Page:Slavonic Fairy Tales.djvu/258

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The Wonderful Bird.
241

upon him who had eaten the heart of the little bird. Then the brother who had eaten the head began, from envy, as well as because he was the wisest man in the world, to hate his brother the king, and to think how he could get rid of him. At last he determined to kill him, so that he might reign in his stead. One evening, when the king was asleep, he killed him, opened the body and found in it the bird's heart; having eaten it he sewed up the body. On the following day the news spread among the people: "The king is dead! Whom shall we elect for his successor?" They set about to elect their king in this place and in that; among high and low; some proposed one, and some another; at last they came to the late king's brother and made him their king. Having become king—every morning he found under his head one hundred sequins as his brother had done—he sent to a neighbouring king asking his daughter in marriage; the king gave him his daughter, and they were married according to custom. When, on the first and second morning after the wedding, the young queen discovered that there were a hundred sequins lying under her husband's head, she was greatly surprised, and on the third morning she removed fifty and left the other half in the same place. But when the king awoke and did not find the whole hundred sequins, he caught hold of his wife as if he were going to kill her; the