The King of Tarakan grew angry. He ordered his soldiers to go over the whole kingdom and lay waste the villages and burn the corn and kill the cattle.
“If you won’t do what I tell you,” he said, “I will punish you all.”
The soldiers were frightened and began to carry out the King’s commands. They burnt the houses and corn and killed the cattle. The fools made no resistance, they only wept. The old men wept and the old women and the little children.
“Why do you treat us like this?” they said. “Why do you waste the good things? If you want them, why not take them?”
And the soldiers grew to loathe their work. They refused to go further and the troops dispersed.
XII
And the old Devil went away, having failed to bring Ivan to reason by means of the soldiers.
The old Devil changed himself into a clean gentleman and came to live in Ivan’s kingdom, hoping to ruin Ivan by money, as he had done Taras.
“I want to do you good and teach you common sense,” he said. “I will build myself a house in your midst and open an establishment.”
“Very well,” the people said; “you can live here.”