Page:Armenian Literature.djvu/95

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DAVID OF SASSUN
75


David and the giants began to hack and hew each other and they fought with clubs and bows until night. David cried: “I believe in the high and holy cross of Maratuk,” and took his sword and cut both their heads off. He bound their hair together and hung them across his horse like saddle bags and their tongues furrowed the ground like a plough.

David rode away with their heads and had already traversed half the way when he saw approaching him, riding between heaven and earth, a rider, who called out to him! “Do you think you have conquered the giants Schibikan and Hamsa?” The rider sprang behind David and struck at him with a club. He crawled under the saddle and the club struck the stirrup and tore it loose, and it fell to the ground. David sprang out from under the saddle and cried: “Bread and wine, as the Lord liveth!” and swung his club over his enemy. The enemy dodged the blow, but his hair fell away from his face. David looked and recognized Chandud-Chanum; she had disguised herself and had come to meet him.

“O shameless woman!” David said. “You would disgrace me a second time.”

They rode together into Chandud-Chanum’s city. They arrived and dismounted and called Chandud-Chanum’s father. David said to him: “Will you give me your daughter for a wife?”

Her father said: “I will not give her to you. If you will marry her and live here, I will give her to you. If you must take her away, I will not give her. How can I do otherwise? I have enemies all around me; they will destroy my city.”

And David said: “I will marry her and stay here. I will not take her away.”

So they were married and celebrated the wedding, feasting seven days and seven nights.

The time passed by unheeded, and when nine months, nine days and nine hours had passed, God sent them a son.

And David said to Chandud-Chanum: “If this child is mine, he must have a mark—he will show great strength.” They put the child in swaddling-clothes, but instead of bands they bound him with plough-chains. He began to cry and stir in his cradle and the chain snapped into pieces.

They sent word to David: “The youngster is a stout fel-