Armenian Literature

Excerpt

THE SHEEP-BROTHER

Once there was a widow and she had a daughter. The widow married a widower who had by his first wife two children, a boy and a girl. The wife was always coaxing her husband: "Take the children, do, and lead them up into the mountains." Her husband could not refuse her, and, lo! one day he put some bread in his basket, took the children, and set off for the mountain.

They went on and on and came to a strange place. Then the father said to the children, "Rest here a little while," and the children sat down to rest. The father turned his face away and wept bitterly, very bitterly. Then he turned again to the children and said, "Eat something," and they ate. Then the boy said, "Father, dear, I want a drink." The father took his staff, stuck it into the ground, threw his coat over it, and said, "Come here, my son, sit in the shadow of my coat, and I will get you some water." The brother and sister stayed and the father went away and forsook his children. Whether they waited a long time or a short time before they saw that their father was not coming back is not known. They wandered here and there looking for him, but saw no human being anywhere.

At last they came back to the same spot, and, beginning to weep, they said:

"Alas! Alas! See, here is father's staff, and here is his coat, and he comes not, and he comes not."

Whether the brother and sister sat there a long time or a short time is not known. They rose after a while, and one took the staff and the other the coat, and they went away without knowing whither. They went on and on and on, until they saw tracks of horses' hoofs filled with rain-water.

"I am going to drink, sister," said the brother.

"Do not drink, little brother, or you will become a colt," said the sister.

They passed on till they saw tracks of oxen's hoofs.

"O sister dear, how thirsty I am!"

"Do not drink, little brother, or you will be a calf," the sister said to him.

They went on till they saw the tracks of buffalo hoofs.

"O sister dear, how thirsty I am!"

"Drink not, little brother, or you will be a buffalo calf."

They passed on and saw the tracks of bears' paws.

"Oh, I am so thirsty, sister dear."

"Drink not, little brother, or you will become a little bear."

They went on and saw the tracks of swine's trotters.

"O sister dear, I am going to drink."

"Drink not, little brother, or you will become a little pig."

They went on and on till they saw the tracks of the pads of wolves.

"O sister dear, how thirsty I am!"

"Do not drink, little brother, or you will become a little wolf."

They walked on and on till they saw the tracks of sheep's trotters.

"O sister dear, I am almost dying with thirst."

"O little brother, you grieve me so! You will, indeed, be a sheep if you drink."

He could stand it no longer. He drank and turned into a sheep. He began to bleat and ran after his sister. Long they wandered, and at last came home.

Then the stepmother began to scheme against them. She edged up to her husband and said: "Kill your sheep. I want to eat him."

The sister got her sheep-brother away in the nick of time and drove him back into the mountains....