ar s[=o][=o]tli maltmahee,
Ganganareez soongalee,
Manni Mulgar sang suwhee:
Sulani, ghar magleer."

Then the Mulla-mulgars cut down stout boughs to make cudgels, and,
having tied up their few possessions into three bundles and filled their
pockets with old nuts, they took palm-leaves and honey-comb and withered
scarlet and green berries, with which they canopied as best they could
their mother's grave, nor forgot poor gluttonous Glint's. They stood
there in the snow, and raised their hands in lamentable salutation. And
each took up a stone and jerked it (for they cannot throw as men do) as
far as he could towards the forest, as if to say, "Go with us!" Then,
with one last sorrowful look at the befrosted ashes of their hut, they
took up their bundles and started on their journey.

At first, as I have said, the Mulgar-track is wide, and even in this
continually falling snow was beaten clear by hundreds of hand and foot
prints. But after a while the lofty branches began to knit themselves
above, and to hang thickly over the travellers, and to shut out the
light. And the path grew faint and narrow.

One by one their friends waved good-bye and left them, until only Noll
and Nunga (Mutta-matutta's only sister's only children) accompanied
them. Just before sunset, when the forest seemed like a cage of music
with the voices of the birds that now sang, many of them desperately
from cold and hunger rather than for delight, Noll, too, and Nunga
raised their hands, touched noses, and said good-bye. And the three
brothers stood watching them till they had waved their branches for the
last time. Then they went on.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER III

It was now, what with the snow and what with natural evening, growing
quickly dark. The birds had ceased to sing; only the Munza night-jar
rattled. Now near, now far away, the Mulla-mulgars heard the beasts of
the forest beginning to range and roar in the gloom. Nod buttoned up his
sheep's jacket, for there was a frost-mist beneath the trees. He was
cold, and began to be tired and very homesick. But Thumb was broad and
fat and prodigiously strong, Thimble lean and sinewy. And when Thumb saw
that Nod went stumbling under his bundle, he said: "Give it to me,
Mulla-jugguba!" (Prince of Bonfires). And Thimble laughed.

But Nod refused to give up his bundle, and trudged on behind his
brothers, until night came down in earnest. Then, when it was quite
dark, after li