Page:Armenian Literature.djvu/83

 Toross took a cup in his hand and paused: he was thinking about something, and he neither drank nor set the cup down. His son cries from the street: “Father, dear, there are the mad men of Sassun. Take care, they will be jeering at you. Let us go away.”

Uncle Toross turned to his son and said: “Oh, you dog of a son! Shall I sit here and feast? Did not Mösramelik come and take our children away? Abamelik’s children in trouble, and I sitting at a banquet? Oh, what a shame it is! Bread and wine, God be praised! Truly, I will drink no wine till I have fetched the little ones.” And Uncle Toross went out of Sassun and came to Mösr. He greeted Mösramelik, and they sat down together. Said Uncle Toross: “Now, we are come for God’s judgment. It i true that you made an agreement with Abamelik, but if a man sells a captive he should first wait on the lord.”

They arose and went to the court, and Uncle Toross was given the children.

But Mösramelik stood in fear of these children, and he said to Uncle Toross, “Let these children first pass under my sword, and then take them with you.”

Uncle Toross told the lads of this, and Zöranwegi said, “Let us pass under his sword and escape hence”; and the other two said the same. But David said otherwise: “If he wishes us dead he will not kill us to-day, for the people will say he has murdered the children. Under his sword I will not go. He does this so that I shall not lift my sword against him when I am a man.” Uncle Toross got the boys together, that they might pass under the sword of Mosramelik, for he was very anxious. David was rebellious; he stood till and went not under it. Uncle Toross seized his collar and pushed him, but David would not go. He ran past it at one side and kicked with his great toe upon a flint until the sparks flew. And Mösramelik was frightened and said: “This child is still so young and yet is terrible. What will happen when he is a man! If any evil comes to me it will be through him.”

Uncle Toross took the children and came to Sassun.