Page:The Russian story book, containing tales from the song-cycles of Kiev and Novgorod and other early sources.djvu/332

 the granddaughter of three grandmothers, and the sister of nine brothers."

"Good youth," said the old woman, "I am nearly seventy years of age, but of Peerless Beauty I have never heard. But farther on the way lives my elder sister. Perhaps she knows." Then Ivan Tsarevich went out of the great house, and, after taking courteous leave of the old woman, rode far away across the open steppe. All day he rode, and as night was coming on he came to a second house as large as a town, with each room as large as a village. He dismounted from his horse, tied the bridle to a silver ring in the door-post, and asked an old woman whom he met in the first room if he might have a night's lodging. And here it happened as it had happened before, only the old woman was eighty years of age.

"Farther on the road," she said, "lives my elder sister and she has givers of answers. The first givers of answers are the fishes and other dwellers in the heaving restless sea; the second givers of answers are the wild beasts of the dark forests; and the third givers of answers are the birds of the open air. Whatever is in the whole white world is obedient to the will of my elder sister."

Once again Ivan Tsarevich set out and came to a house where he tied his horse to a golden ring, and was received by an old, old woman who screamed at him in a voice like a flock of peacocks:

"O you man of boldness, why have you tied your horse to a golden ring when an iron ring would be too good for you?"