the grey hair. A grey hair was living in the winter near the village. When night came,
he pricked one ear and listened, then he pricked a second ear, moved his whiskers, sniffed,
and sat down on his hind legs. Then he took a leap or two over the deep snow, and again
sat down on his hind legs and looked around him. Nothing could be seen but snow. The snow
lay in waves and glistened like sugar. Over the hair's head hovered a frost vapor,
and through this vapor could be seen the large bright stars. The hair had to cross the highway
in order to come to a threshing floor he knew of. On the highway the runners could be heard
squeaking and the horses snorting and seats creaking in the slays. The hair again stopped near
the road. Peasants were walking beside the slays, and the collars of their calf-dans
were raised. Their faces were scarcely visible. Their beards, mustaches, and eyelashes were
white. Steam rose from their mouths and noses. Their horses were sweaty, and the whore
frost clung to the sweat. The horses jostled under their arches, and dived in and out
of snow drifts. The peasants ran behind the horses, and in front of them, and beat them
with their whips. Two peasants walked beside each other, and one of them told the other
how a horse of his had once been stolen. When the carts passed by, the hair leaped across
the road and softly made for the threshing floor. A dog saw the hair from a cart. He began
to bark, and darted after the hair. The hair leaped toward the threshing floor over the
snow drifts, which held him back, but the dog stuck fast in the snow after the tenth leap
and stopped. Then the hair too stopped, and set up on his hind legs, and then softly
went on to the threshing floor. On his way, he met two of the hairs on the sod winter
field. They were feeding and playing. The hair played a while with his companions,
nug away the frosty snow with them, ate the wintergrain and went on. In the village everything
was quiet. The fires were out. All one could hear was a baby's crying a hut in the crackling
of the frost in the logs of the cabins. The hair went to the threshing floor, and there
found some companions. He played a while with them on the cleared floor, ate some oats
from the open grainery, climbed on the kiln over the snow covered roof, and across the
wicker fence started back to his ravine. The dawn was glimmering in the east. The stars
grew less, and the frost vapors rose more densely from the earth. In the nearby village,
the women got up, and went to fetch water. The peasants brought the feed from the barn.
The children shouted and cried. There were still more carts going down the road, and
the peasants talked aloud to each other. The hair leaped across the road, went up to
his old lair, picked out a high place, nug away the snow, lay with his back and his new
lair, dropped his ears on his back, and fell asleep with open eyes.
And of the grey hair.
