p, unto the waterside;
I bring thee food and drink.

Ivashko perceived that the voice was not his mother's, but was that of
a witch, and he sang:

Canoe, canoe, float a little farther,
Canoe, canoe, float a little farther;
That is not my mother, but a witch who calls me.

The witch saw that she must call Ivashko with just such a voice as
his mother had.

So she hastened to a smith and said to him:

"Smith, smith! make me just such a thin little voice as Ivashko's
mother has: if you don't, I'll eat you." So the smith forged her a
little voice just like Ivashko's mother's. Then the witch went down by
night to the shore and sang:

Ivashechko, Ivashechko, my boy,
Float up, float up, unto the waterside;
I bring thee food and drink.

Ivashko came, and she took the fish, and seized the boy and carried
him home with her. When she arrived she said to her daughter
Alenka,[209] "Heat the stove as hot as you can, and bake Ivashko well,
while I go and collect my friends for the feast." So Alenka heated the
stove hot, ever so hot, and said to Ivashko,

"Come here and sit on this shovel!"

"I'm still very young and foolish," answered Ivashko: "I haven't yet
quite got my wits about me. Please teach me how one ought to sit on a
shovel."

"Very good," said Alenka; "it won't take long to teach you."

But the moment she sat down on the shovel, Ivashko instantly pitched
her into the oven, slammed to the iron plate in front of it, ran out
of the hut, shut the door, and hurriedly climbed up ever so high an
oak-tree [which stood close by].

Presently the witch arrived with her guests and knocked at the door of
the hut. But nobody opened it for her.

"Ah! that cursed Alenka!" she cried. "No doubt she's gone off
somewhere to amuse herself." Then she slipped in through the window,
opened the door, and let in her guests. They all sat down to table,
and the witch opened the oven, took out Alenka's baked body, and
served it up. They all ate their fill and drank their fill, and then
they went out into the courtyard and began rolling about on the grass.

"I turn about, I roll about, having fed on Ivashko's flesh," cried
the witch. "I turn about, I roll about, having fed on Ivashko's
flesh."

But Ivashko called out to her from the top of the oak:

"Turn about, roll about, having fed on Alenka's flesh!"

"Did I hear something?" s