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When Vladimir, one day, offers him an insult, he gives
his men a sound thrashing, runs down into the courtyard,
batters the gold tiles down from the roof of the
palace and the gold crosses from the churches, and with
the gold he entertains all the muzhiks and beggars of the
region at a feast, where mead and spirits flow freely. In
other bîlinî he is suspected by Vladimir, because he is
slandered by the Prince of the Boyárs at his court,
and he is thrown into prison to starve to death. He
remains there for three years, secretly supported by
Vladimir’s young daughter. When Kief was attacked
by a huge Tatar host, and Ilia was bitterly missed,
Vladimir, led by the advice of his daughter, finds in the
underground prison the hero, “the old Cossack,” who is
sitting at a plain table, reading the Evangelists.
Vladimir, on his knees, begs him for help, not for himself, but
for the churches of the Blessed Virgin, and for the
widows and the fatherless in the holy Russia. Then
Ilia discloses himself as the Christian knight, who
protects the defenceless and has the churches near to his
heart. Nay, he travels straight to Constantinople
(Tsargrad) and liberates the Tsar from the heathen
army.
It is now peculiarly Russian that, before this great
military hero starts out into the wide world, he makes the
vow that he will never soil his hands with blood. The
few incidents of wildness that are met with in his
history are plainly mythical elements, as when he kills the
robber Soloveï, and afterwards the terrible Amazon or
Polenitsa (who at last shows herself to be his daughter),
tearing them both into small pieces, and scattering these
upon the earth to make it fertile. Otherwise he
performs all his exploits with the greatest calmness, and,
while he despises danger, he is fond of making
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