHCHEDRÌN” (SALTYKÒV).
One day, a rabbit incurred the displeasure of a wolf. You see, he was running along not far from the wolf’s lair, and the wolf saw him, and called out: “Little bunny! Stop a minute, dear!” But the rabbit, instead ofstopping, ran on faster than ever. So the wolf, with just three bounds, caught him, and said—
“Because you did not stop when I first spoke, this is the sentence I pronounce: I condemn you to death by dismemberment. But, as I have dined to-day, and my wife has dined, and we have stored up food enough to last us five days, you sit down under this bush and wait your turn. Then perhaps—ha! ha! ha!—I will pardon you!”
So the rabbit sat on his haunches under the bush, and never moved. He thought of only one thing—how many days, how many hours would pass before he must die. He looked towards the lair, and saw the glittering eyes of the wolf watching him. And sometimes it was still worse; the wolf and his wife would come out into the field, and stroll up and down close by him. They would look at him, and the wolf would say something to his wife in wolf language, then they would burst out laughing, “Ha! ha! ha!...” And all the little wolf-cubs would come with them, and run up to him in play, rub their heads against him, gnash their teeth.... And the poor rabbit’s heart fluttered and bounded.
Never had he loved life so well as now. He was a highly respectable rabbit, and had chosen for a bride the daughter of a widowed lady-rabbit. At the moment when the wolf caught him by the neck, he was just running to his betrothed.
And now she, his betrothed, would wait, and think, “My squint-eyed one has forsaken me!” Or perhaps—perhaps she has waited—waited ... and loved another, ... and ... Or it may be ... she, too, ... playing, poor child, among the bushes, caught by a wolf!...
Tears almost choked the poor fellow at this thought. “And this is the end of all my warrens in the air! I, that was about to marry, had bought the samovar already, looked forward to the time when I should drink tea with sugar in it with my young wife,—and now, instead, what has befallen me!... How many hours now till death?”...
One night he fell asleep where he sat. He dreamed that the wolf had appointed him his special commissioner, and while he was absent, performing his duties, the wolf paid visits to his lady-rabbit.... Suddenly he felt some one touching his side; he awoke, and saw the brother of his betrothed.
“Your bride is dying,” said he. “She heard of your misfortune, and sank at once under the blow. Her one thought now is, ‘Must I die thus, and not say farewell to my beloved?’”
At these words the condemned one felt as though his heart would burst. Oh, why! How had he deserved his bitter fate? He had lived honestly, he had never stirred up revolutions, had never gone about with firearms, he had attended to his business—and must he die for that? Death! Oh, think what that word means! And not he alone must die, but she too, his little grey maiden-rabbit, whose only crime was that she had loved him, her squint-eyed one, with all her heart! Oh, if he could, how he would fly to her, his little grey love, how he would clasp his fore-paws behind her ears, and caress her, and stroke her little head!
“Let us escape,” said the messenger.
At these words the condemned one was for a moment as if transformed. He shrank up altogether, and laid his ears along his back. He was just ready to spring, and leave not a trace behind. But at that moment he glanced at the wolf’s lair. The rabbit heart throbbed with anguish.
“I can’t,” he said; “the wolf has not given me permission.”
All this time the wolf was looking on and listening, and whispering softly in wolf language with the she-wolf. No doubt they were praising the rabbit’s noble-mindedness.
“Let us escape,” said the messenger once more.
“I can’t,” repeated the condemned.
“What treason are you muttering there?” suddenly snarled the wolf.
The rabbits stood as petrified. Now the messenger was lost too. To incite a prisoner to flight—is that permitted? Ah! the little grey maiden-rabbit will lose both lover and brother; the wolf and the she-wolf will tear them both in pieces.
When the rabbits came to their senses, the wolf and the she-wolf were gnashing their teeth before them, and in the darkness their eyes shone like lamps.
“Your Excellency, it was nothing: we were just talking; ... a neighbour came to visit me,” stammered the condemned, half dead with terror.
“Nothing! I dare say! I know you! Butter won’t melt in your mouths! Speak the truth. What is it all about?”
“It’s this way, your Excellency,” interposed the bride’s brother. “My sister, his betrothed, is dying, and asks, may he not come to say farewell to her?”
“H’m! It’s right that a bride should love her betrothed,” said the she-wolf. “That means that they will have a lot of little ones, and there will be more food for wolves. The wolf and I love each other, and we have a lot of cubs. Ever so many are grown up, and now we have four little ones. Wolf! wolf! shall we let him go to take leave of his betrothed?”
“But we were to have eaten him the day after to-morrow——”
“I will come back, your Excellency. I’ll go like a flash; I—indeed.... Oh, as God is holy, I’ll come back!” hurriedly exclaimed the condemned. And, in order to convince the wolf that hecouldmove like a flash, he sprang up with such agility that even the wolf looked at him admiringly, and thought—
“Ah! if only my soldiers were like that.”
And the she-wolf became quite sad, and said—
“See that, now! A rabbit, and how he loves his she-rabbit.”
There was nothing for it; the wolf consented to let the rabbit go onparolewith the stipulation that he should return exactly at the appointed time. And he kept the bride’s brother as hostage.
“If you are not back the day after to-morrow by six in the morning,” he said, “I’ll eat him instead of you; then if you come I’ll eat you too; perhaps, though, I’ll—ha! ha!—pardon you!”
The squint-eyed one darted off like the arrow from the bow. The very earth quivered as he ran. If a mountain barred his way, he simply dashed at it; if a river, he never stopped to look for a ford, but swam straight across; if a marsh, he sprang from tuft to tuft of grass. Not easy work! To get right across country, and go to the bath, and be married (“I will certainly be married!” he kept repeating to himself), and get back in time for the wolfs breakfast....
Even the birds wondered at his swiftness, and remarked—
“Yes, theMoscow Gazettesays that rabbits have no souls, only a kind of vapour, and there it goes.”
At last he arrived. Tongue cannot speak, neither can pen write the rapture of that meeting. The little grey maiden-rabbit forgot her sickness at the sight of her beloved. She stood up on her hind paws, put a drum upon her head, and with her fore-paws beat out the “Cavalier March”; she had been practising it as a surprise for her betrothed. And the widowed lady-rabbit completely lost her head with joy; she thought no place good enough for her future son-in-law to sit in, no food good enough to give him. Then the aunts and cousins and neighbours came running from all sides, overjoyed to see the bridegroom, and perhaps, too, to taste the good cheer.
The bridegroom alone was not like himself. While still embracing his betrothed, he suddenly exclaimed—
“I must go to the bath, and then be married at once.”
“Why should you be in such a hurry?” asked the mother rabbit, smiling.
“I must go back. The wolf only gave me leave of absence for one day.”
Then he told them all, and his bitter tears flowed as he spoke. It was hard to go, and yet he must not stay. He had given his word, and to a rabbit his word is law. And all the aunts and cousins declared with one voice: “Thou speakest truth, oh squint-eyed one. Once given, the spoken word is holy. Never in all our tribe was it known that a rabbit was false to his word!”
A tale is soon told, but a rabbit’s life flies faster still. In the morning they greeted the squint-eyed one, and before evening came he parted from his young wife.
“Assuredly the wolf will eat me,” he said. “Therefore be thou faithful to me. And if children shall be born to thee, educate them strictly; best of all, apprentice them in a circus; there they will be taught not only to beat the drum, but also to shoot peas from a pop-gun.”
Then suddenly, as though lost in thought, he added, remembering the wolf—
“It may be, though, that the wolf will—ha! ha!—pardon me!”
And that was the last of him they saw.
Meantime, while the squint-eyed one was making merry and getting married, great misfortunes were happening in the tract of country which divided him from the wolfs lair. In one place heavy rains had fallen, so that the river, which the rabbit swam across so easily the day before, overflowed and inundated ten versts of ground. In another place King Aaron declared war against King Nikìta, and a battle was pitched right in the rabbit’s path. In a third placethe cholera appeared, so that quarantine was established for a hundred versts round. And, besides all that, wolves, foxes, owls—they seemed to lie in wait at every step.
The squint-eyed one was prudent; he had so calculated his time as to leave himself three hours extra; but when one hindrance after another beset him his heart sank. He ran without stopping all the evening, half the night; the stones cut his feet, the fur on his sides hung in ragged tufts, torn by the thorny branches, a mist covered his eyes, blood and foam fell from his mouth,—and still he had so far to go! And his friend, the hostage, haunted him constantly, as though alive before him. Now he stands like a sentinel in front of the wolfs lair, thinking: “In so many hours my dear brother-in-law will return to deliver me.”... When the rabbit thought of that, he darted on yet faster. Mountains, valleys, forests, marshes—it was all the same to him. Often he felt as though his heart would break; then he would crush it down, by sheer force of will, that fruitless emotion might not distract him from his great aim. He had no time now for sorrow or tears: he must think of nothing but how to tear his friend from the wolf’s jaws.
And now the day began to break. The owls and bats slipped into their hiding-places; the air became chilly. Suddenly all grew silent, like death. And still the squint-eyed one fled on and on, with the one thought ever in his heart: “Shall I come too late to save my friend?”
The east grew red; first on the far horizon the clouds were faintly tipped with fire; then it spread and spread, and suddenly—a flame. The dew flashed on the grass, the birds awoke, the ants and worms and beetles began to move, a light smoke rose from somewhere; through the rye and oats a whisper seemed to pass—clearer, clearer.... But the squint-eyed one saw nothing, heard nothing, only murmured to himself again and again: “I have destroyed my friend,—destroyed my friend!”
At last, a hill! Beyond that was a marsh, and in the marsh the wolf’s lair.... Too late, oh squint-eyed one, too late!...
With one last effort he put forth all his remaining strength, and bounded to the top of the hill. But he could go no further; he was sinking from exhaustion. And must he fail now?...
The wolf’s lair lay before him as on a map. Somewhere far off six o’clock struck from a church steeple, and every stroke of the bell beat like a hammer on the heart of the agonized creature. At the last stroke the wolf rose from his lair, stretched himself, and wagged his tail for pleasure. Then he went up to the hostage, seized him in his fore-paws, and stuck the claws into his body, in order to tear him in two halves, one for himself, the other for his wife. And the wolf-cubs surrounded their father and mother, gnashing their teeth and looking on....
“I am here!—Here!” shrieked the squint-eyed one, like a hundred thousand rabbits at once; and he flung himself down from the hill into the marsh.
And the wolf praised him.
“I see,” he said, “that a rabbit’s word can be trusted. And now, my little dears, this is my command: Sit, both of you, under this bush, and wait till I am ready, and afterwards I will ... ha! ha! ... pardon you!”