Absolution

"The rats! Ugh, the rats!" cried beautiful Mrs. Tiralla, as she stood in the cellar with her maid. They had gone down to fetch some of the pickled cabbage from the tub in the co...

Mr. Trialla's farm lay some distance from the village, near the big pines and deep morass of Przykop. Starydwór was a large farm, and there were many in Starawie['s] who envied...

Röschen--she had been christened Rosa, but he always called her Röschen--was her father's favourite child, and his exact image, as Mrs. Tiralla used to say in a peculiar tone of...

The winter was long in Starydwór, and the winter was the season of the year which Mrs. Tiralla liked least, for her husband would spend almost the whole day at home. He grew mor...

Rosa Tiralla had seen visions; but whether they were good or bad visions nobody knew. Marianna ['S]roka cried loudly when she brought the news to the village, and her lover, Jen...

Rosa was singing as she crossed the fields. She felt so well, so light-hearted. At last she had been to confession. The snow had melted, Eastertide was drawing near, now she cou...

The strawberries were ripening in the Przykop. The children from Starawie['s] would go there to look for them, and when they had all been gathered it would be the time for mushr...

When Marianna was sent to the grocer's in the village, she used to talk to everybody about the lively time they would soon be having at Starydwór. The young master was coming ho...

When the turn came for the sins against the sixth and ninth commandments, she trembled in all her limbs. How quickly and easily she had hitherto been able to answer in the negat...

If Mrs. Tiralla believed that she would have reason to fear her husband now, she was mistaken. There was no necessity for her to steal away so that he should not see her, for he...

The Paninka at Starydwór had visions again. Marianna spoke of it in the village, and when she met Jendrek, who was at Mr. Jokisch's, she complained to him of having to sleep in...

Even yesterday the gossamer had flown across the fields and hung fast to the bare bushes and tops of the few remaining turnips; to-day the first snow lay on the ground. There wa...

She had told Jendrek with many sighs the very next evening behind the stable door, when he had rushed over for a quarter of an hour from the settlement, and her apron had been q...

She yawned and then tried to dance a few steps. How tired she was. But it had been very nice with Jendrek, he was the best of them all in spite of everything.