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Rh will forgive this fault," he said to himself. "Perchance she may yet give me sons fit for a Tzar."

He returned at length to his Tzardom, and lived with his wife happily as before, till there was held a great hunt on the open steppe, and he rode away to kill wild geese and swans. And scarce had he been gone three days, when two more sons were born to his wife, the Tzaritza Marfa—such lovely babes that one could not look sufficiently at them,—and each had legs golden to the knee, arms silver to the elbow, and little stars in his hair clustering close together.

The Tzaritza sent in haste for a nurse, and the servant, as it happened, met on his way the old witch. "Where dost thou haste so fast?" she asked him.

"Not far," he replied.

"Tell me instantly," said the Baba-Yaga, grinding her teeth, "or it will be the worse for thee!"

"Well," said the servant, "if thou must know, I go to fetch a nurse to the Palace, for two hero-sons have just been born to our mistress, the Tzaritza."

"Take me as nurse," commanded the witch.

"That I dare not," the servant replied, "lest the Tzar, on his return, strike my head from off my shoulders."