Mistress of the Copper Mountain

The Gumyoshki mine was renowned for its various wonders, where copper ore has been mined since the 18th century for the nearby Polevsky factory. And not without reason: the power here belonged to the Mistress of the Copper Mountain. She could take on different forms: sometimes she would transform into a lizard, or appear as a cheerful girl, sometimes she would enter a house as a wanderer, or receive guests as a powerful sovereign in her realm. But in any guise, the Mistress loved to "play tricks on people": she would give a difficult task - and the foreman would punish the worker harshly; she would lure with a mysterious stone flower - and the master would forever disappear into her mountain. And in the mountain, "there are large rooms... and the walls are different. Sometimes they are all green, sometimes yellow with golden specks. On which there are again copper flowers. There are blue ones too, azure. In a word, it's decorated beyond description." This beauty of the Ural land, the incredible wealth of the Ural mountains, was conveyed with love and deep knowledge of the nature of stone by artist Vyacheslav Nazaruk, who dedicated several years to illustrating the most famous tales of Pavel Bazhov.