During the second week of July, 1914, the divisional staff transferred Gregor Melekhov’s regiment to the town of Rovno in Volhynia, to take part in manoeuvres. A fortnight later, tired out with continual manoeuvring. Gregor and the other Cossacks of the fourth company were lying in their tents, when the company commander, lieutenant Poljovnikov, galloped furiously back from the regimental staff.
‘Another attack I suppose,’ Prokhor Zikov suggested tentatively, and waited for someone to agree.
The troop sergeant thrust the needle with which he had been mending his trousers into the lining of his cap, and remarked:
‘I expect so; they won’t let us rest for a moment.’
A minute or two later the bugler sounded the alarm. The Cossacks jumped to their feet. They had their horses saddled well within the regulation time. As Gregor was tearing the tent-pegs the sergeant managed to mutter him:
‘It’s war time, my lad!’
‘You’re lying!’ Gregor expressed his disbelief.
‘God’s truth! The sergeant major told me.’
The company formed up in the street, the commander at its head. ‘In troop columns!’ his command flew over the ranks.
The horses’ hoofs clattered as they went at a trot out of the village on to the highway. From a neighbouring village the first and fifth companies could be seen riding towards the station.
From the book ‘And quiet Flows the Don’ by Mikhail Sholokhov, translated by Stephen Garry
