162 COSSACK FAIRY TALES.

off. The next morning the father got up again and
counted his trees, and another was gone. Then the
fool said: ‘Dad, let me go too!” But the father
said: “Oh, fool, fool, wherefore shouldst thou go?
Thy wise brethren have watched to no purpose, what
canst thou do?”—‘Hoity-toity!” said the fool;
“ oive me a oun, and Tl go all the same.” His father
wouldn’t give him a gun, so he took it, and went to
watch. He placed his gun across his knees and sat
down. He sat and sat, but nothing came, nothing
came; he got drowsy, was nodding off, when his gun
fell off his knees, and he awoke with a start and
watched more warily. At last he heard something
—and there stood the hog. It began to dig up
another tree, when he pulled the trigger and—bang!
His brothers heard the sound, came running up, were
quite amazed to see a dead boar lying there, and
said: “ What will become of us now ?’”—“ Let us.
kill him,” said the eldest brother, “and bury him
in that ditch, and say that we killed the hog.” So
they took and slew him, and buried him in’ the ditch,
and took the hog to their father, and said: “ While
we were watching, this hog came up and began

digging, so we killed him and have brought him

 

to you.”
One day a nobleman came by that way, and was
2
surprised to see a beautiful elder-bush growing out