"Do give me my shift!" she says. "You are on your way

to the house of my father, the Water King. When you come

I will do you good service."

So the Prince gave her back her shift, and she immediately

turned into a spoonbill and flew away after her companions.

The Prince went further on; there met him by the way three

heroes--Obedalo, Opivalo, and Moroz Treskum; he took them

with him and went on to the Water King's.

The Water King saw him, and said:

"Hail, friend! why have you been so long in coming to me?

I have grown weary of waiting for you. Now set to work.

Here is your first task. Build me in one night a great crystal

bridge, so that it shall be ready for use to-morrow. If you don't

build it--off goes your head!"

The Prince went away from the Water King, and burst into a

flood of tears. Vasilissa the Wise opened the window of her

upper chamber, and asked:

"What are you crying about, Prince?"

"Ah! Vasilissa the Wise! how can I help crying? Your

father has ordered me to build a crystal bridge in a single night,

and I don't even know how to handle an axe."

"No matter! lie down and sleep; the morning is wiser than

the evening."

She ordered him to sleep, but she herself went out on the

steps, and called aloud with a mighty whistling cry. Then from

all sides there ran together carpenters and workmen; one

levelled the ground, another carried bricks. Soon had they

built a crystal bridge, and traced cunning devices on it; and then

they dispersed to their homes.

Early next morning Vasilissa the Wise awoke the Prince:

"Get up, Prince! the bridge is ready: my father will be

coming to inspect it directly."

Up jumped the Prince, seized a broom, took his place on the

bridge, and began sweeping here, clearing up there.

The Water King bestowed praise upon him:

"Thanks!" says he. "You've done me one service: now

do another. Here is your task. Plant me by to-morrow a

garden green--a big and shady one; and there must be birds

singing in the garden, and flowers blossoming on the trees, and

ripe apples and pears hanging from the boughs."

Away went the Prince from the Water King, all dissolved in

tears. Vasilissa the Wise opened her window and asked:

"What are you crying for, Prince?"

"How can I help crying? Your father has ordered me to

plant a garden in one night!"

"That's nothing! lie down and sleep: the morning is wiser

than the evening."

She made him go to sleep, but she herself went out on the

steps, called and whistled with a mighty whistle. From every

side there ran together gardeners of all sorts, and they planted

a garden green, and in the garden birds sang, on the trees

flowers blossomed, from the boughs hung ripe apples and pears.

Early in the morning Vasilissa the Wise awoke the Prince:

"Get up, Prince! the garden is ready: Papa is coming to

see it."

The Prince immediately snatched up a broom, and was off to

the garden. Here he swept a path, there he trained a twig.

The Water King praised him and said:

"Thanks, Prince! You've done me right trusty service. So

choose yourself a bride from among my twelve daughters. They

are all exactly alike in face, in hair, and in dress. If you can

pick out the same one three times running, she shall be your

wife; if you fail to do so, I shall have you put to death."

Vasilissa the Wise knew all about that, so she found time to

say to the Prince:

"The first time I will wave my handkerchief, the second I

will be arranging my dress, the third time you will see a fly

above my head."

And so the Prince guessed which was Vasilissa the Wise

three times running. And he and she were married, and a wedding

feast was got ready.

Now the Water King had prepared much food of all sorts

more than a hundred men could get through. And he ordered

his son-in-law to see that everything was eaten. "If anything

remains over, the worse for you!" says he.

"My Father," begs the Prince, "there's an old fellow of

mine here; please let him take a snack with us."

"Let him come!"

Immediately appeared Obedalo--ate up everything, and

wasn't content then! The Water King next set out two score

tubs of all kinds of strong drinks, and ordered his son-in-law to

see that they were all drained dry.

"My Father!" begs the Prince again, "there's another old

man of mine here, let him, too, drink your health."

"Let him come!"

Opivalo appeared, emptied all the forty tubs in a twinkling,

and then asked for a drop more by way of stirrup-cup.[145]

The Water King saw that there was nothing to be gained that

way, so he gave orders to prepare a bath-room for the young

couple--an iron bath-room--and to heat it as hot as possible.

So the iron bath-room was made hot. Twelve loads of firewood

were set alight, and the stove and the walls were made

red-hot--impossible to come within five versts of it.

"My Father!" says the Prince; "let an old fellow of ours

have a scrub first, just to try the bath-room."

"Let him do so!"

Moroz Treskum went into the bath room, blew into one corner,

blew in another--in a moment icicles were hanging there.

After him the young couple also went into the bath-room, were

lathered and scrubbed,[146] and then went home.

After a time Vasilissa said to the Prince, "Let us get out of

my father's power. He's tremendously angry with you; perhaps

he'll be doing you some hurt."

"Let us go," says the Prince.

Straightway they saddled their horses and galloped off into

the open plain. They rode and rode; many an hour went by.

"Jump down from your horse, Prince, and lay your ear close

to the earth," said Vasilissa. "Cannot you hear a sound as of

pursuers?"

The prince bent his ear to the ground, but he could hear nothing.

Then Vasilissa herself lighted down from her good

steed, laid herself flat on the earth, and said: "Ah Prince! I hear

a great noise as of chasing after us." Then she turned the

horses into a well, and herself into a bowl, and the Prince into

an old, very old man. Up came the pursuers.

"Heigh, old man!" say they, "haven't you seen a youth and

a maiden pass by?"

"I saw them, my friends! only it was a long while ago. I was

a youngster at the time when they rode by."

The pursuers returned to the Water King.

"There is no trace of them," they said, "no news: all we

saw was an old man beside a well, and a bowl floating on the

water."

"Why did not ye seize them?" cried the Water King, who

thereupon put the pursuers to a cruel death, and sent another

troop after the Prince and Vasilissa the Wise.

The fugitives in the mean time had ridden far, far away.

Vasilissa the Wise heard the noise made by the fresh set of

pursuers, so she turned the Prince into an old priest, and she

herself became an ancient church. Scarcely did its walls hold

together, covered all over with moss. Presently up came the

pursuers.

"Heigh, old man! haven't you seen a youth and a maiden

pass by?"

"I saw them, my own! only it was long, ever so long ago. I

was a young man when they rode by. It was just while I was

building this church."

So the second set of pursuers returned to the Water King,

saying:

"There is neither trace nor news of them, your Royal Majesty.

All that we saw was an old priest and an ancient church."

"Why did not ye seize them?" cried the Water King louder

than before, and having put the pursuers to a cruel death, he

galloped off himself in pursuit of the Prince and Vasilissa the

Wise. This time Vasilissa turned the horses into a river of

honey with _kissel_[147] banks, and changed the Prince into a Drake

and herself into a grey duck. The Water King flung himself

on the _kissel_ and honey-water, and ate and ate, and drank and

drank until he burst! And so he gave up the ghost.

The Prince and Vasilissa rode on, and at length they drew

nigh to the home of the Prince's parents. Then said Vasilissa,

"Go on in front, Prince, and report your arrival to your

father and mother. But I will wait for you here by the wayside.

Only remember these words of mine: kiss everyone

else, only don't kiss your sister; if you do, you will forget me."

The Prince reached home, began saluting every one, kissed

his sister too--and no sooner had he kissed her than from that

very moment he forgot all about his wife, just as if she had

never entered into his mind.

Three days did Vasilissa the Wise await him. On the fourth

day she clad herself like a beggar, went into the capital, and

took up her quarters in an old woman's house. But the Prince

was preparing to marry a rich Princess, and orders were given

to proclaim throughout the kingdom, that all Christian people

were to come to congratulate the bride and bridegroom, each

one bringing a wheaten pie as a present. Well, the old woman

with whom Vasilissa lodged, prepared, like everyone else, to

sift flour and make a pie.

"Why are you making a pie, granny?" asked Vasilissa.

"Is it why? you evidently don't know then. Our King is

giving his son in marriage to a rich princess: one must go to

the palace to serve up the dinner to the young couple."

"Come now! I, too, will bake a pie and take it to the

palace; may be the King will make me some present."

"Bake away in God's name!" said the old woman.

Vasilissa took flour, kneaded dough, and made a pie. And

inside it she put some curds and a pair of live doves.

Well, the old woman and Vasilissa the Wise reached the

palace just at dinner-time. There a feast was in progress, one

fit for all the world to see. Vasilissa's pie was set on the table,

but no sooner was it cut in two than out of it flew the two

doves. The hen bird seized a piece of curd, and her mate said

to her:

"Give me some curds, too, Dovey!"

"No I won't," replied the other dove: "else you'd forget

me, as the Prince has forgotten his Vasilissa the Wise."

Then the Prince remembered about his wife. He jumped

up from table, caught her by her white hands, and seated her

close by his side. From that time forward they lived together

in all happiness and prosperity.

[With this story may be compared a multitude of tales

in very many languages. In German for instance, "Der

Koenig vom goldenen Berg," (Grimm, _KM._ No. 92. See

also Nos. 51, 56, 113, 181, and the opening of No.

31), "Der Koenigssohn und die Teufelstochter,"

(Haltrich, No. 26), and "Gruenus Kravalle" (Wolf's

"Deutsche Hausmaerchen," No. 29)--the Norse

"Mastermaid," (Asbjoernsen and Moe, No. 46, Dasent, No.

11) and "The Three Princesses of Whiteland," (A. and

M. No. 9, Dasent, No. 26)--the Lithuanian story

(Schleicher, No. 26, p. 75) in which a "field-devil"

exacts from a farmer the promise of a child--the

Wallachian stories (Schott, Nos. 2 and 15) in which a

devil obtains a like promise from a woodcutter and a

fisherman--the Modern Greek (Hahn, Nos. 4, 5, 54, and

68) in which a child is promised to a Dervish, a

_Drakos_, the Devil, and a Demon--and the Gaelic tales

of "The Battle of the Birds" and "The Sea-maiden,"

(Campbell, Nos. 2 and 4) in the former of which the

child is promised to a Giant, in the latter to a

Mermaid. The likeness between the Russian story and

the "Battle of the Birds" is very striking. References

to a great many other similar tales will be found in

Grimm (_KM._ iii. pp. 96-7, and 168-9). The group to

which all these stories belong is linked with a set of

tales about a father who apprentices his son to a

wizard, sometimes to the Devil, from whom the youth

escapes with great difficulty. The principal Russian

representative of the second set is called "Eerie

Art," "Khitraya Nauka," (Afanasief, v. No. 22, vi. No.

45, viii. p. 339).

To the hero's adventures while with the Water King,

and while escaping from him, an important parallel is

offered by the end of the already mentioned (at p. 92)

Indian story of Sringabhuja. That prince asks

Agnisikha, the Rakshasa whom, in his crane-form, he

has wounded, to bestow upon him the hand of his

daughter--the maiden who had met him on his arrival at

the Rakshasa's palace. The demon pretends to consent,

but only on condition that the prince is able to pick

out his love from among her numerous sisters. This

Sringabhuja is able to do in spite of all the demon's

daughters being exactly alike, as she has told him

beforehand she will wear her pearls on her brow

instead of round her neck. Her father will not remark

the change, she says, for being of the demon race, he

is not very sharp witted. The Rakshasa next sets the

prince two of the usual tasks. He is to plough a great

field, and sow a hundred bushels of corn. When this,

by the daughter's help, is done, he is told to gather

up the seed again. This also the demon's daughter does

for him, sending to his aid a countless swarm of ants.

Lastly he is commanded to visit the demon's brother

and invite him to the wedding. He does so, and is

pursued by the invited guest, from whom he escapes

only by throwing behind him earth, water, thorns, and

lastly fire, with all of which he has been provided by

his love. They produce corresponding obstacles which

enable him to get away from the uncle of his bride.

The demon now believes that his proposed son-in-law

must be a god in disguise, so he gives his consent to

the marriage. All goes well for a time, but at last

the prince wants to go home, so he and his wife fly

from her father's palace. Agnisikha pursues them. She

makes her husband invisible, while she assumes the

form of a woodman. Up comes her angry sire, and asks

for news of the fugitives. She replies she has seen

none, her eyes being full of tears caused by the death

of the Rakshasa prince Agnisikha. The slow-witted

demon immediately flies home to find out whether he is

really dead. Discovering that he is not, he renews the

pursuit. Again his daughter renders her husband

invisible, and assumes the form of a messenger

carrying a letter. When her father arrives and repeats

his question, she says she has seen no one: she is

going with a letter to his brother from Agnisikha, who

has just been mortally wounded. Back again home flies

the demon in great distress, anxious to find out

whether he has really been wounded to death or not.

After settling this question, he leaves his daughter

and her husband in peace. See Professor Brockhaus in

the "Berichte der phil. hist. Classe der K. Saechs.

Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften," 1861, pp. 226-9, and

Professor Wilson, "Essays, &c.," ii. p. 136-8. Cf. R.

Koehler in "Orient und Occident," ii. pp. 107-14.]

In another story a king is out hunting and becomes thirsty. Seeing a

spring near at hand, he bends down and is just going to lap up its

water, when the Tsar-Medved, a King-Bear, seizes him by the beard. The

king is unable to free himself from his grasp, and is obliged to

promise as his ransom "that which he knows not of at home," which

turns out to be a couple of children--a boy and a girl--who have been

born during his absence. In vain does he attempt to save the twins

from their impending fate, by concealing them in a secret abode

constructed for that purpose underground. In the course of time the

King-Bear arrives to claim them, finds out their hiding-place, digs

them up, and carries them off on his back to a distant region where no

man lives. During his absence they attempt to escape being carried

through the air on the back of a friendly falcon, but the King-Bear

sees them, "strikes his head against the earth, and burns the falcon's

wings." The twins fall to the ground, and are carried by the King-Bear

to his home amid inaccessible mountains. There they make a second

attempt at escape, trusting this time to an eagle's aid; but it meets

with exactly the same fate as their first trial. At last they are

rescued by a bull-calf, which succeeds in baffling all the King-Bear's

efforts to recover them. At the end of their perilous journey the

bull-calf tells the young prince to cut its throat, and burn its

carcase. He unwillingly consents, and from its ashes spring a horse, a

dog, and an apple-tree, all of which play important parts in the next

act of the drama.[148]

In one of the variants of the Water King story,[149] the seizer of

the drinking kings' beard is not called the _Morskoi Tsar_ but _Chudo

Morskoe_, a Water Chudo, whose name recalls to mind the Chudo Yudo we

have already met with.[150] The Prince who is obliged, in consequence

of his father's promise, to surrender himself to the Water Giant,

falls in love with a maiden whom he finds in that potentate's palace,

and who is an enchantress whom the Chudo has stolen. She turns herself

into a ring, which he carries about with him, and eventually, after

his escape from the Chudo, she becomes his bride.

In another story,[151] the being who obtains a child from one of the

incautious fathers of the Jephthah type who abound in popular fiction,

is of a very singular nature. A merchant is flying across a river on

the back of an eagle, when he drops a magic "snuff-box," which had

been entrusted to his charge by that bird, and it disappears beneath

the waters. At the eagle's command, the crayfish search for it, and

bring back word that it is lying "on the knees of an Idol." The eagle

summons the Idol, and demands the snuff box. Thereupon the Idol says

to the merchant--"Give me what you do not know of at home?" The

merchant agrees and the Idol gives him back his snuff-box.

In some of the variants of the story, the influence of ideas

connected with Christianity makes itself apparent in the names given

to the actors. Thus in the "Moujik and Anastasia Adovna,"[152] it is

no longer a king of the waters, but a devil's imp,[153] who bargains

with the thirsting father for his child, and the swan-maiden whose

shift the devoted youth steals bears the name of Adovna, the daughter

of Ad or Hades. In "The Youth,"[154] a moujik, who has lost his way in

a forest makes the rash promise to a man who enables him to cross a

great river; "and that man (says the story) was a devil."[155] We

shall meet with other instances further on of parents whose "hasty

words" condemn their children to captivity among evil spirits. In one

of the stories of this class,[156] the father is a hunter who is

perishing with cold one night, and who makes the usual promise as the

condition of his being allowed to warm himself at a fire guarded by a

devil. Being in consequence of this deprived of a son, he becomes very

sad, and drinks himself to death. "The priest will not bury his sinful

body, so it is thrust into a hole at a crossway," and he falls into

the power of "that very same devil," who turns him into a horse, and

uses him as a beast of burden. At last he is released by his son, who

has forced the devil to free him after several adventures--one of them

being a fight with the evil spirit in the shape of a three-headed

snake.

In the Hindoo story of "Brave Seventee Bai,"[157] that heroine kills

"a very large Cobra" which comes out of a lake. Touching the waters

with a magic diamond taken from the snake, she sees them roll back "in

a wall on either hand," between which she passes into a splendid

garden. In it she finds a lovely girl who proves to be the Cobra's

daughter and who is delighted to hear of her serpent-father's death.

Demon haunted waters, which prove fatal to mortals who bathe in or

drink of them, often occur in oriental fiction. In one of the Indian

stories, for instance,[158] a king is induced to order his escort to

bathe in a lake which is the abode of a Rakshasa or demon. They leap

into the water simultaneously, and are all devoured by the terrible

man-eater. From the assaults of such a Rakshasa as this it was that

Buddha, who was at the time a monkey, preserved himself and 80,000 of

his brother monkeys, by suggesting that they should drink from the

tank in which the demon lay in wait for them, "through reeds

previously made completely hollow by their breath."[159]

* * * * *

From these male personifications of evil--from the Snake, Koshchei,

and the Water King--we will now turn to their corresponding female

forms. By far the most important beings of the latter class are those

malevolent enchantresses who form two closely related branches of the

same family. Like their sisters all over the world, they are, as a

general rule, old, hideous, and hateful. They possess all kinds of

supernatural powers, but their wits are often dull. They wage constant

war with mankind, but the heroes of storyland find them as easily

overcome as the males of their family. In their general character they

bear a strong resemblance to the Giantesses, Lamias, female Trolls,

Ogresses, Dragonesses, &c., of Europe, but in some of their traits

they differ from those well-known beings, and therefore they are

worthy of a detailed notice.

In several of the stories which have already been quoted, a prominent

part is played by the Baba Yaga, a female fiend whose name has given

rise to much philological discussion of a somewhat unsatisfactory

nature.[160] Her appearance is that of a tall, gaunt hag, with

dishevelled hair. Sometimes she is seen lying stretched out from one

corner to the other of a miserable hut, through the ceiling of which

passes her long iron nose; the hut is supported "by fowl's legs," and

stands at the edge of a forest towards which its entrance looks. When

the proper words are addressed to it, the hut revolves upon its

slender supports, so as to turn its back instead of its front to the

forest. Sometimes, as in the next story, the Baba Yaga appears as the

mistress of a mansion, which stands in a courtyard enclosed by a fence

made of dead men's bones. When she goes abroad she rides in a mortar,

which she urges on with a pestle, while she sweeps away the traces of

her flight with a broom. She is closely connected with the Snake in

different forms; in many stories, indeed, the leading part has been

ascribed by one narrator to a Snake and by another to a Baba Yaga. She

possesses the usual magic apparatus by which enchantresses work their

wonders; the Day and the Night (according to the following story) are

among her servants, the entire animal world lies at her disposal. On

the whole she is the most prominent among the strange figures with

which the Skazkas make us acquainted. Of the stories which especially

relate to her the following may be taken as a fair specimen.

THE BABA YAGA.[161]

Once upon a time there was an old couple. The husband lost

his wife and married again. But he had a daughter by the first

marriage, a young girl, and she found no favor in the eyes of

her evil stepmother, who used to beat her, and consider how she

could get her killed outright. One day the father went away

somewhere or other, so the stepmother said to the girl, "Go to

your aunt, my sister, and ask her for a needle and thread to make

you a shift."

Now that aunt was a Baba Yaga. Well, the girl was no fool,

so she went to a real aunt of hers first, and says she:

"Good morning, auntie!"

"Good morning, my dear! what have you come for?"

"Mother has sent me to her sister, to ask for a needle and

thread to make me a shift."

Then her aunt instructed her what to do. "There is a birch-tree

there, niece, which would hit you in the eye--you must tie

a ribbon round it; there are doors which would creak and bang--you

must pour oil on their hinges; there are dogs which would

tear you in pieces--you must throw them these rolls; there is a

cat which would scratch your eyes out--you must give it a piece

of bacon."

So the girl went away, and walked and walked, till she came

to the place. There stood a hut, and in it sat weaving the Baba

Yaga, the Bony-shanks.

"Good morning, auntie," says the girl.

"Good morning, my dear," replies the Baba Yaga.

"Mother has sent me to ask you for a needle and thread to

make me a shift."

"Very well; sit down and weave a little in the meantime."

So the girl sat down behind the loom, and the Baba Yaga

went outside, and said to her servant-maid:

"Go and heat the bath, and get my niece washed; and mind

you look sharp after her. I want to breakfast off her."

Well, the girl sat there in such a fright that she was as much

dead as alive. Presently she spoke imploringly to the servant-maid,

saying:

"Kinswoman dear, do please wet the firewood instead of

making it burn; and fetch the water for the bath in a sieve."

And she made her a present of a handkerchief.

The Baba Yaga waited awhile; then she came to the window

and asked:

"Are you weaving, niece? are you weaving, my dear?"

"Oh yes, dear aunt, I'm weaving." So the Baba Yaga went

away again, and the girl gave the Cat a piece of bacon, and

asked:

"Is there no way of escaping from here?"

"Here's a comb for you and a towel," said the Cat; "take

them, and be off. The Baba Yaga will pursue you, but you must

lay your ear on the ground, and when you hear that she is close

at hand, first of all throw down the towel. It will become a wide,

wide river. And if the Baba Yaga gets across the river, and

tries to catch you, then you must lay your ear on the ground

again, and when you hear that she is close at hand, throw down

the comb. It will become a dense, dense forest; through that

she won't be able to force her way anyhow."

The girl took the towel and the comb and fled. The dogs

would have rent her, but she threw them the rolls, and they let

her go by; the doors would have begun to bang, but she poured

oil on their hinges, and they let her pass through; the birch-tree

would have poked her eyes out, but she tied the ribbon around

it, and it let her pass on. And the Cat sat down to the loom,

and worked away; muddled everything about, if it didn't do

much weaving. Up came the Baba Yaga to the window, and

asked:

"Are you weaving, niece? are you weaving, my dear?"

"I'm weaving, dear aunt, I'm weaving," gruffly replied the

Cat.

The Baba Yaga rushed into the hut, saw that the girl was

gone, and took to beating the Cat, and abusing it for not having

scratched the girl's eyes out. "Long as I've served you," said

the Cat, "you've never given me so much as a bone; but she

gave me bacon." Then the Baba Yaga pounced upon the dogs,

on the doors, on the birch-tree, and on the servant-maid, and set

to work to abuse them all, and to knock them about. Then the

dogs said to her, "Long as we've served you, you've never so

much as pitched us a burnt crust; but she gave us rolls to eat."

And the doors said, "Long as we've served you, you've never

poured even a drop of water on our hinges; but she poured oil

on us." The birch-tree said, "Long as I've served you, you've

never tied a single thread round me; but she fastened a ribbon

around me." And the servant-maid said, "Long as I've served

you, you've never given me so much as a rag; but she gave me

a handkerchief."

The Baba Yaga, bony of limb, quickly jumped into her

mortar, sent it flying along with the pestle, sweeping away the

while all traces of its flight with a broom, and set off in pursuit

of the girl. Then the girl put her ear to the ground, and when

she heard that the Baba Yaga was chasing her, and was now

close at hand, she flung down the towel. And it became a wide,

such a wide river! Up came the Baba Yaga to the river, and

gnashed her teeth with spite; then she went home for her oxen,

and drove them to the river. The oxen drank up every drop of

the river, and then the Baba Yaga began the pursuit anew.

But the girl put her ear to the ground again, and when she heard

that the Baba Yaga was near, she flung down the comb, and

instantly a forest sprang up, such an awfully thick one! The

Baba Yaga began gnawing away at it, but however hard she

worked, she couldn't gnaw her way through it, so she had to go

back again.

But by this time the girl's father had returned home, and he

asked:

"Where's my daughter?"

"She's gone to her aunt's," replied her stepmother.

Soon afterwards the girl herself came running home.

"Where have you been?" asked her father.

"Ah, father!" she said, "mother sent me to aunt's to ask

for a needle and thread to make me a shift. But aunt's a Baba

Yaga, and she wanted to eat me!"

"And how did you get away, daughter?"

"Why like this," said the girl, and explained the whole

matter. As soon as her father had heard all about it, he became

wroth with his wife, and shot her. But he and his daughter

lived on and flourished, and everything went well with them.

In one of the numerous variants of this story[162] the heroine is sent

by her husband's mother to the Baba Yaga's, and the advice which saves

her comes from her husband. The Baba Yaga goes into another room "in

order to sharpen her teeth," and while she is engaged in that

operation the girl escapes, having previously--by the advice of the

Cat, to which she had given a lump of butter--spat under the

threshold. The spittle answers for her in her absence, behaving as do,

in other folk-tales, drops of blood, or rags dipped in blood, or

apples, or eggs, or beans, or stone images, or wooden puppets.[163]

The magic comb and towel, by the aid of which the girl effects her

escape, constantly figure in Skazkas of this class, and always produce

the required effect. A brush, also, is frequently introduced, from

each bristle of which springs up a wood. In one story, however, the

brush gives rise to mountains, and a _golik_, or bath-room whisk,

turns into a forest. The towel is used, also, for the purpose of

constructing or annihilating a bridge. Similar instruments are found

in the folk-tales of every land, whether they appear as the brush,

comb, and mirror of the German water-sprite;[164] or the rod, stone,

and pitcher of water of the Norse Troll;[165] or the knife, comb, and

handful of salt which, in the Modern Greek story, save Asterinos and

Pulja from their fiendish mother;[166] or the twig, the stone, and the

bladder of water, found in the ear of the filly, which saves her

master from the Gaelic giant;[167] or the brush, comb, and egg, the

last of which produces a frozen lake with "mirror-smooth" surface,

whereon the pursuing Old Prussian witch slips and breaks her

neck;[168] or the wand which causes a river to flow and a mountain to

rise between the youth who waves it and the "wicked old Rakshasa" who

chases him in the Deccan story;[169] or the handful of earth, cup of

water, and dry sticks and match, which impede and finally destroy the

Rakshasa in the almost identical episode of Somadeva's tale of "The

Prince of Varddhamana."[170]

In each instance they appear to typify the influence which the

supernatural beings to whom they belonged were supposed to exercise

over the elements. It has been thought strange that such stress should

be laid on the employment of certain toilet-articles, to the use of

which the heroes of folk-tales do not appear to have been greatly

addicted. But it is evident that like produces like in the

transformation in question. In the oldest form of the story, the

Sanskrit, a handful of earth turns into a mountain, a cup of water

into a river. Now, metaphorically speaking, a brush may be taken as a

miniature wood; the common use of the term brushwood is a proof of the

general acceptance of the metaphor. A comb does not at first sight

appear to resemble a mountain, but its indented outline may have

struck the fancy of many primitive peoples as being a likeness to a

serrated mountain range. Thence comes it that in German _Kamm_ means

not only a comb but also (like the Spanish _Sierra_) a mountain ridge

or crest.[171]

In one of the numerous stories[172] about the Baba Yaga, four heroes

are wandering about the world together; when they come to a dense

forest in which a small izba, or hut, is twirling round on "a fowl's

leg." Ivan, the youngest of the party, utters the magical formula

"Izbushka, Izbushka! stand with back to the forest and front towards

us," and "the hut faces towards them, its doors and windows open of

their own accord." The heroes enter and find it empty. One of the

party then remains indoors, while the rest go out to the chase. The

hero who is left alone prepares a meal, and then, "after washing his

head, sits down by the window to comb his hair." Suddenly a stone is

lifted, and from under it appears a Baba Yaga, driving in her mortar,

with a dog yelping at her heels. She enters the hut and, after some

short parley, seizes her pestle, and begins beating the hero with it

until he falls prostrate. Then she cuts a strip out of his back, eats

up the whole of the viands he has prepared for his companions, and

disappears. After a time the beaten hero recovers his senses, "ties up

his head with a handkerchief," and sits groaning until his comrades

return. Then he makes some excuse for not having got any supper ready

for them, but says nothing about what has really happened to him.

On the next day the second hero is treated in the same manner by the

Baba Yaga, and on the day after that the third undergoes a similar

humiliation. But on the fourth day it falls to the lot of the young

Ivan to stay in the hut alone. The Baba Yaga appears as usual, and

begins thumping him with her pestle; but he snatches it from her,

beats her almost to death with it, cuts three strips out of her back,

and then locks her up in a closet. When his comrades return, they are

surprised to find him unhurt, and a meal prepared for them, but they

ask no questions. After supper they all take a bath, and then Ivan

remarks that each of his companions has had a strip cut out of his

back. This leads to a full confession, on hearing which Ivan "runs to

the closet, takes those strips out of the Baba Yaga, and applies them

to their backs," which immediately become cured. He then hangs up the

Baba Yaga by a cord tied to one foot, at which cord all the party

shoot. At length it is severed, and she drops. As soon as she touches

the ground, she runs to the stone from under which she had appeared,

lifts it, and disappears.[173]

The rest of the story is very similar to that of "Norka," which has

already been given, only instead of the beast of that name we have the

Baba Yaga, whom Ivan finds asleep, with a magic sword at her head.

Following the advice of her daughters, three fair maidens whom he

meets in her palace, Ivan does not attempt to touch the magic sword

while she sleeps. But he awakes her gently, and offers her two golden

apples on a silver dish. She lifts her head and opens her mouth,

whereupon he seizes the sword and cuts her head off. As is usual in

the stories of this class, his comrades, after hoisting the maidens

aloft, cut the cord and let him fall back into the abyss. But he

escapes, and eventually "he slays all the three heroes, and flings

their bodies on the plain for wild beasts to devour." This Skazka is

one of the many versions of a widespread tale, which tells how the

youngest of a party, usually consisting of three persons, overcomes

some supernatural foe, generally a dwarf, who had been more than a

match for his companions. The most important of these versions is the

Lithuanian story of the carpenter who overcomes a Laume--a being in

many respects akin to the Baba Yaga--who has proved too strong for his

comrades, Perkun and the Devil.[174]

The practice of cutting strips from an enemy's back is frequently

referred to in the Skazkas--much more frequently than in the German

and Norse stories. It is not often that such strips are turned to good

account, but in the Skazka with which we have just been dealing, Ivan

finding the rope by which he is being lowered into the abyss too

short, ties to the end of it the three strips he has cut from the Baba

Yaga's back, and so makes it sufficiently long. They are often exacted

as the penalty of losing a wager, as well in the Skazkas as

elsewhere.[175] In a West-Slavonian story about a wager of this kind,

the winner cuts off the loser's nose.[176] In the Gaelic stories it is

not an uncommon incident for a man to have "a strip of skin cut off

him from his crown to his sole."[177]

The Baba Yaga generally kills people in order to eat them. Her house

is fenced about with the bones of the men whose flesh she has

devoured; in one story she offers a human arm, by way of a meal, to a

girl who visits her. But she is also represented in one of the

stories[178] as petrifying her victims. This trait connects her with

Medusa, and the three sister Baba Yagas with the three Gorgones. The

Russian Gorgo's method of petrifaction is singular. In the story

referred to, Ivan Devich (Ivan the servant-maid's son) meets a Baba

Yaga, who plucks one of her hairs, gives it to him, and says, "Tie

three knots and then blow." He does so, and both he and his horse turn

into stone. The Baba Yaga places them in her mortar, pounds them to

bits, and buries their remains under a stone. A little later comes

Ivan Devich's comrade, Prince Ivan. Him also the Yaga attempts to

destroy, but he feigns ignorance, and persuades her to show him how to

tie knots and to blow. The result is that she becomes petrified

herself. Prince Ivan puts her in her own mortar, and proceeds to pound

her therein, until she tells him where the fragments of his comrade

are, and what he must do to restore them to life.

The Baba Yaga usually lives by herself, but sometimes she appears in

the character of the house-mother. One of the Skazkas[179] relates how

a certain old couple, who had no children, were advised to get a

number of eggs from the village--one from each house--and to place

them under a sitting hen. From the forty-one eggs thus obtained and

treated are born as many boys, all but one of whom develop into strong

men, but the forty-first long remains a poor weak creature, a kind of

"Hop-o'-my-thumb." They all set forth to seek brides, and eventually

marry the forty-one daughters of a Baba Yaga. On the wedding night she

intends to kill her sons-in-law; but they, acting on the advice of him

who had been the weakling of their party, but who has become a mighty

hero, exchange clothes with their brides before "lying down to sleep."

Accordingly the Baba Yaga's "trusty servants" cut off the heads of her

daughters instead of those of her sons-in-law. Those youths arise,

stick the heads of their brides on iron spikes all round the house,

and gallop away. When the Baba Yaga awakes in the morning, looks out

of the window, and sees her daughters' heads on their spikes, she

flies into a passion, calls for "her burning shield," sets off in

pursuit of her sons-in-law, and "begins burning up everything on all

four sides with her shield." A magic, bridge-creating kerchief,

however, enables the fugitives to escape from their irritated

mother-in-law.

In one story[180] the heroine is ordered to swing the cradle in which

reposes a Baba Yaga's infant son, whom she is ordered to address in

terms of respect when she sings him lullabies; in others she is told

to wash a Baba Yaga's many children, whose appearance is usually

unprepossessing. One girl, for instance, is ordered by a Baba Yaga to

heat the bath, but the fuel given her for the purpose turns out to be

dead men's bones. Having got over this difficulty, thanks to the

advice of a sparrow which tells her where to look for wood, she is

sent to fetch water in a sieve. Again the sparrow comes to her rescue

telling her to line the sieve with clay. Then she is told to wait upon

the Baba Yaga's children in the bath-room. She enters it, and

presently in come "worms, frogs, rats, and all sorts of insects."

These, which are the Baba Yaga's children, she soaps over and

otherwise treats in the approved Russian-bath style, and afterwards

she does as much for their mother. The Baba Yaga is highly pleased,

calls for a "samovar" (or urn), and invites her young bath-woman to

drink tea with her. And finally she sends her home with a blue coffer,

which turns out to be full of money. This present excites the cupidity

of her stepmother, who sends her own daughter to the Baba Yaga's,

hoping that she will bring back a similar treasure. The Baba Yaga

gives the same orders as before to the new-comer, but that conceited

young person fails to carry them out. She cannot make the bones burn,

nor the sieve hold water, but when the sparrow offers its advice she

only boxes its ears. And when the "rats, frogs, and all manner of

vermin," enter the bath-room, "she crushed half of them to death,"

says the story; "the rest ran home, and complained about her to their

mother." And so the Baba Yaga, when she dismisses her, gives her a red

coffer instead of a blue one. Out of it, when it is opened, issues

fire, which consumes both her and her mother.[181]

Similar to this story in many of its features as well as in its

catastrophe is one of the most spirited and dramatic of all the

Skazkas, that of--

VASILISSA THE FAIR.[182]

In a certain kingdom there lived a merchant. Twelve years

did he live as a married man, but he had only one child, Vasilissa

the Fair. When her mother died, the girl was eight years

old. And on her deathbed the merchant's wife called her little

daughter to her, took out from under the bed-clothes a doll,

gave it to her, and said, "Listen, Vasilissa, dear; remember

and obey these last words of mine. I am going to die. And

now, together with my parental blessing, I bequeath to you this

doll. Keep it always by you, and never show it to anybody; and

whenever any misfortune comes upon you, give the doll food,

and ask its advice. When it has fed, it will tell you a cure for

your troubles." Then the mother kissed her child and died.

After his wife's death, the merchant mourned for her a befitting

time, and then began to consider about marrying again. He

was a man of means. It wasn't a question with him of girls (with

dowries); more than all others, a certain widow took his fancy.

She was middle-aged, and had a couple of daughters of her own

just about the same age as Vasilissa. She must needs be both

a good housekeeper and an experienced mother.

Well, the merchant married the widow, but he had deceived

himself, for he did not find in her a kind mother for his

Vasilissa. Vasilissa was the prettiest girl[183] in all the

village; but her stepmother and stepsisters were jealous of her

beauty, and tormented her with every possible sort of toil, in

order that she might grow thin from over-work, and be tanned by

the sun and the wind. Her life was made a burden to her! Vasilissa

bore everything with resignation, and every day grew plumper and

prettier, while the stepmother and her daughters lost flesh and

fell off in appearance from the effects of their own spite,

notwithstanding that they always sat with folded hands like fine

ladies.

But how did that come about? Why, it was her doll that

helped Vasilissa. If it hadn't been for it, however could the

girl have got through all her work? And therefore it was that

Vasilissa would never eat all her share of a meal, but always

kept the most delicate morsel for her doll; and at night, when

all were at rest, she would shut herself up in the narrow chamber[184]

in which she slept, and feast her doll, saying[185] the while:

"There, dolly, feed; help me in my need! I live in my

father's house, but never know what pleasure is; my evil stepmother

tries to drive me out of the white world; teach me how

to keep alive, and what I ought to do."

Then the doll would eat, and afterwards give her advice, and

comfort her in her sorrow, and next day it would do all Vasilissa's

work for her. She had only to take her ease in a shady place

and pluck flowers, and yet all her work was done in good time;

the beds were weeded, and the pails were filled, and the cabbages

were watered, and the stove was heated. Moreover, the

doll showed Vasilissa herbs which prevented her from getting

sunburnt. Happily did she and her doll live together.

Several years went by. Vasilissa grew up and became old

enough to be married.[186] All the marriageable young men in the

town sent to make an offer to Vasilissa; at her stepmother's

daughters not a soul would so much as look. Her stepmother

grew even more savage than before, and replied to every

suitor--

"We won't let the younger marry before her elders."

And after the suitors had been packed off, she used to beat

Vasilissa by way of wreaking her spite.

Well, it happened one day that the merchant had to go

away from home on business for a long time. Thereupon the

stepmother went to live in another house; and near that house

was a dense forest, and in a clearing in that forest there stood

a hut,[187] and in the hut there lived a Baba Yaga. She never let

any one come near her dwelling, and she ate up people like so

many chickens.

Having moved into the new abode, the merchant's wife kept

sending her hated Vasilissa into the forest on one pretence or

another. But the girl always got home safe and sound; the

doll used to show her the way, and never let her go near the

Baba Yaga's dwelling.

The autumn season arrived. One evening the stepmother

gave out their work to the three girls; one she set to lace-making,

another to knitting socks, and the third, Vasilissa, to weaving;

and each of them had her allotted amount to do. By-and-by

she put out the lights in the house, leaving only one candle

alight where the girls were working, and then she went to bed.

The girls worked and worked. Presently the candle wanted

snuffing; one of the stepdaughters took the snuffers, as if she

were going to clear the wick, but instead of doing so, in obedience

to her mother's orders, she snuffed the candle out, pretending

to do so by accident.

"What shall we do now?" said the girls. "There isn't a

spark of fire in the house, and our tasks are not yet done. We

must go to the Baba Yaga's for a light!"

"My pins give me light enough," said the one who was making

lace. "I shan't go."

"And I shan't go, either," said the one who was knitting

socks. "My knitting-needles give me light enough."

"Vasilissa, you must go for the light," they both cried out

together; "be off to the Baba Yaga's!"

And they pushed Vasilissa out of the room.

Vasilissa went into her little closet, set before the doll a supper

which she had provided beforehand, and said:

"Now, dolly, feed, and listen to my need! I'm sent to the

Baba Yaga's for a light. The Baba Yaga will eat me!"

The doll fed, and its eyes began to glow just like a couple of

candles.

"Never fear, Vasilissa dear!" it said. "Go where you're

sent. Only take care to keep me always by you. As long as I'm

with you, no harm will come to you at the Baba Yaga's."

So Vasilissa got ready, put her doll in her pocket, crossed

herself, and went out into the thick forest.

As she walks she trembles. Suddenly a horseman gallops

by. He is white, and he is dressed in white, under him is a white

horse, and the trappings of the horse are white--and the day

begins to break.

She goes a little further, and a second rider gallops by. He

is red, dressed in red, and sitting on a red horse--and the sun

rises.

Vasilissa went on walking all night and all next day. It was

only towards the evening that she reached the clearing on which

stood the dwelling of the Baba Yaga. The fence around it was

made of dead men's bones; on the top of the fence were stuck

human skulls with eyes in them; instead of uprights at the gates

were men's legs; instead of bolts were arms; instead of a lock

was a mouth with sharp teeth.

Vasilissa was frightened out of her wits, and stood still as if

rooted to the ground.

Suddenly there rode past another horseman. He was black,

dressed all in black, and on a black horse. He galloped up to

the Baba Yaga's gate and disappeared, just as if he had sunk

through the ground--and night fell. But the darkness did not

last long. The eyes of all the skulls on the fence began to shine

and the whole clearing became as bright as if it had been midday.

Vasilissa shuddered with fear, but stopped where she was,

not knowing which way to run.

Soon there was heard in the forest a terrible roar. The trees

cracked, the dry leaves rustled; out of the forest came the Baba

Yaga, riding in a mortar, urging it on with a pestle, sweeping

away her traces with a broom. Up she drove to the gate, stopped

short, and, snuffing the air around her, cried:--

"Faugh! Faugh! I smell Russian flesh![188] Who's there?"

Vasilissa went up to the hag in a terrible fright, bowed low

before her, and said:--

"It's me, granny. My stepsisters have sent me to you for a

light."

"Very good," said the Baba Yaga; "I know them. If you'll

stop awhile with me first, and do some work for me, I'll give you

a light. But if you won't, I'll eat you!"

Then she turned to the gates, and cried:--

"Ho, thou firm fence of mine, be thou divided! And ye, wide

gates of mine, do ye fly open!"

The gates opened, and the Baba Yaga drove in, whistling as

she went, and after her followed Vasilissa; and then everything

shut to again. When they entered the sitting-room, the Baba

Yaga stretched herself out at full length, and said to Vasilissa:

"Fetch out what there is in the oven; I'm hungry."

Vasilissa lighted a splinter[189] at one of the skulls which were

on the fence, and began fetching meat from the oven and setting

it before the Baba Yaga; and meat enough had been provided

for a dozen people. Then she fetched from the cellar kvass,

mead, beer, and wine. The hag ate up everything, drank up

everything. All she left for Vasilissa was a few scraps--a crust

of bread and a morsel of sucking-pig. Then the Baba Yaga lay

down to sleep, saying:--

"When I go out to-morrow morning, mind you cleanse the

courtyard, sweep the room, cook the dinner, and get the linen

ready. Then go to the corn-bin, take out four quarters of wheat,

and clear it of other seed.[190] And mind you have it all done--if

you don't, I shall eat you!"

After giving these orders the Baba Yaga began to snore. But

Vasilissa set the remnants of the hag's supper before her doll,

burst into tears, and said:--

"Now, dolly, feed, listen to my need! The Baba Yaga has

set me a heavy task, and threatens to eat me if I don't do it all.

Do help me!"

The doll replied:

"Never fear, Vasilissa the Fair! Sup, say your prayers, and

go to bed. The morning is wiser than the evening!"

Vasilissa awoke very early, but the Baba Yaga was already up.

She looked out of the window. The light in the skull's eyes was

going out. All of a sudden there appeared the white horseman,

and all was light. The Baba Yaga went out into the courtyard and

whistled--before her appeared a mortar with a pestle and a broom.

The red horseman appeared--the sun rose. The Baba Yaga

seated herself in the mortar, and drove out of the courtyard,

shooting herself along with the pestle, sweeping away her traces

with the broom.

Vasilissa was left alone, so she examined the Baba Yaga's

house, wondered at the abundance there was in everything, and

remained lost in thought as to which work she ought to take to

first. She looked up; all her work was done already. The doll

had cleared the wheat to the very last grain.

"Ah, my preserver!" cried Vasilissa, "you've saved me

from danger!"

"All you've got to do now is to cook the dinner," answered

the doll, slipping into Vasilissa's pocket. "Cook away, in God's

name, and then take some rest for your health's sake!"

Towards evening Vasilissa got the table ready, and awaited

the Baba Yaga. It began to grow dusky; the black rider appeared

for a moment at the gate, and all grew dark. Only the

eyes of the skulls sent forth their light. The trees began to

crack, the leaves began to rustle, up drove the Baba Yaga.

Vasilissa went out to meet her.

"Is everything done?" asks the Yaga.

"Please to look for yourself, granny!" says Vasilissa.

The Baba Yaga examined everything, was vexed that there

was nothing to be angry about, and said:

"Well, well! very good!"

Afterwards she cried:

"My trusty servants, zealous friends, grind this my wheat!"

There appeared three pairs of hands, which gathered up the

wheat, and carried it out of sight. The Baba Yaga supped, went

to bed, and again gave her orders to Vasilissa:

"Do just the same to-morrow as to-day; only besides that take

out of the bin the poppy seed that is there, and clean the earth

off it grain by grain. Some one or other, you see, has mixed a

lot of earth with it out of spite." Having said this, the hag turned

to the wall and began to snore, and Vasilissa took to feeding her

doll. The doll fed, and then said to her what it had said the

day before:

"Pray to God, and go to sleep. The morning is wiser than the

evening. All shall be done, Vasilissa dear!"

The next morning the Baba Yaga again drove out of the courtyard

in her mortar, and Vasilissa and her doll immediately did

all the work. The hag returned, looked at everything, and cried,

"My trusty servants, zealous friends, press forth oil from the

poppy seed!"

Three pairs of hands appeared, gathered up the poppy seed,

and bore it out of sight. The Baba Yaga sat down to dinner.

She ate, but Vasilissa stood silently by.

"Why don't you speak to me?" said the Baba Yaga; "there

you stand like a dumb creature!"

"I didn't dare," answered Vasilissa; "but if you give me

leave, I should like to ask you about something."

"Ask away; only it isn't every question that brings good.

'Get much to know, and old soon you'll grow.'"

"I only want to ask you, granny, about something I saw. As

I was coming here, I was passed by one riding on a white horse;

he was white himself, and dressed in white. Who was he?"

"That was my bright Day!" answered the Baba Yaga.

"Afterwards there passed me another rider, on a red horse;

red himself, and all in red clothes. Who was he?"

"That was my red Sun!"[191] answered the Baba Yaga.

"And who may be the black rider, granny, who passed by

me just at your gate?"

"That was my dark Night; they are all trusty servants of

mine."

Vasilissa thought of the three pairs of hands, but held her

peace.

"Why don't you go on asking?" said the Baba Yaga.

"That's enough for me, granny. You said yourself, 'Get

too much to know, old you'll grow!'"

"It's just as well," said the Baba Yaga, "that you've only

asked about what you saw out of doors, not indoors! In my house

I hate having dirt carried out of doors;[192] and as to over-inquisitive

people--well, I eat them. Now I'll ask you something.

How is it you manage to do the work I set you to do?"

"My mother's blessing assists me," replied Vasilissa.

"Eh! eh! what's that? Get along out of my house, you

bless'd daughter. I don't want bless'd people."

She dragged Vasilissa out of the room, pushed her outside

the gates, took one of the skulls with blazing eyes from the

fence, stuck it on a stick, gave it to her and said:

"Lay hold of that. It's a light you can take to your stepsisters.

That's what they sent you here for, I believe."

Home went Vasilissa at a run, lit by the skull, which went out

only at the approach of the dawn; and at last, on the evening

of the second day, she reached home. When she came to the

gate, she was going to throw away the skull.

"Surely," thinks she, "they can't be still in want of a light

at home." But suddenly a hollow voice issued from the skull,

saying:

"Throw me not away. Carry me to your stepmother!"

She looked at her stepmother's house, and not seeing a light

in a single window, she determined to take the skull in there

with her. For the first time in her life she was cordially received

by her stepmother and stepsisters, who told her that from the

moment she went away they hadn't had a spark of fire in the

house. They couldn't strike a light themselves anyhow, and

whenever they brought one in from a neighbor's, it went out as

soon as it came into the room.

"Perhaps your light will keep in!" said the stepmother. So

they carried the skull into the sitting-room. But the eyes of the

skull so glared at the stepmother and her daughters--shot forth

such flames! They would fain have hidden themselves, but run

where they would, everywhere did the eyes follow after them.

By the morning they were utterly burnt to cinders. Only Vasilissa

was none the worse.[193]

[Next morning Vasilissa "buried the skull," locked up

the house and took up her quarters in a neighboring

town. After a time she began to work. Her doll made

her a glorious loom, and by the end of the winter she

had weaved a quantity of linen so fine that it might

be passed like thread through the eye of a needle. In

the spring, after it had been bleached, Vasilissa made

a present of it to the old woman with whom she lodged.

The crone presented it to the king, who ordered it to

be made into shirts. But no seamstress could be found

to make them up, until the linen was entrusted to

Vasilissa. When a dozen shirts were ready, Vasilissa

sent them to the king, and as soon as her carrier had

started, "she washed herself, and combed her hair, and

dressed herself, and sat down at the window." Before

long there arrived a messenger demanding her instant

appearance at court. And "when she appeared before the

royal eyes," the king fell desperately in love with

her.

"No; my beauty!" said he, "never will I part with

thee; thou shalt be my wife." So he married her; and

by-and-by her father returned, and took up his abode

with her. "And Vasilissa took the old woman into her

service, and as for the doll--to the end of her life

she always carried it in her pocket."]

The puppet which plays so important a part in this story is worthy of

a special examination. It is called in the original a _Kukla_ (dim.

_Kukolka_), a word designating any sort of puppet or other figure

representing either man or beast. In a Little-Russian variant[194] of

one of those numerous stories, current in all lands, which commence

with the escape of the heroine from an incestuous union, a priest

insists on marrying his daughter. She goes to her mother's grave and

weeps there. Her dead mother "comes out from her grave," and tells her

what to do. The girl obtains from her father a rough dress of pig's

skin, and two sets of gorgeous apparel; the former she herself

assumes, in the latter she dresses up three _Kuklui_, which in this

instance were probably mere blocks of wood. Then she takes her place

in the midst of the dressed-up forms, which cry, one after the other,

"Open, O moist earth, that the fair maiden may enter within thee!" The

earth opens, and all four sink into it.

This introduction is almost identical with that prefixed to the German

story of "Allerleirauh,"[195] except in so far as the puppets are

concerned.

Sometimes it is a brother, instead of a father, from whom the heroine

is forced to flee. Thus in the story of _Kniaz Danila Govorila_,[196]

Prince Daniel the Talker is bent upon marrying his sister, pleading

the excuse so often given in stories on this theme, namely, that she

is the only maiden whose finger will fit the magic ring which is to

indicate to him his destined wife. While she is weeping "like a

river," some old women of the mendicant-pilgrim class come to her

rescue, telling her to make four _Kukolki_, or small puppets, and to

place one of them in each corner of her room. She does as they tell

her. The wedding day arrives, the marriage service is performed in the

church, and then the bride hastens back to the room. When she is

called for--says the story--the puppets in the four corners begin to

coo.[197]

"Kuku! Prince Danila!

"Kuku! Govorila.

"Kuku! He wants to marry,

"Kuku! His own sister.

"Kuku! Split open, O Earth!

"Kuku! Sister, disappear!"

The earth opens, and the girl slowly sinks into it. Twice again the

puppets sing their song, and at the end of its third performance, the

earth closes over the head of the rescued bride. Presently in rushes

the irritated bridegroom. "No bride is to be seen; only in the corners

sit the puppets singing away to themselves." He flies into a passion,

seizes a hatchet, chops off their heads, and flings them into the

fire.[198]

In another version of the same story[199] a son is ordered by his

parents to marry his sister after their death. They die, and he tells

her to get ready to be married. But she has prepared three puppets,

and when she goes into her room to dress for the wedding, she says to

them:

"O Kukolki, (cry) Kuku!"

The first asks, "Why?"

The second replies, "Because the brother his sister takes."

The third says, "Split open, O Earth! disappear, O sister!"

All this is said three times, and then the earth opens, and the girl

sinks "into that world."

In two other Russian versions of the same story, the sister escapes by

natural means. In the first[200] she runs away and hides in the hollow

of an oak. In the second[201] she persuades a fisherman to convey her

across a sea or lake. In a Polish version[202] the sister obtains a

magic car, which sinks underground with her, while the spot on which

she has spat replies to every summons which is addressed to her.[203]

Before taking leave of the Baba Yaga, we may glance at a malevolent

monster, who seems to be her male counterpart. He appears, however, to

be known in South Russia only. Here is an outline of the contents of

the solitary story in which he is mentioned. There were two old folks

with whom lived two orphan grandchildren, charming little girls. One

day the youngest child was sent to drive the sparrows away from her

grandfather's pease. While she was thus engaged the forest began to

roar, and out from it came Verlioka, "of vast stature, one-eyed,

crook-nosed, bristly-headed, with tangled beard and moustaches half an

ell long, and with a wooden boot on his one foot, supporting himself

on a crutch, and giving vent to a terrible laughter." And Verlioka

caught sight of the little girl and immediately killed her with his

crutch. And afterwards he killed her sister also, and then the old

grandmother. The grandfather, however, managed to escape with his

life, and afterwards, with the help of a drake and other aiders, he

wreaked his vengeance on the murderous Verlioka.[204]

We will now turn to another female embodiment of evil, frequently

mentioned in the Skazkas--the Witch.[205] She so closely resembles the

Baba Yaga both in disposition and in behavior, that most of the

remarks which have been made about that wild being apply to her also.

In many cases, indeed, we find that one version of a story will allot

to a Baba Yaga the part which in another version is played by a Witch.

The name which she bears--that of _Vyed'ma_--is a misnomer; it

properly belongs either to the "wise woman," or prophetess, of old

times, or to her modern representative, the woman to whom Russian

superstition attributes the faculties and functions ascribed in olden

days by most of our jurisprudents, in more recent times by a few of

our rustics, to our own witch. The supernatural being who, in

folk-tales, sways the elements and preys upon mankind, is most

inadequately designated by such names as _Vyed'ma_, _Hexe_, or

_Witch_, suggestive as those now homely terms are of merely human,

though diabolically intensified malevolence. Far more in keeping with

the vastness of her powers, and the vagueness of her outline, are the

titles of Baba Yaga, Lamia, Striga, Troll-Wife, Ogress, or Dragoness,

under which she figures in various lands. And therefore it is in her

capacity of Baba Yaga, rather than in that of _Vyed'ma_, that we

desire to study the behavior of the Russian equivalent for the

terrible female form which figures in the Anglo-Saxon poem as the

Mother of Grendel.

From among the numerous stories relating to the _Vyed'ma_ we may

select the following, which bears her name.

THE WITCH.[206]

There once lived an old couple who had one son called

Ivashko;[207] no one can tell how fond they were of him!

Well, one day, Ivashko said to his father and mother:

"I'll go out fishing if you'll let me."

"What are you thinking about! you're still very small; suppose

you get drowned, what good will there be in that?"

"No, no, I shan't get drowned. I'll catch you some fish;

do let me go!"

So his mother put a white shirt on him, tied a red girdle round

him, and let him go. Out in a boat he sat and said:

Canoe, canoe, float a little farther,

Canoe, canoe, float a little farther!

Then the canoe floated on farther and farther, and Ivashko began to

fish. When some little time had passed by, the old woman hobbled down

to the river side and called to her son:

Ivashechko, Ivashechko, my boy,

Float up, float up, unto the waterside;

I bring thee food and drink.

And Ivashko said:

Canoe, canoe, float to the waterside;

That is my mother calling me.

The boat floated to the shore: the woman took the fish, gave her boy

food and drink, changed his shirt for him and his girdle, and sent him

back to his fishing. Again he sat in his boat and said:

Canoe, canoe, float a little farther,

Canoe, canoe, float a little farther.

Then the canoe floated on farther and farther, and Ivashko began to

fish. After a little time had passed by, the old man also hobbled down

to the bank and called to his son:

Ivashechko, Ivashechko, my boy,

Float up, float up, unto the waterside;

I bring thee food and drink.

And Ivashko replied:

Canoe, canoe, float to the waterside;

That is my father calling me.

The canoe floated to the shore. The old man took the fish, gave his

boy food and drink, changed his shirt for him and his girdle, and sent

him back to his fishing.

Now a certain witch[208] had heard what Ivashko's parents had cried

aloud to him, and she longed to get hold of the boy. So she went down

to the bank and cried with a hoarse voice:

Ivashechko, Ivashechko, my boy,

Float up, float up, unto the waterside;

I bring thee food and drink.

Ivashko perceived that the voice was not his mother's, but was that of

a witch, and he sang:

Canoe, canoe, float a little farther,

Canoe, canoe, float a little farther;

That is not my mother, but a witch who calls me.

The witch saw that she must call Ivashko with just such a voice as

his mother had.

So she hastened to a smith and said to him:

"Smith, smith! make me just such a thin little voice as Ivashko's

mother has: if you don't, I'll eat you." So the smith forged her a

little voice just like Ivashko's mother's. Then the witch went down by

night to the shore and sang:

Ivashechko, Ivashechko, my boy,

Float up, float up, unto the waterside;

I bring thee food and drink.

Ivashko came, and she took the fish, and seized the boy and carried

him home with her. When she arrived she said to her daughter

Alenka,[209] "Heat the stove as hot as you can, and bake Ivashko well,

while I go and collect my friends for the feast." So Alenka heated the

stove hot, ever so hot, and said to Ivashko,

"Come here and sit on this shovel!"

"I'm still very young and foolish," answered Ivashko: "I haven't yet

quite got my wits about me. Please teach me how one ought to sit on a

shovel."

"Very good," said Alenka; "it won't take long to teach you."

But the moment she sat down on the shovel, Ivashko instantly pitched

her into the oven, slammed to the iron plate in front of it, ran out

of the hut, shut the door, and hurriedly climbed up ever so high an

oak-tree [which stood close by].

Presently the witch arrived with her guests and knocked at the door of

the hut. But nobody opened it for her.

"Ah! that cursed Alenka!" she cried. "No doubt she's gone off

somewhere to amuse herself." Then she slipped in through the window,

opened the door, and let in her guests. They all sat down to table,

and the witch opened the oven, took out Alenka's baked body, and

served it up. They all ate their fill and drank their fill, and then

they went out into the courtyard and began rolling about on the grass.

"I turn about, I roll about, having fed on Ivashko's flesh," cried

the witch. "I turn about, I roll about, having fed on Ivashko's

flesh."

But Ivashko called out to her from the top of the oak:

"Turn about, roll about, having fed on Alenka's flesh!"

"Did I hear something?" said the witch. "No it was only the noise of

the leaves." Again the witch began:

"I turn about, I roll about, having fed on Ivashko's flesh!"

And Ivashko repeated:

"Turn about, roll about, having fed on Alenka's flesh!"

Then the witch looked up and saw Ivashko, and immediately rushed at

the oak on which Ivashko was seated, and began to gnaw away at it. And

she gnawed, and gnawed, and gnawed, until at last she smashed two

front teeth. Then she ran to a forge, and when she reached it she

cried, "Smith, smith! make me some iron teeth; if you don't I'll eat

you!"

So the smith forged her two iron teeth.

The witch returned and began gnawing the oak again.

She gnawed, and gnawed, and was just on the point of gnawing it

through, when Ivashko jumped out of it into another tree which stood

beside it. The oak that the witch had gnawed through fell down to the

ground; but then she saw that Ivashko was sitting up in another tree,

so she gnashed her teeth with spite and set to work afresh, to gnaw

that tree also. She gnawed, and gnawed, and gnawed--broke two lower

teeth, and ran off to the forge.

"Smith, smith!" she cried when she got there, "make me some iron

teeth; if you don't I'll eat you!"

The smith forged two more iron teeth for her. She went back again, and

once more began to gnaw the oak.

Ivashko didn't know what he was to do now. He looked out, and saw that

swans and geese[210] were flying by, so he called to them imploringly:

Oh, my swans and geese,

Take me on your pinions,

Bear me to my father and my mother,

To the cottage of my father and my mother,

There to eat, and drink, and live in comfort.

"Let those in the centre carry you," said the birds.

Ivashko waited; a second flock flew past, and he again cried

imploringly:

Oh, my swans and geese!

Take me on your pinions,

Bear me to my father and my mother,

To the cottage of my father and my mother,

There to eat, and drink, and live in comfort.

"Let those in the rear carry you!" said the birds.

Again Ivashko waited. A third flock came flying up, and he cried:

Oh, my swans and geese!

Take me on your pinions,

Bear me to my father and my mother,

To the cottage of my father and my mother,

There to eat, and drink, and live in comfort.

And those swans and geese took hold of him and carried him back, flew

up to the cottage, and dropped him in the upper room.

Early the next morning his mother set to work to bake pancakes, baked

them, and all of a sudden fell to thinking about her boy. "Where is my

Ivashko?" she cried; "would that I could see him, were it only in a

dream!"

Then his father said, "I dreamed that swans and geese had brought our

Ivashko home on their wings."

And when she had finished baking the pancakes, she said, "Now, then,

old man, let's divide the cakes: there's for you, father! there's for

me! There's for you, father! there's for me."

"And none for me?" called out Ivashko.

"There's for you, father!" went on the old woman, "there's for me."

"And none for me!" [repeated the boy.]

"Why, old man," said the wife, "go and see whatever that is up there."

The father climbed into the upper room and there he found Ivashko.

The old people were delighted, and asked their boy about everything

that had happened. And after that he and they lived on happily

together.

[That part of this story which relates to the baking

and eating of the witch's daughter is well known in

many lands. It is found in the German "Haensel und

Grethel" (Grimm. _KM._ No. 15, and iii. p. 25, where a

number of parallels are mentioned); in the Norse

"Askelad" (Asbjoernsen and Moe, No. 1. Dasent, "Boots

and the Troll," No. 32), where a Troll's daughter is

baked; and "Smoerbuk" (Asb. and Moe, No. 52. Dasent,

"Buttercup," No. 18), in which the victim is daughter

of a "Haugkjoerring," another name for a Troll-wife;

in the Servian story of "The Stepmother," &c. (Vuk

Karajich, No. 35, pp. 174-5) in which two _Chivuti_,

or Jews, are tricked into eating their baked mother;

in the Modern Greek stories (Hahn, No. 3 and ii. p.

181), in which the hero bakes (1) a _Drakaena_, while

her husband, the _Drakos_, is at church, (2) a

_Lamiopula_, during the absence of the _Lamia_, her

mother; and in the Albanian story of "Augenhuendin"

(Hahn, No. 95), in which the heroine gets rid in a

similar manner of Maro, the daughter of that four eyed

+sykieneza+. (See note, ii, 309.) Afanasief also refers

(i. p. 121) to Haltrich, No. 37, and Haupt and

Schmaler, ii. pp. 172-4. He also mentions a similar

tale about a giantess existing among the Baltic

Kashoubes. See also the end of the song of Tardanak,

showing how he killed "the Seven Headed Jelbegen,"

Radloff, i. p. 31.]

A variant of this story (from the Chernigof Government)[211] begins by

telling how two old people were childless for a long time. At last the

husband went into the forest, felled wood, and made a cradle. Into

this his wife laid one of the logs he had cut, and began swinging it,

crooning the while a rune beginning

Swing, blockie dear, swing.

After a little time "behold! the block already had legs. The old

woman rejoiced greatly and began singing anew, and went on singing

until the block became a babe." In this variant the boy rows a silver

boat with a golden oar; in another South Russian variant[212] the boat

is golden, the oar of silver. In a White-Russian variant quoted by

Afanasief (i. p. 118), the place of the witch's daughter is filled by

her son, who had been in the habit of alluring to her den by gifts of

toys, and there devouring, the children from the adjacent villages.

Buslaef's "Historical Essays," (i. pp. 313-321) contain a valuable

investigation of Kulish's version of this story, which he compares

with the romance of "The Knight of the Swan."

In another of the variants of this story[213] Ivanushka is the son of

a Baruinya or Lady, and he is carried off in a whirlwind by a Baba

Yaga. His three sisters go to look for him, and each of them in turn

finds out where he is and attempts to carry him off, after sending the

Baba Yaga to sleep and smearing her eyelids with pitch. But the two

elder sisters are caught on their way home by the Baba Yaga, and

terribly scratched and torn. The youngest sister, however, succeeds in

rescuing her brother, having taken the precaution of propitiating with

butter the cat Jeremiah, "who was telling the boy stories and singing

him songs." When the Baba Yaga awakes, she tells Jeremiah to scratch

her eyes open, but he refuses, reminding her that, long as he has

lived under her roof, she has never in any way regaled him, whereas

the "fair maiden" had no sooner arrived than she treated him to

butter. In another variant[214] the bereaved mother sends three

servant-maids in search of her boy. Two of them get torn to pieces;

the third succeeds in saving Ivanushka from the Baba Yaga, who is so

vexed that she pinches her butter-bribed cat to death for not having

awakened her when the rescue took place. A comparison of these three

stories is sufficient to show how closely connected are the Witch and

the Baba Yaga, how readily the name of either of the two may be

transferred to the other.

But there is one class of stories in which the _Vyed'ma_ is

represented as differing from the Baba Yaga, in so far as she is the

offspring of parents who are not in any way supernatural or inhuman.

Without any apparent cause for her abnormal conduct, the daughter of

an ordinary royal house will suddenly begin to destroy and devour all

living things which fall in her way--her strength developing as

rapidly as her appetite. Of such a nature--to be accounted for only on

the supposition that an evil spirit has taken up its abode in a human

body[215]--is the witch who appears in the somewhat incomprehensible

story that follows.

THE WITCH AND THE SUN'S SISTER.[216]

In a certain far-off country there once lived a king and queen.

And they had an only son, Prince Ivan, who was dumb from

his birth. One day, when he was twelve years old, he went into

the stable to see a groom who was a great friend of his.

That groom always used to tell him tales [_skazki_], and on

this occasion Prince Ivan went to him expecting to hear some

stories [_skazochki_], but that wasn't what he heard.

"Prince Ivan!" said the groom, "your mother will soon

have a daughter, and you a sister. She will be a terrible witch,

and she will eat up her father, and her mother, and all their subjects.

So go and ask your father for the best horse he has--as

if you wanted a gallop--and then, if you want to be out of harm's

way, ride away whithersoever your eyes guide you."

Prince Ivan ran off to his father and, for the first time in his

life, began speaking to him.

At that the king was so delighted that he never thought of

asking what he wanted a good steed for, but immediately ordered

the very best horse he had in his stud to be saddled for the

prince.

Prince Ivan mounted, and rode off without caring where he

went.[217] Long, long did he ride.

At length he came to where two old women were sewing

and he begged them to let him live with them. But they said:

"Gladly would we do so, Prince Ivan, only we have now

but a short time to live. As soon as we have broken that trunkful

of needles, and used up that trunkful of thread, that instant

will death arrive!"

Prince Ivan burst into tears and rode on. Long, long did

he ride. At length he came to where the giant Vertodub was,[218]

and he besought him, saying:

"Take me to live with you."

"Gladly would I have taken you, Prince Ivan!" replied the

giant, "but now I have very little longer to live. As soon as I

have pulled up all these trees by the roots, instantly will come

my death!"

More bitterly still did the prince weep as he rode farther and

farther on. By-and-by he came to where the giant Vertogor

was, and made the same request to him, but he replied:

"Gladly would I have taken you, Prince Ivan! but I myself

have very little longer to live. I am set here, you know, to

level mountains. The moment I have settled matters with these

you see remaining, then will my death come!"

Prince Ivan burst into a flood of bitter tears, and rode on

still farther. Long, long did he ride. At last he came to the

dwelling of the Sun's Sister. She received him into her house,

gave him food and drink, and treated him just as if he had been

her own son.

The prince now led an easy life. But it was all no use; he

couldn't help being miserable. He longed so to know what was

going on at home.

He often went to the top of a high mountain, and thence

gazed at the palace in which he used to live, and he could see

that it was all eaten away; nothing but the bare walls remained!

Then he would sigh and weep. Once when he returned after

he had been thus looking and crying, the Sun's Sister asked

him:

"What makes your eyes so red to-day, Prince Ivan?"[219]

"The wind has been blowing in them," said he.

The same thing happened a second time. Then the Sun's

Sister ordered the wind to stop blowing. Again a third time

did Prince Ivan come back with a blubbered face. This time

there was no help for it; he had to confess everything, and then

he took to entreating the Sun's Sister to let him go, that he

might satisfy himself about his old home. She would not let

him go, but he went on urgently entreating.

So at last he persuaded her, and she let him go away to

find out about his home. But first she provided him for the

journey with a brush, a comb, and two youth-giving apples.

However old any one might be, let him eat one of these apples,

he would grow young again in an instant.

Well, Prince Ivan came to where Vertogor was. There was

only just one mountain left! He took his brush and cast it

down on the open plain. Immediately there rose out of the

earth, goodness knows whence,[220] high, ever so high mountains,

their peaks touching the sky. And the number of them was

such that there were more than the eye could see![221] Vertogor

rejoiced greatly and blithely recommenced his work.

After a time Prince Ivan came to where Vertodub was, and

found that there were only three trees remaining there. So he

took the comb and flung it on the open plain. Immediately from

somewhere or other there came a sound of trees,[222] and forth from

the ground arose dense oak forests! each stem more huge than

the other! Vertodub was delighted, thanked the Prince, and

set to work uprooting the ancient oaks.

By-and-by Prince Ivan reached the old women, and gave

each of them an apple. They ate them, and straightway became

young again. So they gave him a handkerchief; you only had

to wave it, and behind you lay a whole lake! At last Prince

Ivan arrived at home. Out came running his sister to meet him,

caressed him fondly.

"Sit thee down, my brother!" she said, "play a tune on the

lute while I go and get dinner ready."

The Prince sat down and strummed away on the lute [_gusli_].

Then there crept a mouse out of a hole, and said to him in a

human voice:

"Save yourself, Prince. Run away quick! your sister has

gone to sharpen her teeth."

Prince Ivan fled from the room, jumped on his horse, and

galloped away back. Meantime the mouse kept running over

the strings of the lute. They twanged, and the sister never

guessed that her brother was off. When she had sharpened

her teeth she burst into the room. Lo and behold! not a soul

was there, nothing but the mouse bolting into its hole! The

witch waxed wroth, ground her teeth like anything, and set off

in pursuit.

Prince Ivan heard a loud noise and looked back. There was

his sister chasing him. So he waved his handkerchief, and a

deep lake lay behind him. While the witch was swimming across

the water, Prince Ivan got a long way ahead. But on she came

faster than ever; and now she was close at hand! Vertodub

guessed that the Prince was trying to escape from his sister.

So he began tearing up oaks and strewing them across the road.

A regular mountain did he pile up! there was no passing by for

the witch! So she set to work to clear the way. She gnawed,

and gnawed, and at length contrived by hard work to bore her

way through; but by this time Prince Ivan was far ahead.

On she dashed in pursuit, chased and chased. Just a little

more, and it would be impossible for him to escape! But Vertogor

spied the witch, laid hold of the very highest of all the mountains,

pitched it down all of a heap on the road, and flung

another mountain right on top of it. While the witch was

climbing and clambering, Prince Ivan rode and rode, and found

himself a long way ahead. At last the witch got across the

mountain, and once more set off in pursuit of her brother. By-and-by

she caught sight of him, and exclaimed:

"You sha'n't get away from me this time!" And now she is

close, now she is just going to catch him!

At that very moment Prince Ivan dashed up to the abode of

the Sun's Sister and cried:

"Sun, Sun! open the window!"

The Sun's Sister opened the window, and the Prince bounded

through it, horse and all.

Then the witch began to ask that her brother might be given

up to her for punishment. The Sun's Sister would not listen

to her, nor would she give him up. Then the witch said:

"Let Prince Ivan be weighed against me, to see which is the

heavier. If I am, then I will eat him; but if he is, then let him

kill me!"

This was done. Prince Ivan was the first to get into one of

the scales; then the witch began to get into the other. But no

sooner had she set foot in it than up shot Prince Ivan in the air,

and that with such force that he flew right up into the sky, and

into the chamber of the Sun's Sister.

But as for the Witch-Snake, she remained down below on

earth.

[The word _terem_ (plural _terema_) which occurs twice

in this story (rendered the second time by "chamber")

deserves a special notice. It is defined by Dahl, in

its antique sense, as "a raised, lofty habitation, or

part of one--a Boyar's castle--a Seigneur's house--the

dwelling-place of a ruler within a fortress," &c. The

"terem of the women," sometimes styled "of the girls,"

used to comprise the part of a Seigneur's house, on

the upper floor, set aside for the female members of

his family. Dahl compares it with the Russian

_tyurma_, a prison, and the German _Thurm_. But it

seems really to be derived from the Greek +teremnon+,

"anything closely shut fast or closely covered, a

room, chamber," &c.

That part of the story which refers to the Cannibal

Princess is familiar to the Modern Greeks. In the

Syriote tale of "The Strigla" (Hahn, No. 65) a

princess devours her father and all his subjects. Her

brother, who had escaped while she was still a babe,

visits her and is kindly received. But while she is

sharpening her teeth with a view towards eating him, a

mouse gives him a warning which saves his life. As in

the Russian story the mouse jumps about on the strings

of a lute in order to deceive the witch, so in the

Greek it plays a fiddle. But the Greek hero does not

leave his sister's abode. After remaining concealed

one night, he again accosts her. She attempts to eat

him, but he kills her.

In a variant from Epirus (Hahn, ii. p. 283-4) the

cannibal princess is called a Chursusissa. Her brother

climbs a tree, the stem of which she gnaws almost

asunder. But before it falls, a Lamia comes to his aid

and kills his sister.

Afanasief (viii. p. 527) identifies the Sun's Sister

with the Dawn. The following explanation of the skazka

(with the exception of the words within brackets) is

given by A. de Gubernatis ("Zool. Myth." i. 183).

"Ivan is the Sun, the aurora [or dawn] is his [true]

sister; at morning, near the abode of the aurora, that

is, in the east, the shades of night [his witch, or

false sister] go underground, and the Sun arises to

the heavens; this is the mythical pair of scales. Thus

in the Christian belief, St. Michael weighs human

souls; those who weigh much sink down into hell, and

those who are light arise to the heavenly paradise."]

As an illustration of this story, Afanasief (_P.V.S._ iii. 272) quotes

a Little-Russian Skazka in which a man, who is seeking "the Isle in

which there is no death," meets with various personages like those

with whom the Prince at first wished to stay on his journey, and at

last takes up his abode with the moon. Death comes in search of him,

after a hundred years or so have elapsed, and engages in a struggle

with the Moon, the result of which is that the man is caught up into

the sky, and there shines thenceforth "as a star near the moon."

The Sun's Sister is a mythical being who is often mentioned in the

popular poetry of the South-Slavonians. A Servian song represents a

beautiful maiden, with "arms of silver up to the elbows," sitting on a

silver throne which floats on water. A suitor comes to woo her. She

waxes wroth and cries,

Whom wishes he to woo?

The sister of the Sun,

The cousin of the Moon,

The adopted-sister of the Dawn.

Then she flings down three golden apples, which the

"marriage-proposers" attempt to catch, but "three lightnings flash

from the sky" and kill the suitor and his friends.

In another Servian song a girl cries to the Sun--

O brilliant Sun! I am fairer than thou,

Than thy brother, the bright Moon,

Than thy sister, the moving star [Venus?].

In South-Slavonian poetry the sun often figures as a radiant youth.

But among the Northern Slavonians, as well as the Lithuanians, the sun

was regarded as a female being, the bride of the moon. "Thou askest me

of what race, of what family I am," says the fair maiden of a song

preserved in the Tambof Government--

My mother is--the beauteous Sun,

And my father--the bright Moon;

My brothers are--the many Stars,

And my sisters--the white Dawns.[223]

A far more detailed account might be given of the Witch and her near

relation the Baba Yaga, as well as of those masculine embodiments of

that spirit of evil which is personified in them, the Snake, Koshchei,

and other similar beings. But the stories which have been quoted will

suffice to give at least a general idea of their moral and physical

attributes. We will now turn from their forms, so constantly

introduced into the skazka-drama, to some of the supernatural figures

which are not so often brought upon the stage--to those mythical

beings of whom (numerous as may be the traditions about them) the

regular "story" does not so often speak, to such personifications of

abstract ideas as are less frequently employed to set its conventional

machinery in motion.

FOOTNOTES:

[72] "Songs of the Russian People," pp. 160-185.

[73] In one story (Khudyakof, No. 117) there are snakes with

twenty-eight and twenty-nine heads, but this is unusual.

[74] Afanasief, ii. No. 30. From the Chernigof Government. The accent

falls on the second syllable of Ivan, on the first of Popyalof.

[75] _Popyal_, provincial word for _pepel_ = ashes, cinders, whence

the surname Popyalof. A pood is about 40lbs.

[76] On slender supports.

[77] _Pod mostom_, _i.e._, says Afanasief (vol. v. p. 243), under the

raised flooring which, in an _izba_, serves as a sleeping place.

[78] _Zatvelyef_, apparently a provincial word.

[79] The Russian word _krof_ also signifies blood.

[80] The last sentence of the story forms one of the conventional and

meaningless "tags" frequently attached to the skazkas. In future I

shall omit them. Kuzma and Demian (SS. Cosmas and Damian) figure in

Russian folk-lore as saintly and supernatural smiths, frequently at

war with snakes, which they maltreat in various ways. See A. de

Gubernatis, "Zoological Mythology," vol. ii. p. 397.

[81] Afanasief, Skazki, vol. vii. p. 3.

[82] _Chudo_ = prodigy. _Yudo_ may be a remembrance of Judas, or it

may be used merely for the sake of the rhyme.

[83] In an Indian story ("Kathasaritsagara," book vii. chap. 42),

Indrasena comes to a place in which sits a Rakshasa on a throne

between two fair ladies. He attacks the demon with a magic sword, and

soon cuts off his head. But the head always grows again, until at last

the younger of the ladies gives him a sign to split in half the head

he has just chopped off. Thereupon the demon dies, and the two ladies

greet the conqueror rapturously. The younger is the demon's sister,

the elder is a king's daughter whom the demon has carried off from her

home, after eating her father and all his followers. See Professor

Brockhaus's summary in the "Berichte der phil. hist. Classe der K.

Saechs. Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften," 1861. pp. 241-2.

[84] Khudyakof, No. 46.

[85] Afanasief, vol. i. No. 6. From the Chernigof Government. The

_Norka-Zvyer'_ (Norka-Beast) of this story is a fabulous creature, but

zoologically the name of Norka (from _nora_ = a hole) belongs to the

Otter.

[86] Literally "into _that_ world" as opposed to this in which we

live.

[87] This address is a formula, of frequent occurrence under similar

circumstances.

[88] Literally "seated the maidens and pulled the rope."

[89] Some sort of safe or bin.

[90] Khudyakof, ii. p. 17.

[91] "Kathasaritsagara," bk. vii. c. xxxix. Wilson's translation.

[92] Genesis, xxxvii. 3, 4.

[93] "Zoological Mythology," i. 25.

[94] Quoted from the "Nitimanjari," by Wilson, in his translation of

the "Rig-Veda-Sanhita," vol. i. p. 142.

[95] See also Juelg's "Kalmukische Maerchen," p. 19, where Massang, the

Calmuck Minotaur, is abandoned in the pit by his companions.

[96] Khudyakof, No. 42.

[97] Erlenvein, No. 41. A king's horses disappear. His youngest son

keeps watch and discovers that the thief is a white wolf. It escapes

into a hole. He kills his horse at its own request and makes from its

hide a rope by which he is lowered into the hole, etc.

[98] Afanasief, v. 54.

[99] The word _koshchei_, says Afanasief, may fairly be derived from

_kost'_, a bone, for changes between _st_ and _shch_ are not

uncommon--as in the cases of _pustoi_, waste, _pushcha_, a wild wood,

or of _gustoi_, thick, _gushcha_, sediment, etc. The verb

_okostenyet'_, to grow numb, describes the state into which a skazka

represents the realm of the "Sleeping Beauty," as being thrown by

Koshchei. Buslaef remarks in his "Influence of Christianity on

Slavonic Language," p. 103, that one of the Gothic words used by

Ulfilas to express the Greek +daimonion+ is _skohsl_, which "is purely

Slavonic, being preserved in the Czekh _kauzlo_, sorcery; in the

Lower-Lusatian-Wendish, _kostlar_ means a sorcerer. (But see Grimm's

"Deutsche Mythologie," pp. 454-5, where _skohsl_ is supposed to mean a

forest-sprite, also p. 954.) _Kost'_ changes into _koshch_ whence our

Koshchei." There is also a provincial word, _kostit'_, meaning to

revile or scold.

[100] _Bezsmertny_ (_bez_ = without, _smert'_ = death).

[101] Afanasief, viii. No. 8. _Morevna_ means daughter of _More_, (the

Sea or any great water).

[102] _Grom._ It is the thunder, rather than the lightning, which the

Russian peasants look upon as the destructive agent in a storm. They

let the flash pass unheeded, but they take the precaution of crossing

themselves when the roar follows.

[103] _Zamorskaya_, from the other side of the water, strange,

splendid.

[104] In Afanasief, iv. No. 39, a father marries his three daughters to

the Sun, the Moon, and the Raven. In Hahn, No. 25, a younger brother

gives his sisters in marriage to a Lion, a Tiger, and an Eagle, after

his elder brothers have refused to do so. By their aid he recovers his

lost bride. In Schott, No. 1 and Vuk Karajich, No. 5, the three sisters

are carried off by Dragons, which their subsequently-born brother

kills. (See also Basile, No. 33, referred to by Hahn, and Valjavec, p.

1, Stier, No. 13, and Bozena Nemcova, pp. 414-432, and a German story

in Musaeus, all referred to by Afanasief, viii. p. 662.)

[105] See Chap. IV.

[106] "Being by the advice of her father Haereeth given in marriage to

Offa, she left off her violent practices; and accordingly she appears

in Hygelac's court, exercising the peaceful duties of a princess. Now

this whole representation can hardly be other than the modern,

altered, and Christian one of a Waelcyrie or Swan-Maiden; and almost in

the same words the Nibelungen Lied relates of Brynhild, the flashing

shield-may of the Edda, that with her virginity she lost her mighty

strength and warlike habits."--Kemble's Beowulf, p. xxxv.

[107] Khudyakof, ii, p. 90.

[108] Khudyakof, No. 20.

[109] Afanasief, i. No. 14.

[110] Khudyakof, No. 62.

[111] Erlenvein, No. 31.

[112] Afanasief, ii. No. 24. From the Perm Government.

[113] A conventional expression of contempt which frequently occurs in

the Skazkas.

[114] _Do chugunnova kamnya_, to an iron stone.

[115] "_Russkaya kost'._" I have translated literally, but the words

mean nothing more than "a man," "something human." Cf. Radloff, iii.

III. 301.

[116] _Bog prostit_ = God will forgive. This sounds to the English ear

like an ungracious reply, but it is the phrase ordinarily used by a

superior when an inferior asks his pardon. Before taking the sacrament

at Easter, the servants in a Russian household ask their employers to

forgive them for any faults of which they may have been guilty. "God

will forgive," is the proper reply.

[117] Khudyakof, No. 43.

[118] _Vikhor'_ (_vit'_ = to whirl), an agent often introduced for the

purpose of abduction. The sorcerers of the present day are supposed to

be able to direct whirlwinds, and a not uncommon form of imprecation

in some parts of Russia is "May the whirlwind carry thee off!" See

Afanasief, _P.V.S._ i. 317, and "Songs of the Russian People," p. 382.

[119] This story is very like that of the "Rider of Grianaig," "Tales

of the West Highlands," iii. No. 58.

[120] Cf. Herodotus, bk. iv. chap. 172.

[121] Khudyakof, No. 44.

[122] Erlenvein, No. 12, p. 67. A popular tradition asserts that the

Devil may be killed if shot with an egg laid on Christmas Eve. See

Afanasief, _P.V.S._ ii. 603.

[123] Afanasief, i. No. 14, p. 92. For an account of Buyan, see "Songs

of the Russian People," p. 374.

[124] Afanasief, vii. No. 6, p. 83.

[125] Some of these have been compared by Mr. Cox, in his "Mythology

of the Aryan Nations," i. 135-142. Also by Professor A. de Gubernatis,

who sees in the duck the dawn, in the hare "the moon sacrificed in the

morning," and in the egg the sun. "Zoological Mythology," i. 269.

[126] Asbjoernsen and Moe, No. 36, Dasent, No. 9, p. 71.

[127] Asbjoernsen's "New Series," No. 70, p. 39.

[128] Haltrich's "Deutsche Volksmaerchen aus dem Sachsenlande in

Siebenbuergen," p. 188.

[129] Wenzig's "Westslawischer Maerchenschatz," No. 37, p. 190.

[130] Campbell's "Tales of the West Highlands," i. No. 4, p. 81.

[131] Hahn, No. 26, i. 187.

[132] Ibid., vol. ii. pp. 215, 294-5.

[133] Vuk Karajich, No. 8. The monster is called in the Servian text

an _Ajdaya_, a word meaning a dragon or snake. It is rendered by

_Drache_ in the German translation of his collection of tales made by

his daughter, but the word is evidently akin to the Sanskrit _ahi_,

the Greek +echir echidna+, the Latin _anguis_, the Russian _ujak_, the

Luthanian _angis_, etc. The Servian word _snaga_ answers to the

Russian _sila_, strength.

[134] Miss Frere's "Old Deccan Days," pp. 13-16.

[135] Castren's "Ethnologische Vorlesungen ueber die Altaischen

Voelker," p. 174.

[136] The story has been translated by M. de Rouge in the "Revue

Archeologique," 1852-3, p. 391 (referred to by Professor Benfey,

"Panchatantra," i. 426) and summarized by Mr. Goodwin in the

"Cambridge Essays" for 1858, pp. 232-7, and by Dr. Mannhardt in the

"Zeitschrift fuer deutsche Mythologie," &c., vol. iv. pp. 232-59. For

other versions of the story of the Giant's heart, or Koshchei's death,

see Professor R. Koehler's remarks on the subject in "Orient und

Occident," ii. pp. 99-103. A singular parallel to part of the Egyptian

myth is offered by the Hottentot story in which the heart of a girl

whom a lion has killed and eaten, is extracted from the lion, and

placed in a calabash filled with milk. "The calabash increased in

size, and in proportion to this, the girl grew again inside it."

Bleek's "Reynard the Fox in South Africa," p. 55. Cf. Radloff, i. 75;

ii. 237-8, 532-3.

[137] Khudyakof, No. 109.

[138] Khudyakof, No. 110.

[139] Afanasief, v. No. 42. See also the _Zagovor_, or spell, "to give

a good youth a longing for a fair maiden," ("Songs of the Russian

People," p. 369,) in which "the Longing" is described as lying under a

plank in a hut, weeping and sobbing, and "waiting to get at the white

light," and is desired to gnaw its way into the youth's heart.

[140] For stories about house snakes, &c., see Grimm "Deutsche

Mythologie," p. 650, and Tylor, "Primitive Culture," ii. pp. 7,

217-220.

[141] Or _Ujak_. Erlenvein, No. 2. From the Tula Government.

[142] Grimm, "Deutsche Mythologie," 456. For a description of the

Rusalka and the Vodyany, see "Songs of the Russian People," pp.

139-146.

[143] Afanasief, v. No. 23. From the Voroneje Government.

[144] Three of the well-known servants of Fortunatus. The eater-up

(_ob'egedat'_ = to devour), the drinker-up (_pit'_ = to drink,

_opivat'sya_, to drink oneself to death), and "Crackling Frost."

[145] _Opokhmyelit'sya_, which may be rendered, "in order to drink off

the effects of the debauch."

[146] The Russian bath somewhat resembles the Turkish. The word here

translated "to scrub," properly means to rub and flog with the soft

twig used in the baths for that purpose. At the end of the ceremonies

attended on a Russian peasant wedding, the young couple always go to

the bath.

[147] A sort of pudding or jelly.

[148] Afanasief, v. No. 28. In the preceding story, No. 27, the king

makes no promise. He hides his children in (or upon) a pillar, hoping

to conceal them from a devouring bear, whose fur is of iron. The bear

finds them and carries them off. A horse and some geese vainly attempt

their rescue; a bull-calf succeeds, as in the former case. In another

variant the enemy is an iron wolf. A king had promised his children a

wolf. Unable to find a live one, he had one made of iron and gave it

to his children. After a time it came to life and began destroying all

it found, etc. An interesting explanation of the stories of this class

in which they are treated as nature-myths, is given by A. de

Gubernatis in his "Zoological Mythology," chap. i. sect. 4.

[149] Khudyakof, No. 17.

[150] It has already been observed that the word _chudo_, which now

means a marvel or prodigy, formerly meant a giant.

[151] Erlenvein, No. 6, pp. 30-32. The Russian word _idol_ is

identical with our own adaptation of +eidolou+.

[152] Khudyakof, No. 18.

[153] _Zhidenok_, strictly the cub of a _zhid_, a word which properly

means a Jew, but is used here for a devil.

[154] Khudyakof, No. 118.

[155] _Chort_, a word which, as has been stated, sometimes means a

demon, sometimes the Devil.

[156] Afanasief, viii. p. 343.

[157] "Old Deccan Days," pp. 34-5. Compare with the conduct of the

Cobra's daughter that of Angaraka, the daughter of the Daitya who,

under the form of a wild boar, is chased underground by Chandasena.

Brockhaus's "Maehrchensammlung des Somadeva Bhatta," 1843, vol. i. pp.

110-13.

[158] "Panchatantra," v. 10.

[159] Upham's "Sacred and Historical Books of Ceylon," iii. 287.

[160] Afanasief says (_P.V.S._ iii. 588), "As regards the word _yaga_

(_yega_, Polish _jedza_, _jadza_, _jedzi-baba_, Slovak, _jenzi_,

_jenzi_, _jezi-baba_, Bohemian, _jezinka_, Galician _yazya_) it

answers to the Sanskrit _ahi_ = snake."

Shchepkin (in his work on "Russian Fable-lore," p. 109) says: "_Yaga_,

instead of _yagaya_, means properly noisy, scolding, and must be

connected with the root _yagat'_ = to brawl, to scold, still preserved

in Siberia. The accuracy of this etymology is confirmed by the use, in

the speech of the common people, of the designation _Yaga Baba_ for a

quarrelsome, scolding old woman."

Kastorsky, in his "Slavonic Mythology," p. 138, starts a theory of his

own. "The name _Yaga Baba_, I take to be _yakaya baba_, _nycyakaya

baba_, and I render it by _anus quaedam_." Bulgarin (Rossiya, ii. 322)

refers the name to a Finnish root. According to him, "_Jagga-lema_, in

Esthonian, means to quarrel or brawl, _jagga-lemine_ means quarrelling

or brawling." There is some similarity between the Russian form of the

word, and the Singalese name for a (male) demon, _yaka_, which is

derived from the Pali _yakkho_, as is the synonymous term _yakseya_

from the Sanskrit _yaksha_ (see the valuable paper on Demonology in

Ceylon by Dandris de Silva Gooneratne Modliar in the "Journal of the

Ceylon Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society," 1865-6). Some Slavonic

philologists derive _yaga_ from a root meaning to eat (in Russian

_yest'_). This corresponds with the derivation of the word _yaksha_

contained in the following legend: "The Vishnu Pur[=a]na, i. 5,

narrates that they (the Yakshas) were produced by Brahm[=a] as beings

emaciate with hunger, of hideous aspect, and with long beards, and

that, crying out 'Let us eat,' they were denominated Yakshas (fr.

_jaksh_, to eat)." Monier Williams's "Sanskrit Dictionary," p. 801. In

character the Yaga often resembles a Rakshasi.

[161] Afanasief, i. No. 3 b. From the Voroneje Government.

[162] Khudyakof, No. 60.

[163] See Grimm, _KM._ iii. 97-8. Cf. R. Koehler in "Orient und

Occident," ii. 112.

[164] Grimm, No. 79. "Die Wassernixe."

[165] Asbjoernsen and Moe, No. 14. Dasent, p. 362. "The Widow's Son."

[166] Hahn, No. 1.

[167] Campbell's "Tales of the West Highlands," No. 2.

[168] Toeppen's "Aberglauben aus Masuren," p. 146.

[169] Miss Frere's "Old Deccan Days," p. 63.

[170] "Kathasaritsagara," vii. ch. xxxix. Translated by Wilson,

"Essays," ii. 137. Cf. Brockhaus in the previously quoted "Berichte,"

1861, p. 225-9. For other forms, see R. Koehler in "Orient and

Occident," vol. ii. p. 112.

[171] See, however, Mr. Campbell's remarks on this subject, in "Tales

of the West Highlands," i. pp. lxxvii-lxxxi.

[172] Afanasief, viii. No. 6.

[173] See the third tale, of the "Siddhi Kuer," Juelg's "Kalm. Maerchen,"

pp. 17-19.

[174] Schleicher's "Litauische Maerchen," No. 39. (I have given an

analysis of the story in the "Songs of the Russian People," p. 101.)

In the variant of the story in No. 38, the comrades are the hero

Martin, a smith, and a tailor. Their supernatural foe is a small gnome

with a very long beard. He closely resembles the German "Erdmaenneken"

(Grimm, No. 91), and the "Maennchen," in "Der starke Hans" (Grimm, No.

166.)

[175] Hahn, No. 11. Schleicher, No. 20, &c., &c.

[176] Wenzig, No. 2.

[177] "Tales of the West Highlands," ii. p. 15. Mr. Campbell says "I

believe such a mode of torture can be traced amongst the

Scandinavians, who once owned the Western Islands." But the Gaelic

"Binding of the Three Smalls," is unknown to the Skazkas.

[178] Erlenvein, No. 3.

[179] Afanasief, vii. No. 30.

[180] Khudyakof, No. 97.

[181] Khudyakof, No. 14. Erlenvein, No. 9.

[182] Afanasief, iv. No. 44.

[183] The first _krasavitsa_ or beauty.

[184] _Chulanchik._ The _chulan_ is a kind of closet, generally used

as a storeroom for provisions, &c.

[185] _Prigovarivaya_, the word generally used to express the action

of a person who utters a charm accompanied by a gesture of the hand or

finger.

[186] Became a _nevyesta_, a word meaning "a marriageable maiden," or

"a betrothed girl," or "a bride."

[187] _Ishbushka_, a little _izba_ or cottage.

[188] "Phu, Phu! there is a Russian smell!" the equivalent of our own

"Fee, faw, fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman!"

[189] _Luchina_, a deal splinter used instead of a candle.

[190] _Chernushka_, a sort of wild pea.

[191] _Krasnoe solnuischko_, red (or fair) dear-sun.

[192] Equivalent to saying "she liked to wash her dirty linen at

home."

[193] I break off the narrative at this point, because what follows is

inferior in dramatic interest, and I am afraid of diminishing the

reader's admiration for one of the best folk-tales I know. But I give

an epitome of the remainder within brackets and in small type.

[194] From the Poltava Government. Afanasief, vi. No. 28 _b_.

[195] Grimm, No. 65. The Wallachian and Lithuanian forms resemble the

German (Schott, No. 3. Schleicher, No. 7). In all of them, the heroine

is a princess, who runs away from an unnatural father. In one of the

Modern Greek versions (Hahn, No. 27), she sinks into the earth. For

references to seven other forms of the story, see Grimm, _KM._, iii.

p. 116. In one Russian variant (Khudyakof, No. 54), she hides in a

secret drawer, constructed for the purpose in a bedstead; in another

(Afanasief, vi. No. 28 _a_), her father, not recognising her in the

pig-skin dress, spits at her, and turns her out of the house. In a

third, which is of a very repulsive character (ibid. vii. No. 29), the

father kills his daughter.

[196] Afanasief, vi. No. 18.

[197] The Russian word is _zakukovali_, _i.e._, "They began to

cuckoo." The resemblance between the word _kukla_, a puppet, and the

name and cry of the cuckoo (_Kukushka_) may be merely accidental, but

that bird has a marked mythological character. See the account of the

rite called "the Christening of the Cuckoos," in "Songs of the Russian

people," p. 215.

[198] Very like these puppets are the images which reply for the

sleeping prince in the opening scene of "De beiden Kuenigeskinner"

(Grimm, No. 113). A doll plays an important part in one of

Straparola's stories (Night v. Fable 2). Professor de Gubernatis

identifies the Russian puppet with "the moon, the Vedic Raka, very

small, but very intelligent, enclosed in the wooden dress, in the

forest of night," "Zoological Mythology," i. 207-8.

[199] Afanasief, ii. No. 31.

[200] Khudyakof, No. 55.

[201] Ibid., No. 83.

[202] Wojcicki's "Polnische Volkssagen," &c. Lewestam's translation,

iii. No. 8.

[203] The germ of all these repulsive stories about incestuous unions,

proposed but not carried out, was probably a nature myth akin to that

alluded to in the passage of the Rigveda containing the dialogue

between Yama and Yami--"where she (the night) implores her brother

(the day) to make her his wife, and where he declines her offer

because, as he says, 'they have called it sin that a brother should

marry his sister.'" Max Mueller, "Lectures," sixth edition, ii. 557.

[204] Afanasief, vii. No. 18.

[205] Her name _Vyed'ma_ comes from a Slavonic root _ved_, answering

to the Sanskrit _vid_--from which springs an immense family of words

having reference to knowledge. _Vyed'ma_ and _witch_ are in fact

cousins who, though very distantly related, closely resemble each

other both in appearance and in character.

[206] Afanasief, i. No. 4 _a_. From the Voroneje Government.

[207] Ivashko and Ivashechko, are caressing diminutives of Ivan.

[208] "Some storytellers," says Afanasief, "substitute the word snake

(_zmei_) in the Skazka for that of witch (_vyed'ma_)."

[209] Diminutive of Elena.

[210] _Gusi--lebedi_, geese--swans.

[211] Afanasief, i. No. 4.

[212] Kulish, ii. 17.

[213] Khudyakof, No. 53.

[214] Ibid. No. 52.

[215] The demonism of Ceylon "represents demons as having _human_

fathers and mothers, and as being born in the ordinary course of

nature. Though born of human parents, all their qualities are

different from those of men. They leave their parents sometime after

their birth, but before doing so, they generally take care to try

their demoniac powers on them." "Demonology and Witchcraft in Ceylon,"

by Dandris de Silva Gooneratne Modliar. "Journal of Ceylon Branch of

Royal Asiatic Society," 1865-6, p. 17.

[216] Afanasief, vi. No. 57. From the Ukraine.

[217] "Whither [his] eyes look."

[218] Vertodub, the Tree-extractor (_vertyet'_ = to twirl, _dub_ =

tree or oak) is the German _Baumdreher_ or _Holzkrummacher_;

_Vertogor_ the Mountain leveller (_gora_ = mountain) answers to the

_Steinzerreiber_ or _Felsenkripperer_.

[219] Why are you just now so _zaplakannoi_ or blubbered.

(_Zalplakat'_, or _plakat'_ = to cry.)

[220] _Otkuda ni vzyalis._

[221] _Vidimo--nevidimo_, visibly--invisibly.

[222] _Zashumyeli_, they began to produce a _shum_ or noise.

[223] Afanasief, _P.V.S._, i. 80-84. In the Albanian story of "The

Serpent Child," (Hahn, No. 100), the heroine, the wife of the man whom

forty snake-sloughs encase, is assisted in her troubles by two

subterranean beings whom she finds employed in baking. They use their

hands instead of shovels, and clean out the oven with their breasts.

They are called "Sisters of the Sun."