IVAN AND THE DAUGHTER OF THE SUN. 183

So he cut down such an oak as his wife had told him
of, and she built a hut of the oak, for the overseer
had come and showed them a place where they might
build their hut. But when the overseer returned
home he praised loudly to his master the wife of this
Ivan. “She is such and such,” said he. ‘“ Fair she
may be,” replied the nobleman, “but she is another’s.”
—‘She need not be another's for long,” replied the
overseer. “Tbis Ivan is in our hands; let us send
him to see why it is the sun grows so red when he
sets.” —“ That's just the same as if you sent him to a
place from whence he can never return.”—‘* All the
better.”—Then they sent for Ivan, and gave him this
errand, and he returned home to his wife, weeping
bitterly. Then his wife asked him all about it, and
said: “ Well, I can tell thee all about the ways of the
sun, for I am the sun’s own daughter. So now [il
tell thee the whole matter. Go back to this noble-
man and say to him that the reason why the sun turns
so red as he sets is this: Just as the sun is going
down into the sea, three fair ladies rise out of it, and
it is the sight of them which makes him turn so red
all over!” So he went back and told them. “ Oh-
ho!” cried they, “if you can go as far as that, you
may now go a little further ;” so they told him to go
to bell and see how it was there. “Yes,” said his
wife, “I know the road that leads to hell also very