This page has been validated.
132
RUSSIAN FOLK-TALES
Then the workman ran to the smithy, and soon returned with the husband, crying out to the servants to stop and not to hang the smith, for there the master was! He then untied the ropes and set the smith free.
And the youth thereafter never more spat on the devil and beat him with a hammer. But his workman vanished and was never seen again. The master and mistress lived on and experienced good in their life, and they are still alive, if they are not dead.