Page:Folk Tales from Tibet (1906).djvu/102

74 alarmed, and she directed him to smear her body all over with poison, and to tie a long string to her tail. As soon as she was ready the Boy placed her in the sleeve of his coat, and carried her along to the palace.

In the courtyard of the palace everything had been made ready for the fight. Seats had been prepared behind a barrier for the King and his nobles, whilst the roofs and the windows were crowded with hundreds of people who had come to see the show. At one end of the enclosure the King's great tusker stood ready, still chained by the leg; and the Boy, with the Mouse in his sleeve, took up his stand at the other end of the arena, face to face with the angry Elephant.

At a given signal the Elephant's chain was loosed, and with a bellow of rage he rushed towards where the Boy was standing. As he came on, holding his trunk high in the air, the little Mouse jumped to the ground and ran to meet him. The Elephant caught sight of this small object, and stopped for a moment to see what it was, and the Mouse hopped on to his foot. The Elephant at once put down his trunk to feel what was there, and in a twinkling the Mouse jumped into the open end of the trunk, and scuttled up it as fast as she could till she reached the head. She soon found herself inside the Elephant's brain, and there she ran round and round, smearing poison all over the brain of the great beast.

The Elephant, not knowing what had happened, rushed round the arena, bellowing with rage and pain, and smashing everything within reach of his trunk. But