t already in the third month,
When a boy no more than knee-high,
He began to speak in thiswise:
"Presently when I am bigger,
And my body shall be stronger, 110
I'll avenge my father's slaughter,
And my mother's tears atone for."

This was heard by Untamoinen,
And he spoke the words which follow:
"He will bring my race to ruin,
Kalervo reborn is in him."
Thereupon the heroes pondered
And the old crones all considered
How to bring the boy to ruin,
So that death might come upon him. 120

Then they put him in a barrel,
In a barrel did they thrust him,
And they pushed it to the water,
Pushed it out upon the billows.

Then they went to look about them,
After two nights, after three nights,
If the boy had sunk in water,
Or had perished in the barrel.

In the waves he was not sunken,
Nor had perished in the barrel, 130
He had 'scaped from out the barrel,
And upon the waves was sitting,
In his hand a rod of copper,
At the end a line all silken,
And for lake-fish he was fishing,
As he floated on the water.
There was water in the lakelet,
Which perchance might fill two ladles,
Or if more exactly measured,
Partly was a third filled also. 140

Untamo again reflected,
"How can we o'ercome the infant,
That destruction come upon him,
And that death may overtake him?"

Then he bade his servants gather
First a large supply of birch-trees,
Pine-trees with their hundred needles,
Trees from which the pitch was oozing,
For the burning of the infant,
And for Kullervo's destruction. 150

So they gathered and collected
First a large supply of birch-trees,
Pine-trees with their hundred needles,
Trees from which the pitch was oozing,
And of bark a thousand sledgefuls,
Ash-trees, long a hundred fathoms.
Fire beneath the wood they kindled,
And the pyre began to crackle,
And the boy they cast upon it,
'Mid the glowing fire they cast him. 160
Burned the fire a day, a second,
Burning likewise on the third day,
When they went to look about them.
Knee-deep sat the boy in ashes,
In the embers to his elbows.
In his hand he held the coal-rake,
And was stirring up the fire,
And he raked the coals toge