it was the last days of december. there had been a merry christmas festival and the snow had lain thick on house and slope. wolves were now on the trail. then marina felt the first stirring of her child; soft, gentle movements, like the touch of eiderdown upon her body. she was filled with a triumphant joy, and pressed her hands softly and tenderly to her side; then sang a lullaby of how her son should become a great hunter and slay a thousand and three hundred elks, a thousand and three hundred bears, a thousand and three hundred ermines, and take the chief village beauty as his wife!

there was misty frost, the night, and stillness outside—the stillness that whispers of death. wolves crept up to the plot of land, sat on their hind-legs and howled long and dismally at the sky.

in the spring the shores of the river were strewn with wild flocks of swans, geese, and eider-ducks. the forest resounded with the stir of the beasts. its woody depths echoed with the noise of bears, elks, wolves, foxes, owls, and woodcocks. the herbage began to sprout and flourish. the nights now drew in, and the days were longer. dawn and sunset were lilac and lingering. the twilight fell in pale green, shimmering floods of light, and as it deepened and spread the village maidens gathered again on the river slope and sang their songs of lada, the spring god.

in the morning the sun rose in a glory of golden splendour and swam into the limpid blue heavens. there, enthroned, it spent the many hours of spring. then came the easter festival when, according to the legend, the sun smiled and the people exchanged red eggs as its symbol.