here his wife had left her frog-skin.
He hunted about until he found it, and then he threw it into the fire,
for he did not intend that she should ever hide herself away in it
again.

At once a clap of thunder sounded, and the Princess stood before him.
Her eyes were streaming with tears, and she wrung her hands in grief.

"Alas and woe is me!" she cried. "Why did you burn my frog-skin? A
little longer, and I would have been free. Now I must go away and
leave you forever."

"But where are you going?" cried the Prince in despair. "Wherever it
is I will follow and find you."

"Seek me beyond the seven mountains, beyond the seven seas, in the
kingdom of Koshchei the Deathless, for it is in his house I will be,"
answered the Princess. Then she turned into a great white swan and
flew out through the window and far, far away; so far the Prince could
no longer see her.

Then Prince Ivan was filled with grief; and he neither stayed nor
tarried but set out at once in search of his Princess.

He journeyed on and journeyed on a short way and a long way, and then
he met an old man with a grey beard that hung down far below his belt.

"Good day, good youth," said the old man.

"Good day, grandfather," answered Ivan.

"Whither do you journey with so sad a face?" asked the stranger.

"I journey over land and over sea in search of the kingdom of Koshchei
the Deathless," answered Ivan.

"Then you have a long journey before you," said the old man. "But why
do you seek the kingdom of Koshchei the Deathless, that terrible man?"

"I seek it that I may find what is lost." Then Ivan told the old man
his story, all about his frog bride and how she had turned into a
Princess,--how he had burned the frog-skin and how she had flown away
as a swan, and that now life would be nothing but a burden to him
until he could find her again.

The old man shook his head. "Alas! alas! You should never have burned
the frog-skin!" he said. He then told Ivan that the name of the
Princess was Vasilisa the Fair. "Her mother was the sister of Koshchei
the Deathless," said the stranger, "and when she was born it was
foretold that before she was eighteen Koshchei should lose his life
because of her. It was for this reason that he changed her into a frog
and set her in the midst of the lonely swamp. In a month and a day
from now the Princess would have been eighteen, and the danger to
Koshchei would have been over. Then he would have allowed her to la