“Wait a bit,” said the stepmother’s daughter, “I’ll wash and dress, and whiten myself and rouge myself, and then I’ll marry you.” And straightway she set to work washing and dressing—and she hastened and hurried to get all that done—she wanted so awfully to see herself decked out as a bride. By-and-by she was quite dressed—but the cock had not yet crowed.
“Well, maiden!” says he, “will you marry me now?”
“I’m quite ready,” says she.
Thereupon he tore her to pieces.[291]
There is one other of those personifications of natural forces which play an active part in the Russian tales, about which a few words may be said. It often happens that the heroine-stealer whom the hero of the story has to overcome is called, not Koshchei nor the Snake, but Vikhor,[292] the whirlwind. Here is a brief analysis of part of one of the tales in which this elementary abducer figures. There was a certain king, whose wife went out one day to walk in the garden. “Suddenly a gale (vyeter) sprang up. In the gale was the Vikhor-bird. Vikhor seized the Queen, and carried her off.” She left three sons, and they, when they came to man’s estate, said to their father—“Where is our mother? If she be dead, show us her grave; if she be living, tell us where to find her.”
“I myself know not where your mother is,” replied the King. “Vikhor carried her off.”
“Well then,” they said, “since Vikhor carried her off, and she is alive, give us your blessing. We will go in search of our mother.”
All three set out, but only the youngest, Prince Vasily, succeeded in climbing the steep hill, whereon stood the palace in which his mother and Vikhor lived. Entering it during Vikhor’s absence, the Prince made himself known to his mother, “who straightway gave him to eat, and concealed him in a distant apartment, hiding him behind a number of cushions, so that Vikhor might not easily discover him.” And she gave him these instructions. “If Vikhor comes, and begins quarrelling, don’t come forth, but if he takes to chatting, come forth and say, ‘Hail father!’ and seize hold of the little finger of his right hand, and wherever he flies do you go with him.”
Presently Vikhor came flying in, and addressed the Queen angrily. Prince Vasily remained concealed until his mother gave him a hint to come forth. This he did, and then greeted Vikhor, and caught hold of his right little finger. Vikhor tried to shake him off, flying first about the house and then out of it, but all in vain. At last Vikhor, after soaring on high, struck the ground, and fell to pieces, becoming a fine yellow sand. “But the little finger remained in the possession of Prince Vasily, who scraped together the sand and burnt it in the stove.”[293]