Page:Sagas from the Far East; or, Kalmouk and Mongolian traditionary tales.djvu/220

196 saying, "Who then could this enemy possibly be?" And the fox told him, saying, "Who should it be other than the lion-cub in the forest on the other side the mountain? Behold! doth he not use to say, 'Even as my mother killed and devoured his mother, so also will I kill and devour him. "Let not this disturb thee, fox," interposed the calf, "for we two are brothers; he hath no bad thoughts against me." But the fox warned him again, saying, "Of a surety, if thou disregard my words thou shalt berue it. Behold! I have warned thee." Then the calf began to think within himself, "Is it not true what he says that the cub's mother killed my mother; and, further, what gain should he, mine uncle, have in deceiving me?" Then said he aloud, "If thy warning be so true, tell me further, I pray thee, by what manner of means doth he design to put me to death?" And the fox told him, saying, "When he wakes to-morrow morning observe thou him, and if he stretch himself and shake his mane, if he draws his claws out and in, and scratches up the earth with them, then know that it is a sure token he is minded to slay thee." The calf, his suspicions beginning to be awakened, promised to be upon his guard and to observe the cub.

The next morning, when they woke, each observed the other as he had promised the fox, and each by natural habit, which the fox had observed of old, but they not, gave the signs he had set before them for a