The Priest with The Greedy Eyes

The Priest With The Greedy Eyes

THE PRIEST WITH THE GREEDY EYES.[454]

In the parish of St. Nicholas there lived a Pope. This

Pope's eyes were thoroughly pope-like.[455] He served Nicholas

several years, and went on serving until such time as there

remained to him nothing either for board or lodging. Then our

Pope collected all the church keys, looked at the picture of

Nicholas, thumped him, out of spite, over the shoulders with

the keys, and went forth from his parish as his eyes led him.

And as he walked along the road he suddenly lighted upon an

unknown man.

"Hail, good man!" said the stranger to the Pope. "Whence

do you come and whither are you going? Take me with you

as a companion."

Well, they went on together. They walked and walked for

several versts, then they grew tired. It was time to seek repose.

Now the Pope had a few biscuits in his cassock, and the companion

he had picked up had a couple of small loaves.[456]

"Let's eat your loaves first," says the Pope, "and afterwards

we'll take to the biscuits, too."

"Agreed!" replies the stranger. "We'll eat my loaves,

and keep your biscuits for afterwards."

Well, they ate away at the loaves; each of them ate his fill,

but the loaves got no smaller. The Pope grew envious:

"Come," thinks he, "I'll steal them from him!" After the

meal the old man lay down to take a nap, but the Pope kept

scheming how to steal the loaves from him. The old man went

to sleep. The Pope drew the loaves out of his pocket and

began quietly nibbling them at his seat. The old man awoke

and felt for his loaves; they were gone!

"Where are my loaves?" he exclaimed; "who has eaten

them? was it you, Pope?"

"No, not I, on my word!" replied the Pope.

"Well, so be it," said the old man.

They gave themselves a shake, and set out again on their

journey. They walked and walked; suddenly the road branched

off in two different directions. Well, they both went the same

way, and soon reached a certain country. In that country the

King's daughter lay at the point of death, and the King had given

notice that to him who should cure his daughter he would give

half of his kingdom, and half of his goods and possessions; but

if any one undertook to cure her and failed, he should have his

head chopped off and hung up on a stake. Well, they arrived,

elbowed their way among the people in front of the King's palace,

and gave out that they were doctors. The servant came out

from the King's palace, and began questioning them:

"Who are you? from what cities, of what families? what

do you want?"

"We are doctors," they replied; "we can cure the Princess!"

"Oh! if you are doctors, come into the palace."

So they went into the palace, saw the Princess, and asked

the King to supply them with a private apartment, a tub of

water, a sharp sword, and a big table. The King supplied

them with all these things. Then they shut themselves up in

the private apartment, laid the Princess on the big table, cut

her into small pieces with the sharp sword, flung them into the

tub of water, washed them, and rinsed them. Afterwards they

began putting the pieces together; when the old man breathed

on them the different pieces stuck together. When he had put

all the pieces together properly, he gave them a final puff of

breath: the Princess began to quiver, and then arose alive and

well! The King came in person to the door of their room, and

cried:

"In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy

Ghost!"

"Amen!" they replied.

"Have you cured the Princess?" asked the King.

"We've cured her," say the doctors. "Here she is!"

Out went the Princess to the King, alive and well.

Says the King to the doctors: "What sort of valuables will

you have? would you like gold or silver? Take whatever you

please."

Well, they began taking gold and silver. The old man used

only a thumb and two fingers, but the Pope seized whole handfuls,

and kept on stowing them away in his wallet--shovelling

them into it, and then lifting it a bit to see if he was strong

enough to carry it.

At last they took their leave of the King and went their way.

The old man said to the Pope, "We'll bury this money in the

ground, and go and make another cure." Well, they walked

and walked, and at length they reached another country. In

that country, also, the King had a daughter at the point of death,

and he had given notice that whoever cured his daughter should

have half of his kingdom and of his goods and possessions; but

if he failed to cure her he should have his head chopped off and

hung up on a stake.[457] Then the Evil One afflicted the envious

Pope, suggesting to him "Why shouldn't he go and perform

the cure by himself, without saying a word to the old man, and

so lay hold of all the gold and silver for himself?" So the

Pope walked about in front of the royal gates, forced himself on

the notice of the people there, and gave out that he was a doctor.

In the same way as before he asked the King for a private

room, a tub of water, a large table, and a sharp sword. Shutting

himself up in the private room, he laid the Princess on the table,

and began chopping her up with the sharp sword; and however

much the Princess might scream or squeal, the Pope, without

paying any attention to either screaming or squealing, went on

chopping and chopping just as if she had been so much beef.

And when he had chopped her up into little pieces, he threw

them into the tub, washed them, rinsed them, and then put

them together bit by bit, exactly as the old man had done, expecting

to see all the pieces unite with each other. He breathes

on them--but nothing happens! He gives another puff--worse

than ever! See, the Pope flings the pieces back again into the

water, washes and washes, rinses and rinses, and again puts

them together bit by bit. Again he breathes on them--but still

nothing comes of it.

"Woe is me," thinks the Pope; "here's a mess!"

Next morning the King arrives and looks--the doctor has

had no success at all--he's only messed the dead body all over

with muck!

The King ordered the doctor off to the gallows. Then our

Pope besought him, crying--

"O King! O free to do thy will! Spare me for a little

time! I will run for the old man, he will cure the Princess."

The Pope ran off in search of the old man. He found the

old man, and cried:

"Old man! I am guilty, wretch that I am! The Devil

got hold of me. I wanted to cure the King's daughter all by

myself, but I couldn't. Now they're going to hang me. Do

help me!"

The old man returned with the Pope.

The Pope was taken to the gallows. Says the old man to

the Pope:

"Pope! who ate my loaves?"

"Not I, on my word! So help me Heaven, not I!"

The Pope was hoisted on to the second step. Says the old

man to the Pope:

"Pope! who ate my loaves?"

"Not I, on my word! So help me Heaven, not I!"

He mounted the third step--and again it was "Not I!"

And now his head was actually in the noose--but it's "Not I!"

all the same. Well, there was nothing to be done! Says the

old man to the King:

"O King! O free to do thy will! Permit me to cure the

Princess. And if I do not cure her, order another noose to be

got ready. A noose for me, and a noose for the Pope!"

Well, the old man put the pieces of the Princess's body together,

bit by bit, and breathed on them--and the Princess stood

up alive and well. The King recompensed them both with

silver and gold.

"Let's go and divide the money, Pope," said the old man.

So they went. They divided the money into three heaps.

The Pope looked at them, and said:

"How's this? There's only two of us. For whom is this

third share?"

"That," says the old man, "is for him who ate my loaves."

"I ate them, old man," cries the Pope; "I did really, so

help me Heaven!"

"Then the money is yours," says the old man. "Take my

share too. And now go and serve in your parish faithfully;

don't be greedy, and don't go hitting Nicholas over the shoulders

with the keys."

Thus spake the old man, and straightway disappeared.

  [The principal motive of this story is, of course, the

  same as that of "The Smith and the Demon," in No. 13

  (see above, p. 70). A miraculous cure is effected by a

  supernatural being. A man attempts to do likewise, but

  fails. When about to undergo the penalty of his

  failure, he is saved by that being, who reads him a

  moral lesson. In the original form of the tale the

  supernatural agent was probably a demigod, whom a

  vague Christian influence has in one instance degraded

  into the Devil, in another, canonized as St. Nicholas.



  The Medea's cauldron episode occurs in very many

  folk-tales, such as the German "Bruder Lustig" (Grimm,

  No. 81) and "Das junge geglühte Männlein" (Grimm, No.

  147), in the latter of which our Lord, accompanied by

  St. Peter, spends a night in a Smith's house, and

  makes an old beggar-man young by first placing him in

  the fire, and then plunging him into water. After the

  departure of his visitors, the Smith tries a similar

  experiment on his mother-in-law, but quite

  unsuccessfully. In the corresponding Norse tale of

  "The Master-Smith," (Asbjörnsen and Moe, No. 21,

  Dasent, No. 16) an old beggar-woman is the victim of

  the Smith's unsuccessful experiment. In another Norse

  tale, that of "Peik" (Asbjörnsen's New Series, No.

  101, p. 219) a king is induced to kill his wife and

  his daughter in the mistaken belief that he will be

  able to restore them to life. In one of the stories of

  the "Dasakumáracharita," a king is persuaded to jump

  into a certain lake in the hope of obtaining a new and

  improved body. He is then killed by his insidious

  adviser, who usurps his throne, pretending to be the

  renovated monarch. In another story in the same

  collection a king believes that his wife will be able

  to confer on him by her magic skill "a most celestial

  figure," and under that impression confides to her all

  his secrets, after which she brings about his death.

  See Wilson's "Essays," ii. 217, &c., and 262, &c.

  Jacob's "Hindoo Tales," pp. 180, 315.]

II.

About Demons.

From the stories which have already been quoted some idea may be

gained of the part which evil spirits play in Russian popular fiction.

In one of them (No. 1) figures the ghoul which feeds on the dead, in

several (Nos. 37, 38, 45-48) we see the fiend-haunted corpse hungering

after human flesh and blood; the history of The Bad Wife (No. 7)

proves how a demon may suffer at a woman's hands, that of _The Dead

Witch_ (No. 3) shows to what indignities the remains of a wicked woman

may be subjected by the fiends with whom she has chosen to associate.

In the Awful Drunkard (No. 6), and the Fiddler in Hell (No. 41),

the abode of evil spirits is portrayed, and some light is thrown on

their manners and customs; and in the Smith and the Demon (No. 13),

the portrait of one of their number is drawn in no unkindly spirit.

The difference which exists between the sketches of fiends contained

in these stories is clearly marked, so much so that it would of itself

be sufficient to prove that there is no slight confusion of ideas in

the minds of the Russian peasants with regard to the demoniacal beings

whom they generally call chorti or devils. Still more clearly is the

contrast between those ideas brought out by the other stories, many in

number, into which those powers of darkness enter. It is evident that

the traditions from which the popular conception of the ghostly enemy

has been evolved must have been of a complex and even conflicting

character.

Of very heterogeneous elements must have been composed the form under

which the popular fancy, in Russia as well as in other lands, has

embodied the abstract idea of evil. The diabolical characters in the

Russian tales and legends are constantly changing the proportions of

their figures, the nature of their attributes. In one story they seem

to belong to the great and widely subdivided family of Indian demons;

in another they appear to be akin to certain fiends of Turanian

extraction; in a third they display features which may have been

inherited from the forgotten deities of old Slavonic mythology; in all

the stories which belong to the "legendary class" they bear manifest

signs of having been subjected to Christian influences, the effect of

which has been insufficient to do more than slightly to disguise their

heathenism.

The old gods of the Slavonians have passed away and left behind but

scanty traces of their existence; but still, in the traditions and

proverbial expressions of the peasants in various Slavonic lands,

there may be recognized some relics of the older faith. Among these

are a few referring to a White and to a Black God. Thus, among the

peasants of White Russia some vague memory still exists of a white or

bright being, now called Byelun,[458] who leads belated travellers out

of forests, and bestows gold on men who do him good service. "Dark is

it in the forest without Byelun" is one phrase; and another, spoken of

a man on whom fortune has smiled, is, "He must have made friends with

Byelun." On the other hand the memory of the black or evil god is

preserved in such imprecations as the Ukraine "May the black god smite

thee!"[459] To ancient pagan traditions, also, into which a Christian

element has entered, may be assigned the popular belief that infants

which have been cursed by their mothers before their birth, or which

are suffocated during their sleep, or which die from any causes

unchristened or christened by a drunken priest, become the prey of

demons. This idea has given rise in Russia, as well as elsewhere, to a

large group of stories. The Russian peasants believe, it is said, that

in order to rescue from the fiends the soul of a babe which has been

suffocated in its sleep, its mother must spend three nights in a

church, standing within a circle traced by the hand of a priest. When

the cocks crow on the third morning, the demons will give her back her

dead child.[460]

Great stress is laid in the skazkas and legends upon the terrible

power of a parent's curse. The "hasty word" of a father or a mother

will condemn even an innocent child to slavery among devils, and when

it has once been uttered, it is irrevocable. It might have been

supposed that the fearful efficacy of such an imprecation would have

silenced bad language, as that of the Vril rendered war impossible

among the Vril-ya of "The Coming Race;" but that such was not the case

is proved by the number of narratives which turn on uncalled-for

parental cursing. Here is an abridgment of one of these stories.

There was an old man who lived near Lake Onega, and who supported

himself and his wife by hunting. One day when he was engaged in the

pursuit of game, a well-dressed man met him and said,

"Sell me that dog of yours, and come for your money to the Mian

mountain to-morrow evening."

The old man sold him the dog, and went next day to the top of the

mountain, where he found a great city inhabited by devils.[461] There

he soon found the house of his debtor, who provided him with a banquet

and a bath. And in the bath-room he was served by a young man who,

when the bath was over, fell at his feet, saying,

"Don't accept money for your dog, grandfather, but ask for me!"

The old man consented. "Give me that good youth," said he. "He shall

serve instead of a son to me."

There was no help for it; they had to give him the youth. And when the

old man had returned home, the youth told him to go to Novgorod, there

to enquire for a merchant, and ask him whether he had any children.

He did so, and the merchant replied,

"I had an only son, but his mother cursed him in a passion, crying,

'The devil take thee!'[462] And so the devil carried him off."

It turned out that the youth whom the old man had saved from the

devils was that merchant's son. Thereupon the merchant rejoiced

greatly, and took the old man and his wife to live with him in his

house.[463]

And here is another tale of the same kind, from the Vladimir

Government.

Once upon a time there was an old couple, and they had an only son.

His mother had cursed him before he was born, but he grew up and

married. Soon afterwards he suddenly disappeared. His parents did all

they could to trace him, but their attempts were in vain.

Now there was a hut in the forest not far off, and thither it chanced

that an old beggar came one night, and lay down to rest on the stove.

Before he had been there long, some one rode up to the door of the

hut, got off his horse, entered the hut, and remained there all night,

muttering incessantly:

"May the Lord judge my mother, in that she cursed me while a babe

unborn!"

Next morning the beggar went to the house of the old couple, and told

them all that had occurred. So towards evening the old man went to the

hut in the forest, and hid himself behind the stove. Presently the

horseman arrived, entered the hut, and began to repeat the words which

the beggar had overheard. The old man recognized his son, and came

forth to greet him, crying:

"O my dear son! at last I have found thee! never again will I let thee

go!"

"Follow me!" replied his son, who mounted his horse and rode away, his

father following him on foot. Presently they came to a river which was

frozen over, and in the ice was a hole.[464] And the youth rode

straight into that hole, and in it both he and his horse disappeared.

The old man lingered long beside the ice-hole, then he returned home

and said to his wife:

"I have found our son, but it will be hard to get him back. Why, he

lives in the water!"

Next night the youth's mother went to the hut, but she succeeded no

better than her husband had done.

So on the third night his young wife went to the hut and hid behind

the stove. And when she heard the horseman enter she sprang forth,

exclaiming:

"My darling dear, my life-long spouse! now will I never part from

thee!"

"Follow me!" replied her husband.

And when they came to the edge of the ice-hole--

"If thou goest into the water, then will I follow after thee!" cried

she.

"If so, take off thy cross," he replied.

She took off her cross, leaped into the ice-hole--and found herself in

a vast hall. In it Satan[465] was seated. And when he saw her arrive,

he asked her husband whom he had brought with him.

"This is my wife," replied the youth.

"Well then, if she is thy wife, get thee gone hence with her! married

folks must not be sundered."[466]

So the wife rescued her husband, and brought him back from the devils

into the free light.[467]

Sometimes it is a victim's own imprudence, and not a parent's "hasty

word," which has placed him in the power of the Evil One. There is a

well-known story, which has spread far and wide over Europe, of a

soldier who abstains for a term of years from washing, shaving, and

hair-combing, and who serves, or at least obeys, the devil during that

time, at the end of which he is rewarded by the fiend with great

wealth. His appearance being against him, he has some difficulty in

finding a wife, rich as he is. But after the elder sisters of a family

have refused him, the youngest accepts him; whereupon he allows

himself to be cleansed, combed, and dressed in bright apparel, and

leads a cleanly and a happy life ever afterwards.[468]

In one of the German versions of this story, a king's elder daughter,

when asked to marry her rich but slovenly suitor, replies, "I would

sooner go into the deepest water than do that." In a Russian

version,[469] the unwashed soldier lends a large sum of money to an

impoverished monarch, who cannot pay his troops, and asks his royal

creditor to give him one of his daughters in marriage by way of

recompense. The king reflects. He is sorry for his daughters, but at

the same time he cannot do without the money. At last, he tells the

soldier to get his portrait painted, and promises to show it to the

princesses, and see if one of them will accept him. The soldier has

his likeness taken, "touch for touch, just exactly as he is," and the

king shows it to his daughters. The eldest princess sees that "the

picture is that of a monster, with dishevelled hair, and uncut nails,

and unwiped nose," and cries:

"I won't have him! I'd sooner have the devil!"

Now the devil "was standing behind her, pen and paper in hand. He

heard what she said, and booked her soul."

When the second princess is asked whether she will marry the soldier,

she exclaims:

"No indeed! I'd rather die an old maid, I'd sooner be linked with the

devil, than marry that man!"

When the devil heard that, "he booked her soul too."

But the youngest princess, the Cordelia of the family, when she is

asked whether she will marry the man who has helped her father in his

need, replies:

"It's fated I must, it seems! I'll marry him, and then--God's will be

done!"

While the preparations are being made for the marriage, the soldier

arrives at the end of his term of service to "the little devil" who

had hired him, and from whom he had received his wealth in return for

his abstinence and cleanliness. So he calls the "little devil," and

says, "Now turn me into a nice young man."

Accordingly "the little devil cut him up into small pieces, threw them

into a cauldron and set them on to boil. When they were done enough,

he took them out and put them together again properly--bone to bone,

joint to joint, vein to vein. Then he sprinkled them with the Waters

of Life and Death--and up jumped the soldier, a finer lad than stories

can describe, or pens portray!"

The story does not end here. When the "little devil" returns to the

lake from which he came, "the grandfather" of the demons asks him--

"How about the soldier?"

"He has served his time honestly and honorably," is the reply. "Never

once did he shave, have his hair cut, wipe his nose, or change his

clothes." The "grandfather" flies into a passion.

"What! in fifteen whole years you couldn't entrap a soldier! What, all

that money wasted for nothing! What sort of a devil do you call

yourself after that?"--and ordered him to be flung "into boiling

pitch."

"Stop, grandfather!" replies his grandchild. "I've booked two souls

instead of the soldier's one."

"How's that?"

"Why, this way. The soldier wanted to marry one of three princesses,

but the elder one and the second one told their father that they'd

sooner marry the devil than the soldier. So you see both of them are

ours."

After he had heard this explanation, "the grandfather acknowledged

that the little devil was in the right, and ordered him to be set

free. The imp, you see, understood his business."

  [For two German versions of this story, see the tales

  of "Des Teufels russiger Bruder," and "Der

  Bärenhäuter" (Grimm, Nos. 100, 101, and Bd. iii. pp.

  181, 182). More than twelve centuries ago,

  Hiouen-Thsang transferred the following story from

  India to China. A certain Rishi passed many times ten

  thousand years in a religious ecstasy. His body became

  like a withered tree. At last he emerged from his

  ecstasy, and felt inclined to marry, so he went to a

  neighboring palace, and asked the king to bestow upon

  him one of his daughters. The king, exceedingly

  embarrassed, called the princesses together, and asked

  which of them would consent to accept the dreaded

  suitor (who, of course, had not paid the slightest

  attention to his toilette for hundreds of centuries).

  Ninety-nine of those ladies flatly refused to have

  anything to do with him, but the hundredth, the last

  and youngest of the party, agreed to sacrifice herself

  for her father's sake. But when the Rishi saw his

  bride he was discontented, and when he heard that her

  elder and fairer sisters had all refused him, he

  pronounced a curse which made all ninety-nine of them

  humpbacks, and so destroyed their chance of marrying

  at all. Stanislas Julien's "Mémoires sur les contrées

  occidentales," 1857, i. pp. 244-7.]

As the idea that "a hasty word" can place its utterer or its victim

in the power of the Evil One (not only after death, but also during

this life) has given rise to numerous Russian legends, and as it still

exists, to some extent, as a living faith in the minds of the Russian

peasantry, it may be as well to quote at length one of the stories in

which it is embodied. It will be recognized as a variant of the

stories about the youth who visits the "Water King" and elopes with

one of that monarch's daughters. The main difference between the

"legend" we are about to quote, and the skazkas which have already

been quoted, is that a devil of the Satanic type is substituted in it

for the mythical personage--whether Slavonic Neptune or Indian

Rákshasa--who played a similar part in them.