In another (Hahn, No. 15) a prince finds in the forbidden fortieth a lake in which fairies of the swan-maiden species are bathing. In a third (No. 45) the fortieth room contains a golden horse and a golden dog which assist their bold releaser. In a fourth (No. 68) it imprisons "a fair maiden, shining like the sun," whom the demon proprietor of the castle has hung up within it by her hair. As usual, all these stories are hard to understand. But one of the most important of their Oriental equivalents is perfectly intelligible. When Saktideva, in the fifth book of the "Kathásaritságara," comes after long travel to the Golden City, and is welcomed as her destined husband by its princess, she warns him not to ascend the central terrace of her palace. Of course he does so, and finds three chambers, in each of which lies the lifeless form of a fair maiden. After gazing at these seeming corpses, in one of which he recognizes his first love, he approaches a horse which is grazing beside a lake. The horse kicks him into the water; he sinks deep--and comes up again in his native land. The whole of the story is, towards its termination, fully explained by one of its principal characters--one of the four maidens whom Saktideva simultaneously marries. With the version of this romance in the "Arabian Nights" ("History of the Third Royal Mendicant," Lane, i. 160-173), everyone is doubtless acquainted. A less familiar story is that of Kandarpaketu, in the second book of the "Hitopadesa," who lives happily for a time as the husband of the beautiful semi-divine queen of the Golden City. At last, contrary to her express commands, he ventures to touch a picture of a Vidyádharí. In an instant the pictured demigoddess gives him a kick which sends him flying back into his own country. For an explanation of the myth which lies at the root of all these stories, see Cox's "Mythology of the Aryan Nations," ii. 36, 330. See also Professor de Gubernatis's "Zoological Mythology," i. 168.] We will now take one of those versions of the story which describe how Koshchei's death is brought about by the destruction of that extraneous object on which his existence depends. The incident is one which occupies a prominent place in the stories of this class current in all parts of Europe and Asia, and its result is almost always the same. But the means by which that result is brought about differ considerably in different lands. In the Russian tales the "death" of the Evil Being with whom the hero contends--the substance, namely, the destruction of which involves his death--is usually the last of a sequence of objects either identical with, or closely resembling, those mentioned in the following story of-- KOSHCHEI THE DEATHLESS.[112]