The Tsar Sends for the Girl
The father went back to the tsar and told him what his daughter had said, and the tsar, seeing that the girl was wiser than himself, ordered that she should be brought before him. When she appeared the tsar asked her: “Can you guess what it is that can be heard at the greatest distance?” and the girl answered: “Your Majesty, there are two things: the thunder and the lie can be heard at the greatest distance!”
The astonished tsar grasped his beard, and, turning to his attendants, exclaimed: “Guess what my beard is worth?” Some said so much, others again so much; but the maiden observed to the tsar that none of his courtiers had guessed right. “His Majesty’s beard is worth as much as three summer rains,” she said. The tsar, more astonished than ever, said: “The maiden has guessed rightly!” Then he asked her to become his wife, for “I love you,” said he. The girl had become enamoured of the tsar, and she bowed low before him and said: “Your glorious Majesty! Let it be as you wish! But I pray that your Majesty may be graciously pleased to write with your own hand on a piece of parchment that should you or any of your courtiers ever be displeased with me, and in consequence banish me from the palace, I shall be allowed to take with me any one thing which I like best.”
The tsar gladly consented, wrote out this declaration and affixed his signature.
Some years passed by happily but there came at last a day when the tsar was offended with the tsarina and he said angrily: “You shall be no longer my wife, I command you to leave my palace!”
The tsarina answered dutifully: “O most glorious tsar, I will obey; permit me to pass but one night in the palace, and to-morrow I will depart.”
To this the tsar assented.
That evening, at supper, the tsarina mixed certain herbs in wine and gave the cup to the tsar, saying: “Drink, O most glorious tsar! And be of good cheer! I am to go away, but, believe me, I shall be happier than when I first met you!”
The tsar, having drunk the potion fell asleep. Then the tsarina who had a coach in readiness, placed the tsar in it and carried him off to her father’s cottage.
When his Majesty awoke next morning and saw that he was in a cottage, he exclaimed: “Who brought me here?”