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Updated: June 9, 2025
As the hole was narrow and dark, the cow held back, and the old woman was slapping and pushing at her hind quarters, trying to spank her into the drawside. Grandfather ignored her singular occupation and greeted her politely. 'Good morning, Mrs. Shimerda. Can you tell me where I will find Ambrosch? Which field?
Shimerda came out and placed an open prayer-book against the body, making the sign of the cross on the bandaged head with her fingers. Ambrosch knelt down and made the same gesture, and after him Ántonia and Marek. Yulka hung back. Her mother pushed her forward, and kept saying something to her over and over.
When grandmother and I went into the Shimerdas' house, we found the womenfolk alone; Ambrosch and Marek were at the barn. Mrs. Shimerda sat crouching by the stove, Antonia was washing dishes. When she saw me, she ran out of her dark corner and threw her arms around me.
When he saw me draw back, he began to crow delightedly, “Hoo, hoo-hoo, hoo-hoo!” like a rooster. His mother scowled and said sternly, “Marek!” then spoke rapidly to Krajiek in Bohemian. “She wants me to tell you he won’t hurt nobody, Mrs. Burden. He was born like that. The others are smart. Ambrosch, he make good farmer.” He struck Ambrosch on the back, and the boy smiled knowingly.
I knew, too, that Ambrosch put upon her some chores a girl ought not to do, and that the farm-hands around the country joked in a nasty way about it. Whenever I saw her come up the furrow, shouting to her beasts, sunburned, sweaty, her dress open at the neck, and her throat and chest dust-plastered, I used to think of the tone in which poor Mr.
She was a rich mine of life, like the founders of early races. WHEN I awoke in the morning long bands of sunshine were coming in at the window and reaching back under the eaves where the two boys lay. Leo was wide awake and was tickling his brother’s leg with a dried cone-flower he had pulled out of the hay. Ambrosch kicked at him and turned over. I closed my eyes and pretended to be asleep.
'Then there was a great time of packing. It was in March, if I remember rightly, and a terrible muddy, raw spell, with the roads bad for hauling her things to town. And here let me say, Ambrosch did the right thing. He went to Black Hawk and bought her a set of plated silver in a purple velvet box, good enough for her station. He gave her three hundred dollars in money; I saw the cheque.
Ambrosch, Jake said, showed more human feeling than he would have supposed him capable of; but he was chiefly concerned about getting a priest, and about his father’s soul, which he believed was in a place of torment and would remain there until his family and the priest had prayed a great deal for him. “As I understand it,” Jake concluded, “it will be a matter of years to pray his soul out of Purgatory, and right now he’s in torment.”
His prayers reflected what he was thinking about at the time, and it was chiefly through them that we got to know his feelings and his views about things. After we sat down to our waffles and sausage, Jake told us how pleased the Shimerdas had been with their presents; even Ambrosch was friendly and went to the creek with him to cut the Christmas tree.
Leo, in a low voice, tossed off some scornful remark in Bohemian. I turned to him. 'You think I don't know what kolaches are, eh? You're mistaken, young man. I've eaten your mother's kolaches long before that Easter Day when you were born. 'Always too fresh, Leo, Ambrosch remarked with a shrug. Leo dived behind his mother and grinned out at me.
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