By this time Cloudfall was again passing through the air swifter than a falcon in its flight, though his progress was somewhat stayed when he reached the outer rim of the watching host. Ilya brandished his oak, and bringing it down with one mighty blow after another cleared a path through the host as a hurricane makes a lane through a forest. Through the pathway Cloudfall passed, alighting upon the earth again and again, and leaving wherever he touched the host a heap of prostrate warriors. So did Ilya the Old Cossáck pass through the great host of Tatars, the enemies of Holy Russia. When the hero came to the gates of Chernigof he found them strongly barred, and a keen watch kept against the armies of the Tatars, who were reported to be advancing upon the city. The wall was lofty and broad, but not too high for Cloudfall, who leapt over it with ease, to the great astonishment of the guards and of the leaders who stood on one of the towers in earnest council. Ilya alighted in the broad courtyard of the church, and entering the holy place found the citizens assembled for prayer, which they hoped might avert the approaching calamity or fortify them for the endurance of a cruel death. Then Ilya stood forth amongst them and said boldly, "Ye traders of Chernigof, and citizens all, why do you pray when the time is come for action? Why do you meet together to bid farewell to the white world with all its joys?" Then one of the merchants, who was very richly dressed, explained to Ilya, as if he were quite ignorant of outside affairs, how the city was at that moment besieged by the Tatars. Ilya made a slight gesture of impatience and disgust, "Go out," he said, "upon the broad wall of your famous city, and look towards the open steppe." Then some of the men and a few of the bolder maidens went out upon the ramparts, and in the place where the Tatar banners had stood like a forest, the accursed foes lay in great heaps of slain. Upon this the men of the city bowed themselves before Ilya and begged for the honour of his name. They also besought him to stay with them and be their Tsar, and that he would accept at their hands a bowl of pure red gold, another of shining silver, and a third of fine seed pearls. "Nay, I ask no gifts from you," said Ilya, "though I may possibly have earned them, nor will I stay to be your Tsar. Go on with your lives as of old, my brothers, but grant the favour of showing me the straight way to Kiev town." Again they bowed before him, and one of them, speaking for the others, said, "It is twice as far by the circling path as it is by the straight way, but you must take the longer journey, for athwart the straight way lie three barriers; and the road is so lonely that the grey wolf and the black raven avoid it, for it is deserted even by the dead. The first mighty barrier is a range of lofty mountains; the second is a rushing river of enormous breadth, bordered by the Black Morass; and the third is Nightingale the Robber.