“Turn about, roll about, having fed on Alenka’s flesh!”
Then the witch looked up and saw Ivashko, and immediately rushed at the oak on which Ivashko was seated, and began to gnaw away at it. And she gnawed, and gnawed, and gnawed, until at last she smashed two front teeth. Then she ran to a forge, and when she reached it she cried, “Smith, smith! make me some iron teeth; if you don’t I’ll eat you!”
So the smith forged her two iron teeth.
The witch returned and began gnawing the oak again.
She gnawed, and gnawed, and was just on the point of gnawing it through, when Ivashko jumped out of it into another tree which stood beside it. The oak that the witch had gnawed through fell down to the ground; but then she saw that Ivashko was sitting up in another tree, so she gnashed her teeth with spite and set to work afresh, to gnaw that tree also. She gnawed, and gnawed, and gnawed—broke two lower teeth, and ran off to the forge.
“Smith, smith!” she cried when she got there, “make me some iron teeth; if you don’t I’ll eat you!”
The smith forged two more iron teeth for her. She went back again, and once more began to gnaw the oak.
Ivashko didn’t know what he was to do now. He looked out, and saw that swans and geese[210] were flying by, so he called to them imploringly:
Oh, my swans and geese, Take me on your pinions, Bear me to my father and my mother,
To the cottage of my father and my mother,
There to eat, and drink, and live in comfort.
“Let those in the centre carry you,” said the birds.