“Magboloto, Magboloto, why are you weeping?” asked Mr. Eagle.

“Ask me nothing, if you cannot help me in any way,” answered Magboloto.

“Tell me your trouble and I will help you,” replied Mr. Eagle.  Then Magboloto told Mr. Eagle his trouble.

“Magboloto,” said Mr. Eagle, “get upon my back and I will carry you to your wife’s home.”

Magboloto climbed upon Mr. Eagle’s back and they flew up until they reached Macaya’s house.  Then Magboloto requested Macaya’s grandmother, with whom she lived, to let her granddaughter return to earth with him.

“By no means,” said the grandmother, “unless you will spread ten jars of lunga (a certain very small grain) out to dry and gather them again in the evening.”

So Magboloto spread the jars of lunga on the sand, and at noon began to gather them up; but sunset had come before he had gathered more than five handfuls, so he sat down and began to cry like a little boy.

The king of the ants heard him, and wishing to help him, asked:—­“Magboloto, Magboloto, why are you weeping?”

“Ask me nothing, if you cannot help me.”

“Tell me about it and I will help you.”

So Magboloto told the king of the ants all his history, and the condition imposed by the grandmother before he could have his wife, and how impossible it was to fulfil it.

“Well, Magboloto, you shall be helped,” said the king of the ants.  Then he blew his horn, and in a little while all his subjects came, and began picking up the grain and putting it into the jars.  In a few moments all the grain was in the jars.

The next morning Magboloto went to get his wife, but the grandmother stopped him, saying:—­

“You shall not take my granddaughter away until you have first hulled a hundred bushels of rice.”

Magboloto was in despair, for he knew that to hull one hundred bushels of rice would take him not less than one hundred days, and the grandmother required him to do it in one day; so he cried like a child at his misfortune.  The king of the rats heard him crying, and at once came to help him.

“Magboloto, Magboloto, why are you weeping?” asked King Rat.

“Ask me nothing, if you cannot help me.”

“Relate the matter, and I will.”

Magboloto told him his trouble.  Then the king of the rats called his subjects together and ordered them to gnaw the hulls from the rice.  In an instant the rice was all hulled.

The next morning Magboloto made ready to depart with his wife, but the grandmother stopped him again, saying:—­

“You may not go until you have chopped down all the trees you see on that mountain over there.”

There were more than a million trees, so Magboloto was in great trouble, and as usual he began to weep.

The king of the wild boars heard him and came up, saying:—­

“Magboloto, Magboloto, why are you weeping?”