When the Tsar heard this speech, he was furious with the soldier. “What, what!” he shrieked at him. “You who have cured so many boyárs and generals, cannot do anything for me! I shall instantly have you put to death.”
So the soldier thought and thought what he should do. And he began to beseech Death. “O Death,” he said, “give the Tsar my life and take me instead, for it doesn’t matter to me whether I live or die; for it is better to die by my own death than to suffer such a cruel punishment.”
And he looked in the glass, and saw that Death was standing at the Tsar’s feet. Then the soldier took the water and sprinkled the Tsar, and he recovered completely. “Now, Death,” said the soldier, “give me only three hours’ interval in order that I may go home and say farewell to my wife and my son.”
“Well, you may have three hours. Go,” Death replied.
So the soldier went away home, lay down on his bed, and became very ill.
And when Death was standing very near him, she said, “Now, discharged soldier, say goodbye quickly—you have only three minutes left to live in the bright world.”
So the soldier stretched himself out, took his nosebag from under his head, opened it, and asked: “What is this?”
Death answered: “A nosebag.”
“Well, if it is a nosebag, then jump into it!”
And Death instantly jumped straight into the bag. And the soldier, ill as he was, jumped up from his bed, buckled the nosebag together firmly, very tightly, threw it on his shoulder, and went into the Bryánski Woods, the slumbrous forest. And he went there, and he hung this bag on the bitter aspen, on the very top twig, and he went back home.
From that day forward nobody died in that kingdom: they were born, and they kept on being born, and they never died. And very many years went by, and the soldier never took his nosebag down. One day he happened to go into the town. He went, and on his way he met such an old, old lady, so old that on whichever side the wind blew, she inclined. “Oh, what an old lady!” the soldier said. “Why, it is almost time she died.”
“Yes, father,” the old dame replied. “The time has come and gone long since. At the time when you put Death into the nosebag I had only one hour left in which to live in the white world. I should be very glad to have some rest; but unless I die, earth will not take me up; and you, discharged soldier, are guilty of an unforgivable sin in God’s eyes. For there is no single soul left on earth who is tortured as I am.”
Then the soldier stayed and began to think. “Yes, yes; it would be better to let Death out; perhaps I, too, might die. And beyond this, too, I have many sins on my conscience. Thus it is better now whilst I am still strong and I bear pain on this earth; for when I shall become very old then it will be all the worse for me to suffer anything.”
So he got up and he went up into the Bryánski Woods, and he went up to the aspen, and saw there the nosebag was hanging very high, shaking in the winds to all sides. “Oh, you Death,” he says, “are you still alive?”
A faint voice came out of the nosebag: “Yes, father, I am alive.”
So the soldier took the nosebag, opened it, and he let out Death.
And he himself lay down on his bed, bade farewell to his wife and son, and he begged Death that he might die. And she23 ran outside the door with all the strength in her feet. “Go!” she cried. “It is the devils who shall slay you—I shall not slay you!”
So the soldier remained alive and healthy. And he thought: “Shall I go straight into the burning pitch, for then the devils will throw me into the seething sulphur until such time as my sins shall have been melted from off me.” And he bade farewell from all, and he went with the knapsack in his hand straight into the burning pitch.
And he went on: maybe near, maybe far, maybe downhill, maybe uphill, maybe short, maybe long; and he at last arrived in the abyss, and he looked, and all round the burning cauldron there stood watchmen. As soon as he stopped at the gate a devil asked who was coming.
“A guilty soul to be tortured.”
“Why do you come? What are you carrying with you?”
“Oh, a nosebag.”
And the devil shrieked out of his full throat and made a tremendous stir. All the infernal powers roused themselves and looked out of the gates and windows with their unbreakable bolts.
And the soldier went all round the cauldron, and he called out to the master of the cauldron: “Let me in, please; do let me into the cauldron. I have come to you to be tortured for my sins.”
“No, I will not let you in. Go away wherever you will—there is no room for you here.”
“Well, if you will not let me in to be tortured, at least give me two hundred souls. I will take them up to God, and perhaps the Lord will pardon my faults.”
And the master of the cauldron answered: “I will add fifty more souls to the lot; only do go away!” So he instantly ordered two hundred and fifty souls to be counted out and to be taken to the rear gates in order that the soldier might not see him.
So the soldier gathered up the guilty souls, and he went up to the gates of Paradise.
The Apostles saw him, and said to the Lord: “Some soldier or other has come up here with two hundred and
