The Malachite Box nuggets. The story of the brothers is continued in "The Snake Trail" (alternative translation: "The Serpent's Trail"), published in 1939. In this "skaz", a young the factory worker Stepan meets the legendary Mistress of the Copper Mountain. He passes her tests and is rewarded by a malachite casket filled with jewellery for his betrothed, Nastyona. Stepan dies, leaving the Malachite Casket to his widow Nastyona. Their daughter Tanyushka likes to play with it. With black hair and green eyes, Tanyushka does not look like her mother at all, as if she was born to different parents. When she grows up,
The Malachite Box them so popular among the adult readers. They were exceptionally popular during the Great Patriotic War. The paperbacks were sent to the front line. The author received fan mail from the soldiers who asked to send them the book. The publication attracted a large number of folklorists, who collected tales near Sysert since 1940s and long after Pavel Bazhov's death. The characters of the Ural Mountains folklore such as the Mistress of the Copper Mountain became very well known after their appearance in Bazhov's "The Malachite Box". Sysert's old coat of arms (1982–2002) featured the Mistress as a lizard with