ut to count them, and Zachary sleeps in
comfort, till just before it comes back to say that the living are
more numerous than the dead. By the time the wolf-fiend has made a
third journey in order to settle a doubt which Zachary describes as
weighing on his mind--as to the numerical relation of the large beasts
to the small--the three years have passed away. So the wolf-fiend is
obliged to part with his fiddle, and Zachary carries it back to the
tailor in triumph.[476]

The demons not unfrequently show themselves capable of being actuated
by gratitude. Thus, as we have already seen, the story of the Awful
Drunkard[477] represents the devil himself as being grateful to a man
who has rebuked an irascible old woman for unjustly blaming the Prince
of Darkness. In a skazka from the Orenburg Government, a lad named
Vanka [Jack] is set to watch his father's turnip-field by night.
Presently comes a boy who fills two huge sacks with turnips, and
vainly tries to carry them off. While he is tugging away at them he
catches sight of Vanka, and immediately asks him to help him home with
his load. Vanka consents, and carries the turnips to a cottage,
wherein is seated "an old greybeard with horns on his head," who
receives him kindly and offers him a quantity of gold as a recompense
for his trouble. But, acting on the instructions he has received from
the boy, Vanka will take nothing but the greybeard's lute, the sounds
of which exercise a magic power over all living creatures.[478]

One of the most interesting of the stories of this class is that of
the man who unwittingly blesses the devil. As a specimen of its
numerous variants we may take the opening of a skazka respecting the
origin of brandy.

"There was a moujik who had a wife and seven children, and one day he
got ready to go afield, to plough. When his horse was harnessed, and
everything ready, he ran indoors to get some bread; but when he got
there, and looked in the cupboard, there was nothing there but a
single crust. This he carried off bodily and drove away.

"He reached his field and began ploughing. When he had ploughed up
half of it, he unharnessed his horse and turned it out to graze. After
that he was just going to eat the bread, when he said to himself,

"'Why didn't I leave this crust for my children?'

"So after thinking about it for awhile, he set it aside.

"Presently a little demon came sidling up and carried off the bread.
The moujik returned and look