KOSHCHEI THE DEATHLESS 305 - 
meaning of all this ; and it is in just this way that the 
deathless Koshchei is slain again and again by his 
solar antagonist. 
Conversely, among the incidents of the legend 
which we omitted as too cumbrous for citation is one 
in which Prince Ivan is chopped into small pieces by 
Koshchei, and is brought to life again only by most 
weird magic. What can be more obvious than that 
here we have the perennial conflict between Day and 
Night,—the struggle that knows no end, because both 
the antagonists are immortal ? 
As for the conception of grateful beasts, who in so 
many legends aid the solar hero in time of need, I 
think it is most likely derived from a mingling together 
of ancient myths in which the sun himself figures as a 
beast. In various ancient myths the sun is repre- 
sented as a horse or a bull, or even as a fish, — Oannes 
or Dagon, — who swims at night through a subterra- 
nean ocean from the west, where he has disappeared, 
to the east, whence he is to emerge. The cock is also, 
quite naturally, a solar animal, and his cheerful crow 
is generally the signal at which ghosts and night 
demons depart in confusion. In popular legends, in 
which these primitive connections of ideas have been 
blurred and partially forgotten, we need not be sur- 
prised to find these and other solar beasts assisting 
the solar hero. 
The beast, on the other hand, who enlists his ser- 
vices in support of the powers of darkness is usually a 
wolf, or a serpent, or a fish. In many legends the sun 
is supposed to be swallowed by a fish at nightfall, and 
cast up again at daybreak; and in the same way the 
wolf of darkness devours little Red Riding Hood, the 
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