There was a church in the village,--St. Pantelei, if I remember rightly.
There lived there a priest, Father Athanasii of blessed memory.
Observing that Basavriuk did not come to church, even on Easter, he
determined to reprove him, and impose penance upon him. Well, he hardly
escaped with his life. "Hark ye, pannotche!" [Footnote: Sir] he
thundered in reply, "learn to mind your own business instead of meddling
in other people's, if you don't want that goat's throat of yours stuck
together with boiling kutya." [Footnote: A dish of rice or wheat flour,
with honey and raisins, which is brought to the church on the
celebration of memorial masses] What was to be done with this
unrepentant man? Father Athanasii contented himself with announcing that
any one who should make the acquaintance of Basavriuk would be counted a
Catholic, an enemy of Christ's church, not a member of the human race.
In this village there was a Cossack named Korzh, who had a laborer whom
people called Peter the Orphan--perhaps because no one remembered either
his father or mother. The church starost, it is true, said that they had
died of the pest in his second year; but my grandfather's aunt would not
hear to that, and tried with all her might to furnish him with parents,
although poor Peter needed them about as much as we need last year's
snow.
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