22. The Nether-Distant-Land

1[The Deity Great-House-Prince spoke to him], saying: “Thou must set off to the Nether-Distant-Land where dwells His Impetuous-Male-Augustness. That Great Deity will certainly counsel thee.” So on his obeying her commands and arriving at the august place of His Impetuous-Male-Augustness, the latter’s daughter the Forward-Princess came out and saw him, and they exchanged glances and were married, and [she] went in again, and told her father, saying: “A very beautiful Deity has come.” Then the Great Deity went out and looked, and said: “This is the Ugly-Male-Deity-of-the-Reed-Plains,” and at once calling him in, made him sleep in the snake-house. Hereupon his wife, Her Augustness the Forward-Princess, gave her husband a snake-scarf, saying: “When the snakes are about to bite thee, drive them away by waving this scarf thrice.” So, on his doing as she had instructed, the snakes became quiet, so that he came forth after calm slumbers. Again on the night of the next day [the Impetuous-Male-Deity] put him into the centipede and wasp-house; but as she again gave him a centipede and wasp-scarf, and instructed him as before, he came forth calmly. Again [the Impetuous-Male-Deity] shot a whizzing barb into the middle of a large moor, and sent him to fetch the arrow, and, when he had entered the moor, at once set fire to the moor all round. Thereupon, while he [stood] knowing no place of exit, a mouse came and said: “The inside is hollow-hollow; the outside is narrow-narrow.” Owing to its speaking thus, he trod on the place, whereupon he fell in and hid himself, during which time the fire burnt past. Then the mouse brought out in its mouth and presented to him the whizzing barb. The feathers of the arrow were brought in their mouths by all the mouse’s children. Hereupon his wife the Forward-Princess came bearing mourning-implements, and crying. Her father the great Deity, thinking that [the Deity-Great-Name-Possessor] was already dead and done for, went out and stood on the moor, whereupon [the Deity Great-Name-Possessor] brought the arrow and presented it to him, upon which [the Great Deity], taking him into the house and calling him into an eight-foot spaced large room, made him take the lice off his head. So, on looking at the head, [he saw that] there were many centipedes [there]. Thereupon, as his wife gave to her husband berries of the muku tree and red earth, he chewed the berries to pieces, and spat them out with the red earth which he held in his month, so that the Great Deity believed him to be chewing up and spitting out the centipedes, and, feeling fond [of him] in his heart, fell asleep. Then [the Deity Great-Name-Possessor], grasping the Great Deity’s hair, tied it fast to the various rafters of the house, and, blocking up the floor of the house with a five hundred draught rock, and taking his wife the Forward-Princess on his back, then carried off the Great Deity’s great life-sword and life-bow-and-arrows, as also his heavenly speaking-lute, and ran out. But the heavenly speaking-lute brushed against a tree, and the earth resounded. So the Great Deity, who was sleeping, started at the sound, and pulled down the house. But while he was disentangling his hair which was tied to the rafters, [the Deity Great-Name-Possessor] fled a long way. So then, pursuing after him to the Even Pass of Hades, and gazing on him from afar, he called out to the Deity Great-Name-Possessor, saying: “With the great life-sword and the life-bow-and-arrows which thou carriest, pursue thy half-brethren till they crouch on the august slopes of the passes, and pursue them till they are swept into the reaches of the rivers, and do thou, wretch! become the Deity Master-of-the-Great-Land; and moreover, becoming the Deity Spirit-of-the-Living-Land, and making my daughter the Forward-Princess thy consort, do thou make stout the temple-pillars at the foot of Mount Uka in the nethermost rock-bottom, and make high the cross-beams to the Plain-of-High-Heaven, and dwell [there], thou villain!” So when, bearing the great sword and bow, he pursued and scattered the eighty Deities, he did pursue them till they crouched on the august slope of every pass, he did pursue them till they were swept into every river, and then he began to make the land. Quamobrem Hera Yakami, secundum anterius pactum, [cum eo] in thalamo coivit. So he brought her with him; but, fearing his consort the Forward Princess, she stuck into the fork of a tree the child that she had borne, and went back. So the child was called by the name of the Tree-Fork-Deity, and another name was the Deity-of-August-Wells.