Tihar/Yamapanchak

Tihar, also known as Dipawali and Yamapanchak, is a five-day-long Hindu festival.

Yama Panchak starts with people lighting butter lamps and worshipping Yama, the god of death. It is also called the festival of lights.

 The first day is called Kag Tihar when crows are worshiped as the messengers of Yama, God of death. Crows are worshipped with offerings of sweets and dishes placed on the roofs of houses. The cawing of crows symbolizes sadness and grief in Hinduism. Devotees believe that the offerings will help avert grief and death in their homes.

The second day is Kukur Tihar when dogs are worshiped as protectors of the house. Dogs occupy a special place in Hindu mythology. According to legends, dogs guard the entrance to the kingdom of Yama.

The third day is famous as Gai Tihar and Laxmi Puja. On this day, cows are worshipped early in the morning. The cow is regarded as the mother and Laxmi, the goddess of wealth by the Hindus. On this day, prayers are offered to Laxmi, the goddess of wealth. Cow is worshiped in the morning, while Laxmi is worshiped at night. Devotees believe that Laxmi visits their homes at night to check who are lying awake. Many people stay awake, hoping that the goddess will be pleased and shower them with wealth.

 The fourth day of the festival is Govardhan Puja when oxen are worshiped. On this day, there are three different kinds of pujas, depending on the people's cultural background. Mainly oxen are worshipped on this day by giving them good food. It is observed as Goru Tihar or Goru Puja (worship of the ox). People who follow Vaishnavism perform Govardhan Puja, which is the worship of Govardhan mountain. Cow dung is taken as a representative of the mountain and is worshipped. The majority of the Newar community perform Mha Puja (worship of self) on the night of this day. This day is the beginning of the new year of Nepal Sambat.

The fifth or the last day of Yama Panchak is Bhai Tika. On this day, sisters put tika on their brothers’ foreheads and wish them long life and prosperity. It is believed that Yamaraj, the god of death, visited his sister, Goddess Yamuna, on this day during which she applied the auspicious tika on his forehead, garlanded him and fed him special dishes. Together, they ate sweets, talked and enjoyed themselves to their hearts' content. Upon parting, Yamaraj gave Yamuna a special gift as a token of his affection and, in return, Yamuna gave him a lovely gift which she had made with her own hands. That day Yamraj announced that anyone who receives tilak or tika from his sister will never die on that day.

पूस की रात (A Winter's Night)

पूस की रात
              - मुन्शी प्रेमचन्द

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हल्कू ने आकर स्त्री से कहा- सहना आया है, लाओ, जो रुपये रखे हैं, उसे दे दूँ, किसी तरह गला तो छूटे ।
मुन्नी झाड़ू लगा रही थी। पीछे फिरकर बोली- तीन ही तो रुपये हैं, दे दोगे तो कम्मल कहाँ से आवेगा ? माघ-पूस की रात हार में कैसे कटेगी ? उससे कह दो, फसल पर दे देंगे। अभी नहीं ।
हल्कू एक क्षण अनिश्चित दशा में खड़ा रहा । पूस सिर पर आ गया, कम्मल के बिना हार में रात को वह किसी तरह नहीं जा सकता। मगर सहना मानेगा नहीं, घुड़कियाँ जमावेगा, गालियाँ देगा। बला से जाड़ों में मरेंगे, बला तो सिर से टल जाएगी । यह सोचता हुआ वह अपना भारी- भरकम डील लिए हुए (जो उसके नाम को झूठ सिद्ध करता था ) स्त्री के समीप आ गया और खुशामद करके बोला- ला दे दे, गला तो छूटे। कम्मल के लिए कोई दूसरा उपाय सोचूँगा।
मुन्नी उसके पास से दूर हट गयी और आँखें तरेरती हुई बोली- कर चुके दूसरा उपाय ! जरा सुनूँ तो कौन-सा उपाय करोगे ? कोई खैरात दे देगा कम्मल ? न जाने कितनी बाकी है, जों किसी तरह चुकने ही नहीं आती । मैं कहती हूँ, तुम क्यों नहीं खेती छोड़ देते ? मर-मर काम करो, उपज हो तो बाकी दे दो, चलो छुट्टी हुई । बाकी चुकाने के लिए ही तो हमारा जनम हुआ है । पेट के लिए मजूरी करो । ऐसी खेती से बाज आये । मैं रुपये न दूँगी, न दूँगी ।
हल्कू उदास होकर बोला- तो क्या गाली खाऊँ ?
मुन्नी ने तड़पकर कहा- गाली क्यों देगा, क्या उसका राज है ?
मगर यह कहने के साथ ही उसकी तनी हुई भौहें ढीली पड़ गयीं । हल्कू के उस वाक्य में जो कठोर सत्य था, वह मानो एक भीषण जंतु की भाँति उसे घूर रहा था ।
उसने जाकर आले पर से रुपये निकाले और लाकर हल्कू के हाथ पर रख दिये। फिर बोली- तुम छोड़ दो अबकी से खेती । मजूरी में सुख से एक रोटी तो खाने को मिलेगी । किसी की धौंस तो न रहेगी । अच्छी खेती है ! मजूरी करके लाओ, वह भी उसी में झोंक दो, उस पर धौंस ।
हल्कू ने रुपये लिये और इस तरह बाहर चला मानो अपना हृदय निकालकर देने जा रहा हो । उसने मजूरी से एक-एक पैसा काट-कपटकर तीन रुपये कम्मल के लिए जमा किये थे । वह आज निकले जा रहे थे । एक-एक पग के साथ उसका मस्तक अपनी दीनता के भार से दबा जा रहा था ।
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पूस की अंधेरी रात ! आकाश पर तारे भी ठिठुरते हुए मालूम होते थे। हल्कू अपने खेत के किनारे ऊख के पतों की एक छतरी के नीचे बाँस के खटोले पर अपनी पुरानी गाढ़े की चादर ओढ़े पड़ा काँप रहा था । खाट के नीचे उसका संगी कुत्ता जबरा पेट मे मुँह डाले सर्दी से कूँ-कूँ कर रहा था । दो में से एक को भी नींद न आती थी ।
हल्कू ने घुटनियों कों गरदन में चिपकाते हुए कहा- क्यों जबरा, जाड़ा लगता है? कहता तो था, घर में पुआल पर लेट रह, तो यहाँ क्या लेने आये थे ? अब खाओ ठंड, मैं क्या करूँ ? जानते थे, मै यहाँ हलुवा-पूरी खाने आ रहा हूँ, दौड़े-दौड़े आगे-आगे चले आये । अब रोओ नानी के नाम को ।
जबरा ने पड़े-पड़े दुम हिलायी और अपनी कूँ-कूँ को दीर्घ बनाता हुआ एक बार जम्हाई लेकर चुप हो गया। उसकी श्वान-बुध्दि ने शायद ताड़ लिया, स्वामी को मेरी कूँ-कूँ से नींद नहीं आ रही है।
हल्कू ने हाथ निकालकर जबरा की ठंडी पीठ सहलाते हुए कहा- कल से मत आना मेरे साथ, नहीं तो ठंडे हो जाओगे । यह राँड पछुआ न जाने कहाँ से बरफ लिए आ रही है । उठूँ, फिर एक चिलम भरूँ । किसी तरह रात तो कटे ! आठ चिलम तो पी चुका । यह खेती का मजा है ! और एक-एक भगवान ऐसे पड़े हैं, जिनके पास जाड़ा जाय तो गरमी से घबड़ाकर भागे। मोटे-मोटे गद्दे, लिहाफ- कम्मल । मजाल है, जाड़े का गुजर हो जाय । तकदीर की खूबी ! मजूरी हम करें, मजा दूसरे लूटें !
हल्कू उठा, गड्ढ़े में से जरा-सी आग निकालकर चिलम भरी । जबरा भी उठ बैठा ।
हल्कू ने चिलम पीते हुए कहा- पियेगा चिलम, जाड़ा तो क्या जाता है, जरा मन बदल जाता है।
जबरा ने उसके मुँह की ओर प्रेम से छलकती हुई आँखों से देखा ।
हल्कू- आज और जाड़ा खा ले । कल से मैं यहाँ पुआल बिछा दूँगा । उसी में घुसकर बैठना, तब जाड़ा न लगेगा ।
जबरा ने अपने पंजे उसकी घुटनियों पर रख दिये और उसके मुँह के पास अपना मुँह ले गया । हल्कू को उसकी गर्म साँस लगी ।
चिलम पीकर हल्कू फिर लेटा और निश्चय करके लेटा कि चाहे कुछ हो अबकी सो जाऊँगा, पर एक ही क्षण में उसके हृदय में कम्पन होने लगा । कभी इस करवट लेटता, कभी उस करवट, पर जाड़ा किसी पिशाच की भाँति उसकी छाती को दबाये हुए था ।
जब किसी तरह न रहा गया तो उसने जबरा को धीरे से उठाया और उसक सिर को थपथपाकर उसे अपनी गोद में सुला लिया । कुत्ते की देह से जाने कैसी दुर्गंध आ रही थी, पर वह उसे अपनी गोद मे चिपटाये हुए ऐसे सुख का अनुभव कर रहा था, जो इधर महीनों से उसे न मिला था । जबरा शायद यह समझ रहा था कि स्वर्ग यहीं है, और हल्कू की पवित्र आत्मा में तो उस कुत्ते के प्रति घृणा की गंध तक न थी । अपने किसी अभिन्न मित्र या भाई को भी वह इतनी ही तत्परता से गले लगाता । वह अपनी दीनता से आहत न था, जिसने आज उसे इस दशा को पहुँचा दिया । नहीं, इस अनोखी मैत्री ने जैसे उसकी आत्मा के सब द्वा र खोल दिये थे और उनका एक-एक अणु प्रकाश से चमक रहा था ।
सहसा जबरा ने किसी जानवर की आहट पायी । इस विशेष आत्मीयता ने उसमे एक नयी स्फूर्ति पैदा कर दी थी, जो हवा के ठंडें झोकों को तुच्छ समझती थी । वह झपटकर उठा और छपरी से बाहर आकर भूँकने लगा । हल्कू ने उसे कई बार चुमकारकर बुलाया, पर वह उसके पास न आया । हार में चारों तरफ दौड़-दौड़कर भूँकता रहा। एक क्षण के लिए आ भी जाता, तो तुरंत ही फिर दौड़ता । कर्तव्य उसके हृदय में अरमान की भाँति ही उछल रहा था ।

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एक घंटा और गुजर गया। रात ने शीत को हवा से धधकाना शुरु किया। हल्कू उठ बैठा और दोनों घुटनों को छाती से मिलाकर सिर को उसमें छिपा लिया, फिर भी ठंड कम न हुई | ऐसा जान पड़ता था, सारा रक्त जम गया है, धमनियों मे रक्त की जगह हिम बह रहा है। उसने झुककर आकाश की ओर देखा, अभी कितनी रात बाकी है ! सप्तर्षि अभी आकाश में आधे भी नहीं चढ़े । ऊपर आ जायँगे तब कहीं सबेरा होगा । अभी पहर से ऊपर रात है ।
हल्कू के खेत से कोई एक गोली के टप्पे पर आमों का एक बाग था । पतझड़ शुरु हो गयी थी । बाग में पत्तियों को ढेर लगा हुआ था । हल्कू ने सोचा, चलकर पत्तियाँ बटोरूँ और उन्हें जलाकर खूब तापूँ । रात को कोई मुझे पत्तियाँ बटोरते देख तो समझे कोई भूत है । कौन जाने, कोई जानवर ही छिपा बैठा हो, मगर अब तो बैठे नहीं रहा जाता ।
उसने पास के अरहर के खेत में जाकर कई पौधे उखाड़ लिए और उनका एक झाड़ू बनाकर हाथ में सुलगता हुआ उपला लिये बगीचे की तरफ चला । जबरा ने उसे आते देखा तो पास आया और दुम हिलाने लगा ।
हल्कू ने कहा- अब तो नहीं रहा जाता जबरू । चलो बगीचे में पत्तियाँ बटोरकर तापें । टाँठे हो जायेंगे, तो फिर आकर सोयेंगें । अभी तो बहुत रात है।
जबरा ने कूँ-कूँ करके सहमति प्रकट की और आगे-आगे बगीचे की ओर चला।
बगीचे में खूब अँधेरा छाया हुआ था और अंधकार में निर्दय पवन पत्तियों को कुचलता हुआ चला जाता था । वृक्षों से ओस की बूँदे टप-टप नीचे टपक रही थीं ।
एकाएक एक झोंका मेहँदी के फूलों की खूशबू लिए हुए आया ।
हल्कू ने कहा- कैसी अच्छी महक आई जबरू ! तुम्हारी नाक में भी तो सुगंध आ रही है ?
जबरा को कहीं जमीन पर एक हडडी पड़ी मिल गयी थी । उसे चिंचोड़ रहा था ।
हल्कू ने आग जमीन पर रख दी और पत्तियाँ बटोरने लगा । जरा देर में पत्तियों का ढेर लग गया। हाथ ठिठुरे जाते थे । नंगे पाँव गले जाते थे । और वह पत्तियों का पहाड़ खड़ा कर रहा था । इसी अलाव में वह ठंड को जलाकर भस्म कर देगा ।
थोड़ी देर में अलाव जल उठा । उसकी लौ ऊपर वाले वृक्ष की पत्तियों को छू-छूकर भागने लगी । उस अस्थिर प्रकाश में बगीचे के विशाल वृक्ष ऐसे मालूम होते थे, मानो उस अथाह अंधकार को अपने सिरों पर सँभाले हुए हों अंधकार के उस अनंत सागर मे यह प्रकाश एक नौका के समान हिलता, मचलता हुआ जान पड़ता था ।
हल्कू अलाव के सामने बैठा आग ताप रहा था । एक क्षण में उसने दोहर उताकर बगल में दबा ली, दोनों पाँव फैला दिए, मानों ठंड को ललकार रहा हो, तेरे जी में जो आये सो कर । ठंड की असीम शक्ति पर विजय पाकर वह विजय-गर्व को हृदय में छिपा न सकता था ।
उसने जबरा से कहा- क्यों जब्बर, अब ठंड नहीं लग रही है ?
जब्बर ने कूँ-कूँ करके मानो कहा- अब क्या ठंड लगती ही रहेगी ?
‘पहले से यह उपाय न सूझा, नहीं इतनी ठंड क्यों खाते ।’
जब्बर ने पूँछ हिलायी ।
’अच्छा आओ, इस अलाव को कूदकर पार करें । देखें, कौन निकल जाता है। अगर जल गए बच्चा,
तो मैं दवा न करूँगा ।’
जब्बर ने उस अग्निराशि की ओर कातर नेत्रों से देखा !
मुन्नी से कल न कह देना, नहीं तो लड़ाई करेगी ।
यह कहता हुआ वह उछला और उस अलाव के ऊपर से साफ निकल गया । पैरों में जरा लपट लगी, पर वह कोई बात न थी । जबरा आग के गिर्द घूमकर उसके पास आ खड़ा हुआ ।
हल्कू ने कहा- चलो-चलो इसकी सही नहीं ! ऊपर से कूदकर आओ । वह फिर कूदा और अलाव के इस पार आ गया ।

                              4

पत्तियाँ जल चुकी थीं । बगीचे में फिर अंधेरा छा गया था । राख के नीचे कुछ-कुछ आग बाकी थी, जो हवा का झोंका आ जाने पर जरा जाग उठती थी, पर एक क्षण में फिर आँखें बंद कर लेती थी !
हल्कू ने फिर चादर ओढ़ ली और गर्म राख के पास बैठा हुआ एक गीत गुनगुनाने लगा । उसके बदन में गर्मी आ गयी थी, पर ज्यों-ज्यों शीत बढ़ती जाती थी, उसे आलस्य दबाये लेता था ।
जबरा जोर से भूँककर खेत की ओर भागा । हल्कू को ऐसा मालूम हुआ कि जानवरों का एक झुंड खेत में आया है। शायद नीलगायों का झुंड था । उनके कूदने-दौड़ने की आवाजें साफ कान में आ रही थी । फिर ऐसा मालूम हुआ कि खेत में चर रहीं हैं। उनके चबाने की आवाज चर-चर सुनाई देने लगी।
उसने दिल में कहा- नहीं, जबरा के होते कोई जानवर खेत में नहीं आ सकता। नोच ही डाले। मुझे भ्रम हो रहा है। कहाँ! अब तो कुछ नहीं सुनाई देता। मुझे भी कैसा धोखा हुआ!
उसने जोर से आवाज लगायी- जबरा, जबरा।
जबरा भूँकता रहा। उसके पास न आया।
फिर खेत के चरे जाने की आहट मिली। अब वह अपने को धोखा न दे सका। उसे अपनी जगह से हिलना जहर लग रहा था। कैसा दंदाया हुआ था। इस जाड़े-पाले में खेत में जाना, जानवरों के पीछे दौड़ना असह्य जान पड़ा। वह अपनी जगह से न हिला।
उसने जोर से आवाज लगायी- लिहो-लिहो !लिहो! !
जबरा फिर भूँक उठा । जानवर खेत चर रहे थे । फसल तैयार है । कैसी अच्छी खेती थी, पर ये दुष्ट जानवर उसका सर्वनाश किये डालते हैं।
हल्कू पक्का इरादा करके उठा और दो-तीन कदम चला, पर एकाएक हवा का ऐसा ठंडा, चुभने वाला, बिच्छू के डंक का-सा झोंका लगा कि वह फिर बुझते हुए अलाव के पास आ बैठा और राख को कुरेदकर अपनी ठंडी देह को गर्माने लगा ।
जबरा अपना गला फाड़ डालता था, नीलगायें खेत का सफाया किए डालती थीं और हल्कू गर्म राख के पास शांत बैठा हुआ था । अकर्मण्यता ने रस्सियों की भाँति उसे चारों तरफ से जकड़ रखा था।
उसी राख के पास गर्म जमीन पर वह चादर ओढ़ कर सो गया ।
सबेरे जब उसकी नींद खुली, तब चारों तरफ धूप फैल गयी थी और मुन्नी कह रही थी- क्या आज सोते ही रहोगे ? तुम यहाँ आकर रम गए और उधर सारा खेत चौपट हो गया ।
हल्कू ने उठकर कहा- क्या तू खेत से होकर आ रही है ?
मुन्नी बोली- हाँ, सारे खेत का सत्यानाश हो गया । भला, ऐसा भी कोई सोता है। तुम्हारे यहाँ मड़ैया डालने से क्या हुआ ?
हल्कू ने बहाना किया- मैं मरते-मरते बचा, तुझे अपने खेत की पड़ी है। पेट में ऐसा दरद हुआ कि मै ही जानता हूँ !
दोनों फिर खेत के डाँड़ पर आये । देखा, सारा खेत रौंदा पड़ा हुआ है और जबरा मड़ैया के नीचे चित लेटा है, मानो प्राण ही न हों ।
दोनों खेत की दशा देख रहे थे । मुन्नी के मुख पर उदासी छायी थी, पर हल्कू प्रसन्न था ।
मुन्नी ने चिंतित होकर कहा- अब मजूरी करके मालगुजारी भरनी पड़ेगी ।
हल्कू ने प्रसन्न मुख से कहा- रात को ठंड में यहाँ सोना तो न पड़ेगा ।



Here is the English translation of Munshi Premchand's story 'Poos Ki Raat' (A Winter’s Night).


A Winter’s Night
                  - Munshi Premchanda

                              1

Halku came in and said to his wife, ‘Sahna is at the door. Come on, give me the money you have. Let me pay him and get rid of the noose.’
His wife, Munni, was sweeping the floor. She turned her face towards him and said, ‘Three rupees is all I have. If we give these up, how shall you buy a blanket? How’ll you face the winter nights guarding the crop. Tell him, we shall pay at the time of harvest. Not now.’
Halku stood quietly for a moment, unsure of himself. The month of Poos, the peak of winter, was at hand and he won’t be able to sleep out in the field without a blanket. But Sahna won’t relent. He will threaten and curse. It was better to face the winter somehow and get rid of this trouble. Halku, carrying his heavy weight (which disproved his name which meant ‘light- weight’), moved towards his wife and said in a cajoling voice, ‘Come on, please give me the money. Let me get rid of this. I shall find a blanket somehow.’
Munni moved away from him, arching her eyes. ‘What’ll you do? Will someone give you a blanket in charity? God knows how much more we owe him. There’s no end to it. I say, stop tilling the land. Kill yourself toiling, and when the harvest is ready, hand it over to him. That’s the end. We’re born to remain under debt. And then slave as a labour to fill our stomach. What use is this tillage? I won’t give you the money. I won’t.’
‘So I should face the insults?’ Halku said in a melancholy tone.
‘How can he insult you? Is he the king?’ shouted Munni.
But the taut eyebrows were lowered just as she uttered these words. There was a bitter truth in Halku’s words that stared at them like a fierce animal.
She went up to the nich in the wall, took out the rupees and placed them on Halku’s palm. ‘You stop tilling the land. We shall feed ourselves through our daily labour peacefuly. And we won’t have to face the insults. What sort of tilling is this? Earn something by labouring and push that too into this fire. And over and above, this bullying.
Halku walked out with the money as if he was going to tear his own heart out and hand it over to someone. He had saved these three rupees bit by bit out of his daily wages for buying a blanket. He was losing them today. With each step he took his mind was sinking under the weight of his helplessness.

                                2

A dark night in the winter’s month of Poos ! Even the stars seemed to be shivering with cold. Halku lay at one edge of his field on a bamboo-stick cot under the sugar cane-leaf shelter, wrapped in an old thick cotton sheet, shaking with cold. Under the cot sat his pet dog Jabra with his mouth pushed into his body, whining. Neither of them was able to sleep.
Halku folded his knees up to his mouth and said to Jabra, ‘Are you feeling cold? I had told you to sleep under the pual (a pile of paddy husk) at home. Why did you come here? Now face it. What can I do! You followed me thinking I was coming here to feast on halwa-poori . Now go and call your grandmother for help.’
Jabra wagged his tail, and letting out a long whine he stretched his body once and then became silent. Perhaps his dog-sense had told him that his master was unable to sleep because of his cries.
Halku stretched his hand to caress Jabra’s cold body and said, ‘Don’t come tomorrow, or you will go cold for ever. God alone knows wherefrom this bastardly west wind is bringing in this iciness. Let me light another chillum. The night must be passed somehow. I have already smoked eight. This is the pleasure of being a peasant! There are many so fortunate that if the cold came near them it would be driven away by heat. Thick quilts, sheets, and blankets! The cold dare not come near them. How strange life is! We labour, others enjoy at our cost.
Halku got up and filled up his chillum with a cinder from the pit. Jabra also stood up.
As he smoked, Halku said to Jabra, ‘Would you have a go at the chillum? It doesn’t drive away the cold, but it eases the mind a little bit.’
Jabra looked towards Halku, his eyes overflowing with love.
‘Face this cold for this night. Tomorrow I shall spread a pual for you, and you can sit covered under it. Then you won’t feel the cold.’
Jabra placed his front legs on Halku’s knees and brought his mouth close to Halku’s mouth. Halku could feel his warm breath.
After smoking his chillum Halku lay down again with the determination to sleep this time. But his body began to shiver in no time. He would turn and twist now on this, then on that side, but the cold had caught hold of his body like an evil spirit.
Suddenly Jabra heard the footsteps of an animal. This rare show of affection had infused such a new spirit in him that he thought nothing of the blasts of the cold wind. He got up out of the shed and began to bark vigorously. Halku tried to coax him to come back to him but Jabra did not turn. He kept on running around in the field, barking. He would return for a moment but go back at once. Duty was spilling out of his heart like an unsatisfied desire.

                             3

 Another hour passed. The night began to pulsate with draughts of cold wind. Halku sat up. He folded his legs and brought his knees on to his chest and hid his head in them. This gave him no respite from cold. He felt as if the blood in his body had frozen, and ice was flowing through his blood vessels. He looked up at the sky to check how far the night had gone. The constellation Saptarishi was still half-way up. It will be dawn only when the constellation reached directly above. More than one fourth of the night still remained.
There was a mango orchard at stone's throw from Halku’s field. It was the time when leaves fall off. There was a heap of dry leaves in the orchard. Halku thought of collecting them and lighting a fire to get some warmth. He was reflecting: If someone saw him gathering the leaves here, he might take him for a ghost. Who knows some animal might be hiding in them. But now it was impossible to stand this cold.
He went into the neighbouring arhar field, uprooted a few stalks and tied them together to make a broom. He picked up a piece of smouldering dung cake and began to walk towards the orchard. Jabra saw him and came to him and started wagging his tail.
Halku said, ‘I can stand it no more. Come, Jabru, let’s go to the orchard, gather some leaves and burn them to get some warmth. When we have warmed ourselves a little we shall come back and sleep. The night is still long.
Jabra whined his assent and began to walk in front towards the orchard.
It was pitch-dark in the orchard; and the cruel wind was blowing across, mercilessly trampling upon the leaves. Dewdrops were constantly dripping down the trees.
All of a sudden the wind carried towards them a waft of fragrance from henna flowers.
Halku said, ‘What a fine smell, Jabru! Doesn’t it tickle your nose?’
Jabru had found a bone and was gnawing at it.
Halku put the smouldering piece of dung cake on the ground and began to gather leaves around it. In no time he had collected a big heap. His hands were stiff with cold. His bare feet were dissolving. And he was raising a mountain of leaves, lighting which he was going to incinerate this cold.
The fire came alive in a short while. The flames leapt out of it to touch the tree above. In the flickering flames of the fire, it appeared as if the trees in the orchard were carrying the unbounded darkness on their heads. In this limitless sea of darkness this light seemed to be rocking and dancing like a boat.
Halku was sitting in front of the fire warming himself. Soon he took the cloth sheet off his body, tucked it in one of his armpits, and spread out his legs, as if he was provoking the cold. ‘Come on, do what you can.’ Having conquered the infinite power of cold, he was unable to repress his triumph.
He said to Jabra, ‘Are you still feeling cold?’
Jabra whined, as if to say, ‘Shall we go on feeling cold for ever?’
‘We didn’t think of this, otherwise why should we have suffered so much.’
Jabra wagged his tail.
‘Come on, let’s jump over this fire and see who can cross over. And son, if you burn yourself I won’t get you any treatment.’
Jabra looked at the fire with frightened eyes.
“And don’t tell Munni about it, or there would be a fight.’
Saying this he jumped cleanly over the fire, just grazing the flames but without any harm. Jabra only circled round the fire, and then came and stood beside him.
Halku said, ‘Come, come, this is not right. Now jump.’ Saying this, he jumped over the fire again and came over to the other side.

                             4

The leaves had burnt out. Once again the orchard was stark dark. The fire was still alive under the ashes; and ruffled by draughts of wind, it would peep out momentarily, and then close its eyes.
Halku once again wrapped the sheet round himself, and sitting beside the still warm ashes he began to hum a song. His body had warmed up but as the cold around him began to envelop him he was sinking into a state of torpor.
Jabru barked angrily and ran towards the field. Halku thought that a herd of animals had invaded his field. Perhaps it was a herd of neelgais. He could clearly hear the noise of their running and tramping around; and then it looked they were grazing in the field for he could hear the sound of munching.
‘No.’ For a moment he thought, ‘No no animal can enter the field in the presence of Jabra. He would bite them away. i'm only imagining. I don't hear anything now. I was mistaken.'
He shouted loudly for Jabra.
Jabra kept on barking and did not come to him.
Then again he heard the sound of animals grazing. He could deceive himself no longer. Moving from his seat looked like poison. How cosily he was sitting! In this cold entering the field and chasing the animals seemed foolhardy. He did not move.
He shouted loudly, ‘Liho! Liho! Liho!’
Jabra barked again. The animals were devouring the field. The harvest is ready. And what a good harvest! But these villainous animals are going to destroy it.
Halku got up with determination and walked a few steps. But all of a sudden a draught of wind, biting like the sting of a scorpion, overwhelmed him and he returned to the dying fire and began scouring through the ashes to get some warmth.
Jabra was barking himself hoarse, the neelgais were cleaning out the field, and Halku was sitting beside the warm ashes with a calm resignation. Listlessness had bound him hand and foot.
He covered himself in his sheet went to sleep, close to the ashes.
When he woke in the morning there was sunshine all around, and Munni was waking him up, ‘Will you keep sleeping today? You are lying here in bliss, and there the crop has been destroyed.’
Halku woke up and said, ‘Have you been to the field?’
‘Yes’, she said, ‘The whole crop has been ruined. Who sleeps like this? How did your camping here all night help?’
Halku reeled off an excuse, ‘Here I was dying, and you’re worried about the crop. I had such a severe stomach ache!’
Both walked to their field. They saw the whole crop trampled upon, and Jabru lying under the shed almost lifeless.
Both of them were looking at their field. Munni was sad, but Halku was happy.
Munni said, ‘Now, to pay the tax we shall have to work as daily wagers.’
Halku replied, ‘So what? I won’t have to sleep here on a cold night.’

'How Much Land Does a Man Need?', a short story by Leo Tolstoy

How Much Land Does a Man Need?
                             I
An elder sister came to visit her younger sister in the country.
The elder was married to a tradesman in town, the younger to a
peasant in the village. As the sisters sat over their tea talking,
the elder began to boast of the advantages of town life: saying how
comfortably they lived there, how well they dressed, what fine
clothes her children wore, what good things they ate and hdrank, and how she went to the theatre, promenades, and entertainments.

The younger sister was piqued, and in turn disparaged the life of a
tradesman, and stood up for that of a peasant.

"I would not change my way of life for yours," said she. "We may
live roughly, but at least we are free from anxiety. You live in
better style than we do, but though you often earn more than you
need, you are very likely to lose all you have. You know the proverb,
'Loss and gain are brothers twain.' It often happens that people who
are wealthy one day are begging their bread the next. Our way is
safer. Though a peasant's life is not a fat one, it is a long one.
We shall never grow rich, but we shall always have enough to eat."

The elder sister said sneeringly:
"Enough? Yes, if you like to share with the pigs and the calves!
What do you know of elegance or manners! However much your good man may slave, you will die as you are living-on a dung heap-and your
children the same."

"Well, what of that?" replied the younger. "Of course our work is
rough and coarse. But, on the other hand, it is sure; and we need
not bow to any one. But you, in your towns, are surrounded by
temptations; today all may be right, but tomorrow the Evil One may
tempt your husband with cards, wine, or women, and all will go to
ruin. Don't such things happen often enough?"

Pahom, the master of the house, was lying on the top of the oven,
and he listened to the women's chatter.

"It is perfectly true," thought he. "Busy as we are from childhood
tilling Mother Earth, we peasants have no time to let any nonsense
settle in our heads. Our only trouble is that we haven't land
enough. If I had plenty of land, I shouldn't fear the Devil himself!"

The women finished their tea, chatted a while about dress, and then cleared away the tea-things and lay down to sleep.

But the Devil had been sitting behind the oven, and had heard all
that was said. He was pleased that the peasant's wife had led her
husband into boasting, and that he had said that if he had plenty of
land he would not fear the Devil himself.

"All right," thought the Devil. "We will have a tussle. I'll give you
land enough; and by means of that land I will get you into my power."
                         
                            II
Close to the village there lived a lady, a small landowner, who had
an estate of about three hundred acres. She had always lived on
good terms with the peasants, until she engaged as her steward an
old soldier, who took to burdening the people with fines. However
careful Pahom tried to be, it happened again and again that now a horse of his got among the lady's oats, now a cow strayed into her
garden, now his calves found their way into her meadows-and he
always had to pay a fine.

Pahom paid, but grumbled, and, going home in a temper, was rough
with his family. All through that summer Pahom had much trouble
because of this steward; and he was even glad when winter came and
the cattle had to be stabled. Though he grudged the fodder when
they could no longer graze on the pasture-land, at least he was free
from anxiety about them.

In the winter the news got about that the lady was going to sell her
land, and that the keeper of the inn on the high road was bargaining
for it. When the peasants heard this they were very much alarmed.

"Well," thought they, "if the innkeeper gets the land he will worry us with fines worse than the lady's steward. We all depend on that estate."

So the peasants went on behalf of their Commune, and asked the lady
not to sell the land to the innkeeper; offering her a better price
for it themselves. The lady agreed to let them have it. Then the
peasants tried to arrange for the Commune to buy the whole estate,
so that it might be held by all in common. They met twice to
discuss it, but could not settle the matter; the Evil One sowed
discord among them, and they could not agree. So they decided to
buy the land individually, each according to his means; and the lady agreed to this plan as she had to the other.

Presently Pahom heard that a neighbor of his was buying fifty acres, and that the lady had consented to accept one half in cash and to wait a year for the other half. Pahom felt envious.

"Look at that," thought he, "the land is all being sold, and I shall
get none of it." So he spoke to his wife.

"Other people are buying," said he, "and we must also buy twenty
acres or so. Life is becoming impossible. That steward is simply
crushing us with his fines."

So they put their heads together and considered how they could
manage to buy it. They had one hundred roubles laid by. They sold
a colt, and one half of their bees; hired out one of their sons as a
laborer, and took his wages in advance; borrowed the rest from a
brother-in-law, and so scraped together half the purchase money.

Having done this, Pahom chose out a farm of forty acres, some of it
wooded, and went to the lady to bargain for it. They came to an
agreement, and he shook hands with her upon it, and paid her a
deposit in advance. Then they went to town and signed the deeds; he
paying half the price down, and undertaking to pay the remainder
within two years.

So now Pahom had land of his own. He borrowed seed, and sowed it on
the land he had bought. The harvest was a good one, and within a
year he had managed to pay off his debts both to the lady and to his
brother-in-law. So he became a landowner, ploughing and sowing his own land, making hay on his own land, cutting his own trees, and
feeding his cattle on his own pasture. When he went out to plough his fields, or to look at his growing corn, or at his grass meadows, his heart would fill with joy. The grass that grew and the flowers that bloomed there, seemed to him unlike any that grew elsewhere. Formerly, when he had passed by that land, it had appeared the same as any other land, but now it seemed quite different.

                          III
So Pahom was well contented, and everything would have been right if
the neighboring peasants would only not have trespassed on his corn-fields and meadows. He appealed to them most civilly, but they still went on: now the Communal herdsmen would let the village cows stray into his meadows; then horses from the night pasture would get
among his corn. Pahom turned them out again and again, and forgave their owners, and for a long time he forbore from prosecuting any one. But at last he lost patience and complained to the District
Court. He knew it was the peasants' want of land, and no evil
intent on their part, that caused the trouble; but he thought:

"I cannot go on overlooking it, or they will destroy all I have.
They must be taught a lesson."

So he had them up, gave them one lesson, and then another, and two
or three of the peasants were fined. After a time Pahom's neighbours began to bear him a grudge for this, and would now and then let their cattle on his land on purpose. One peasant even got into Pahom's wood at night and cut down five young lime trees for their bark. Pahom passing through the wood one day noticed something white. He came nearer, and saw the stripped trunks lying on the ground, and close by stood the stumps, where the tree had been. Pahom was furious.

"If he had only cut one here and there it would have been bad enough," thought Pahom, "but the rascal has actually cut down a whole clump.
If I could only find out who did this, I would pay him out."

He racked his brains as to who it could be. Finally he decided: "It
must be Simon-no one else could have done it." Se he went to
Simon's homestead to have a look around, but he found nothing, and
only had an angry scene. However' he now felt more certain than
ever that Simon had done it, and he lodged a complaint. Simon was
summoned. The case was tried, and re-tried, and at the end of it
all Simon was acquitted, there being no evidence against him. Pahom
felt still more aggrieved, and let his anger loose upon the Elder
and the Judges.

"You let thieves grease your palms," said he. "If you were honest
folk yourselves, you would not let a thief go free."

So Pahom quarrelled with the Judges and with his neighbors. Threats to burn his building began to be uttered. So though Pahom had more land, his place in the Commune was much worse than before.

About this time a rumor got about that many people were moving to
new parts.

"There's no need for me to leave my land," thought Pahom. "But some
of the others might leave our village, and then there would be more room for us. I would take over their land myself, and make my
estate a bit bigger. I could then live more at ease. As it is, I am still too cramped to be comfortable."

One day Pahom was sitting at home, when a peasant passing through
the village, happened to call in. He was allowed to stay the night,
and supper was given him. Pahom had a talk with this peasant and
asked him where he came from. The stranger answered that he came from beyond the Volga, where he had been working. One word led to another, and the man went on to say that many people were settling
in those parts. He told how some people from his village had
settled there. They had joined the Commune, and had had twenty-five
acres per man granted them. The land was so good, he said, that the
rye sown on it grew as high as a horse, and so thick that five cuts
of a sickle made a sheaf. One peasant, he said, had brought nothing with him but his bare hands, and now he had six horses and two cows of his own.

Pahom's heart kindled with desire. He thought:

"Why should I suffer in this narrow hole, if one can live so well
elsewhere? I will sell my land and my homestead here, and with the
money I will start afresh over there and get everything new. In
this crowded place one is always having trouble. But I must first
go and find out all about it myself."

Towards summer he got ready and started. He went down the Volga on
a steamer to Samara, then walked another three hundred miles on
foot, and at last reached the place. It was just as the stranger had said. The peasants had plenty of land: every man had twenty-
five acres of Communal land given him for his use, and any one who
had money could buy, besides, at fifty-cents an acre as much good
freehold land as he wanted.

Having found out all he wished to know, Pahom returned home as
autumn came on, and began selling off his belongings. He sold his
land at a profit, sold his homestead and all his cattle, and withdrew from membership of the Commune. He only waited till the spring, and then started with his family for the new settlement.

                          IV
As soon as Pahom and his family arrived at their new abode, he
applied for admission into the Commune of a large village. He stood treat to the Elders, and obtained the necessary documents. Five shares of Communal land were given him for his own and his sons'
use: that is to say--125 acres (not altogether, but in different
fields) besides the use of the Communal pasture. Pahom put up the buildings he needed, and bought cattle. Of the Communal land alone he had three times as much as at his former home, and the land was good corn-land. He was ten times better off than he had been. He had plenty of arable land and pasturage, and could keep as many head of cattle as he liked.

At first, in the bustle of building and settling down, Pahom was
pleased with it all, but when he got used to it he began to think
that even here he had not enough land. The first year, he sowed
wheat on his share of the Communal land, and had a good crop. He wanted to go on sowing wheat, but had not enough Communal land for the purpose, and what he had already used was not available; for in those parts wheat is only sown on virgin soil or on fallow land. It is sown for one or two years, and then the land lies fallow till it is again overgrown with prairie grass. There were many who wanted such land, and there was not enough for all; so that people quarrelled about it. Those who were better off, wanted it for growing wheat, and those who were poor, wanted it to let to dealers, so that they might raise money to pay their taxes. Pahom wanted to sow more wheat; so he rented land from a dealer for a year. He sowed much wheat and had a fine crop, but the land was too far from the village--the wheat had to be carted more than ten miles. Aftera time Pahom noticed that some peasant-dealers were living on separate farms, and were growing wealthy; and he thought:

"If I were to buy some freehold land, and have a homestead on it, it
would be a different thing, altogether. Then it would all be nice
and compact."

The question of buying freehold land recurred to him again and again.

He went on in the same way for three years; renting land and sowing wheat. The seasons turned out well and the crops were good, so that he began to lay money by. He might have gone on living contentedly, but he grew tired of having to rent other people's land every year, and having to scramble for it. Wherever there was good land to be had, the peasants would rush for it and it was taken up at once, so that unless you were sharp about it you got none. It happened in the third year that he and a dealer together rented a piece of
pasture land from some peasants; and they had already ploughed it
up, when there was some dispute, and the peasants went to law about
it, and things fell out so that the labor was all lost.

"If it were my own land," thought Pahom, "I should be independent,
and there would not be all this unpleasantness."

So Pahom began looking out for land which he could buy; and he came across a peasant who had bought thirteen hundred acres, but having got into difficulties was willing to sell again cheap. Pahom
bargained and haggled with him, and at last they settled the price
at 1,500 roubles, part in cash and part to be paid later. They had
all but clinched the matter, when a passing dealer happened to stop
at Pahom's one day to get a feed for his horse. He drank tea with
Pahom, and they had a talk. The dealer said that he was just
returning from the land of the Bashkirs, far away, where he had
bought thirteen thousand acres of land all for 1,000 roubles. Pahom
questioned him further, and the tradesman said:

"All one need do is to make friends with the chiefs. I gave away
about one hundred roubles' worth of dressing-gowns and carpets,
besides a case of tea, and I gave wine to those who would drink it;
and I got the land for less than two cents an acre. And he showed
Pahom the title-deeds, saying:

"The land lies near a river, and the whole prairie is virgin soil."

Pahom plied him with questions, and the tradesman said:

"There is more land there than you could cover if you walked a year,
and it all belongs to the Bashkirs. They are as simple as sheep,
and land can be got almost for nothing."

"There now," thought Pahom, "with my one thousand roubles, why
should I get only thirteen hundred acres, and saddle myself with a
debt besides. If I take it out there, I can get more than ten times
as much for the money."

                          V
Pahom inquired how to get to the place, and as soon as the tradesman
had left him, he prepared to go there himself. He left his wife to
look after the homestead, and started on his journey taking his man with him. They stopped at a town on their way, and bought a case of tea, some wine, and other presents, as the tradesman had advised.

On and on they went until they had gone more than three hundred
miles, and on the seventh day they came to a place where the
Bashkirs had pitched their tents. It was all just as the tradesman
had said. The people lived on the steppes, by a river, in felt-
covered tents. They neither tilled the ground, nor ate bread.

Their cattle and horses grazed in herds on the steppe. The colts
were tethered behind the tents, and the mares were driven to them
twice a day. The mares were milked, and from the milk kumiss was
made. It was the women who prepared kumiss, and they also made cheese. As far as the men were concerned, drinking kumiss and tea, eating mutton, and playing on their pipes, was all they cared about.
They were all stout and merry, and all the summer long they never
thought of doing any work. They were quite ignorant, and knew no
Russian, but were good-natured enough.

As soon as they saw Pahom, they came out of their tents and gathered
round their visitor. An interpreter was found, and Pahom told them
he had come about some land. The Bashkirs seemed very glad; they
took Pahom and led him into one of the best tents, where they made
him sit on some down cushions placed on a carpet, while they sat
round him. They gave him tea and kumiss, and had a sheep killed,
and gave him mutton to eat. Pahom took presents out of his cart and
distributed them among the Bashkirs, and divided amongst them the tea. The Bashkirs were delighted. They talked a great deal among themselves, and then told the interpreter to translate.

"They wish to tell you," said the interpreter, "that they like you,
and that it is our custom to do all we can to please a guest and to
repay him for his gifts. You have given us presents, now tell us
which of the things we possess please you best, that we may present them to you."

"What pleases me best here," answered Pahom, "is your land. Our
land is crowded, and the soil is exhausted; but you have plenty of
land and it is good land. I never saw the like of it."

The interpreter translated. The Bashkirs talked among themselves
for a while. Pahom could not understand what they were saying, but saw that they were much amused, and that they shouted and laughed. Then they were silent and looked at Pahom while the interpreter said:

"They wish me to tell you that in return for your presents they will
gladly give you as much land as you want. You have only to point it
out with your hand and it is yours."

The Bashkirs talked again for a while and began to dispute. Pahom
asked what they were disputing about, and the interpreter told him
that some of them thought they ought to ask their Chief about the
land and not act in his absence, while others thought there was no
need to wait for his return.

                           VI
While the Bashkirs were disputing, a man in a large fox-fur cap
appeared on the scene. They all became silent and rose to their
feet. The interpreter said, "This is our Chief himself."

Pahom immediately fetched the best dressing-gown and five pounds of tea, and offered these to the Chief. The Chief accepted them, and
seated himself in the place of honour. The Bashkirs at once began
telling him something. The Chief listened for a while, then made a
sign with his head for them to be silent, and addressing himself to
Pahom, said in Russian:

"Well, let it be so. Choose whatever piece of land you like; we
have plenty of it."

"How can I take as much as I like?" thought Pahom. "I must get a
deed to make it secure, or else they may say, 'It is yours,' and
afterwards may take it away again."

"Thank you for your kind words," he said aloud. "You have much
land, and I only want a little. But I should like to be sure which
bit is mine. Could it not be measured and made over to me? Life and death are in God's hands. You good people give it to me, but your children might wish to take it away again."

"You are quite right," said the Chief. "We will make it over to you."

"I heard that a dealer had been here," continued Pahom, "and that
you gave him a little land, too, and signed title-deeds to that
effect. I should like to have it done in the same way."

The Chief understood.

"Yes," replied he, "that can be done quite easily. We have a scribe,
and we will go to town with you and have the deed properly sealed."

"And what will be the price?" asked Pahom.

"Our price is always the same: one thousand roubles a day."

Pahom did not understand.
"A day? What measure is that? How many acres would that be?"

"We do not know how to reckon it out," said the Chief. "We sell it
by the day. As much as you can go round on your feet in a day is
yours, and the price is one thousand roubles a day."

Pahom was surprised.

"But in a day you can get round a large tract of land," he said.

The Chief laughed.

"It will all be yours!" said he. "But there is one condition: If
you don't return on the same day to the spot whence you started,
your money is lost."

"But how am I to mark the way that I have gone?"

"Why, we shall go to any spot you like, and stay there. You must
start from that spot and make your round, taking a spade with you.
Wherever you think necessary, make a mark. At every turning, dig a hole and pile up the turf; then afterwards we will go round with a
plough from hole to hole. You may make as large a circuit as you
please, but before the sun sets you must return to the place you
started from. All the land you cover will be yours."

Pahom was delighted. It-was decided to start early next morning.
They talked a while, and after drinking some more kumiss and eating some more mutton, they had tea again, and then the night came on. They gave Pahom a feather-bed to sleep on, and the Bashkirs
dispersed for the night, promising to assemble the next morning at
daybreak and ride out before sunrise to the appointed spot.

                           VII
Pahom lay on the feather-bed, but could not sleep. He kept thinking
about the land.

"What a large tract I will mark off!" thought he. "I can easily go
thirty-five miles in a day. The days are long now, and within a
circuit of thirty-five miles what a lot of land there will be! I
will sell the poorer land, or let it to peasants, but I'll pick out
the best and farm it. I will buy two ox-teams, and hire two more
laborers. About a hundred and fifty acres shall be plough-land, and
I will pasture cattle on the rest."

Pahom lay awake all night, and dozed off only just before dawn.
Hardly were his eyes closed when he had a dream. He thought he was
lying in that same tent, and heard somebody chuckling outside. He
wondered who it could be, and rose and went out, and he saw the
Bashkir Chief sitting in front of the tent holding his side and
rolling about with laughter. Going nearer to the Chief, Pahom
asked: "What are you laughing at?" But he saw that it was no longer
the Chief, but the dealer who had recently stopped at his house and
had told him about the land. Just as Pahom was going to ask, "Have
you been here long?" he saw that it was not the dealer, but the
peasant who had come up from the Volga, long ago, to Pahom's old
home. Then he saw that it was not the peasant either, but the Devil
himself with hoofs and horns, sitting there and chuckling, and
before him lay a man barefoot, prostrate on the ground, with only
trousers and a shirt on. And Pahom dreamt that he looked more
attentively to see what sort of a man it was lying there, and he saw
that the man was dead, and that it was himself! He awoke horror-struck.

"What things one does dream," thought he.

Looking round he saw through the open door that the dawn was breaking.

"It's time to wake them up," thought he. "We ought to be starting."
He got up, roused his man (who was sleeping in his cart), bade him
harness; and went to call the Bashkirs.

"It's time to go to the steppe to measure the land," he said.

The Bashkirs rose and assembled, and the Chief came, too. Then they
began drinking kumiss again, and offered Pahom some tea, but he
would not wait.

"If we are to go, let us go. It is high time," said he.

                          VIII
The Bashkirs got ready and they all started: some mounted on horses,
and some in carts. Pahom drove in his own small cart with his
servant, and took a spade with him. When they reached the steppe,
the morning red was beginning to kindle. They ascended a hillock
(called by the Bashkirs a shikhan) and dismounting from their carts
and their horses, gathered in one spot. The Chief came up to Pahom
and stretched out his arm towards the plain:

"See," said he, "all this, as far as your eye can reach, is ours.
You may have any part of it you like."

Pahom's eyes glistened: it was all virgin soil, as flat as the palm
of your hand, as black as the seed of a poppy, and in the hollow.s
different kinds of grasses grew breast high.

The Chief took off his fox-fur cap, placed it on the ground and said:
"This will be the mark. Start from here, and return here again.
All the land you go round shall be yours."

Pahom took out his money and put it on the cap. Then he took off
his outer coat, remaining in his sleeveless under coat. He
unfastened his girdle and tied it tight below his stomach, put a
little bag of bread into the breast of his coat, and tying a flask
of water to his girdle, he drew up the tops of his boots, took the
spade from his man, and stood ready to start. He considered for
some moments which way he had better go--it was tempting everywhere.

"No matter," he concluded, "I will go towards the rising sun."

He turned his face to the east, stretched himself, and waited for
the sun to appear above the rim.

"I must lose no time," he thought, "and it is easier walking while
it is still cool."

The sun's rays had hardly flashed above the horizon, before Pahom,
carrying the spade over his shoulder, went down into the steppe.

Pahom started walking neither slowly nor quickly. After having gone a thousand yards he stopped, dug a hole and placed pieces of turf
one on another to make it more visible. Then he went on; and now
that he had walked off his stiffness he quickened his pace. After a
while he dug another hole.

Pahom looked back. The hillock could be distinctly seen in the
sunlight, with the people on it, and the glittering tires of the
cartwheels. At a rough guess Pahom concluded that he had walked
three miles. It was growing warmer; he took off his under-coat,
flung it across his shoulder, and went on again. It had grown quite
warm now; he looked at the sun, it was time to think of breakfast.

"The first shift is done, but there are four in a day, and it is too
soon yet to turn. But I will just take off my boots," said he to himself.

He sat down, took off his boots, stuck them into his girdle, and went on. It was easy walking now.

"I will go on for another thre
 miles," thought he, "and then turn
to the left. The spot is so fine, that it would be a pity to lose it. The further one goes, the better the land seems."

He went straight on a for a while, and when he looked round, the
hillock was scarcely visible and the people on it looked like black
ants, and he could just see something glistening there in the sun.

"Ah," thought Pahom, "I have gone far enough in this direction, it
is time to turn. Besides I am in a regular sweat, and very thirsty."

He stopped, dug a large hole, and heaped up pieces of turf. Next he
untied his flask, had a drink, and then turned sharply to the left.
He went on and on; the grass was high, and it was very hot.

Pahom began to grow tired: he looked at the sun and saw that it was noon.

"Well," he thought, "I must have a rest."

He sat down, and ate some bread and drank some water; but he did not lie down, thinking that if he did he might fall asleep. After
sitting a little while, he went on again. At first he walked
easily: the food had strengthened him; but it had become terribly
hot, and he felt sleepy; still he went on, thinking: "An hour to
suffer, a life-time to live."

He went a long way in this direction also, and was about to turn to
the left again, when he perceived a damp hollow: "It would be a pity
to leave that out," he thought. "Flax would do well there." So he
went on past the hollow, and dug a hole on the other side of it
before he turned the corner. Pahom looked towards the hillock. The
heat made the air hazy: it seemed to be quivering, and through the
haze the people on th,,,,,,,,,e hillock could scarcely be seen.

"Ah!" thought Pahom, "I have made the sides too long; I must make
this one shorter." And he went along the third side, stepping
faster. He looked at the sun: it was nearly half way to the
horizon, and he had not yet done two miles of the third side of the
square. He was still ten miles from the goal.

"No," he thought, "though it will make my land lopsided, I must
hurry back in a straight line now. I might go too far, and as it is
I have a great deal of land."

So Pahom hurriedly dug a hole, and turned straight towards the hillock.

                        IX
Pahom went straight towards the hillock, but he now walked with
difficulty. He was done up with the heat, his bare feet were cut
and bruised, and his legs began to fail. He longed to rest, but it
was impossible if he meant to get back before sunset. The sun waits
for no man, and it was sinking lower and lower.

"Oh dear," he thought, "if only I have not blundered trying for too
much! What if I am too late?"

He looked towards the hillock and at the sun. He was still far from
his goal, and the sun was already near the rim. Pahom walked on and
on; it was very hard walking, but he went quicker and quicker. He
pressed on, but was still far from the place. He began running,
threw away his coat, his boots, his flask, and his cap, and kept
only the spade which he used as a support.

"What shall I do," he thought again, "I have grasped too much, and
ruined the whole affair. I can't get there before the sun sets."

And this fear made him still more breathless. Pahom went on
running, his soaking shirt and trousers stuck to him, and his mouth was parched. His breast was working like a blacksmith's bellows,
his heart was beating like a hammer, and his legs were giving way as if they did not belong to him. Pahom was seized with terror lest he should die of the strain.

Though afraid of death, he could not stop. "After having run all
that way they will call me a fool if I stop now," thought he. And
he ran on and on, and drew near and heard the Bashkirs yelling and
shouting to him, and their cries inflamed his heart still more. He
gathered his last strength and ran on.

The sun was close to the rim, and cloaked in mist looked large, and
red as blood. Now, yes now, it was about to set! The sun was quite
low, but he was also quite near his aim. Pahom could already see
the people on the hillock waving their arms to hurry him up. He
could see the fox-fur cap on the ground, and the money on it, and
the Chief sitting on the ground holding his sides. And Pahom
remembered his dream.

"There is plenty of land," thought he, "but will God let me live on
it? I have lost my life, I have lost my life! I shall never reach that spot!"

Pahom looked at the sun, which had reached the earth: one side of it
had already disappeared. With all his remaining strength he rushed
on, bending his body forward so that his legs could hardly follow
fast enough to keep him from falling. Just as he reached the
hillock it suddenly grew dark. He looked up--the sun had already
set. He gave a cry: "All my labor has been in vain," thought he,
and was about to stop, but he heard the Bashkirs still shouting, and
remembered that though to him, from below, the sun seemed to have
set, they on the hillock could still see it. He took a long breath
and ran up the hillock. It was still light there. He reached the
top and saw the cap. Before it sat the Chief laughing and holding
his sides. Again Pahom remembered his dream, and he uttered a cry:
his legs gave way beneath him, he fell forward and reached the cap
with his hands.

"Ah, what a fine fellow!" exclaimed the Chief. "He has gained
much land!"

Pahom's servant came running up and tried to raise him, but he saw
that blood was flowing from his mouth. Pahom was dead!

The Bashkirs clicked their tongues to show their pity.

His servant picked up the spade and dug a grave long enough for
Pahom to lie in, and buried him in it. Six feet from his head to
his heels was all he needed.


Footnotes:
1.  One hundred kopeks make a rouble. The kopek is worth about
half a cent.
2.  A non-intoxicating drink usually made from rye-malt and rye-flour.
3.  The brick oven in a Russian peasant's hut is usually built so
as to leave a flat top, large enough to lie on, for those who want
to sleep in a warm place.
4.  120 "desyatins." The "desyatina" is properly 2.7 acres; but in
this story round numbers are used.
5.  Three roubles per "desyatina."
6.  Five "kopeks" for a "desyatina."

'The Necklace', a short story by Guy de Maupassant

The Necklace
                
                   - Guy de Maupassant

She was one of those pretty and charming girls born, as if by an error of fate, into a family of clerks. She had no dowry, no expectations, no means of becoming known, understood, loved or wedded by a man of wealth and distinction; and so she let herself be married to a minor official at the Ministry of Education.

She dressed plainly because she had never been able to afford anything better, but she was as unhappy as if she had once been wealthy. Women don't belong to a caste or class; their beauty, grace, and natural charm take the place of birth and family. Natural delicacy, instinctive elegance and a quick wit determine their place in society, and make the daughters of commoners the equals of the very finest ladies.

She suffered endlessly, feeling she was entitled to all the delicacies and luxuries of life. She suffered because of the poorness of her house as she looked at the dirty walls, the worn-out chairs and the ugly curtains. All these things that another woman of her class would not even have noticed, tormented her and made her resentful. The sight of the little Brenton girl who did her housework filled her with terrible regrets and hopeless fantasies. She dreamed of silent antechambers hung with Oriental tapestries, lit from above by torches in bronze holders, while two tall footmen in knee-length breeches napped in huge armchairs, sleepy from the stove's oppressive warmth. She dreamed of vast living rooms furnished in rare old silks, elegant furniture loaded with priceless ornaments, and inviting smaller rooms, perfumed, made for afternoon chats with close friends - famous, sought after men, who all women envy and desire.

When she sat down to dinner at a round table covered with a three-day-old cloth opposite her husband who, lifting the lid off the soup, shouted excitedly, "Ah! Beef stew! What could be better," she dreamed of fine dinners, of shining silverware, of tapestries which peopled the walls with figures from another time and strange birds in fairy forests; she dreamed of delicious dishes served on wonderful plates, of whispered gallantries listened to with an inscrutable smile as one ate the pink flesh of a trout or the wings of a quail.

She had no dresses, no jewels, nothing; and these were the only things she loved. She felt she was made for them alone. She wanted so much to charm, to be envied, to be desired and sought after.

She had a rich friend, a former schoolmate at the convent, whom she no longer wanted to visit because she suffered so much when she came home. For whole days afterwards she would weep with sorrow, regret, despair and misery.

                            *

One evening her husband came home with an air of triumph, holding a large envelope in his hand.

"Look," he said, "here's something for you."

She tore open the paper and drew out a card, on which was printed the words:

"The Minister of Education and Mme. Georges Rampouneau request the pleasure of M. and Mme. Loisel's company at the Ministry, on the evening of Monday January 18th."

Instead of being delighted, as her husband had hoped, she threw the invitation on the table resentfully, and muttered:

"What do you want me to do with that?"

"But, my dear, I thought you would be pleased. You never go out, and it will be such a lovely occasion! I had awful trouble getting it. Every one wants to go; it is very exclusive, and they're not giving many invitations to clerks. The whole ministry will be there."

She stared at him angrily, and said, impatiently:

"And what do you expect me to wear if I go?"

He hadn't thought of that. He stammered:

"Why, the dress you go to the theatre in. It seems very nice to me ..."

He stopped, stunned, distressed to see his wife crying. Two large tears ran slowly from the corners of her eyes towards the corners of her mouth. He stuttered:

"What's the matter? What's the matter?"

With great effort she overcame her grief and replied in a calm voice, as she wiped her wet cheeks:

"Nothing. Only I have no dress and so I can't go to this party. Give your invitation to a friend whose wife has better clothes than I do."

He was distraught, but tried again:

"Let's see, Mathilde. How much would a suitable dress cost, one which you could use again on other occasions, something very simple?"

She thought for a moment, computing the cost, and also wondering what amount she could ask for without an immediate refusal and an alarmed exclamation from the thrifty clerk.

At last she answered hesitantly:

"I don't know exactly, but I think I could do it with four hundred francs ."
He turned a little pale, because he had been saving that exact amount to buy a gun and treat himself to a hunting trip the following summer, in the country near Nanterre, with a few friends who went lark-shooting there on Sundays.

However, he said:

"Very well, I can give you four hundred francs . But try and get a really beautiful dress."

                         *

The day of the party drew near, and Madame Loisel seemed sad, restless, anxious. Her dress was ready, however. One evening her husband said to her:

"What's the matter? You've been acting strange these last three days."
She replied: "I'm upset that I have no jewels, not a single stone to wear. I will look cheap. I would almost rather not go to the party."

"You could wear flowers, " he said, "They are very fashionable at this time of year. For ten
francs you could get two or three magnificent roses."

She was not convinced.

"No; there is nothing more humiliating than looking poor in the middle of a lot of rich women."

"How stupid you are!" her husband cried. "Go and see your friend Madame Forestier and ask her to lend you some jewels. You know her well enough for that."

She uttered a cry of joy.

"Of course. I had not thought of that."

The next day she went to her friend's house and told her of her distress.
Madame Forestier went to her mirrored wardrobe, took out a large box, brought it back, opened it, and said to Madame Loisel:

"Choose, my dear."

First she saw some bracelets, then a pearl necklace, then a gold Venetian cross set with precious stones, of exquisite craftsmanship. She tried on the jewelry in the mirror, hesitated, could not bear to part with them, to give them back. She kept asking:

"You have nothing else?"

"Why, yes. But I don't know what you like."

Suddenly she discovered, in a black satin box, a superb diamond necklace, and her heart began to beat with uncontrolled desire. Her hands trembled as she took it. She fastened it around her neck, over her high-necked dress, and stood lost in ecstasy as she looked at herself.

Then she asked anxiously, hesitating:

"Would you lend me this, just this?"

"Why, yes, of course."

She threw her arms around her friend's neck, embraced her rapturously, then fled with her treasure.

                            *

The day of the party arrived. Madame Loisel was a success. She was prettier than all the other women, elegant, gracious, smiling, and full of joy. All the men stared at her, asked her name, tried to be introduced. All the cabinet officials wanted to waltz with her. The minister noticed her.

She danced wildly, with passion, drunk on pleasure, forgetting everything in the triumph of her beauty, in the glory of her success, in a sort of cloud of happiness, made up of all this respect, all this admiration, all these awakened desires, of that sense of triumph that is so sweet to a woman's heart.

She left at about four o'clock in the morning. Her husband had been dozing since midnight in a little deserted anteroom with three other gentlemen whose wives were having a good time.

He threw over her shoulders the clothes he had brought for her to go outside in, the modest clothes of an ordinary life, whose poverty contrasted sharply with the elegance of the ball dress. She felt this and wanted to run away, so she wouldn't be noticed by the other women who were wrapping themselves in expensive furs.

Loisel held her back.

"Wait a moment, you'll catch a cold outside. I'll go and find a cab."

But she would not listen to him, and ran down the stairs. When they were finally in the street, they could not find a cab, and began to look for one, shouting at the cabmen they saw passing in the distance.

They walked down toward the Seine in despair, shivering with cold. At last they found on the quay one of those old night cabs that one sees in Paris only after dark, as if they were ashamed to show their shabbiness during the day.

They were dropped off at their door in the Rue des Martyrs, and sadly walked up the steps to their apartment. It was all over, for her. And he was remembering that he had to be back at his office at ten o'clock.

In front of the mirror, she took off the clothes around her shoulders, taking a final look at herself in all her glory. But suddenly she uttered a cry. She no longer had the necklace round her neck !

"What is the matter?" asked her husband, already half undressed.

She turned towards him, panic-stricken.

"I have ... I have ... I no longer have Madame Forestier's necklace."

He stood up, distraught.

"What! ... how ! ... That's impossible !"

They looked in the folds of her dress, in the folds of her cloak, in her pockets, everywhere. But they could not find it.

"Are you sure you still had it on when you left the ball?" he asked.

"Yes. I touched it in the hall at the Ministry."

"But if you had lost it in the street we would have heard it fall. It must be in the cab."

"Yes. That's probably it. Did you take his number?"

"No. And you, didn't you notice it?"

"No."

They stared at each other, stunned. At last Loisel put his clothes on again.

"I'm going back," he said, "over the whole route we walked, see if I can find it."

He left. She remained in her ball dress all evening, without the strength to go to bed, sitting on a chair, with no fire, her mind blank.

Her husband returned at about seven o'clock. He had found nothing.

He went to the police, to the newspapers to offer a reward, to the cab companies, everywhere the tiniest glimmer of hope led him.

She waited all day, in the same state of blank despair from before this frightful disaster.

Loisel returned in the evening, a hollow, pale figure; he had found nothing.

"You must write to your friend," he said, "tell her you have broken the clasp of her necklace and that you are having it mended. It will give us time to look some more."

She wrote as he dictated.

                         *

At the end of one week they had lost all hope.

And Loisel, who had aged five years, declared:

"We must consider how to replace the jewel."

The next day they took the box which had held it, and went to the jeweler whose name they found inside. He consulted his books.

"It was not I, madame, who sold the necklace; I must simply have supplied the case."

And so they went from jeweler to jeweler, looking for an necklace like the other one, consulting their memories, both sick with grief and anguish.

In a shop at the Palais Royal, they found a string of diamonds which seemed to be exactly what they were looking for. It was worth forty thousand francs . They could have it for thirty-six thousand.

So they begged the jeweler not to sell it for three days. And they made an arrangement that he would take it back for thirty-four thousand francs if the other necklace was found before the end of February.

Loisel had eighteen thousand francs which his father had left him. He would borrow the rest.

And he did borrow, asking for a thousand
francs from one man, five hundred from another, five louis here, three louis there. He gave notes, made ruinous agreements, dealt with usurers, with every type of money-lender. He compromised the rest of his life, risked signing notes without knowing if he could ever honor them, and, terrified by the anguish still to come, by the black misery about to fall on him, by the prospect of every physical privation and every moral torture he was about to suffer, he went to get the new necklace, and laid down on the jeweler's counter thirty-six thousand francs .

When Madame Loisel took the necklace back, Madame Forestier said coldly:

"You should have returned it sooner, I might have needed it."

To the relief of her friend, she did not open the case. If she had detected the substitution, what would she have thought? What would she have said? Would she have taken her friend for a thief?

                          *
From then on, Madame Loisel knew the horrible life of the very poor. But she played her part heroically. The dreadful debt must be paid. She would pay it. They dismissed their maid; they changed their lodgings; they rented a garret under the roof.

She came to know the drudgery of housework, the odious labors of the kitchen. She washed the dishes, staining her rosy nails on greasy pots and the bottoms of pans. She washed the dirty linen, the shirts and the dishcloths, which she hung to dry on a line; she carried the garbage down to the street every morning, and carried up the water, stopping at each landing to catch her breath. And, dressed like a commoner, she went to the fruiterer's, the grocer's, the butcher's, her basket on her arm, bargaining, insulted, fighting over every miserable sou.

Each month they had to pay some notes, renew others, get more time.

Her husband worked every evening, doing accounts for a tradesman, and often, late into the night, he sat copying a manuscript at five sous a page.

And this life lasted ten years.

At the end of ten years they had paid off everything, everything, at usurer's rates and with the accumulations of compound interest.

Madame Loisel looked old now. She had become strong, hard and rough like all women of impoverished households. With hair half combed, with skirts awry, and reddened hands, she talked loudly as she washed the floor with great swishes of water. But sometimes, when her husband was at the office, she sat down near the window and thought of that evening at the ball so long ago, when she had been so beautiful and so admired.

What would have happened if she had not lost that necklace? Who knows, who knows? How strange life is, how fickle! How little is needed for one to be ruined or saved !

                           *
One Sunday, as she was walking in the Champs Élysées to refresh herself after the week's work, suddenly she saw a woman walking with a child. It was Madame Forestier, still young, still beautiful, still charming.

Madame Loisel felt emotional. Should she speak to her? Yes, of course. And now that she had paid, she would tell her all. Why not?

She went up to her.

"Good morning, Jeanne."

The other, astonished to be addressed so familiarly by this common woman, did not recognize her. She stammered:

"But - madame - I don't know. You must have made a mistake."

"No, I am Mathilde Loisel."

Her friend uttered a cry.

"Oh! ... my poor Mathilde, how you've changed ! ..."

"Yes, I have had some hard times since I last saw you, and many miseries ... and all because of you ! .."

"Me? How can that be?"

"You remember that diamond necklace that you lent me to wear to the Ministry party?"

"Yes. Well?"

"Well, I lost it."

"What do you mean? You brought it back."

"I brought you back another exactly like it. And it has taken us ten years to pay for it. It wasn't easy for us, we had very little. But at last it is over, and I am very glad."

Madame Forestier was stunned.

"You say that you bought a diamond necklace to replace mine?"

"Yes; you didn't notice then? They were very similar."

And she smiled with proud and innocent pleasure.

Madame Forestier, deeply moved, took both her hands.

"Oh, my poor Mathilde ! Mine was an imitation ! It was worth five hundred francs at most ! ..."

History of English Literature

English Literature

A Brief History

Art is an expression of life in its truth and beauty; and artist looks deeper into life and enjoys that treasure of truth and beauty; and his realization finds expression in his creation in the form of music, dance, painting or literature. Literature is a kind of artist's record of life - a simple portrait presenting in the facts in the perspective of soul and nature, and an author is an architect of that work of art which has its natural appeal to the readers' emotions and imagination rather than his intellect.

A literary creation is called literature when it attains the stage of universality with the widest human interests and simplest human emotions. Pure literature knows no bound of race, land or religion. It's chiefly occupied with elementary emotions and passions like love and hate, joy and sorrow, fear and faith- the natural expression of human hearts.

Literature, when first created, remains personal, but when expressed, it becomes universal. It has some definite object: to know man in his inner and outer nature, his feelings and expression of life, his good or bad activities. In order to understand a people of an age, it is necessary to study their history that records their deeds, but it is equally important to read their literature that records their dreams which made their deeds possible.
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English Literature

English literature begins with songs and stories of the ancestors of the English people who lived on the borders of the North Sea. Then the tribes of those ancestors-the Jutes, Angles and Saxons conquered Britain during the later part of fifth century and laid the foundation of the English nation. They were mainly warriors and sea rovers, but the men of profound emotions. Their poetry reflects their nature trough subjects, like the sea, the boats, battles, adventure, nostalgia and so on. In the history of English literature, this period of creation is known as "The Anglo-Saxon Period" which produced chiefly the first poetry in Latin, especially great epic poem "Beowulf" , and a few other pieces like "Widsith", Deor's Lament" and "The Seafarer".

Bede, a historian, and Ca'edmon and Cynewulf, the two great poets, belong to the Northumbrian school of writers between 650 and 850. The beginning of English prose writing is seen under Alfred (848-901) who revised and enlarged the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.

The Anglo-Norman period began after the conquest of Anglo-Saxon England under William, Duke of Normandy of France. The literature, which they brought to England, is remarkable for its romantic tales of love and adventure. With its influence , the Anglo-Saxon speech simplified itself by dropping many of its Teutonic vocabulary to become the English language. Thus English literature is combination of French and Saxon elements.
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The Age of Chaucer

The fourteenth century produced only a few eminent writers, of whom, Geoffrey Chaucer is greatest of all. Chaucer's best poetical works are "The Canterbury Tales", "The Romance of the Rose (translation)", "Troilus and Cressida", and "The Legend of Good Woman". Chaucer's works and Wyclif's translation of the Bible developed the Midland into the national standard of prose in England.

The two other contemporaries of Chaucer were William Langland and John Mandeville. Langland is known for his great poem "Piers Plowman". About the year 1356, Mandeville's work "Voyage and Travail of Sir John Mandeville" was written in the midland dialect giving an outline of his wide travels.
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The Age of Elizabeth

The period between the later part of the sixteenth and the earlier part of seventeenth centuries is called the "Age of Elizabeth" which produced many excellent prose works, although it is essentially an age of poetry.

During this age, the emergence of the first national poet (since Chaucer's death in 1400) of Edmund Spenser, along with Christopher Marlow, Philip Sydney, William Shakespeare, Ben Johnson, and Francis Bacon is noticed. Spencer produced "Shepherd's Calendar", "The Faerie Queen"; Marlowe's poem "Hero and Leander", and his translation of Homer's "Iliad" and "Odyssey" are remarkable. And besides his poems, Philip Sydney wrote his romance prose "Arcadia", and The Defense of Poisie, a critical essay.

William Shakespeare's appearance as a great force in the literary arena of English Literature secured him the foremost place in the world's literature, he is over the ages a universal poet and dramatist. His famous works are "Henry VI", "Richard III", "The Comedy of Errors", "Titus Andronicus", "The Taming of the Shrew", "Love's Labour's Lost", "Romeo and Juliet", "A Midsummer Night's Dream", "The Two Gentlemen of Verona", "King John", "Richard II", "The Merchant of Venice", "Henry IV", "Henry IV (Part Two)", "Much Ado about Nothing", "Henry V", "Julius Caesar", "The Merry Wives of Windsor", "As You Like It", "Hamlet", "Twelfth Night", "Trollus and Cressida', "All's Well that Ends Well", "Measure for Measure", "Othello", "Macbeth", "King Lear", "Antony and Cleopatra", "Timon of Athens", "Pericles", "Cymbeline", "The Winter's Tale", "The Tempest", and "Henry VIII".

Ben Johnson's powerful dramas, like "Every Man in His Humor", "Cyntia's Revels", "The Poetster", "The Alchemist", "The Volpone", "The Silent Woman" etc. and Bacon's "The Advancement of Learning", "Novum Organum", "The Instauratio" and his famous "Essays" accelerated immensely the steps of growth of the English literature of the age.
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The Puritan Age

The period between 1625 and 1675 is known as the "Puritan Age (or John Milton's Age)", because during the period, Puritan standards prevailed in England, and also because the greatest literary figure John Milton (1608-1674) was a Puritan. The Puritans struggled for righteousness and liberty.

Puritanism became a great national movement which included English Churchman as well as extreme Separatists. While the Catholic Church had always held true to the ideal of the united church, the possibility of the ideal of a purely national Protestantism grew.

The political upheaval of the period is summed up in the struggle between the King and the Parliament, the blasphemy of a man's divine right to rule his fellowmen was ended. Thus the age marked the beginning of the reformation.

In literature also, the age created a sort of confusion due to breaking up of old ideas. Some of the literary men had the tendencies to look backward for the old golden age, and some wanted to look forward for a better world with the throbs of hope and fresh vitality and youth. And in John Milton, the indomitable Puritan spirit finds its noblest expression. There was Samuel Daniel, John Donne, George Herbert, Thomas Carew, Robert Herick, Sir John Suckling, Sir Richard Lovelace, John Bunyan, Robert Burton, Sir Thomas Browne, Thomas Fuller, Jeremy Taylor, Richard Baxter, Izaak Walton among other important writers of the age.

Milton's "Paradise Lost" and "Paradise Regained" , his sonnets and other works; Bunyan's "The Pilgrim's Progress", and "Faerie Queene", Burton's "Anatomy of Melancholy", Browne's "Religio Medici", Taylor's "Holy Living and Dying", and Walton's "Complete Angler" are known as remarkable works of the age.
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The Restoration Period

During 1660-1700, there were tremendous social reactions from the restraint of parliament. A wild delight in the pleasures and varieties of the world like performances of dramas and theaters, the revival of bull and bear baiting, sports, music, dancing etc. replaced the absorption in other "other-worldliness",. The writers turned from Italian influence of imagination to French objective repression of emotions.

The greatest literary figure of the Restoration period is John Dryden (1631-1700) whose book provides an excellent reflection of both good and evil tendencies of age. He is best known for his narrative poem "Annus Mirabilis", "All for love", "Religio Laici", "A'eneid", "Fables" etc.

Samuel Butler, Thomas Hobbes, and John Locke were among others prominent writers of the age. Butler's "Hudibras", Hobbe's "Leviathan", Locke's "Essay Concerning Human Understanding" etc. add glory to the literature of the age.
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Eighteenth-Century Literature

The literature of the century may be classified under three categories: the trend of classicism, the revival of romantic poetry, and the beginning of the "modern novel". Modern newspapers like "Chronicle", "Post", and "Times" and the literary magazines like "Tatler" and "Spectator" had greatly influenced the development of the prose style.

Alexander Pope (1688-1774), a unique figure during the period, was, for a generation, "the poet" of a great nation. Pope's "Pastorals", "Windsor", "Forest Messiah", "Essays on Criticism", "Tamburlaine", "Eloise to Abelard", "the Rape of the Lock", "Dunciad", "Moral Epistles" are well known.

Besides, Jonathan Swift's (1667-1745) famous work "Bickerstaff Almanac" containing "Predictions for the year 1708, as Determined by the Unerring Stars", , his two great satires are "Tale of a Tub", and "Gulliver's Travels".

Joseph Addison (1672-1719) seized upon the new social life and made it the subject of many of his essays based upon types of men and manners. The most interesting work of Addison's early life is his "Account of the Greatest English Poets". His "Cato" is one of his popular poems. Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) is remembered chiefly for his "Dictionary", an English lexicon, the "Lives of the Poets", and "Rasselas", "Prince of Abyssinia". Edmund Burke (1729-1797) is best known for essays, like "Reflections of the French Revolution", "A Philosophical Inquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful". Edward Gibbon's (1737-1794) "Memoirs" and "The Decline and Fall of Roman Empire" are two remarkable works. Thomas Gray's (1716-1771) "The Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard" is the most perfect poem of the age, although his "Letters" and the "Journal" are also noteworthy.

Oliver Goldsmith (1728-1774) is famous for his "The Deserted Village" (poem), although he was also noted essayist, dramatist and novelist. His "The Vicar of Wakefield", "The Citizen of The World", "The Good-Natured Man" and "She Stoops to Conquer" brought him more fame. William Cowper (1731-1800) wrote his largest poem, "The Task". Robert Burns (1759-1796) is better known as a great song-writer. William Blake (1759-1796) is perhaps the most original romantic poet of the age. His last huge prophetic works, prophetic works; "Jerusalem" and "Milton", the "Poetical Sketches", "Songs of Experience" reflect different views of human soul. His other famous works are "Urizen", "Gates of Paradise", "Marri age of Heaven and Hell", "The French Revolution", "The Vision of the Daughters of Albion".

James Thomson's (1700-1748) poems, like "Rule Britannia" (one of the national songs of Britain), "The Castle of Indolence", "The Seasons"; William Collins' (1721-1759) "Oriental Eclogems", George Crabbe's (1721-1759) poetical works, like "The Village", "The Parish Register", "The Borough", "Tales in Verse", "Tales of the Hall" ; James Macpherson's (1736-1796) "Fragments of Ancient Poetry Collected in the Highlands", "Fingal", "Temora" are wonderful works of the age.

Other prominent writers of the age were Thomas Chatterton, Thomas Percy, the author of "Reliques of Ancient English Poetry", "Northern Antiquities", Daniel Defoe, famous for his "Robinson Crusoe", "Journal of the Plague Year", "Memoirs of a Cavalier", "Captain Singleton", "Colonel Jack", "Moll Flanders", "Roxana" etc.; Samuel Richardson, a noted writer of "Family Letters", "Pamela", "Clarissa", "Sir Charles Grandison" etc.; Henry Fielding, the author of "Joseph Andrews", "Jonathan Wilde", "The History of Tom Tones", "A Foundling", "Amelia" etc.; Tobias Smollett, The author of "Roderick Random", "Peregrine Pickle", "Humphrey Clinker" etc.; Lawrence Sterne, the author of "Tristram Shandy", "A Sentimental Journey through France and Italy".
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The Age of Romanticism

During the first half of the nineteenth century, known as "Age of Romanticism", the literature in England was largely political in form, and mainly romantic in spirit. In the early works of Wordsworth, Byron and Shelley the political turmoil in England and the triumph of democracy are reflected. The age is marked by the first appearance of some women novelists, like Anne Radcliffe, Jane Porter, Maria Edgeworth, and Jane Austen, in addition to many prominent poets, like William Wordsworth (170-1850) who is famous for his "Lyrical Ballads" (in the partnership with Coleridge), "The Prelude", "The Excursion", "The Recluse", "The Home at Grasmere", especially for poems, "Lucy", "Intimations of Immortality", etc.

Samuel Coleridge (1772-1834), a powerful poet and a contemporary of Wordsworth, was a great man of grief who made the world glad. His chief contribution is "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" to the "Lyrical Ballads". His other famous poems are "A Day Dream", "The Devil's Thoughts", "The Suicide's Argument", "The Day Wandering of Cain", "Kubla Khan", "Christabal" etc.; and his prose works include "Biographia Literaria", or "Sketches of My Literary Life and Opinions", "Lectures on Shakespeare", "Aids to Reflection" etc.

Robert Southey (1774-1843) is famous for his "Thalaba", "The Curse of Kehama", "Madoc", "Roderick", "Life of Nelson", "Lives of British Admirals" etc. Walter Scott (1771-1883) is poet of "Marmion", "Lady of the Lake", "Ministrelsy of the Scottish Border", "The Lady of the Last Ministrel" etc. His novels, "Waverley", "Guy Mannering", "The Antiquary", "Black Dwarf", "Old Mortality", "Rob Roy", "The Heart of Midlothian" etc. are successful. But is most popular work is "Ivanhoe" which was followed by "Kenilworth", "Nigel", "Peveril", "Woodstock", "Count Robert", "The Talisman" etc.

George Gordon, Lord Byron's (1788-1824) famous works are "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage", "Manfred", "Cain", "Mazeppa", "The prisoner of Chillon", "The Corsair", "The Giaour", "Don Juan" etc. Percy Bysshe Shelley's (1792-1822) noteworthy works are "Alastor", or "the Spirit of Solitude", "Prometheus Unbound", "Queen Mab", "The Revolt of Islam", "Hellas", "The Witch of Atlas", "Adonais", etc. Shelley's popular poems are "The Cloud", "To a Skylark", "Ode to the West Wind", "To Night" etc.

John Keats (1795-1821), a poet devoted to his ideal, who lived for poetry, has produced wonderful poetry: Poems, "Endymion", "Lamia, Isabella", "The Eve of St. Agnes", and "Other Poems" etc. Charles Lamb (1775-1835) is renowned chiefly for his "Tales from Shakespeare", in addition to "Rosamund Gray", "John Woodvil", "Specimens of English Dramatic Poets Contemporary with Shakespeare", "Last Essays of Elia" etc.

Thomas De Quincey (1785-1859) is recognized as an established author for his prose works, like "Confessions of an English Opium Eater", "Literary Reminiscences", "On the Knocking at the Gate in Macbeth", "Murder Considered as One of the Fine Arts", "Letters to a Young Man", "Joan of Arc", "The Revolt of The Tartars", "The English Mail-coach", "Autobiographical Sketches" etc. He wrote on wide range subjects: "Klosterheim", a novel, "Logic of Political Economy", "The Essays on Style and Rhetoric", "Philosophy of Herodotus" etc.

Jane Austen (1775-1817), who is a powerful author, was famous for her novels, like "Pride and Prejudice", "Sense and Sensibility", "Emma", "Mansfield Park", "Northanger Abbey" etc.
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The Victorian Age

The later part of the nineteenth century is said to be the "Victorian Age" of English literature, because Victoria became queen of England in 1837, and there was rapid growth of democracy and splendid progress in all branches of art and science. The age produced two great poets, Alfred Tennyson (1809-1892) and Robert Browning (1812-1889). Tennyson is famous for his works, like "Poems", "The Princes", "a Medley", "Maud", "In Memoriam", "The Idylls of the King", "Ballads", "Demeter" etc. Robert Browning's works, like "Paulin", "Paracelsus", "Stafford", "Sordello", "Bells and Pomegranates", "Letters", "The Ring and The Book", "Dramatic Lyrics", "Dramatic Romances and Lyrics", "Men and Women", "Dramatic Personae", "The Inn Album", "Jocoseria Colombe's Birthday", "In a Balcony", "Fifine at the Fair", "Red Cotton Night-Cap Country", and of all "The Last Ride Together", established him as a great poet of the age.

Besides the said two poets, there were few other prominent writers of the age. Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-1861) was the leading writer of all of them. Her "Piers Plowman", "The Seraphim and Other Poems", "Sonnets from the Portuguese", "Casa Guide Windows", "Aurora Leigh", "Poem Before Congress", "Last Poems" are remarkable. Robert Browning married this invalid talented lady whose fame spread much before her husband in the literary field.

Other writers were Dante Gabriel Rossetti, William Moris, and Algernon Charles Swinburne. Among the novelists of the Victorian age, the most prominent was Charles Dickens (1812-1870) whose major works included "Pickwick Papers", "Oliver Twist", "Nicholas Nickleby", "Bleak Dorrit", "Davis Copperfield", "The Chimes", "The Cricket on the Hearth", "Charismas Carol", "Dombey and Son", "Our Mutual Friend", "Old Curiosity Shop" etc.

Another successful novelist of the age was William Makepeace Thackeray (1811-1863) whose important works are "Henry Esmond", "Pendennis", "The Newcomes", "The Virginians", and of all of them the most popular "Vanity Fair" that brought him instant fame. His essays, like "English Humorists" and "The Four Georges", are among finest essays of the period.

In the Victorian Age, the prominent writers, like Mary Ann Evans, George Eliot produced a few worthy novels, like "Scenes of Clerical Life", "Adam Bede", "Mill on the Floss", "Silas Marner", "Romola", "Felix Halt", "Middlemarch", "Daniel Deronda" etc., the drama-poem, "Spanish Gypsy", and a volume of essays, "the Impressions of Theophrastus Such" etc.

Among other writers of the Victorian Age, there were Charles Reade, Anthony Trollope, Charlotte Bonti, Edward Bulwer Lytton, Charles Kingsley, Mrs. Elizabeth Gaskell, Thomas Hardy, Robert Louis Stevenson, Richard Doddridge Blackman, George Meredith, Thomas Babington Macaulay, an essayist, Thomas Carlyh, John Ruskin, Mathew Arnold, John Henry Newman etc.

Thomas Hardy's "Under the Greenwood Tree", "A Pair of Blue Eyes", "Far from the Madding Crowd", "The Return of Nature", "The Woodlanders", "Tess of the D'Urbervillas", "Jude the Obscure" are his best works.

Stevenson's wonderful novels, such as "Treasure Island", "Dr. Jekyll and Hyde", "Kidnapped", "The Master of Ballantrae", "David Balfour", and his remarkable essays, namely "Virginibus Puerisque", "Familiar Studies of Men and Books", and "Memoirs and portraits", and his sketches of travels, like "An Island Voyage", "Travels with a Donkey", "Across the Plains", "The Amateur Emigrant", and also volumes of poems, "Underwoods", "A Child's Garden of Verses" make him a great author.

Macaulay is famous in literature for his essays, such as History of England, Essays on Milton, etc. His poetical work "Lays of an Ancient Rome" is a collection of ballads. Ruskin's major essays are "Ethics of the Dust", "Crown of Wild Olive", "Sesame and Lilies", "Fors Clavigera", "Unto the Last", and of his books of art, "Seven Lamps of Architecture", "Stones of Venice", "Modern Painters" established him as prominent writer of the age.

Mathew Arnold's popular works are "The Strayed Reveller and other poems", "Balder Dead", "Sohrab and Rustam", "Empedocles on Etna and Other Poems"; His essays: "The Study of Poetry", "On Translating Homer", "Essays in Criticism", "Friendship's Garland", "Culture and Anarchy" and books on religious subjects, like "St. Paul and Protestantism", "Liberation and Dogma", "God and the Bible", "Last Essays on Church and Religion", "Discourses in America" etc. are equally adored.
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Twentieth Century Literature

During the twentieth-century, English literature took a new turn, bringing a noticeable sign of development in almost all its branches, especially in novel-writing. The World-War II left an unavoidable influence on the contemporary literature. The signs of rapidly grown modernity are noticed in prose and poetry, not only in England but also in America.

The prominent writers during the century were Rudyard Kipling (1856-1936), Herbert G. Wells (1866-1946), John Galsworthy (1867-1933), James M. Barrie (1860-1937), Joseph Conrad (1857-1924), Arnold Bennett (1867-1931), Samuel Butler (1835-1902), John Masefield, George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950), William Butler Yeats (1865-1939), George W. Russell (1867-1935), John Millington Synge (1871-1909), Walter de la Mare (1873-1956), among others.

Kipling's verses possess ballad-like quality. Some of them are "Departmental Ditties", "Barrack-Room Ballads" etc. Some of his best verses are "Ballad of East and West", "Gunga Din", "Fuzzy Wuzzy" etc. His short story collection include "A Diversity of Creatures", "Soldiers Three", and also his fictions, "The Brushwood Boy", "Captain's Courageous", "Kim", "The Jungle Book" etc. make him a great writer.

H.G. Wells is known mainly for his unique style of writing. His famous works are "An Experiment in Autobiography", "Tono-Bungay", "The New Machiavelli", "The Soul of a Bishop", "Joan and Peter", "Outline of History", "A Year of Prophesying", "The Shape of Things to Come", "The Time Machine", "Mr. Britling Sees it Through", "The Wheel of Chance" etc.

Galsworthy's novels, "The Man of Property", "Flowing Wilderness and Indian Summer of a Forsyle" raised him to the level of front rank novelists. His plays, "The Island Pharisees", "Justice", "Loyalties", "Escape", "The Silver Box", etc are also popular. Masefield's "Collected Poems", "Salt-Water Ballads", "Ballads and Poems", "The Everlasting Mercy", "The Widow in the Bye Street", "The Daffodil Fields", "End and Beginning" etc. are masterpieces.

Barnard Shaw is perhaps the most dynamic dramatist of modern English literature. His famous dramas are "Windows' Houses", "Simpleton of the Unexpected Isles", "Caesar and Cleopatra", "The Devil's Disciples", "The Doctor's Dilemma", "Candida", "John Bull's Other Island", "Divorcee", "Getting Married" etc. W.B. Yeats is a renowned essayist, editor, poet, playwright of the modern age. His famous works are "The Seven Woods", "Wild Swans at Coole", "The wind among the Reeds", "Collected Poems" etc. and his plays, like "Land of Heart's Desire", "The Shadowy Waters" etc. are notable. Walter dela Mare is a famous modern poet. Some of his poetical works are "The Listeners and Other Poems", "Peacock Pie", "The Fleeting and Other Poems", "Bells and Grass", "Collected Poems" etc.

The inter-war years (World War II) produced many bold writers in English literature. Some of them are David Herbert Lawrence (1885-1930), James Joyce (1882-1941), Virginia Woolf (1882-1941), Edward Morgan Foster (1879-1970), Aldous Leonard Huxley (1894-1963), Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889), T.S. Eliot (1888-1965), Wystan Hugh Auden (1907-1973), Stephen Spender (1909-1977), C. Day Lewis (1904-1972), Louis MacNiece (1907-1967), Dame Edith Sitwell (1887-1964), Sean O'case'y (1884-1964), Sir Noel Coward (1899-1973), William Somerset Maugham (1874-1965), J.B. Priestley(1894- ), James Bridie (1888-1951) etc.

Among the writers of miscellaneous prose, Winston Churchill (1874-1965) stands supreme. His speeches and non-fictional works include "Into Battle", "The Second World War" etc.

During the forties and the later period of the twentieth-century, there was a remarkable growth of the American novels in English language. The works of the American novels are found to be realistic with picture of contemporary life and society, indicating lack of moral values, exposure of corruption, emotional crises etc. The famous writer in this respect is Earnest Hemmingway (1898-1962) whose noteworthy novels are "The Sun Also Rises", "Men Without Women", "A Farwell to Arms", "To Have and Have Not" and "For Whom the Bell Tolls".

William Faulkner (1897-1962) is the author of "Soldier's Pay", "The Sound and Fury", "Sanctuary" etc. Ezra Pound (1885-1972) was a famous imagist poet; his works include "The Pisan Cantons" which indicate vast survey of history from his personal emotional sustenance.

Among the modern outstanding writers of prose in England are Henry Miller (1891- ), John Steinbeck (1902-1968), Nelson Allgren (1909- ), James Baldwin (1924- ), V.S. Naipaul (1932- ), Graham Greene (1904- ), Charles Percy Snow (1905- ), Evelyn Wamgh (1903-1950), etc. and in the field of poetry, Dylan Marlais Thomas (1914-1953), George Barker (1913- ), Robert Conquest (1917- ), Ted Hughes (1930- ), Dominic Frank (Dom) Moraes (1938- ), etc. As dramatists, Bertolt Brecht (1898-1956), the foremost, Samuel Beckett (1906- ), John James Osborne (1929- ), Arnold Wesker (1932- ), Harold Pinter (1930- ), etc. are famous.

Popular scientific literature has also grown during the post-war period. The names of Julian Huxley, Jacob Bronowski, J.D. Bernal etc. are noteworthy in this respect. Huxley's "Man in the Modern World" and Bronowski's "The Ascent of Man" are very popular.
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