Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 4 1886.djvu/45

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FOLK-LORE IN MONGOLIA.
37

wife ordered him again to go to the lake and call forth the white man to accompany him to the city under the water, and to say there the word, "Tohugu tachēn." When he pronounced that word the white man gave him a small iron box. His wife again told him the box was "Tohugu tachēn." She opened the box and said, "Let there come forth 500 soldiers and 500 horses." This army went to the town, took it, and killed the amban. After this the army returned to the box. The woman kept the little box for herself. Whatever army she wished for she could draw from the box.[1] The narrator added that she was the Empress of Russia.—(The same as above.)

32. Khovugu and Khaduin-Dziuge.[2]

Khovugu was a tremendous hero. He leant against the mountain Sumbur and drank of the ocean Sum Dalai. His tent had 1,500 stanchions; the screen for the hole that let out the smoke was of white Taipuin. He sat on a chair of red "Dzanduin." Ten men could not lift up his black "Domba Asuir," five men could not lift his grey cup "Batuir." He hunted in the three mountains, the Altai, the Khanghai, and the Khukhêi; his steed was the grey "Solongo."[3] Besides him he had two dogs, Aisuir and Bassuir, and two birds, Aigan and Taigan. On the Khangai mountains browsed his herds of black horses, on the Khukhei mountains his herds of grey horses, and on the Altai his herds of piebald horses. His whip Koshyak was thirty fathoms long; his saddle was like a mountain pass. Without smoke he made a red fire; without steam he boiled red tea. He hunted on the three mountains, the Altai, the Khangai, and the Khukèi; he watered his cattle at the water of Iusun sur. He had a mother and a sister older than himself.

A tremendous dust rose in the south-west. When the dust drew near it appeared that a black-bearded man, thirty years old, on a bay

  1. The Mongols call the Tsar "the White Khan," and believe he is a woman. They confound him with the White Khan of mythology. (Potanin.)
  2. Khovugu, the Hare (?), Khaduin, the Hare (?), Dziugu, the Glutton. (Potanin.)
  3. Solongo perhaps weazel? (Potanin.)