He's greedier far 390
For his food than for vodka,
So one man to-day
(A teetotaller mason)
Gets perfectly drunk
On his breakfast of goose!
A shout! "Who is coming?
Who's this?" Here's another
Excuse for rejoicing
And noise! There's a hay-cart
With hay, now approaching, 400
And high on its summit
A soldier is sitting.
He's known to the peasants
For twenty versts round.
And, cosy beside him,
Justinutchka sits
(His niece, and an orphan,
His prop in old age).
He now earns his living
By means of his peep-show, 410
Where, plainly discerned,
Are the Kremlin and Moscow,
While music plays too.
The instrument once
Had gone wrong, and the soldier,
No capital owning,
Bought three metal spoons,
Which he beat to make music;
But the words that he knew
Did not suit the new music, 420
And folk did not laugh.
The soldier was sly, though:
He made some new words up
That went with the music.
They hail him with rapture!
"Good-health to you, Grandad!
Jump down, drink some vodka,
And give us some music."
"It's true I got _up_ here,
But how to get-down?" 430
"You're going, I see,
To the town for your pension,
But look what has happened:
It's burnt to the ground."
"Burnt down? Yes, and rightly!
What then? Then I'll go
To St. Petersburg for it;
For all my old comrades
Are there with their pensions,
They'll show me the way.
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