Page:Sagas from the Far East; or, Kalmouk and Mongolian traditionary tales.djvu/72

48 Being thus defiled by contact with the corpse, he slept for many years. When at last he woke, he found that three cherry-trees had sprung up from the seeds he planted and now reached to the top of the rock. Rejoicing greatly therefore, he climbed up by their means and reached the earth.

First he bent his steps to his late dwelling, to look for his companions, but it was deserted, and no one lived therein. So, taking his iron bow and his arrows, he journeyed farther.

Presently he came to a place where there were three fine houses, with gardens and fields and cattle and all that could be desired by the heart of man. These were the houses which his three companions had built for themselves out of the spoil of the cave. And when he would have gone in, their wives said—for they had taken to them wives also—"Thy companions are not here; they are gone out hunting." So he took up his iron bow and his arrows again, and went on to seek them, and as he went by the way he saw them coming towards him with the game they had taken with their bows. Then he strung his iron bow and would have shot at them; but they, falling down before him, cried out, "Slay us not. Only let us live, and behold our houses, and our wives, and our cattle, and all that we have is in thine hand, to do with it as it seemeth good to thee."

Then he put up his arrows again, and said to them only these words, "In truth, friends, ye dealt evilly with me in that ye left me to perish in the cave."