'You're a fool, a fool, Mark,' said the old man contemptuously.
'Why, that's what one steals for, so as not to be stingy! As for
you, I suppose you haven't so much as seen how one drives off a
herd of horses? Why don't you speak?'

'What's one to say. Daddy?' replied Lukashka. 'It seems we are not
the same sort of men as you were.'

'You're a fool. Mark, a fool! "Not the same sort of men!"'
retorted the old man, mimicking the Cossack lad. 'I was not that
sort of Cossack at your age.'

'How's that?' asked Lukashka.

The old man shook his head contemptuously.

'Daddy Eroshka was simple; he did not grudge anything! That's why
I was kunak with all Chechnya. A kunak would come to visit me and
I'd make him drunk with vodka and make him happy and put him to
sleep with me, and when I went to see him I'd take him a present--
a dagger! That's the way it is done, and not as you do nowadays:
the only amusement lads have now is to crack seeds and spit out
the shells!' the old man finished contemptuously, imitating the
present-day Cossacks cracking seeds and spitting out the shells.

'Yes, I know,' said Lukashka; 'that's so!'

'If you wish to be a fellow of the right sort, be a brave and not
a peasant! Because even a peasant can buy a horse--pay the money