Bursting with a quake, as when the earth opens, it was scattered in countless pieces, never to be again united. Pulp and rind and seeds were splattered over his brow and well-smoothed locks, and the juice ran down over his face, and covered his hairy chest, and flowed from his limbs to the ground. Dripping and sticky the proud Oboo, like a half-drowned rat crawling out of a well, sneaked away, unfit to be seen, and would no longer match his prowess against the Ammi in battle.
THE RETREAT OF THE LALI.
Inextinguishable laughter arose among the men; while even among the Lali there was merriment. The females were most amused at the seed-besplattered lover; and Ilo, glad in his heart at his inglorious retreat, said with contempt:
“Go back to the women and get dried up; you were made not for war, but for love.”
Like a bubble blown by a boy, which swells bigger and bigger, until the sky and mountains are reflected in it, and then, at the moment of its greatest bulk, when it seems to carry the whole world, bursts and settles into a little suds, so the swelling Oboo, who matched the sun in its splendor when he came to battle, dwindled to a sop as he returned.
Meanwhile the girls who had been drawn into the battle, and for whom Oboo had left his retreat, fought so fiercely that none of them were captured, but many of their assailants were slain or left wounded on the field.
And now all the Lali retreated from the victorious Ammi, being demoralized by the victory of the girls and the discomfiture of Oboo, while the Ammi prepared to move with all their force on the Lali and to end the war that day.
But Night settled down on the contending armies, and the wheels of history stopped awhile.