The Fire

: STORIES FOR CHILDREN
: Fables For Children, Stories For Children, Natural Science Stori

During harvest-time the men and women went out to work. In the village

were left only the old and the very young. In one hut there remained a

grandmother with her three grandchildren.



The grandmother made a fire in the oven, and lay down to rest herself.

Flies kept alighting on her and biting her. She covered her head with a

towel and fell asleep. One of the grandchildren, Masha (she was three

years old), opened the oven, scraped some coals into a potsherd, and

went into the vestibule. In the vestibule lay sheaves: the women were

getting them bound.



Masha brought the coals, put them under the sheaves, and began to blow.

When the straw caught fire, she was glad; she went into the hut and took

her brother Kiryusha by the arm (he was a year and a half old, and had

just learned to walk), and brought him out, and said to him:



"See, Kiryusha, what a fire I have kindled."



The sheaves were already burning and crackling. When the vestibule was

filled with smoke, Masha became frightened and ran back into the house.

Kiryusha fell over the threshold, hurt his nose, and began to cry; Masha

pulled him into the house, and both hid under a bench.



The grandmother heard nothing, and did not wake. The elder boy, Vanya

(he was eight years old), was in the street. When he saw the smoke

rolling out of the vestibule, he ran to the door, made his way through

the smoke into the house, and began to waken his grandmother; but she

was dazed from her sleep, and, forgetting the children, rushed out and

ran to the farmyards to call the people.



In the meantime Masha was sitting under the bench and keeping quiet; but

the little boy cried, because he had hurt his nose badly. Vanya heard

his cry, looked under the bench, and called out to Masha:



"Run, you will burn!"



Masha ran to the vestibule, but could not pass for the smoke and fire.

She turned back. Then Vanya raised a window and told her to climb

through it. When she got through, Vanya picked up his brother and

dragged him along. But the child was heavy and did not let his brother

take him. He cried and pushed Vanya. Vanya fell down twice, and when he

dragged him up to the window, the door of the hut was already burning.

Vanya thrust the child's head through the window and wanted to push him

through; but the child took hold of him with both his hands (he was very

much frightened) and would not let them take him out. Then Vanya cried

to Masha:



"Pull him by the head!" while he himself pushed him behind.



And thus they pulled him through the window and into the street.