Chapter VI: Canto II: The Death of Kalev

Kalev and Linda lived very happily together, and were blessed
with a numerous offspring;
[23] but the country was small, and as soon as the children
were grown up they wandered forth into the world to seek their
fortunes, more especially as Kalev had determined that one son
only should be the heir to his possessions. At length Kalev
began to grow old, and felt that his end was approaching. Two
of his younger sons, who were still little boys, remained at
home; but the youngest of all, the famous Sohni, more often
known by his patronymic, the Son of Kalev, was still unborn.
Kalev foretold the glory and greatness of this last son to
Linda, indicating him as his heir,
[24] and shortly afterwards fell dangerously sick.
[Pg 19]

Then Linda took her brooch, and spun it round on a thread,
while she sent forth the Alder-Beetle
[25] to bid the Wind-Magician and Soothsayer hasten to the
bedside of her husband. Seven days the brooch spun round, and
seven days the beetle flew to the north, across three kingdoms
and more, till he encountered the Moon, and besought his aid.
But the Moon only gazed on him sorrowfully without speaking,
and went on his way.

Again Linda spun the brooch for seven days, and sent forth the beetle, who flew farther this time, through many thick forests, and as far as the Gold Mountain, till he encountered the Evening Star; but he also refused him an answer.

Next time the beetle took a different route, over wide heaths
and thick fir-woods, till he reached the Gold Mountain, and met
the rising Sun. He also
[Pg 20]
returned no answer; but on a fourth journey the beetle
encountered the Wind-Magician, the old Soothsayer from
Finland,
[26] and the great Necromancer himself. He besought their aid,
but they replied with one voice that what the drought had
parched up, the moonlight blanched, and the stars withered,
could never bloom again. And before the beetle returned from
his fruitless journey the mighty Kalev had expired.

Linda sat weeping by his bedside without food or sleep for
seven days and nights, and then began to prepare his corpse for
burial. First she bathed it with her tears, then with salt
water from the sea, rain water from the clouds, and lastly
water from the spring. Then she smoothed his hair with her
fingers, and brushed it with a silver brush, and combed it with
the golden comb which the water-nymphs had used to comb their
hair. She drew on him a silken shirt, a satin shroud, and a
robe over it, confined by a silver girdle. She her
[Pg 21]
self dug his grave thirty ells below the sod, and grass and
flowers soon sprang from it.

From the grave the grasses sprouted,

And the herbage from the hillock;

From the dead man dewy grasses,

From his cheeks grew ruddy flowers,

From his eyes there sprang the harebells,

Golden flowerets from his eyelids.
[27]

Linda mourned for Kalev for one month after another till three
months had passed, and the fourth was far advanced. She heaped
a cairn of stones over his tomb, which formed the hill on which
the Cathedral of Revel now stands. One day she was carrying a
great stone to the cairn, but found herself too weak, and let
it fall. She sat down on it, and lamented her sad fate, and her
tears formed the lake called "Ülemiste järv," the Upper Lake,
beside which the huge stone block may still be seen.
[28]

After this, Linda felt her time approaching, and she retired to
the bathroom,
[29] and called upon the
[Pg 22]
gods to aid her. Ukko and Rõugutaja
[30] both attended at her call, and one brought a bundle of
straw, and the other pillows, and they made her up a soft bed;
nor was it long before Kalev's posthumous son saw the light.

Linda was sitting by the cradle one day, trying to sing the
child to sleep, when suddenly he began to scream, and continued
to scream day and night for a whole month, when he burst his
swaddling-clothes, smashed the cradle to pieces, and began to
creep about the floor.
[31]

Linda suckled the child till he was three years old, and he
grew up a fine strong boy. He first learned to tend the cattle,
and then to guide the plough, and grew up like a young
oak-tree. When he played _kurni_
(tipcat), his blocks flew far and wide all over the country,
and many even as far as the sea. Sometimes he used to go down
to the sea, and make ducks and drakes of huge rocks, which he
sent spinning out to sea for a
[Pg 23]
verst or more, while he stood on his head to watch them.

At other times he used to amuse himself quietly in the enclosure, carving skates or weaving baskets. Thus he passed his days till he came to man's estate.

After the death of Kalev, Linda was much pestered by suitors who were anxious to marry the rich widow; but she refused them all, and at length they ceased to trouble her. Last of all came a mighty wind-sorcerer from Finland, calling himself Kalev's cousin; and when she refused him also, he vowed revenge. But she laughed at his threats, telling him she had three young eagles with sharp claws growing up in the house, who would protect their mother.

Linda was no longer tormented by suitors, but the magician whom she had discarded recommended all his friends not to seek a wife in Kalev's house, for notwithstanding Linda's wealth her beauty was faded, her teeth were iron, and her words were red-hot pincers. They would do better to sail to Finland, where they would find rows of maidens, rich in money, pearls, jewels, and golden bracelets, waiting for them on the rocky coast.

[Pg 24]