The rich merchant Sadko, the very entertaining hero of several Russian popular epics, is nowhere more entertaining than when, during one of his voyages, his ship comes to a stop in the sea. He thinks he has run upon a rock or sand-bank, and tries to push off, but the vessel is immovable. Twelve years we have been sailing, says Sadko, and never paid tribute to the king of the sea. A box of gold is thrown in as a peace-offering, but floats like a duck. It is clear that the sea-king wants no toll; he requires a man. Every man is ordered to make a lot from pine-wood and write his name on it. These lots are thrown into the sea. Every one of them swims like a duck but Sadko's, and his goes down like a stone. That is not the proper wood for a lot, says Sadko: make lots of fir-wood. Fir lots are tried: Sadko's goes down like a stone, the rest swim like ducks. Fir is not right, either; alder, oak, are tried with the same result. We are quite wrong, says Sadko; we must take cypress, for cypress was the wood of the cross. They try cypress, and still Sadko's lot sinks, while all the others float. I am the man, says Sadko. He orders his men to get for him an oblation of silver, gold, and pearls, and with this, taking an image of St Nicholas in one hand and his gusli in the other, commits himself to the sea, and goes down like a stone. But not to drown. It was quite worth his while for the rare adventures that followed.[18] The casting of lots to find out the guilty man who causes trouble to a ship occurs in William Guiseman, Kinloch's Ancient Scottish Ballads, p. 156, Kinloch MSS, V, 43, a copy, improved by tradition, of the "lament" in 'William Grismond's Downfal,' a broadside of 1650, which is transcribed among the Percy papers, from Ballard's collection. Captain Glen is thrown overboard without a lot, on the accusation of the boatswain, and with the happiest effect; broadside in the Roxburghe collection, Logan's Pedlar's Pack, p. 47, Kinloch MSS, V, 278. * * * * * Translated by Gerhard, p. 66, Knortz, L. u. R. Altenglands, p. 155, No 40. Swedish #A# by the Howitts, Literature and Romance of Northern Europe, I, 276; Danish #B# by Prior, II, 227. 1 It fell upon a Wodensday Brown Robyn's men went to sea, But they saw neither moon nor sun, Nor starlight wi their ee. 2 'We'll cast kevels us amang, See wha the unhappy man may be;' The kevel fell on Brown Robyn, The master-man was he. 3 'It is nae wonder,' said Brown Robyn, 'Altho I dinna thrive, For wi my mither I had twa bairns, And wi my sister five. 4 'But tie me to a plank o wude, And throw me in the sea; And if I sink, ye may bid me sink, But if I swim, just lat me bee.' 5 They've tyed him to a plank o wude, And thrown him in the sea; He didna sink, tho they bade him sink; He swimd, and they bade lat him bee.