Explore "The Laestrygonians" by Aleksandr Kuprin on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
This charming ancient legend was related to me at Balaklava by the ataman, Kolya Konstandi, a real saltwater Greek, an excellent seaman, and a heavy drinker.
At that time he was instructing me in all those wise and strange things which make up the fishermen's lore. He showed me how to make sea knots and mend torn nets, how to bait hooks for white sturgeon, how to launch and clean seines, how to take out the mullet from the three-walled net, how to fry it, how to separate with a knife the petalide which grow on rocks, how to eat shrimps raw, how to forecast the night's weather by the day's surf, how to set sail, weigh anchor, and sound the depths of the sea.