uggled like
anything, and broke the cord; then she went and sat down at
the threshold.

"Ah, villain!" she cried. "You sha'n't get away from me
now!"

He saw that he was in an evil plight again. There he sat,
thinking, "What's to be done?"

By-and-by the sheep came home from afield, and she drove
them into her cottage for the night. Well, the Smith spent the
night there, too. In the morning she got up to let the sheep
out. He took his sheep-skin pelisse and turned it inside out
so that the wool was outside, passed his arms through its
sleeves, and pulled it well over him, and crept up to her as
he had been a sheep. She let the flock go out one at a time,
catching hold of each by the wool on its back, and shoving it
out. Well, he came creeping up like the rest. She caught
hold of the wool on his back and shoved him out. But as
soon as she had shoved him out, he stood up and cried:

"Farewell, Likho! I have suffered much evil (_likha_) at your
hands. Now you can do nothing to me."

"Wait a bit!" she replied; "you shall endure still more.
You haven't escaped yet!"

The Smith went back through the forest along the narrow
path. Presently he saw a golden-handled hatchet sticking in a
tree, and he felt a strong desire to seize it. Well, he did seize
that hatchet, and his hand stuck fast to it. What was to be
done? There was no freeing it anyhow. He gave a look behind
him. There was Likho coming after him, and crying:

"There you are, villain! you've not got off yet!"

The Smith pulled out a small knife which he had in his
pocket, and began hacking away at his hand--cut it clean off
and ran away. When he reached his village, he immediately
began to show his arm as a proof that he had seen Likho at last.

"Look," says he, "that's the state of things. Here am I,"
says he, "without my hand. And as for my comrade, she's
eaten him up entirely."

In a Little-Russian variant of this story, quoted by Afanasief,[226]
(III. p. 137) a man, who often hears evil or misfortune (_likho_)
spoken of, sets out in search of it. One day he sees an iron castle
beside a wood, surrounded by a palisade of human bones tipped with
skulls. He knocks at the door, and a voice cries "What do you want?"
"I want evil," he replies. "That's what I'm looking for." "Evil is
here," cries the voice. So in he goes, and finds a huge, blind giant
lying within, stretched on a couch of