“I am called Little Ilija, sir,” said he; “my father is Ivan, and I was born in the town of Murom, near to Katatscharowa.”
The prince next asked him by what road he had come.
“From Murom I rode to Tschernigof, and there I slew a great host of pagans and saved the city. From that place I came here. I have taken prisoner the famous Robber Nightingale, and I have brought him here bound to my stirrup.”
Then the prince grew angry, and said—
“Why do you try to deceive me?”
However, he sent two knights, Alescha Popowitsch and Dobrinja Nikititsch, to see if it was as Ilija said; and when they told the prince that it was true, he was pleased, gave the young man some drink, and desired to hear the robber’s whistle. Ilija, the Muromer, therefore wrapped up the prince and the princess under his cloak, lined with sable, put them under his arm, and then told the Robber Nightingale to blow his whistle gently. He blew, however, so loud that he deafened all the knights and they fell on the floor, and Ilija, the Muromer, was so enraged that he killed him there and then.
Ilija became very friendly with Dobrinja Nikititsch, and, saddling their good horses, they rode away together, and travelled for three months without meeting with any adversary. Then they came up with a cripple. His beggar’s cloak weighed fifty pounds, his hat nine pounds, and his crutch was six feet long. Ilija, the Muromer, rode up to him and began to try his courage, but the cripple addressing him said—
“Ah! Ilija, the Muromer, do you not know me? Do you not remember how we learnt lessons in the same school? Will you fall on me, a poor cripple? Do you know that there is great distress in the famous town of Kiev? A powerful infidel knight, a godless idolater, has come there. His head is as big as a beer-barrel, his eyebrows are a span apart, and his shoulders are six feet across. He eats an ox at a meal, and drinks a cask of beer at a time. The Prince is sore troubled at your absence.”
Then Ilija, the Muromer, put on the cripple’s cloak and rode off to Kiev. He went to the palace, and cried with all his might—