P.S. I had a nice woman with empty buckets. I was afraid that she might cross the road in front of my car, and I followed her as slowly as possible. Ten paces away, under a sprawling old maple tree, there was a slightly crooked well covered with chips. But, to my great surprise, the woman did not turn towards him, but walked another twenty meters and stepped off the pavement of the street into the tall grass of an abandoned plot. There were only thickets of raspberry bushes and a couple of apple trees from the once large village garden, which were living out their days. When I stopped and turned off the engine, I immediately heard the creak of the spinning wheel of the well, which I had not forgotten since childhood. "Yes, there is a well on this site besides the old apple trees!" I thought, and followed the well-trodden path to the sound of water pouring into a bucket. After greeting and apologizing, he asked why the woman had walked past the well, which was much closer to her house. "there's no secret here," she replied with a smile. - The water in this well is the most delicious, there is nowhere else like it. His owners have been in the cemetery for a long time, but we don't leave the well. Anyone else in the village is coming to him. He doesn't refuse anyone, although everyone knows that he has a character.

- and how is it with character– I asked, and in response I heard a small but interesting story ...

- My grandfather told me - and he heard this story from his father - that people dug this well first, as soon as they began to buy land here. Everyone used the same well. Everyone remembers the first time when he showed his temper. It was during this French campaign. It didn't matter who was staying in the village then, the French or the Russian troops, but the well was shallow at the same time. It was impossible to get even half a bucket of water. Both of them did not stay here for a long time for this reason. Yes, they will plunder forage and provisions and leave.

this case might have been forgotten, if not for a new manifestation. After the suppression of Kalinouski's uprising in the forest, not far from here, several captured rebels were shot by Russian soldiers. We returned to the village to water the horses, lowered the bucket into the well, and only lifted the wet sand back. The villagers were scared -there was no place to get water anymore. But as soon as the soldiers from the "39" rode, water appeared from the bottom of the well again.

P.S. It was so that when I saw that I had water, I went down the path. After the First World War, new houses were built, the village grew, and new wells appeared. My parents told me that during the period of dispossession, the water in the well disappeared more than once. And during the German occupation, there was no water in this well for three years. They threw planks at it, and it stood there until the end of the war. And one day, when one of the veterans who had recently returned home threw off the boards from him, he looked, and there was a lot of water in it – scoop it up with a cup.

I was in town with my daughter, and I told her this story about our well, but they just laughed at me. I see you don't believe me either. Well, God be with you. Try some water...

She put the bucket on the bench and allowed me to drink directly from it. Yes, it actually tasted unusual. The water resembled maple juice...