THE STORY OF UNLUCKY DANIEL. 121

a delight to look upon it. Then the Tsar went
a-hunting, and saw it swimming in the water, and it
was so close that he could touch it with his hand.
The Tsar took off his clothes and plunged into the
water after it, and it enticed him farther and farther
away from the shore. Then the drake swam towards
the spot where the Tsar had left his clothes, and
when it came up to them it changed into a man
and put them on, and behold! the man was Daniel.
Then he called to the Tsar: “Swim hither, swim
hither!” The Tsar swam up, but when he swam
ashore Daniel met and killed him, and after that he
went back to court in the Tsar’s clothes. Then all
the courtiers hailed him as the Tsar, but he said:
“Where is that damsel who was here just now ?”—
They brought her instantly before him. “ Well,” said
he to her, “thou hast been a second mother to me,
and now thou shalt be my second wife!” So he
lived with her and was happy, but he caused his first
wife to be tied to the tails of wild horses and torn to

picces in the endless steppes.