“Hear me, Jumala!” he cried. “O Jumala, friend of the friendless, help me. I will have revenge. I will pay those women well for the sorrow they have made me feel. The slave will [[267]]whip the master, and the master shall serve the slave.”
All the savagery that had been lurking in his blue eyes burst forth, as lightning bursts from the drifting clouds. He ran to the woody thicket and broke off a long branch of hemlock to serve him as a whip. Slashing it this way and that, he rushed hither and thither collecting his herd. With great ado he drove the lazy milkers far into the savage woods. He gathered the yearlings together and, after much shouting and cursing, chased them into the tangled thickets where the wild beasts had their lairs.
Out of the shady places wolves leaped up, howling, snarling, snapping their teeth. The bears were roused from their lurking holes and came forth growling, their tongues lolling out. The gentle milk cows, the timid yearlings, even the stolid oxen, were overcome with fear. They ran together in groups, trembling and helpless. Instantly the wild beasts leaped upon them with bared claws and gnashing teeth. If any escaped the wolves, they were seized by the bears; if any fled from the bears, they were devoured by the wolves. The whole herd perished. [[268]]
From a safe seat in the crotch of a pine the slave boy looked on and watched the slaughter; and he laughed a wild, discordant, triumphant laugh. Then, clapping his hands together and knocking his knees against the trunk of the tree, he began to sing. He sang a wild, strange song of enchantment—a song he had learned from a witch woman in the land of mists and shadows. And as he sang, behold, a wonderful thing occurred: all the wolves so lately feasting were changed into sleek, fat yearlings, and all the bears so lately gorging themselves became fine milk cows with mild, soft eyes and pendent udders.
The slave boy descended from the tree, still singing, still shouting, still working the magic spell. The beasts with one accord looked up to him as their master. One after another, they marched slowly and orderly out of the marshes and out of the woods, the false milk cows going foremost calmly chewing their cuds, and the false yearlings gambolling behind. The sun was now well down towards the western hills, and the evening milking time was nigh at hand.
Homeward, over the hills and along the well-known [[269]]pathways, the slave boy drove his herd. With noiseless steps he ran among the beasts, breathing words of magic, words of cunning in their ears.
“Spare not the mistress when she comes out to milk you,” he whispered to one.
“Seize the maidens when they come with pails to milk you,” he said to others.
“Seek the old cook in the kitchen and remind her of her cake,” he muttered to still another.
“Be bold, be fierce, be very hungry,” he counselled them all.