Page:Indian Fairy Tales (Stokes, 1879).djvu/186

 174 the seventh gone?" they said. "Well, when he returns we will all go on together." They sat waiting and waiting for him, till, as it was getting late and he had not come, they all thought they had better start without him. So they Continued their journey, taking the goat with them. Before they went they said to the villagers, "If our seventh man comes back to you, send him after us."

At evening they came to another village, where they stayed for the night. They cooked and ate their dinners, and gave grain and grass to the goat. At midnight, when they were fast asleep, the goat became a demon and swallowed another man, and then took her goat's shape again.

In this way she ate five men. The two that were left were very sad at finding themselves alone. "We were seven men," they said, "now we are but two." The grain merchant's son was one of the two, and he was very quick and sharp. He determined he would not say anything to his companion, but that he would watch by him that night, and find out, if he could, what had happened to his other friends. To keep himself awake he cut a piece out of his finger, and rubbed a little salt into the wound, so that when his companion went to sleep, he should not be able to sleep because of the pain. At midnight the goat came and turned into a huge demon. She went quickly up to the sleeping man to swallow him; but the merchant's son rushed at her, beat her, and snatched his companion from her mouth. The demon turned instantly into a goat, and went back to the place where it had been stabled.

The two men next morning set out from the village where they had passed the night. They would have killed the goat had they been able. As they could not do so, they took it with them till they came to a plain in the jungle, where they tied it up to a tree, and left it. Then they continued their journey, and were very sorry they had not known how