"Do not touch it, Iván Tsarévich," the lioness said; "at some time or other I shall be of service to you."
"Very well; it shall be as you will."
So he went on hungry, and he went on and on and on, and at last he reached the house of the Bába Yagá. Round the house there were twelve poles, and on eleven of the poles there were the skulls of men: only one as yet was untenanted.
"Hail, bábushka!" he said.
"Hail, Iván Tsarévich!" she replied: "what have you come for? By your own good will or for need?"
"I have come to earn of you a knightly horse."
"Very well, Iván Tsarévich: you are to serve me not one year, but only three days. If you can guard my mares, I will give you a knightly horse; if you cannot, do not be angry, but your head must also lie on the last of the stakes."
Iván Tsarévich agreed, and Bába Yagá gave him drink and food and bade him set to work. As soon as ever he had driven the mares into the field, they all turned their tails and ran in the meadows so far that the Tsarévich could not trace them with his eyes: and thus they were all lost. Then he sat down and wept, and became melancholy, and sat down on a stone and went to sleep.
The sun was already setting when the sea-bird flew to him, woke him up and said, "Arise, Iván Tsarévich—all the mares have gone home."
The Tsarévich got up, turned back home; but Bába Yagá was angry with her mares. "Why have you all come home?"
"Why should we not come home? the birds flew down from every quarter of the sky and almost clawed out our eyes."
"Well, to-morrow do not stray in the meadows, but scatter into the dreamy forest."
So Iván Tsarévich passed that night; and next day
