THE RIVER MAIRURE
even were it five times as strong as it is. The man who made the cage knew his work. And think, friends, how could there be any danger from the beasts in the king's pleasure-ground?"
Then, not raising my head, I answered my friend Sarroo: "My heart knows not fear, and does not tremble even in moments of mortal danger, but I heard the roar of the dweller in the woods on the other side of the river Mairure, and at that sound it becomes a man to lie in the dust and wait till the choice of a victim has been made."
Then, laughing as before, Sarroo replied: "That is only a beast in a cage roaring, and it is quite harmless. Look! Even little children go right up to the cage and are not afraid; the wire cannot be broken. The beast is fed by the keepers, and the meat they give him he has, and no more."
As I lay in the dust the roaring continued. I remembered the many nights in the village when, awakening in my tent, I heard the same awful demands for a victim, and I dared not get up. But at last I heard my brother Sin say to me, "I have dared to look up; it seems the roaring proceeds from a beast shut in a cage."
221
