Page:Sagas from the Far East; or, Kalmouk and Mongolian traditionary tales.djvu/242

218 Then the tamer took up the serpent, and put it on a piece of grass near, and covered it with his cap. He had hardly done so, when there came up out of the water a whole train of princes of the serpent-dæmons, riding on horses, on to the bank of the stream, where they dispersed themselves, searching about every where for the white serpent, which was a serpent-prince.

After they had searched long and found nothing, there came up out of the water, riding on a white horse, a white serpent, having on a white mantle and a white crown.

He, seeing the tamer, said to him,—

"I am the Serpent-king, reigning over the white mother-o'-pearl shells. I have lost my son. O man! say if thine eyes have lighted on him."

The tamer asked of him, "What was thy son like?"

And the Serpent-king answered,—

"Even a white serpent was my son."

"If that is so," answered the tamer, "thy son is with me. Even now a mighty Garuda-bird had him in his beak and prepared to devour him. But I, who am a tamer of all living creatures, knew how to entreat him so that he should give the white serpent up to me."

Then he lifted his cap from off the grass and delivered the White Serpent-prince unto the Serpent-king, his father.