ly
one hundred doors, and descend a few steps after unlocking each. When
she had unlocked the last, she entered a vast cave, the roof of which
was supported by huge natural pillars of rock. Now this roof was the
under side of the bottom of the lake.

She then untwined the snake from her body, and held it by the tail high
above her. The hideous creature stretched up its head towards the roof
of the cavern, which it was just able to reach. It then began to move
its head backwards and forwards, with a slow oscillating motion, as if
looking for something. At the same moment the witch began to walk round
and round the cavern, coming nearer to the centre every circuit; while
the head of the snake described the same path over the roof that she did
over the floor, for she kept holding it up. And still it kept slowly
osculating. Round and round the cavern they went, ever lessening the
circuit, till at last the snake made a sudden dart, and clung to the
roof with its mouth.

"That's right, my beauty!" cried the princess; "drain it dry."

She let it go, left it hanging, and sat down on a great stone, with her
black cat, which had followed her all round the cave, by her side. Then
she began to knit and mutter awful words. The snake hung like a huge
leech, sucking at the stone; the cat stood with his back arched, and his
tail like a piece of cable, looking up at the snake; and the old woman
sat and knitted and muttered. Seven days and seven nights they remained
thus; when suddenly the serpent dropped from the roof as if exhausted,
and shrivelled up till it was again like a piece of dried seaweed. The
witch started to her feet, picked it up, put it in her pocket, and
looked up at the roof. One drop of water was trembling on the spot where
the snake had been sucking. As soon as she saw that, she turned and
fled, followed by her cat. Shutting the door in a terrible hurry, she
locked it, and having muttered some frightful words, sped to the next,
which also she locked and muttered over; and so with all the hundred
doors, till she arrived in her own cellar. Then she sat down on the
floor ready to faint, but listening with malicious delight to the
rushing of the water, which she could hear distinctly through all the
hundred doors.

But this was not enough. Now that she had tasted revenge, she lost her
patience. Without further measures, the lake would be too long in
disappearing. So the next night, with the last shred of the dying old