Richard Wilson

“ What I wish to have done I must do for myself. No matter; after all it was I myself who promised to find for the Terrible Tsar a bride who is ruddier than the sun, fairer than the moon, and whiter than snow." Nikita leapt from his horse, put his heroic hand to the paling and a full length of it lay upon the ground. Through the opening thus made the company rode boldly forward. On the green lawn before the great door of the castle they quietly set up their white gold-embroidered tents, ate a good meal, and then, lying down, slept soundly. But Nikita did not enter one of the tents. ”

“ When you put it on your head no man will be able to see you, for it is a cap of darkness." Nikita thanked the old man warmly, took the cap, and once more galloped on after his companions, whom he overtook after a short space of time. By-and-by they came to a castle which was surrounded by a stout iron paling through which there was no gateway.
"Well," said the Terrible Tsar, "what shall we do now? It is very plain, Nikita, that the people of this castle do not intend that any one should enter." ”

“ The staff fell into his outstretched hand, which never shook, and remained there firmly held.
"This will do," said Nikita. Thereupon he paid the men for their work, and rode off quickly after his companions. But as he rode onward he heard some one behind him lustily calling out his name, and turning in his saddle he saw the old man running quickly after him.
"Thanks, thanks, many thanks and more thanks again for your help," said the old man. "For thirty years I lay upon that anvil and was tortured by those fifty fiends. ”

“ Then she went off to her cottage and the restored men took their way to the city of the Terrible Tsar for Nikita had another bright idea. In a field outside the palace they found the Terrible Tsar herding pigs, whereupon Nikita began to blow on the whistle and the pigs began to dance, for their ancestors had come from the herd of the wicked Baba-Yaga. Yelena the Haughty Beauty saw what was happening from the window, but she did not laugh, for she was not a woman of that kind. ”

“ So the hero went back and told his mistress all that had happened.
"What is to be, must be," she said with outward graciousness. "I will go to meet this heroic bridegroom in a manner fitting to his warlike ways." So she summoned her heroic bodyguard, and, surrounded by these youths, who carried battle-bows in their hands, she walked proudly from the front door of the castle towards the tents of white linen standing upon her own green lawn. ”

“ But when the feast was over the haughty bride took the rule of the kingdom upon herself, and forced the Terrible Tsar to go out into the fields to herd the pigs! Then she gave orders that all the relatives of Nikita should be brought before her at the royal palace. Her soldiers found only one, Timothy, the brother of Nikita, and by order of the Terrible Tsaritza his eyes were put out and he was driven from the town into the green fields.
The blind man went on with his hands spread out before him, onward and ever onward until he came to the seashore and found the water beneath his feet. ”

“ This was a prize worth trying for, and before long the people of all the cities with their suburbs and towns with their villages, as well as the goose-herds, swan-herds, cow-herds, and keepers of downy ducks on the open steppe, were wagging their heads over the matter and counting up enormous numbers upon their finger-tips. ”