She handed me one which depicted the Virgin completely surrounded by a halo of starlike points shaded in red and yellow flames.  It is called “the Virgin-of-the-Bush-that-burned-but-was-not-consumed,” evidently a reminiscence of Moses.  She attached particular value to it because of the aid rendered on the occasion which had demonstrated its “wonder-working” (miraculous) powers.  It appeared that a dangerous fire had broken out in the neighborhood, and was rapidly consuming the close-set wooden village, as such fires generally do without remedy.  As the fire had been started by the lightning, on St. Ilya’s Day (St. Elijah’s), no earthly power could quench it but the milk from a jet-black cow, which no one chanced to have on hand.  Seeing the flames approach, my old woman, Domna Nikolaevna T., seized the holy image, ran out, and held it facing the conflagration, uttering the proper prayer the while.  Immediately a strong wind arose and drove the flames off in a safe direction, and the village was rescued.  She had a thanksgiving service celebrated in the church, and placed I know not how many candles to the Virgin’s honor, as did the other villagers.  Thus they had learned that there was divine power in this ikona, although it was not, strictly speaking, “wonder-working,” since it had not been officially recognized as such by the ecclesiastical authorities.

These people seemed happy and contented with their lot.  Not one of them could read or write much, the old woman not at all.  They cultivated berries for market as well as carried on the milk business; and when we rose to go, they entreated us to come out on their plot of land and see whether some could not be found.  To their grief, only a few small cherries were to be discovered,—­it was September,—­and these they forced upon us.  As we had hurt their feelings by leaving money on the table to pay for the cream, we accepted the cherries by way of compromise.  The old woman chatted freely in her garden.  She had been a serf, and, in her opinion, things were not much changed for the better, except in one respect.  All the people in this village had been crown serfs, it seemed.  The lot of the crown serfs was easier in every way than that of the ordinary private serfs, so that the emancipation only put a definite name to the practical freedom which they already enjoyed, and added a few minor privileges, with the ownership of a somewhat larger allotment of land than the serfs of the nobility received.  I knew this:  she was hardly capable of giving me so complete a summary of their condition.  But—­it was the usual but, I found—­they had to work much harder now than before, in order to live.  The only real improvement which she could think of, on the inspiration of the moment, was, that a certain irascible crown official, who had had charge of them in the olden days, and whose name she mentioned, who had been in the habit of distributing beatings with a lavish hand whenever the serfs displeased him or obeyed reluctantly, had been obliged to restrain his temper after the emancipation.