Page:Tales and Legends from the Land of the Tzar.djvu/195

Rh when next we meet. Good-bye, and may good luck attend you and Princess Helen."

With these words the grey wolf disappeared.

Four days afterwards the prince, seated on the golden horse, with the princess in front of him, and the golden cassowary in the cage over his shoulders, came to his father's kingdom, where, as ill-luck would have it, he met his elder brothers in a field. In a fit of jealousy the wretches attacked him, leaving him for dead on the ground, and rode away, taking with them the princess, the cassowary and the horse.

In the meantime, breathless, immovable, and covered with blood, on a barren heath lay Prince John. Thus passed the whole day, and already the sun was beginning to set; the heath was dreary, not a soul was to be seen, the wild carrion crows, attended by their young, came flying round the prince. At this critical moment the grey wolf suddenly made his appearance, as though he had sprung up from the earth.

He had scented danger from afar and arrived just in time to save his beloved prince; another moment and it would have been too late. He foresaw what the crows wanted to do, and permitted them to approach the body. Hardly had they flown down upon the prince when the grey wolf seized them by their tails.

"Let us go, grey wolf, let us go!" croaked the crows.

"No, my friends," replied the wolf, "I shall not let you go until your young ones bring me the water of life and the water of death."