Page:Tales from the Indian Epics.djvu/123

Rh spoiled the sacrifice." "No," said the elephant Bhadra. As he spoke he stamped his mighty feet and the ice floes cracked, and the bergs crashed together, and the freed seas roared and thundered with each stamp of the monster's feet. Silently King Sagar's sons returned to the centre of the earth and bored a fifth tunnel, which brought them out at the north-east quarter of the other side of the earth. Round them stretched an endless, meadow and on it they saw grazing the very steed which King Sagar had sent out with Prince Anshumat. Not far from it they saw the old woman who had stolen it. With drawn swords they ran forward to kill her. But suddenly the old woman changed into a god like form. Two mighty columns of fire shot out from the eyes of the divine being and in a moment all that remained of King Sagar's sixty thousand sons was as many heaps of smouldering ashes.

For a year King Sagar waited in vain for news of his sixty thousand sons. At last he said to Prince Anshumat, "My grandson, I fear that some evil has overtaken my sons. Go and seek for them. For my heart is heavy within me."

Prince Anshumat gladly assented and taking the king's sword and his own bow went off alone to search for his uncles. The young prince wandered through all the countries of India, but though he learnt that King Sagar's sons had passed through many lands, he could find them nowhere. At last he came to the shores of the ocean. Not far from its waters, the prince saw great mounds of sand. Going close to them he found that they marked the mouth of the mighty tunnel which his