'Who is killed ?' they asked.

'Vanka! Well, he deserved it.' You, my friends, are acting in just the same manner.

When Michael attacked Sidor you should have stood by your promise.

Why didn't you arise, and with one stroke put an end to him and to our misery ?" The effect of this speech was to make the peasants more firm in their determination to kill their superintendent.

The latter had already given orders that they should be ready to plough during the Easter holidays, and to sow the field with oats, whereupon the serfs became stricken with grief, and gathered in Vasili's house to hold another indignation meeting.