bath made ready for them, and sent them word,--

"First take a bath, that you may refresh yourselves after the fatigue of
your journey, then come into my presence."

The bath was heated, and the Drevlians entered it. But, to their dismay,
smoke soon began to circle round them, and flames flashed on their
frightened eyes. They ran to the doors, but they were immovable. Olga
had ordered them to be made fast and the house to be set on fire, and
the miserable bathers were all burned alive.

But even this terrible revenge was not enough for the implacable widow.
Those were days when news crept slowly, and the Drevlians did not dream
of Olga's treachery. Once more she sent them a deceitful message: "I am
about to repair to you, and beg you to get ready a large quantity of
hydromel in the place where my husband was killed, that I may weep over
his tomb and honor him with the trizna [funeral banquet]."

The Drevlians, full of joy at this message, gathered honey in quantities
and brewed it into hydromel. Then Olga sought the tomb, followed by a
small guard who were only lightly armed. For a while she wept over the
tomb. Then she ordered a great mound of honor to be heaped over it. When
this was done she directed the trizna to be set out.

The Drevlians drank freely, while the men of Kief served them with the
intoxicating beverage.

"Where are the friends whom we sent to you?" they asked.

"They are coming with the friends of my husband," she replied.

And so the feast went on until the unsuspecting Drevlians were stupid
with drink. Then Olga bade her guards draw their weapons and slay her
foes, and a great slaughter began. When it ended, five thousand
Drevlians lay dead at her feet.

Olga's revenge was far from being complete: her thirst for blood grew as
it was fed. She returned to Kief, collected her army, took her young son
with her that he might early learn the art of war, and returned inspired
by the rage of vengeance to the land of the Drevlians.

Here she laid waste the country and destroyed the towns. In the end she
came to the capital, Korosten, and laid siege to it. Its name meant
"wall of bark," so that it was, no doubt, a town of wood, as probably
all the Russian towns at that time were.

The siege went on, but the inhabitants defended themselves obstinately,
for they knew now the spirit of the woman with whom they had to contend.
So a long time passed and Korosten still held out.

Finding that force wou