IVAN THE FOOL AND ST. PETERS FIFE. 229

parson had to go on dancing in the midst of the
prickly hedge till there were great weals and wounds
all over his body, and the red blood began to flow.
Then the parson saw he was in evil case, and shrieked
to his herdsman to leave off playing; but the herds-
man was so wrapped up in his music that he did not
hear him; but at last he looked in the direction of
the hedge, and when he saw the poor parson skipping
about like a lunatic, he stopped. The parson darted
away as fast as his legs could carry him towards the
village, and oh! what a sight he looked as he dashed
through the streets! The people didn’t know him,
and—scandalized that anybody should run about
in rags and tatters so that his whole body could
be seen—began to hoot him. Then the poor man
turned aside from the public road, crawled off
through the woods, and dashed off through the tall
reeds of the gardens, with the dogs after him. For
wherever he went they took him for. a robber, and
hounded on the dogs. At last the parson got home,
all rags and tatters, so that when his wife saw him
she did not know him, but called to the labourers :
“Help, help! here’s a robber, turn him out!” They
came rushing up with sticks and cudgels, but he
began talking to them, and at last they recognized
him, led him home, and he told his wife all about
Ivan. The parson’s wife was. so amazed she could