“What now?” I asked myself.  I said good-bye, and as I moved away he asked: 

“You are going far, belike!”

“To Jerusalem,” I answered laconically.  In Russia there is only one thing to say when a man tells you he is going to Jerusalem.  It is, “Pray for me there!” But somehow that request stuck in the old man’s throat.

When I got outside the park gates I pulled down my pack and took out of it the only thing that had stood between me and a night’s lodging—­a grey tweed sportsman’s jacket—­and I put it on, and with it a collar and tie, and I walked along the road in real sadness.  For I felt wounded.

I could forgive the man for doing so unto me, but it was hard to forgive him for doing so unto himself, unto us all.  He had made life ugly for a moment, and made the world less beautiful.  To-morrow the sun and the earth would be less glorious because of him.

But I had only walked a few steps down the road from the rich man’s house when I came to a poor peasant’s hut where there burned one little light at a little square window.

And I thought, “Please God, I will not go to the tavern, which is possibly kept by a Turk and is very dirty.  I will try for a night’s lodging here.”

I knocked at the door with my staff.

There was a stirring inside.

“Who is there?”

“One who wants a lodging for the night.  It is late to disturb you, but I fear there will be rain.”

A peasant woman came to the door and unbarred it, and let me in.

“Ah, little father,” she said, “you come late, and we have little space, as you see, only one room and a big family, but come in if you will.”

She turned up the little kerosene lamp and looked at me.

“Ai, ai,” she said, “a barin.”  She looked at my coat and collar.  “It will be but poor fare here.”

“Not a barin” I urged, “but a poor wanderer coming from far and going farther still.  I generally sleep under the open sky with God as my host and the world as my home, but to-night promises storm, and I fear to take cold in the rain.”

The peasant girl, for she was no more, busied herself with the samovar.  “You must have something hot to drink, and some milk and eggs perhaps.  My husband is not yet home from market, but he will come belike very soon, and will be very glad to find a stranger.  He will rejoice.  He always rejoices to give hospitality to strangers upon the road.”

When she had brought me a meal she fetched fresh hay from a barn and spread a quilt over it and made a bed for me, and would have given me her own pillow but that I pointed out that my pack itself made a very good resting-place for my head.

Then her husband came home, a strong kindly man, full of life and happiness, and he did rejoice as his little wife had promised.  He was sorry he had not wine with which to entertain me.  Such people drink wine not more than twice in a year.