Then the old woman, with her patched skirt, said, “Oh, I am now ‘Babushka’ and your ‘little dove’! Do you go to the border of the blue sea, and stand in front of the grey oak: at the hour of midnight the blue sea will boil over and Chúdo-Yúda, the Old Man of the Sea, will come out to you: he has no hands, no feet, and he has a grey beard. Take hold of him by his beard and beat him until he asks you, ‘Why do you beat me, Danílo the Unfortunate?’ Then you are to answer, ‘I am beating you for this reason: let me see the Swan, 13 the fair maiden; let her body glint through her wings, and through her body let her bones appear, and from bone to bone let the marrow run like a flowing string of pearls.’ ”