So the soldier marched into the palace, and settled himself down in the biggest saloon, took his knapsack off and his sabre, put the knapsack in a corner and the sabre on a hand-peg, sat down on a chair, put his hand into his pocket for his tobacco-pouch, lit his pipe, and smoked at his ease. Then about midnight, I don’t know where from, hordes of devils, seen and unseen, scurried up, and made such a turmoil and row, and set up a dance with wild music. “What, you here, discharged soldier!” all the devils began yelling. “Welcome! Will you play cards with us?” “Certainly; here I have a set ready. Let’s start!” He took them out and dealt round. They began, played a game out, and the soldier won; another, and the same luck; and all the finessing of the devils availed them nothing; the soldier won all the money, and raked it all together. “Stop, soldier,” the devils said. “We still have sixty ounces of silver and forty of gold. We’ll stake them on the last game.” And they sent a little devil-boy to fetch the silver. So a new game commenced; and then the little devil had to pry in every nook and come back and tell the old devil: “It’s no use, grandfather—we have no more.” “Off you go; find some gold!” And the urchin went and hunted up gold from everywhere, turned an entire mine inside out and still found nothing: the soldier had played everything away. The devils got angry at losing all their money, and began to assault the soldier, roaring out: “Smash him up, brothers! Eat him up!” “We’ll see who’ll have the last word if it comes to eating,” said the soldier, shook the nosebag open, and asked, “What is this?” “A nosebag,” said the devils. “Well, in you all go, by God’s own spell!” And he collected them all together—so many you couldn’t count them all! Then the soldier buckled the bag tightly, hung it on a peg, and lay down to sleep. In the morning the Tsar sent for all his folks. “Come up to me and inform me how does it stand with the soldier. If the unholy powers have destroyed him, bring me his little bones.” So off they went and entered the palace, and there saw the soldier trudging up and down gaily in the rooms and smoking his pipe. “Well, how are you, discharged soldier? We never expected to see you again alive. How did you pass the night? What kind of bargain did you make with the devils?” “What devils! Just come and look what a lot of gold and silver I won off them. Look, what piles of it!” And the Tsar’s servants looked and were amazed. And the soldier told them: “Bring me two smiths as fast as you can. Tell them to bring an iron anvil and a hammer.” Off they went helter-skelter to the smiths, and the matter was soon arranged. The smiths arrived with iron anvil and with heavy hammers. “Now,” said the soldier, “take this nosebag and beat it hard after the ancient manner of smiths.” So the smiths took the nosebag, and they began to whisper to each other: “How fearfully heavy it is! The devil must be in it.”