A damsel fell in love with a snake, and was also beloved by him. He
took her to wife. His dwelling was of pure glass, all crystal. This
dwelling was situated underground, in a kind of mound, or something
of the sort. Well, it is said that her old mother at first grieved
over her. How could she help doing so? Well, when the time came, the
snake's wife became the mother of twins, a boy and a girl; they
looked, as they lay by their mother, as if they were made of wax.
And she was herself as beautiful as a flower. Well, God having given
her children, she said: 'Now, then, since they have been born as
human beings, let us christen them among human beings.' She took her
seat in a golden carriage, laid the children on her knees, and drove
off to the village to the pope.[11] The carriage had not got into
the open country, when sadness was brought to the mother. The old
woman had made an outcry in the whole village, seized a sickle, and
rushed into the country. She saw she had manifest death before her,
when she called to her children, and went on to say: 'Fly, my
children, as birds about the world: you, my little son, as a
nightingale, and you, my daughter, as a cuckoo.' Out flew a
nightingale from the carriage by the right-hand, and a cuckoo by the
left-hand window. What became of the carriage and horses and all
nobody knows. Nor did their mistress remain, only a dead nettle
sprang up by the roadside.
[11] The orthodox Greek priests are always designated 'popes.'