“I am the dear brother of the sun-goddess, and have just descended from heaven.”
“Most obediently do I offer my daughter to you,” the old man said with reverence.
Susa-no-wo then transformed the girl into a comb, which he placed in his hair. Having done this, he bade the old couple to brew rice-beer (sake). They obeyed him, and he asked them to construct a fence with eight gates and eight benches, and to place on each bench a vat filled with the beer.
In time the eight-forked serpent came nigh. It dipped each of its heads into each of the vats, drank the sake, became drunk, and then lay down and slept. Susa-no-wo drew his two-handed sword,[3] and cut the serpent in pieces. The Hi River turned red with blood.
When Susa-no-wo cut the middle tail his sword broke. He marvelled at this. Taking the point of the sword in his hand, he thrust and split, and looked inside, and found a keen-cutting blade within this tail. He took it out and sent it to his sister, Ama-terâsu, the sun-goddess. [[373]]This sword is the Kusa-nagi-no-tachi (the “herb-quelling” dragon-sword).
Susa-no-wo afterwards built a house in the land of Idzumo, at a place called Suga. Clouds rose up from that place. He made an ode regarding the eight clouds that formed an eight-fold fence for husband and wife to retire within the house. Then he appointed the maiden’s father to be keeper, or head-man of the house.
In this nuptial house children were born to Susa-no-wo and the young woman he had rescued from the dragon. These children included Oho-toshi-no-kami (Great Harvest deity), Uka-no-mitama (the August Spirit of Food), and Ohonamochi (“Great Name Possessor”), the god of Idzumo,[4] who could assume snake form or human form at will.
Ohonamochi and his eighty brothers desired to marry the Princess of Yakami in Inaba. On their way thither the eighty brothers tricked a hare, which came by a distressing injury, but Ohonamochi caused it to be cured. The grateful hare of Inaba, now called “the Hare Deity”, promised Ohonamochi, who carried the bag as a servant to his brothers, that he would get the princess for wife.
The princess afterwards refused to marry any of the eighty brothers, saying she favoured Ohonamochi. Being enraged, the brothers took counsel together and said to Ohonamochi: “There is a red boar on this mountain, named Tema, in the land of Hataki. When we drive it down, you must catch it. If you fail to catch it, we shall certainly slay you.”[5]
Having thus spoken, the eighty deities kindled a fire, in which they heated a great boulder, shaped like to a boar. They rolled the stone down the mountain-side, [[374]]and when Ohonamochi seized it he was so grievously burned that he died.