The Kahawana Sowing (Variant)
At a certain city there was a foolish King. At the time when the King says anything he kills the whole of the Ministers who do not give answer, “Yahapati” (It is good), to it. In this way, by not remembering to say Yahapati a great number of Ministers tasted death.[2] By his doing thus, on account of his making this order [in the end] there was not a Minister for the King.
After that, he caused notice to be given by tom-toms in the city for a person to come for the ministership (aemaeptiyakama). Because they were not willing to taste death anybody was unwilling to do it.
At last, a drunken cheat having the name Jobbuwā arrived. “Yahapati; be pleased to give me the office of Minister,” he said. The King having said, “Yahapati,” gave him the office of Minister.
While time was passing, he spoke to the Minister one day, and said, “Cannot I obtain profit by cultivating kahawanas (coins)?”
“Yahapati; you can get much gain by it,” he said.
“If so, for the purpose of sowing them cause a chena to be cut,” the King said to the Minister.
The Minister, having said, “Yahapataeyi” (It is good), went away, and firstly having told the Chiefs (pradānīnṭa) of the village to collect and bring Tamarind seeds, told the villagers to put in order a wide, level, open place on the border of a certain river. The villagers having put the Tamarind seeds into sacks and stitched them up, brought them.
Having cut the chena, after it was completed the Minister having gone, asked the King for kahawanas [to sow in it]. The King said, “Take as many as you require for sowing in the chena.” The Minister having brought the kahawanas home, caused the Tamarind seeds to be sown in the chena.
After they sprouted, the King said he must go to look at the chena. The Minister inviting the King [to go], having gone in state (peraharin) with him, and caused the army to stay on one side, the King and the Minister went into the chena. Because, when the Tamarind seeds sprouted, many young shoots were of golden colour[3] the King said, “These are very good.”
While he was walking there a long time, having arrived at weariness the King went to the river to bathe. In that river the water is very rapid. Because of it, at the time when the King descended into the water he began to be drawn down into the water. Thereupon, at the time when the King says, “Take hold of me,” the Minister, having said, “Yahapati,” remained looking on.
After the King had been swallowed up in the river and died, the Minister, having put on the royal ornaments and gone away with the army, exercised the sovereignty of that city with renown.
[1] A very respectful form of affirmative. [↑]
[2] Maerum kāēwōya, ate dying. [↑]
[3] It is evident that some kahawanas were golden ones. See also vol. i, p. 348, and the Appendix, p. 454. [↑]
No. 240
Concerning the Prince with his Life in his Sword
In a certain country there was a King. There were seven Princes for the King. Having instructed the whole seven, the King tried to fit them [for their position]. The party without wanting to do anything whatever passed the days in amusement.
The King thought when he looked [at their idleness], “From this party of seven persons there is not an advantage,” and having punished (daḍa gahalā) the whole seven, “Go to any kingdom you can; don’t stay in this country,” he said.
The seven persons speaking [together] said, “Our father the King told us to go!” and the whole of them went.
Out of them, the eldest Prince, took six flower seeds. The whole seven having arrived at a kingdom, to the youngest Prince the eldest Prince said, “Getting any livelihood you can, remain in this country. At the place where you stay plant this flower seed for yourself. It having sprouted, when the flower tree has grown, on the tree a flower will blossom. At the time when the flower has faded come seeking me.” Having told him thus he made the Prince stay in that country.
In that very way he made the other five stay in five countries. Having given to those persons five flower seeds, he told them [about them] in the very way he told that Prince.
To the last country the eldest Prince went. When he was living in that country doing cultivation work, one day he went to walk in the midst of the forest. In the midst of the forest there is a house. The Prince saw it. Having gone to that rock house (cave), when he looked a Princess was [there].
He asked the Princess, “Are you a human daughter, or a Yaksa-daughter?”
Thereupon the Princess said, “I am a daughter of a King. Having eaten food at night I went to sleep. That Yakā having brought me, I am in this rock house. I also do not know a path for going away; I stay in fear,” the Princess said.
Then the Prince asked the Princess, “Will you come to go with me?”
At that time the Princess having said, “It is good,” the two together having bounded off, proceeded to the place where the Prince who went there stays. During the time while these persons are staying there obtaining a livelihood, the Prince’s life is in his sword. Except that his brothers know that his life is in this sword, no other person knows.
The Princess one day went to the river to bathe. While bathing there, three or four hairs of her head in the Princess’s hair knot having become loosened and having floated, went away in the river. When the Prince of the King of that country was bathing lower down in the river, those hairs of her head which went became entangled on the hand of the Prince. When the Prince, having said, “What is this?” was looking, it was a sort of long hairs of the head, hair of the head of gold colour, and about two fathoms’ length.
Having seen this hair, and known that these were the very best, like [those of] a royal Princess, he thought, “I must seek this Princess,” and went to the palace. Having taken the hairs of the head he showed them to his father the King. Having shown them he told him to do whatever [was necessary], and seek and give him the Princess to whom this hair of the head belongs.
He published by the notification tom-tom that to a person who, having found, gave her, he will give goods [amounting] to a tusk elephant’s load. An old woman who stayed near there said, “I can.” Having told the old woman to come, the King asked, “What do you want in order to go to seek the Princess?”
“I don’t want anything, O Lord; I only want a boat,” she said. So he gave her a boat.
Having gone to the river taking the boat, the old woman sat in the boat, saying and saying lamentations, and having floated she went up[1] the river. Having gone in that way, and tied the boat on that side, the old woman went to the place where the Princess possessing that hair, and the Prince, are staying.
When the old woman was going there the Prince was not at home. To the Princess the old woman said, “Anē! Daughter, there is no person to look after me. Assist me for the sake of charity,” she said. The Princess becoming grieved at it told the old woman to remain.
After a little, the Prince came home. Having come he asked, “This mother, a person from where is she? What came she here for?”
Thereupon the Princess also [said], “She came and said, ‘There is no one to give me to eat!’ Because of it, I being alone I said, ‘Remain with me,’ ” she said.
While she was [there] in that way, at the time when the Prince was not [there] the old woman said to the Princess, “You having eaten and drunk, when you are lying down by way of fun ask the Prince, ‘Where is your life?’ ”
So the Princess asked the Prince, “Where is your life?”
At that time the Prince said, “My life is in my sword.”
Through the ignorance of the Princess regarding it, she told that old woman that his life is in the sword. Well then, the old woman from that day, having said that it was for putting in the hearth on rainy days, sought for firewood and heaped it up. When the old woman is going to sleep, every day having built a bon-fire she goes to sleep.
One day during the day time, having been [there] at the time when the Prince is not there, she looked where the sword is. Thereupon, at night a rain began. Having said, “To-day there is rain,” she strengthened the bon-fire. After the Princess and the Prince went to sleep she brought the sword and put it in the bon-fire.
Having arisen in the morning, when she looked the Prince having died the Princess began to lament. The old woman also falsely lamented. The two persons having been lamenting and lamenting a little time, the old woman, calling the Princess, went to obtain shelter at another place. Having gone there, and handed over the Princess to the King of that country, taking the presents also, the old woman went home.
At that time the King told the Princess to take that Prince in marriage. Thereupon the Princess said, “My Prince is now dead only two or three days. Because of it I want time for a month.” Having found an upper-story house very near there, he sent the Princess to stay in the upper-story house in that street.
Having seen that the flowers of the flower trees of the younger brothers of that Prince had faded, [his brothers] began to seek him. Seeking him, they went to the place where the Prince is dead. Having gone, these six persons together said, “Where is the sword?” and began to seek it. When seeking it, the sword having been in a heap of ashes they took it. Thereafter having taken the sword to the river, they cleaned it; at that time life was [re-]established for that Prince. Then the Prince having arisen spoke to those Princes, and having said, “Now then, go you to each of the places where you were,” he did that cultivation work, and remained obtaining a livelihood [thus].
This one got news that that old woman having taken the Princess and given her to the King, received for herself presents and distinctions. At that time sorrow having gone to the Prince he went to seek the Princess. When [he was] going walking in the street in which is the Princess, the Princess saw that this one is going. The Prince did not see her.
At that time the Princess began to write a letter. Having written the letter, the Princess remained in expectation of the time when the Prince is coming. The Prince, through news that she is in that very street, came back. At that time the Princess, having seen that the Prince is coming, taking the letter dropped it [so as] to fall in front of him. The Prince having taken the letter, when he looked at it and read it there was written, “That old woman who stayed near us having deceived us and having brought and given me to the King, received for herself presents and distinctions. The King said to me that he must marry and give me to the King’s Prince. Thereupon I said, ‘My Prince is not dead a month now.’ Because of it, asking for time for a month, I am staying in another house,” there was written. “I said so through the thought that I shall obtain my Prince again. In three days more we are going to the church (palliya) to marry. Because of it, having got a horse carriage should you come on that day to the church we can escape and go off,” there was written.
Thereupon the Prince on the day she told him having got a horse carriage also, went near the church in the disguise of a horse-keeper, and halting the carriage, remained [there].
On the wedding day the King, the Prince, the Princess, the whole of the party, went in a horse carriage. The Princess saw that that Prince is staying like the horse-keeper, holding the horse. But when the Princess looking [at him] went into the church, the horse-keeper [Prince] having remained standing, becoming sleepy reclined a little. Then the Prince went to sleep.
That Princess having got married and come, and having ascended into the carriage which the Prince brought, not knowing that the Prince was asleep struck the horse, and making it bound went off as though she flew. The other people who were there, not observing the quarter to which the Princess went, went away. The King and the married Prince after that sought her; they did not meet with her. The sleeping horse-keeper Prince having ascertained that the carriage was not [there], weeping and weeping began to go along the path on which that Princess went.
When the Princess was going in the midst of a forest wilderness, Vaeddās having been there came and watched in order to seize her. Having watched, they said to the Princess, “If thou come not with us we will shoot and kill thee.”
Thereupon the Princess asked, “I can come with one of you. How shall I come with four or five persons?”
The Vaeddās asked the Princess, “If so, how is it [to be]?”
Thereupon the Princess says, “You having been set in line, all at one discharge shoot. Having shot, I will join the person whose arrow should fall far, who came [after] picking up the arrow, and will come [with him],” she said.
At that time the whole of the party having been fixed in line shot [for the arrows] to go very far. Having shot, all ran for the purpose of bringing the arrows. Thereupon the Princess having struck the horse, driving it off went away without being perceived. The Vaeddās having got the arrows and come, went away without the Princess.
When she was going to that side from the forest wilderness in which are the Vaeddās, the Princess thought that should she go by the carriage she will be unable to escape. So she descended from the carriage to the ground, and having unloosed the horse drove it into the jungle. She rolled the carriage over into the jungle.
The Princess having thrown away the Princess’s dress, dressing like a Heṭṭiyā went away. In this manner she went to another kingdom. In that country, establishing shops, there was a rich Heṭṭiyā. She approached near him. At that time the shopkeeper Heṭṭiyā having become much pleased with the [apparent] Heṭṭiyā, told him to remain there. Well then, the shopkeeper Heṭṭiyā asked, “Who art thou?”
Thereupon the Princess said, “I am a Heṭṭirāla of a country; I came to establish a shop.”
The shopkeeper having heard that word, said, “If so, let us two trade in partnership.” Having said [this] he handed over a shop to the Princess resembling a Heṭṭiyā. He gave for it suitable servants.
At that time this Princess says, “I having come to a new country, when establishing a shop have the thought to give a dāna (free donation of food), and secondly to establish the shop.”
Thereupon the shopkeeper Heṭṭirāla having become pleased, and having said, “Let us two pay the amount that the cost comes to,” they gave the dāna.
Then that horse-keeper Prince having come, approached there. The Heṭṭirāla having seen the horse-keeper gave him alms. The [Princess] Heṭṭirāla after the man ate the food put him in a house and told the servants to shut the door.
During that night having given the dāna and having finished, “Whence are you?” the new Heṭṭirāla asked the horse-keeper.
At that time the horse-keeper said to that Heṭṭirāla, “Anē! Heṭṭirāla, I indeed am a royal Prince. The Princess whom I had married, driving off in the horse-carriage came here. I also having become hungry when coming here [saw that] there was an alms-house. Because of it I came here,” he said.
The Heṭṭirāla, having cast off those clothes and put on clothes in the manner of a Princess, came and asked, “Am I the Princess?”
Having said, “You indeed are my Princess,” holding her hand he began to weep. The clothes that she wore like the Heṭṭirāla that Prince put on. After that, having gone near the shopkeeper Heṭṭirāla, they told him completely the things that occurred to these people. This Heṭṭirāla having become pleased at it told them to stay at that very shop. The two persons trading at the shop and having become very wealthy, remained at that very city.
[1] In the MS. the words are gañga-pahalaṭa, ‘down the river,’ an evident mistake, as the hair passed down with the current. [↑]
No. 241
The Royal Prince and the Heṭṭirāla[1]
In a certain country both the royal Prince and the Minister-Prince were joined together by much friendship, it is said. Thus, having been in that way, one day the royal Prince having talked with the Minister-Prince, says, “Friend, we two having come to a foreign country, let us do trading.”
The Minister-Prince also having said, “It is good,” the two persons taking as much money as each can carry for the purpose of trading, set off to go to a foreign country.
During the time when they are going thus, the two having met with a junction of two roads, the two persons say, “We two having separated at these roads let us go to two districts.” So speaking, having separated they went to two districts.
Out of them, the royal Prince having arrived at the place where a courtesan woman is gambling, and having staked with the courtesan woman this money he brought, gambled. The courtesan woman won the whole of the money. Well then, the royal Prince having staked the clothes he was wearing, when he gambled the Prince lost them also.
Well then, the Prince says, “It is good.[2] If so, you and I having staked ourselves let us gamble.”
So speaking, staking each against the other they gambled. Thereupon the Prince lost. Having shaved the Prince’s head, taking him for the state of labourer, while he was drawing water and washing pots, when the Heṭṭirāla of that village was going by that street he saw the Prince who was washing and washing pots, and great sorrow having been produced for the Heṭṭirāla, he spoke to the courtesan woman, and says, “The labourer who is washing these pots is of very white colour. It is not worth [while] taking this work from him. If you will give me him I can give him a suitable means of livelihood.”
Thereupon the courtesan woman says, “Yes, if there is sorrow for you concerning him; although I can give him I cannot give him without payment (nikan). Why? He has let me in[3] for a thousand masuran. If the Heṭṭi-elder-brother give that money I can give him; if not so, I cannot give him,” the courtesan woman said.
Then the Heṭṭirāla says, “It is good. Taking the money from me give me him.”
The Heṭṭirāla gave the money; and taking the Prince and having arrived at his house the Heṭṭirāla having spoken to the Prince, asks, “What can you do?”
The Prince says, “I can do anything.”
Thereupon the Heṭṭirāla says, “Don’t you do work [so as] to become tired. There are my shops; you can stay at a shop.” When he asked, “Can you [do] letter accounts?”[4] the Prince said, “I can.” When he said it, having said, “If so, go to my shop,” he started him, and having gone with the Heṭṭirāla he gave him charge of the shop.
Thereupon the Prince asks, “Do you give the shop goods on credit (nayaṭa) and the like? How is the mode of selling the goods?”
The Heṭṭirāla says, “Yes, give them on credit. When giving them on credit don’t merely give them; [after] writing the name give them.”
Thereupon the Prince having said, “It is good,” and taking charge, from that time spoke to men who are going on the road. When the men came he asked, “Where are you going? Where is your village? What is your name?” Afterwards he says, “It is good. Taking anything you want, go.” Having said and said it, and having brought in that manner all the men going on the road, in a week’s time he finished the goods that were in the shop. During the time when he was giving the goods in that way, should anyone come and having given money ask for goods, taking the money he gave goods for the money.
When he finished the goods in that manner, the Heṭṭirāla, not knowing [about it], having become much pleased, said, “You are very good, having looked with this promptitude at the account of the money for which you sold the goods. Bringing goods afresh will be good, will it not?”
When he was preparing to look at the accounts, having brought the book in which he wrote the men’s names, and a little money, [the Prince] placed them [before him]. The Heṭṭirāla asked, “What is this?”
Then the Prince says, “Why, what is it you are asking? Have I blundered? In the book, indeed, the names will be correct; having indeed written the names I gave the goods. I did not give goods to even a person without having written the name.”
The Heṭṭirāla says, “Anē! You are a great fool; you are not a person who can do trading.” Having said [this], the Heṭṭirāla, calling the Prince, went home again.
Having gone [there], when three or four days were going the Heṭṭirāla’s wife began to scold the Heṭṭirāla, “For what reason are we causing this one to stay, and undergoing expense by giving him to eat and to wear?” When she shouted to the Heṭṭirāla, “If this thief is sitting unemployed, this very day having beaten him I shall drive him away,” the Heṭṭirāla asks the Prince, “Child, there are many cattle of mine; can you look after the cattle?”
At that time the Prince says, “It is good; I can look after cattle.”
Thereupon the Heṭṭirāla having gone, calling the Prince, to the district where the cattle are, and having shown him the cattle, says, “All these cattle are mine. You must look after them, taking care of them very well. Do not send them into outside gardens. You must tie the fastening (baemma) well.”
Thereupon the Prince says, “It is good, Heṭṭi-elder-brother. Don’t be afraid. Having well tied the fastening I shall look after the cattle.”
Having started off the Heṭṭirāla and sent him away, the Prince placed each one of the cattle at each tree, and having tied the fastenings and tightened them to the degree that they were unable to take breath, was looking in the direction of the cattle. While he was there some cattle died, some were drawing the breath (i.e., gasping for breath). At that time, the time of eating cooked rice went by.
The Heṭṭirāla, having remained looking for the Prince’s coming at the time of eating cooked rice during the day, when the time went by thought, “He is a great fool, isn’t he? Having sent the cattle into the gardens of others they have been seized, maybe.” As he did not come at noon to eat cooked rice, he said, “I must go to look”; and having come there, when he looked some had died at the very bottom of the trees to which they were tied, some are drawing and drawing breath.
The Heṭṭirāla asks the Prince, “Why, fool, what a thing this is you did! Do you look after cattle in this way?” Having said [this], he scolded him.
Thereupon the Prince says, “What is the Heṭṭi-elder-brother saying? The Heṭṭi-elder-brother said at first, ‘Having tied the fastenings well, look after them, not letting (nen̆dī) them go into the gardens of others.’ I tied the fastenings well, and stayed looking at them. What is it you are saying? Have I tied them badly? If there is a fault in the tying, tell me.”
Well then, the Heṭṭirāla being without a reply to say, [thought], “Because I told this fool to tie the fastenings well, he, thinking foolishly, in observance of the order killed my few cattle. I was foolish; this fool will not have the ability to do this work;” and he went, calling the Prince again, to the Heṭṭirāla’s house.
When he is there three or four days, in the very [same] manner as at first the Heṭṭirāla’s wife began to scold the Heṭṭirāla:—“Having come calling this thief again, is he simply sitting down? Even for a day there will not be [the means] here to give this one to eat, sitting down unemployed. This very day I will drive him from the house.” Having said various things she scolded the Heṭṭirāla.
Thereupon the Heṭṭirāla having spoken to the Prince asks, “Can you plough rice fields?”
At that time the Prince says, “It is good. I am able to do that work.”
Thereupon the Heṭṭirāla says, “It is good. If so get ready to go to-morrow morning.”
Having given the Prince a plough also, and having arisen at daybreak, the Heṭṭirāla set off to go on a journey. Calling the Prince on the journey on which he is going, and having gone and shown the Prince the Heṭṭirāla’s fields, he says, “Look there. From the place where that egret is perched plough to that side until the time when I have gone on this journey and come back.”
Well then, this Prince says to the Heṭṭirāla, “It is good, Heṭṭi-elder-brother. Let Him go on the journey He is going.[5] I will plough to the place where the egret is.”
Taking over the charge, and having started off the Heṭṭirāla and sent him away, he tied the yoke of bulls in the plough. When he went driving them to the place where the egret is, the egret having gone flying perched at another place. Driving the yoke of bulls he went there also. The egret having gone flying from there also, perched at another place. Driving the yoke of bulls he went there also. From there also the egret having gone flying, perched at another place. Thereupon the Prince, driving the yoke of bulls and having gone to the root of the tree, taking a large stick and beating and beating the yoke of bulls, says, “Why, bulls (gonnunē)! Go to the place where the egret is. Should you two not go to the place where the egret is I shall not succeed in escaping from the Heṭṭirāla; to-day there is not any work [done], and I myself did not eat.” Saying and saying [this], he began to beat the yoke of bulls. While he was there beating and beating them it became night.
The Heṭṭirāla, also, having made that journey, came to the house. Having come there the Heṭṭirāla asks, he asks from the house people, “Hasn’t the fool himself who went to the rice field come?”
Thereupon the house people say, “After he went with the Heṭṭi-elder-brother in the morning, he did not come back.”
The Heṭṭirāla says, “Apoyi! As that fool himself came not there will be some accident or other!”
Quickly having gone running to the rice field, when he looked, at no place in the rice field had [the ground] been ploughed, and he does not see the yoke of bulls or the man. When the Heṭṭirāla looks on that and this side, the Prince whom the Heṭṭirāla came to seek having seen him, breaking a large cudgel he began to beat the yoke of bulls more and more, as though he did not see him.
Thereupon the Heṭṭirāla, having heard this noise when he looked, having heard it and gone running, asks, “Why, fool! What is this you are doing?”
The Prince says, “Go away, go aside. From the morning itself I drove and drove this yoke of bulls [so as] to go to the place where the egret is. They did not go yet. You are good, the way the bulls have been trained!” Having said [this], the Prince began to scold the Heṭṭirāla.
Thereupon the Heṭṭirāla says, “Yes, the way that yoke of bulls has been trained is indeed not good. Because the bulls will not go up trees those bulls are not good. Afterwards taking a yoke of bulls that go up trees you can plough. Let us go now, to go home.” Having said [this], he came calling the Prince.
The Heṭṭirāla’s wife asks, “Even to-day did that fool do even that work?”
The Heṭṭirāla says, “To-day indeed don’t speak to that fool. He has been very angry. Because he was angry I came calling him, without speaking anything.”
Thereupon the woman having been silent that day, on the next day began to scold the Heṭṭirāla and the Prince. The Heṭṭirāla having thought, “Should I remain causing this fool to stay he will cause much loss to me. Having gone, taking him, and having spoken to my son-in-law, I must put him in a ship and send him away.” Having thought thus, and having spoken to the Heṭṭirāla’s wife, he says, “Don’t you scold; I am sending him away soon.” Thereupon the woman remained without making any talk.
Then the Heṭṭirāla says, “Taking him I must go to-morrow or the next day; having prepared a suitable thing (food) for it give me it.” Thereupon the woman having gone, and very well prepared a food box to give to her daughter and son-in-law, and for these two persons to eat for food on the road a package of cooked rice, gave him them.
The Heṭṭirāla tied them well, and taking also a suit (coat and cloth, kuṭṭamak) of the Heṭṭirāla’s new clothes to wear when they got near the son-in-law’s house, and having tied them in one bundle, and called the Prince, he says, “We two must go on a journey and return. Can you go?”
When he asked the Prince, the Prince says, “It is good; I can go.”
The Heṭṭirāla having said, “If so, take these two bundles,” gave him the two packages. Just as he is taking the two bundles in his hand, the Prince asks, “What are these?”
Thereupon the Heṭṭirāla says, “One bundle is my clothes; one is things for us for the road, to eat.”
The Prince taking them, when he was starting to go on the journey the Heṭṭirāla’s wife gave him yet a package. The Prince asks, “What is this?”
Thereupon the woman says, “For our son-in-law there is need of snakes’ eggs; in that packet there are snakes’ eggs. Having gone, give that packet into either son-in-law’s hand or daughter’s hand.” The Prince, taking the packet, put it away.
The Heṭṭirāla, dressing well, mounted upon the back of a horse, and calling the Prince went off. When he had gone a considerable distance, the Prince alone ate the package which she prepared and gave him to eat for the road. Taking the food which was in the packet that she told him to give to the son-in-law, having said they were snakes’ eggs, he ate of them to the possible extent; and having thrown the remaining ones there and here, and seen an ant-hill on the path when coming, he broke a stick, and taking it, prodding and prodding [the ground] round the ant-hill he began to cry out. The Heṭṭirāla having turned back, when he looked the Prince says, “The snakes that were in this packet, look! they entered this ant-hill!” Thereupon the Heṭṭirāla, ascertaining that he is telling lies, having said, “It is good; if so, you come on,” calling him, goes on.
At that time, the time for eating cooked rice at noon having arrived, the Heṭṭirāla, stopping the horse, said, “Bola, I am now hungry. Take out even the packet which you brought to eat for the road.”
Thereupon to the Heṭṭirāla the Prince says, “Heṭṭi-elder-brother, what is this you say? Because you said, ‘They are for the road, to eat,’ I threw them away for the road to eat, and came. For eating for the road, what shall we eat?”
Well then, much anger having gone to the Heṭṭirāla, because there was not a thing to do he said, “If so, come, to go.”
As they were going, the Heṭṭirāla, having hunger which he was unable to bear, says to the Prince, “Bola, can you climb this tree, and pluck a young coconut for me and give it?” Thereupon the Prince says, “I can.”
Having climbed the tree, and gone round the stems of the branches of the tree, holding two stems firmly, with his two feet he began to kick down the clusters of [ripe] coconuts into the jungle, and the clusters of young coconuts into the jungle. Thereupon the Heṭṭirāla having descended from the horse’s back, began to shout, “Hā! Hā! Don’t pluck them, don’t pluck them!” At that time the person who owned the place having come, prepared to beat him.
Thereupon the Heṭṭirāla says, “It is I who sent him up the tree to make him pluck a young coconut. He is a great fool; don’t beat him.”
The man, treating with respect the Heṭṭirāla’s saying, said, “It is good. If so, having eaten as many young coconuts as possible, go ye”; and the man went away.
Thereupon the Prince having eaten young coconut with the Heṭṭirāla, when they set off to go the Heṭṭirāla says, “Having struck [thy hand] on my head, swear thou in such a way that thou wilt not go [in future] by even a foot-bridge (ēdanḍa) in which a coconut trunk is laid, putting [out of consideration] going up a coconut tree.”
Thereupon the Prince having struck on the Heṭṭirāla’s head, swears, “I will not go up a coconut tree, and I will not go by a foot-bridge in which a coconut trunk is placed.” Having sworn this, they began to go.
When going they met with a bridge in which a great many coconut trunks were placed. The Heṭṭirāla having gone to the other side, spoke to the Prince, [telling him to follow]. Thereupon the Prince says, “Anē! I cannot come. Having struck on the head of the Heṭṭi-elder-brother and sworn, how can I come?”
Thereupon the Heṭṭirāla having descended from the back of the horse, came [across]; and lifting up the Prince and having gone [over], placed him on the other side. Through that disturbance the cloth that was on the Heṭṭirāla’s head fell on the ground. The Heṭṭirāla did not see it. The Prince having seen that the cloth fell, took it with his foot, and having thrown it into the bush went on.
When going a considerable distance, ascertaining that the cloth on the Heṭṭirāla’s head was not [there], he asks the Prince, “My cloth fell on the ground; didn’t you see it?”
Thereupon the Prince says, “The thing which the Heṭṭi-elder-brother has thrown away when coming, why should I bring? I threw it into the bush with my foot.”
Then the Heṭṭirāla says, “Since you threw away the cloth and came, beginning from this time when anything has fallen from us don’t leave it and come.”
The Prince says, “It is good. If so, beginning from this time, without throwing it away I will bring it.”
Beginning from there, taking the horse-dung and earth from the staling-place he went along putting and putting them in the Heṭṭirāla’s clothes box. Having gone there, when they came near the house of the Heṭṭirāla’s daughter, [the Heṭṭirāla] having spoken to the Prince asking for the bundle of clothes, he unfastened it. When he looked, he saw that the horse-dung and mud were in the bundle of clothes, and much anger having gone to the Heṭṭirāla, he said, “Ǣ! Enemy, what is this?”
Thereupon the Prince says, “What, Heṭṭi-elder-brother, are you saying? At first you said, ‘Don’t throw away anything that falls from us.’ What is this thing you are saying now?”
Then the Heṭṭirāla thought to himself the word he said at the beginning was wrong; bearing it because of it, he says, “With these clothes on my back I cannot go to the house of son-in-law’s people. My clothes are very dirty. I shall come when it has become night. Thou having gone immediately (daemmama) say that I am coming.” Having said [this], and told the Prince the road going to the house, he started him.
Thereupon the Prince having gone to that house and having spoken, says, “The Heṭṭi-elder-brother started and came in order to come with me. Thereupon he got a stomach-ache.[6] Before this also[7] he got a stomach-ache. The Heṭṭi-elder-brother having told me the medical treatment he applies for the stomach-ache, and started me quickly, sent me to prepare the medicine,” he said.
Thereupon the Heṭṭirāla’s daughter having become much afraid, asked, “What is the medicine?”
The Prince says, “Don’t be afraid; it is not a difficult medicine [to prepare]. Taking both coconut oil of seven years and the dust of Mā-Vī (the largest kind of paddy), and having ground them together, when you have made ball-cakes (aggalā), and placed them [ready], it will do; that indeed is the medicine. Don’t give him any other thing to eat.”
Thereupon, the Heṭṭirāla’s daughter very quickly having ground up coconut oil and Mā-Vī dust, and made ball-cakes, placed them [ready]. When, after a very long time, the Heṭṭirāla came, quickly having given him to wash his face, hands, and feet, as soon as he had finished she gave him that ball-cake to eat.
Thereupon the Heṭṭirāla thinks, “My daughter and son-in-law having become very poor, are now without a thing also to eat”; but through shame to ask he remained without speaking. Well, then, at the time for eating rice at night, although the whole of the [other] persons ate cooked rice and finished, she did not give cooked rice to the Heṭṭirāla. Having made ready [the necessary things,—mat and pillow]—to sleep, only, she gave them.
The Heṭṭirāla lay down. Having been in hunger during the daytime and night, when he had eaten the ball-cakes he began [to experience the purgative effect of the oil]. After he had [been affected] four or five times, being without water to wash his hands and feet, having spoken to the Prince he asks, “Bola, the water is finished; there is not a means to wash my hands and feet. Didn’t you see a place where there is water?”
Thereupon the Prince says, “I saw it. There is a sort of water-pot.” Having gone to the place where there are pots of palm juice, and filled a cooking pot, he brought the palm juice, and saying it was water gave it.
Thereupon the whole of his body having been smeared with the palm juice, he says, “Bola, this is not water; it is a sort of palm juice. Seek something to wipe this, and give me it.”
Then the Prince having torn in two the pillow that was [there] for placing the head upon, gave him the cotton to wipe off the palm juice. When the Heṭṭirāla was wiping off the palm juice with the cotton, the palm juice and cotton having held together, it became more difficult than it was. Thereupon having become very angry with the Prince, and having looked to that and this hand, finding a little water and slightly washing himself he came to the bed, and made ready to go to sleep. Again [the purgative affected him violently, and he was compelled to utilise a cooking-pot which the Prince brought him]. When he was removing it in the early morning, unobserved by the people at the house, [the Prince] having gone running says to the Heṭṭirāla’s daughter, “Look there. Last night it was very difficult for your father. Having become angry that you did not pay attention to him he is going away.”
Thereupon the Heṭṭirāla’s daughter having gone, embraced the Heṭṭirāla. When she embraced him, the Heṭṭirāla and the Heṭṭirāla’s daughter were [befouled by the contents of the vessel].
The Heṭṭirāla having become very angry said, “He having done me much injury until this time, now he smeared this on my body, didn’t he?” Being unable to bear it, and having told his son-in-law all these matters in secret, “Taking him, we will go away and put him in a distant country,” he said.
The son-in-law having said, “It is good,” and having spoken to the Prince, says, “We two are to go on a journey. The three [of us] having gone together, let us return.” So saying, on the following day after that, the Heṭṭirāla, and the Prince, and the Heṭṭirāla’s son-in-law, the three persons together, went to the wharf (naew-toṭṭa).
Thereupon the Prince thought, “Now then, it is not good; I must spring off and go.” Having thought [this], when he said to the two persons, “I must go aside [for necessary reasons],” the two said, “If so, having gone, come back.”
Having gone running from there to the place where the Heṭṭirāla’s daughter is, he says, “They told me to ask for the money which he gave yesterday to be put away, and to go back quickly.” Having said it, asking for [and getting] the money from the Heṭṭiyā’s daughter, he bounded off and ran, and in much time arrived at his city.
The Heṭṭirāla and the Heṭṭirāla’s son-in-law having remained looking till the Prince comes, said, “Let that fool go to any place he wants.” When they went home, ascertaining that he went [after] taking the money also, [they searched until] they became much fatigued, but did not succeed in finding him.
The Minister-Prince, who having joined with the royal Prince went away, [after] trading very well and gaining profit, again arrived in happiness at the city. Having seen the royal Prince, while the two are [there], having discussed each other’s happiness and sorrow, and binding their friendship in the very first manner, when the royal Prince’s father the King died, the royal Prince was appointed to the sovereignty, and gave the post of Chief Minister to the Minister-Prince.
Western Province.
(By Saddhunanda Sthavira of Ratmalāna Wihāra.)
In Folk-Tales of Kashmir (Knowles), 2nd ed., p. 149, a young man who went to gamble lost everything he possessed, and was himself made a prisoner until he was rescued by his wife.
Regarding some of the Heṭṭirāla’s experiences, see the story of the Moghul and his servant, of which a condensed account is appended to the tale numbered 195 in this volume.
In “The Story of Hokkā,” given by Mr. W. Goonetilleke in The Orientalist, vol. i, p. 131 ff., there is the incident of the tying up of the cattle. The order of the Gamarāla was that the man was to look after them, but the Sinhalese word balāpiya means also “look at,” and the servant acted accordingly after tying up the cattle, the result being that they were too weak to stand when the Gamarāla went to inspect them.
[1] The Sinhalese title is, “The Royal Prince and the Minister-Prince” (aemati-kumārayā). [↑]
[2] This means here, “No matter.” [↑]
[4] Akuru gaṇan, that is, “Can you keep accounts?” [↑]
[5] The third person used honorifically instead of the second. [↑]
No. 242
Prince Sokkā[1]
At a certain city, a lion having been caught by the King of the city had been put in a house. While the King’s Prince and the Minister’s Prince were playing at ball near the house in which was the lion, the royal Prince’s ball fell into the cage in which the lion is lying. Thereupon the Prince asked the lion for the ball. Then the lion said, “Should you let me go I will give the ball.” Then the Prince having said, “It is good,” and having cheated him, asking for [and getting] the ball remained without letting the lion go.
Having come on the following day, while those two were playing at ball, that day, also, the royal Prince’s ball went and fell at the place where the lion is. The Prince that day also asked the lion for the ball.
At that time the lion says, “You shall not cheat me as on that day, indeed; to-day indeed, unless you let me go I shall not give it.” Then the Prince having let the lion go, asking for [and getting] the ball, played.
The King having come, when he looked the lion was not [there]. “Where is the lion?” the King asked the party of Ministers. The party of Ministers said, “By the Prince the lion [was] sent away.”
Then the King having said, “Should the disobedient Prince remain at this palace I will kill him,” sorrow seized the Queen regarding it, and having given the Prince expenses, and given him also a horse, and said, “Having gone to any country you like, get a living,” sent him off.
The Prince having mounted on the horse, when he was going the Minister-Prince (son of the Minister), the friend of the Prince, asked, “Where are you going?”
Then the Prince says, “Having been guilty of sending away the lion, it has occurred that I am to go away, not staying in this country.”
Thereupon, the Minister-Prince, having said, “If my friend the Prince be not here my remaining is not proper,” set off to go with the Prince.
Having set out, when the two had gone a little far together, [they saw that] a letter had been written, and fixed on a tree. Having taken the letter, when they looked in it there was said that should one go to the right district good will happen, should one go to the left district evil will happen. Thereupon, having looked at the letter the Minister-Prince went to the right district, the royal Prince went to the left district.
While the royal Prince was going he met with a gambling place. He, also, having gone there gambled. Having gambled he lost all the money he took. After that, being without money, while he was staying looking on, owing to a rich Heṭṭiyā’s being there he sold him the horse, and taking the money played [again]. That also he lost.
After that, having written himself as the slave of the Heṭṭiyā, and having said, “Should I be unable to bring back the money I will do slave work,” taking the money he gambled [again]. That also he lost.
At that time, the Heṭṭiyā, having mounted upon the horse, calling the Prince for the horsekeepership went away. The Heṭṭiyā having gone home established the name “Sokkā”[2] for the Prince.
That Sokkā he told to look after the horse, having well attended to it and bathed it. That Sokkā not giving food and water to the horse, the horse went decrepit. Owing to it, the Heṭṭirāla having become angry, said, “Sokkā, you cannot look after the horse. Because of it, work you in the flower garden.”
Then Sokkā says, “Heṭṭirālahāmi, in our kingdom it was that very work that was mine. I am much accustomed to it.” Having said this he took charge. [After] taking charge, every day uprooting and uprooting the best (lit., good good) flower trees (plants) he began to plant [them afresh].
The Heṭṭirāla having gone one day, when he looked saw that all the flower trees had died. Having said, “Sokkā, thou canst not [do] this work; thou hast completely done for my flower garden,” he beat him.
He said, “After that, that work is of no use for thee,” and gave him charge of a plantain garden. Having handed it over he said, “Sell the plantains; having brought the money thou art to give it to me.”
Then Sokkā said, “It is good, Heṭṭirālahāmi; I am accustomed to that work.”
Well then, what does that Sokkā do? Leaving aside the ripe plantains, having cut the immature plantains he takes them to the shop. No one taking them, having brought them back he throws them away. By this means, all the plantain garden went to waste.
The Heṭṭirāla having gone one day, when he looked the plantain garden had been destroyed. Thereupon, having called Sokkā, and having said, “Where is the revenue obtained from this? Thou art a Yakā come to eat me,” he became angry, and scolded him.
Having said, “Thou canst not do that work. Look here (Menna); from to-day attend thou to the grazing of these cattle,” he gave him charge of them.
Then Sokkā, having said, “It is good, Heṭṭirālahāmi. In our country I do that for a livelihood; I am well accustomed to it,” took charge of them. Taking charge, he went driving the cattle to the jungle.
Having gone there he looked for a bull to eat, and having killed it, cutting a haunch he came home [with it]. At that time the Heṭṭirāla having seen the haunch of flesh, asked, “What is that, Sokkā?”
Then Sokkā says, “As I was going a leopard was [there], seizing a deer. Then I said ‘Hū.’ Then the leopard sprang off and ran away. After that, because I was unable to bring it I came [after] cutting off a haunch.”
Thereupon the Heṭṭirālahāmi said, “Sokkā, it is good,” and stroked his head, and said, “Give ye abundantly to eat to Sokkā.”
By that method he began to bring the haunch every day, one by one. The Heṭṭirāla and the Heṭṭi-woman on those days were very kind to Sokkā.
When a few days had gone, because of the eating of the deer’s meat it appeared that the cattle of the herd were finished. Then, having called Sokkā, he asked, “Where are the cattle?”
Sokkā says, “I could not drive the cattle to the stalls; they are in the jungle.”
The Heṭṭirāla, not trusting the word he said, went into the jungle to look at the cattle. When he was going, the stench [of the dead bodies] began to strike him to the extent that he was unable to go into the jungle. Having gone in, when he looked he saw that there are the heads and legs of the cattle. “Sokkā is good! I ate the meat. I must kill Sokkā,” he got into his mind.
The Heṭṭirāla had taken a contract to give firewood to a ship. He told Sokkā to cut firewood by the yard account for the ship. Because he must give firewood once a month, having cut the firewood by the yard account he was to heap it up. At that time, Sokkā, having said, “It is very good, Heṭṭirālahāmi,” taking that work also, went for cutting firewood.
The ship came after a month. The Heṭṭirāla went and looked, in order to give the firewood. There were only three or four yards of firewood; there was no firewood to give to the ship. When the ship person, having called the Heṭṭirāla, asked for the firewood, there being no firewood to give a great fault occurred. Having fined the Heṭṭirāla he destroyed the firewood contract.
“After Sokkā came there was great loss of money; this one lost it. I must kill him,” the Heṭṭirāla got into his mind.
Getting it in his mind, he said to the Heṭṭi-woman, “I am going to the quarter in which younger sister is. Having prepared something to eat on the road please give me it.” The Heṭṭi-woman having prepared a box of sugared food, and made ready a box of clothes, and tied them as a pingo (carrying stick) load, placed [them ready].
The Heṭṭirāla having arisen at dawn in the morning and mounted on horse-back, and said, “Sokkā, taking that pingo load, come thou,” the Heṭṭirāla went on horse-back in front.
Sokkā, while going on and on (yaddī yaddī), ate the sugared food until the box was finished. When going a little far in that manner, the whip that was in the Heṭṭirāla’s hand fell down. Sokkā picked it up and threw it into the jungle.
The Heṭṭirāla, having gone a little far, asked, “Where [is the whip], Bola? You met with it.”
Thereupon Sokkā said, “I don’t know; there is no whip.”
Then the Heṭṭirāla having become angry, said, “Thou must bring anything that falls, whether from me or from the horse,” and he scolded him.
After that, Sokkā picked up the dung which the horse dropped, and began to put it in the clothes box. In that way and this way, at noon the time for eating came.
On that road there was a travellers’ shed. For the purpose of eating food at that travellers’ shed they halted. Having opened the box in order to eat, when [the Heṭṭirāla] looked there was nothing of food in the box. “Where is the food that was in this?” he asked Sokkā.
Sokkā said, “I don’t know what was [in it] when it was given to me, indeed.”
The Heṭṭirāla being very hungry, and in anger with Sokkā also, started to go. Having gone, when they were coming near his younger sister’s village he said to Sokkā, “Go thou, and tell them to be quick and cook a little food because I am fatigued.”
Then Sokkā having gone said to the Heṭṭirāla’s younger sister and brother-in-law, “The Heṭṭirāla is coming; as he has become ill he is coming. Because of it, he does not eat anything. He said that having removed the shells from unripe pulse and prepared balls of it, you are to place them [ready]; and that having killed a fowl for me I am to eat it with cooked rice, he said. The Heṭṭirāla at night is himself accustomed to salt gruel.”
Afterwards that party, having prepared them, gave them in the evening. The Heṭṭirāla because of fatigue having eaten these things and drunk a great deal of salt gruel, went to sleep. (It is necessary to draw a veil over the nocturnal difficulties of the Heṭṭirāla owing to the purgative action of his evening’s repast. In the morning) the Heṭṭirāla thought to himself, “It is Sokkā himself makes the whole of these traps. Because of it I must kill him.”
Well then, having said, “We must go,” and having opened the clothes box, when he looked horse-dung had been put [in it]. Then at the time when the Heṭṭirāla asked, “Sokkā, what is this?” he said, “That day you told me to take anything that falls from the Heṭṭirāla or from the horse. Because of it I put these things away; I put them in that, without omitting one.”
After that, having set off, they went away to go home. Having gone a considerable distance, when they were approaching the house he said to Sokkā, “Go thou, and as there has been no food for me for two days or three days, tell grandmother to prepare something for food.”
Having said “Hā,” Sokkā having gone running, says, “Grandmother, madness having seized him, the Heṭṭirāla is coming. No one can speak [to him]; then he beats them. You will be unable to be rid of it.” He said all these words.
Then the grandmother asked, “What, Sokkā, shall we do for it?”
Thereupon Sokkā says, “Putting on a black cloth and a black jacket, take two handfuls of branches, and without speaking having gone in front of him, please wave them.”
Having said it and come running back to the Heṭṭirāla, he said, “Heṭṭirālahāmi, there is no means of doing anything in that way. Madness having seized grandmother she is dancing, [after] putting on a black cloth and a black jacket, and breaking two handfuls of branches.”
When the Heṭṭirāla was asking at the hand of Sokkā, “What shall I do for it?” Sokkā said, “Breaking two handfuls of branches, and having gone without even speaking, please strike them on the head of grandmother.”
Thereupon the Heṭṭirāla, having gone in that very way, without speaking began to beat her. The grandmother also began to beat the Heṭṭirāla. In this way constantly for half a day they beat each other. Afterwards having recovered their reason, when he learnt, while they were speaking, that it was a work of Sokkā’s, he thought of injuring him.
On the following day after that, he wrote a letter to the Heṭṭirāla’s brother-in-law: “In some way or other please kill the person who brings this letter.” Having said, “Go and give this letter, and bring a reply from brother-in-law,” he gave it into Sokkā’s hand.
Sokkā, taking the letter, went to a travellers’ shed on the road. While he was there yet [another] man came there. Having broken open this letter and shown it to the man, he asked, “What things are in this letter?”
The man, having looked at the letter, said, “ ‘The person who brings this letter has caused a loss to me of three or four thousand pounds.’ Because of it, it is said [that he is] to kill him.”
Thereupon Sokkā, having thrown the letter away, went to a house, and asking for pen and ink and having come back, told that man and caused him to write the [following] letter:—“The person who brings this letter has been of great assistance to me. Because of it, having given to him your daughter [in marriage], give him a half share of your landed property.” Having taken it and gone, he gave it.
Thereupon the Heṭṭirāla’s brother-in-law having looked at the letter and having been pleased, married to him and gave him his eldest daughter;[3] and having given him a half share of his money, and told him to go again to the place where this Heṭṭiyā is, sent him away.
Well then, the Prince whom the Heṭṭiyā caught, taking his Heṭṭi wife, went away to the district where the Minister-Prince is.
In the Aventures du Gourou Paramarta (Dubois), p. 312, while the Guru and his foolish disciples were on a journey, the Guru being on horseback, the branch of a tree caught his turban, and it fell down. Thinking his disciples would pick it up he said nothing at the time. As he had previously told them to do nothing without orders, however, they left it. When he afterwards asked for it and found it was not brought, he scolded them, and sent one to fetch it, at the same time giving them orders to pick up everything that fell from the horse. While the disciple was returning with the turban he accordingly collected and stored in it the horse’s droppings that he found on the road, and handed over the bundle to his master. The Guru made them wash the turban, and told them when they grumbled at being reprimanded for obeying his orders, “There are articles that are worthy of being picked up, and others that are unworthy of it.”
In Folk-Tales of Kashmir (Knowles), 2nd ed., p. 81, two brothers who had run away from home came to a place where the road bifurcated, and found there an inscription on a stone, which contained a warning that one of the roads should be avoided. The adventurous elder brother went on this road and was robbed by a witch; the younger one selected the other, and after being wrecked became a King.
In The Orientalist, vol. i, p. 131 ff., Mr. W. Goonetilleke gave “The Story of Hokkā,” in which the man who was sent in advance to announce the coming of the Gamarāla, told the daughter that he could take only paddy dust. He left in anger on the following morning, and sent Hokkā to let his wife know of his return. Hokkā advised her to meet her husband clothed in rags and sitting on an ēdanḍa, or foot-bridge. In the dusk, Hokkā, who was in front, kicked her off, calling her “Bitch,” and she fell into the stream and was drowned, the Gamarāla thinking it was a dog. The Gamarāla had previously mutilated Hokkā’s elder brother, as related in No. 195, and Hokkā was determined to have his revenge.
The portion omitted on p. 290 will be found at the end of the Additional Notes, by those who wish to see how the villager treats such matters.
[1] The Sinhalese title is, “Concerning the Royal Prince and the Minister-Prince.” [↑]
[2] Sōka + ekā, the one of sorrows; he was not aware that the sorrows were to be his own. [↑]
[3] This incident occurs in Folklore of the Santal Parganas (Rev. Dr. Bodding), p. 261, the young man being a servant who was playing tricks on a farmer and had burnt his house down. [↑]
No. 243
The Affectionate Prince
In a certain city there was a King; the King was married. If the Queen bore a Prince they rear the Prince; if she bore a Princess, at the very time when she was born, [even] should she be alive, they bury her. This order is a thing commanded by the King.
The King’s Queen formerly having given birth to a first-born Prince, and having reared him and been satisfied with him, he continued to stay there. During the time while he was there the Queen bore yet a Princess.
Then the King told them to bury the Princess. The midwife having given her into the hand of a man told him to bury her. So the man in order to bury the Princess took her and went to the burial ground.
At that very time, as the elder Prince of the King, who had been for sport, was coming back, he saw that this man [after] putting this Princess into a bundle was going to the ground for new burials; and he asked the man, “What is that you are going with, [after] making it into a bundle?”
The man said, “In this bundle is your younger sister, Sir.”
Then the Prince said, “Anē! Stop there for me to look at her a little.” So the man stopped.
When this Prince went and looked, she was a Princess who was beautiful to the extent that through sorrow he could not look at her. Thereupon asking the man for the Princess, what does this Prince do? Having given her to another woman, having given sufficient hire for it, he said, “Having very thoroughly brought her up until she reaches maturity, not showing her to anyone, hand her over to me.” The woman said. “It is good.”
Well then, the Princess in not much time had reached maturity. After that, this Prince, sewing suitable robes for the Princess, came, and causing the Princess to put them on went with her to the palace at which he stayed.
Then the King, having become angry at the Prince, contrived a stratagem to kill her, that is, he wrote to a great person of the city, “My Princess is [here]. To kill the Princess make ready an eating (feast) at your house, and having put poison into the food for the Princess send a letter to all of us to come for the eating.”
So the great man having made it ready just like that, sent a letter to this King for all who are at the royal palace to come. Thereupon the King, having looked at the letter, prepared to go there.
This Prince perceived that it was a device which was adopted by the King for the purpose of killing the Princess. Having perceived it and told those parties to go before, at the time when they were going this Prince and his younger sister, both of them, mounted on a cart (carriage), and went along another path to the midst of a forest. As they were going on, leaving the forest wilderness behind, there was a city which a [wild] tusk elephant, having come, is making desolate. They went to the city. While they were going to the city it did not become light.
As this Prince and Princess were going, not knowing that there is a tusk elephant laying waste the city, the tusk elephant walked through the whole city, and having broken down the houses, while it was coming to go back to the midst of the forest this Prince and Princess met it in front.
Having met it, it chased the Prince and Princess along the road. As it was going chasing them this Prince drew his sword and struck it. Then the sword went and pierced the stomach of the elephant, and it died. After it died they stayed that day night at the city.
The King of the city having gone with the city tusk elephant to stay at night at certain other rock houses (caves), comes to this city only for hearing law-suits in the daytime. Having come and repaired the houses which that [wild] tusk elephant had broken, and heard law-suits, as it becomes night he goes to the rock house.
The King [had] notified by beat of tom-toms[1]: “To the person who [shall have] killed this tusk elephant I will give a portion from my kingdom and marry my Princess, and I will send him to stay at this city.” Every one was unable.
On the morning on which this Prince killed the tusk elephant, men came in order to build [the damaged houses in] the city. When they looked about that day, they said that the tusk elephant is still staying there, sleeping; and the men having become afraid, ran away.
After that, a man came, and having slowly come near the tusk elephant, when he was looking at it perceived that was dead. Thereupon the man having come near, when he looked [saw that] some one had stabbed the tusk elephant.
There was a house near by. Having gone near it, when he looked he saw that a Prince and a Princess were sleeping. Having seen them, he spoke to the Prince and awoke him, and asked, “How did you kill this tusk elephant?”
Then the Prince said, “I stabbed it with my sword and killed it.”
The man said, “Anē! By favour to me you must stay there a little,” and having gone he said to the King, “Last night a Prince and Princess came to our city; and having stabbed the tusk elephant with the sword and killed it, they are still staying [there], sleeping.”
Thereupon the King having come, when he looked they were there. The King having heard from the Prince about the matter, and having gone calling them to the palace, and given them food and drink, asked to marry his Princess to the Prince.
At that time the Prince said, “Until the time when I marry and give my younger sister I will not marry”; and they went away to yet a city.
When he was going, [persons] are robbing the city of this [other] King. Because of it, [the King] gave notice by beat of tom-toms, “Can any one seize them?” Thereupon all said they could not.
This Prince having said, “I will endeavour [to do] this,” went away. While going, he met with a young Leopard, a young Parrot, and a Kitten. Taking the three and placing them in a cart, while going on he saw in the midst of the forest a very large house like a prison.
Thereupon the Prince, not going to look at it during the daytime, waited until it became night; and having gone at daybreak, when he was looking about, the robbers having come [after] committing robbery he ascertained that they were making ready to sleep.
Having waited a little time after the men had gone to sleep, when he looked for an opening, because there was not one, being on the back of his horse he sprang on the wall. Having sprung on it, when he looked [he saw that after] putting down their armour on going to sleep, they were sleeping well. Thereupon the Prince cut them all down, beginning from one end. One of them having been wounded and got hid in the room, remained; all the other men died. The blood that came from them flowed to the depth of the Prince’s knee.
After that, having waited until it became light he cut a hole, and having put the dead bodies into the hole he thoroughly washed the houses and cleaned them. Because there were many silver and golden things there he stayed a little time.
While he was staying, one day, having told the Princess to remain [there], the Prince, taking a gun, went to hunt. At that time the Parrot, the Leopard, and the Cat went with the Prince.
The three and the Prince, or a person who would send him away, not being near, that robber who had been wounded that day, and having got hid remained after the Prince went away, came out into the light; and asking for cooked rice from the Princess and having eaten it, became associated with the Princess, and stayed a few days without the Prince’s knowing it, healing those wounds and the like.
Then that robber spoke to the Princess, “Having killed your elder brother and we two having married, let us remain [here].”
Thereupon the Princess also being willing regarding it, asked the robber, “How shall we kill elder brother?”
Then the robber said, “At the time when your elder brother comes, say that you have got fever, and remain lying down. Then he having come will be grieved. Then say, ‘Elder brother, the deity who protects us—who he is I do not know—said there is a pool in the midst of this forest. In the pool there is a lotus flower. Unless, plucking the lotus flower, you come and boil it, and I should drink the gravy, my fever will not be cured otherwise.’ ”
The Princess asked the robber, “When he has gone to the pool what will happen?”
The robber said, “There is a Crocodile in the pool. No one can descend into the pool. Because the Celestial Nymphs (Apsarases) bathe [there], should another person go the Crocodile will swallow him.”
Then the Princess having become pleased, at the time when the Prince, having gone for hunting-sport, came back, she remained lying down groaning and groaning.
The Prince having come asked, “What is it, younger sister?”
The Princess said, “Anē! Elder brother, I have got fever.”
Thereupon the Prince through grief that the Princess had got fever does not eat the cooked rice. Then the Princess said all the words which the robber told her. So having said, “I will bring the lotus flower,” the Prince went.
Having gone and found the pool, when he looked there was a large lotus flower in the manner she said. The Prince, putting on the bathing cloth,[2] and fastening his sword in his waist string, prepared to descend into the pool.
Thereupon, the three animals that went with the Prince said, “Don’t descend,” and began to say it again and again. Out of them the Parrot said, “Elder brother, having gone flying, I will bring each pollen grain of the flower. Don’t you descend.”
The Prince said, “While thou art going and bringing each grain of pollen it will become night. On that account I will go, and cutting the flower from the outside will come back”; and he descended into the pool. As he descended, the Crocodile having come swallowed him. When it was swallowing him the sword fixed at the Prince’s waist pierced the Crocodile’s stomach, and the Crocodile and the Prince died.
Thereupon the three animals which remained on the bank, rolling over and over on the ground, breaking and breaking up the soil of the earth, began to cry out.
At that time the Celestial Nymphs came to the pool to bathe. Having come, and seen the lamentation of these animals, they told the Dēvatāwā of the pool to come, and splitting open the stomach of the Crocodile he caused the Prince to be [re]-born. Having come to life, the Prince, plucking the lotus flower, came to the bank.
Then the four, taking the lotus flower and having come back, and boiled and given it to that Princess, the false fever of the Princess was cured. Well then, by that they were unable to kill him.
So the robber asked the Princess, “Now then, how to kill your elder brother?”
Then the Princess said, “Elder brother having come [after] walking, goes from this side near the screen to wash his face. You stay on the other side [of the screen] and cut him with your sword.” So he remained that day in that way.
That day the Prince having come [after] walking did not go to the side to which he goes before; he went to the other side. At that time the man having been [there] tried to spring away. Then having cut down the man with the sword that was in the Prince’s hand, he asked the Princess, “Whence this man?” The Princess remained silent.
Thereupon the Prince said, “I shall not do anything to you; say the fact.” The Princess told him the fact.
Then the Prince having said, “Thou faithless one! Go thou also,” cut her down with the sword; and taking those things, went with the three animals to the city where he killed that tusk elephant.
Having gone there, and told the King the manner in which he killed the robbers, and all the dangers that had befallen him, the King, having been pleased, married the King’s Princess [to him]; and having given the kingdom also to that very Prince, he remained there.
The Prince having gone to his [father’s] city, said to the King, “Father, having destroyed the word which you, Sir, said, by the acts that I performed, I was made to ascertain [the wisdom of] it.”
Having made obeisance to his father the King, and told him all the circumstances that had occurred, thereafter he came back with contentment to that city. Having come, he remained ruling over that city.
Western Province.
In the Kolhān tales (Bompas) appended to Folklore of the Santal Parganas, p. 468, a girl and her brother, fearing their father wished to kill them, ran away and lived in the jungle. While the brother was hunting, a Raja met with the sister and wanted to marry her; thinking the youth would object the Raja persuaded the girl to try to get him killed. She pretended to be ill, and told him she could not recover unless he brought a flower which grew in a lake. When the boy was swimming to the flower a gigantic fish swallowed him; but a Rākshasa friend drank the pool dry, caught the fish, and took out the boy alive. The Raja carried off the girl, but was defeated by the youth and Rākshasa and some animal friends, gave the youth half his kingdom, and married him to his own daughter.
In the actions of the animals, expressive of their grief at the death of the Prince, there is a striking resemblance to those ascribed to the Werewolf in William of Palerne (E.E.T.S., ed. Skeat), on discovering that the child he was rearing was missing:
For reuliche (ruefully) gan he rore · and rente al his hide,
And fret (gnawed) oft of the erthe · and fel doun on swowe,
And made the most dool (sorrow) · that man mizt diuise.
The English translation of this twelfth-century Romance is said to date from about A.D. 1350.
In vol. i, p. 130, a dog shows its grief by rolling about and howling, and in vol. iii, p. 446, a man rolls on the ground in feigned sorrow.
[1] Aṇḍa bera gaesuwāya, beat the proclamation tom-toms. [↑]
No. 244
The Prince who received the Turtle Shell
In a certain country there was a son of a King. After this son had become big to a certain extent, for the purpose of teaching him he sent him near a teacher; but as time was going on, the teacher, ascertaining that he could not teach this one, gave notice to His Majesty the King. Thereupon the King having summoned the Prince near him, sent him to stay unoccupied (nikan) in the royal house.
During the time while he was thus, the other Princes, having finished learning the sciences and having again arrived near the King, began to show him, one by one, their dexterity. Some of them began to make jests about this ignorant Prince. Thereupon this Prince being much ashamed, and his father the King also not concealing it, his Prince, putting on his ornaments and decorating himself with his sword, bow, etc., having entered a forest wilderness went away.
When he had gone in this manner for a considerable distance through the midst of the forest wilderness, he saw a house of a cow-herd. The Prince went to this cow-herd’s house, and having told him of his hunger, asked for a little food.
The cow-herd’s wife, having thought that she must take the Prince’s costly ornaments, gave the Prince to eat, drink, and sit, and [permitted him] to stay; and having told him to unfasten his clothes and go to sleep, handed over to him a bed also.
Thereupon having thought, “This woman is a most kind person,” the Prince having taken off his ornaments, gave them together with his weapons to the cow-herd’s wife. The Prince having been sleeping, after his eyes were opened, when he asked for the ornaments from the cow-herd’s wife, without giving them she told the Prince to dwell there.
Well then, a certain goddess who saw that this young Prince in this manner was causing the cattle to graze, having shown great compassion towards him, one day approached near him and said thus, “I will give thee a turtle shell and a spell. By the power of the spell thou canst do the thing thou thinkest. Having got inside the turtle shell thou canst stay there. If not in that way, thou canst become a Prince decorated with beautiful ornaments. But without saying the spell just now, thou art to say it when thou hast become twenty-five years of age,” she said.
But this Prince, for the purpose of seeing whether the spell is true or false, having said it, became a Turtle; and again having said it became a handsome Prince. After that, until the twenty-fifth year arrives he put away and hid the turtle shell.
After this time, the Prince having stayed [there] causing the cattle to graze, when the twenty-fifth year arrived, taking also the turtle shell he set off in the very disguise of a poor man, and went away to another country. This Prince having arrived at the house of a flower-mother who gives flowers to the King of that country, dwelt [with her] like a son. During the time when he was staying thus, he got to know the affairs of the royal house.
Out of the King’s seven daughters six having contracted marriages, only the youngest Princess was left. When the husbands of those six Princesses went hunting, the Prince who stayed near the flower-mother having gone into the midst of the forest became an extremely handsome Prince; and having decorated himself with the sword, bow, etc., and mounted upon a horse, and waited to be visible to the other Princes who were in the midst of the forest, when they were coming to look [at him] immediately having become a Turtle he hides in a bush.
When he acted in this manner on very many days, the husbands of the six Princesses related this circumstance while at the royal house. [Their account of] this matter the youngest Princess who was unmarried heard.
Thereafter, one day the six Princesses and their husbands also, went to the festival pool to bathe. The youngest Princess went with these. The Prince who had become the son of the flower-mother, creating a most handsome Prince’s body, and having gone after the whole of them, waited [there] to show a pleasure to these Princesses who came to bathe; and immediately having become a Turtle, got hid at the side of the pool.
Only the youngest Princess saw this circumstance. Having thus seen it, catching the Turtle and wrapping it in her silk robe she took it to the palace. After she took it to the Princess’s chamber, the Turtle, having become the Prince, talking with the Princess told her all his story, and when he told her that he was a royal Prince the two persons agreed to marry each other.
Beginning from that time (taen), this Prince whom men were thinking was the son of the flower-mother, by the favour of the Princess began to go to the floor of the upper story where the Princess resides. During the progress of time, the King perceived that the Princess was pregnant, and having menaced the Princess and asked who was the offender regarding it, ascertaining that he was the flower-mother’s son, he gave the Princess to the flower-mother’s son, and turned them out of the palace.
After this, one day because of a great feast at the royal house, the King ordered these six Princes to go for hunting, and return. Because the flower-mother’s son was in an extremely poor condition, except that the other Princes made jests at him they did not notice him. The other six Princesses ask the Princess of the flower-mother’s son, “Is your husband going for the hunting-sport to-day?”
Then having exhibited a most sorrowful state, the Princess says, “That I do not know. I must ask my husband, and ascertain.”
When the other Princes had ornamented [themselves] for the hunting-sport, the flower-mother’s son, seeking a rust-eaten sword and rotten bow, went to the midst of the forest, and taking a Prince’s appearance, mounted upon a horse. Having gone [hunting], cutting off the tongues of the whole of the animals that he hunted [and killed], and taking only a rat-snake [besides], he returned to the palace before everybody [in his ordinary form].
The King required to look at the animals which these Princes had hunted [and killed]. Thereupon, to be visible above the meat procured by the hunting of the whole of them, [the Prince] placed [on the top of them] the dead body of his rat-snake. Then the whole of them abused this one, it is said.
Thereupon this one says to the King, “It was not these Princes; I killed these animals.” Having said, “If these killed them, where are the tongues of these animals?” he opened [their] mouths and showed them. Having shown the King the tongues of the animals which he had, and caused them to see [him in] the likeness of the Prince decorated with all the ornaments, like the full moon, this flower-mother’s son stood before the King. Thereupon, the King and the other Princes also, retreated in extreme astonishment.
Thereupon, when he gave the King information of all the account of this Prince from the commencement, [the King] having handed over the sovereignty to him he put on the crowns.[1]
[1] Ceylon was formerly sometimes termed Tri-Siṇhala, because it was divided into three districts, Pihiṭi-raṭa, the northern part, containing the capital; Malaya-raṭa, consisting of the mountainous part; and Ruhuṇu-raṭa, the southern part, round the hills. It is very doubtful if the supreme King ever wore a triple crown that symbolised his rule over the three districts; on the other hand, a triple head-covering like the Pope’s tiara was certainly known, and is represented in the frontispiece to Ancient Ceylon. [↑]
No. 245
Concerning a Prince and a Kinnara Woman
In a certain country there was a King, it is said. There was a single daughter of the King’s. From many places they spoke of marriage to that royal Princess, but her father the King did not agree to it.
At last, when a certain royal Prince asked to marry this Princess, her father the King, having made inquiry, because of his not happening to be a son of the Chief Queen was not satisfied with it.
But on account of the Prince’s possessing a mind extremely attached to the said Princess, having considered several means of success for bringing away this Princess, he made a very large brass lamp. The chamber of the lamp had a size [sufficient] for the Prince to be concealed [in it].
Having caused the lamp to be constructed in this manner, after the Prince entered there, having employed four persons they took this very lamp to sell. In order to go in this way, the Prince said thus to his servants, “There is necessity for me to enter such and such a royal house. While [you are] taking this lamp, when anyone [elsewhere] asks for it, mention a price which it is not worth; but having gone to the royal house give it at whatever they ask it for,” he said.
Thereafter the servants, keeping this word in mind, and the Prince being concealed [in it], took the lamp to the royal house, it is said. The King, having seen the lamp and having thought, “This is an extremely fine lamp. This is suitable for placing in my daughter’s chamber,” asked the price of it, it is said. Thereupon the servants who took the lamp fixed the price at four hundred masuran. And when the King said, “This is not worth so much; I will give seventy-five[1] masuran,” the servants because of the Prince’s word gave the lamp at that price, it is said.
Thereafter, for the purpose of beautifying the royal Princess’s chamber he placed there this lamp. The Prince, also, having entered the lamp was [in it].
Although for the care of the Princess many servants were staying there, the Prince obtained opportunity in order to bring about conversation with the Princess, it is said. By this method obtaining about a [half] share of the Princess’s food, the Prince remained hidden for a time.
They give the Princess only one quantity of food. It was the custom once in seven days to weigh this Princess;[2] but as the Prince was eating a share of the Princess’s food, the Princess having become thin became less in weight.
Having seen that the Princess’s weight by degrees was growing less, the servant women, becoming afraid, informed the King that the Princess perhaps had some illness. The King also having thought that the Princess perhaps had some sickness (ābādayak), made inquiry, and having ascertained that she had not a sickness in that way, ordered them to give additional food on account of it. After this time, having seen that the Princess is increasing in weight by the method, at the time when he inquired about it, he ascertained, it is said, that the Princess had been pregnant for eight months.
After this, although the King investigated by several methods regarding the manner in which this disgrace occurred to the Princess, he was unable to learn it. Everyone in the country got to know about this.
In this way, after the King was coming to great grief, he caused notification to be made by beat of tom-toms throughout the country that to a person who should seize and give him the wicked man who caused the disgrace to the royal Princess, he will give goods [amounting] to a tusk elephant’s load.
A certain old woman, having caused the proclamation tom-tom to stop, said, “I can catch and give the thief,” it is said. Thereupon they took the old mother near the King.
Then the King having spoken, asked, “Canst thou catch and give the thief?”
“It is so; may the Gods cause me to be wise,” the old woman said, it is said.
“Dost thou require something for it?” he asked.
“[You] must give me a permission for it in this manner,” she said. “That is to say, whether in the [right] time or in unseasonable time,[3] it is proper that I should receive permission for coming to any place I please in the palace,” she said. And the King gave permission for it.
The old mother, upon that same permission having come to the royal house, while conversing in a friendly manner with the Princess after many days had gone by ascertained that from outside anyone was unable to approach the palace. But perceiving that some one could hide inside the lamp that is in the Princess’s chamber, one day, in the evening, at the time when darkness was about to fall, she came to the Princess’s chamber, and having been talking, dishonestly to the Princess she scattered white sand round the lamp, and went away.
In the morning, having arrived, when she looked she saw the foot-marks of a person who went out of the lamp, and perceiving that most undoubtedly the rogue is in the lamp, told the King (rajuhaṭa), it is said. Thereupon the King having employed the servants and brought the rogue out, made the tusk elephant drink seven large pots of arrack (palm spirit), and ordered them to kill him by means of the tusk elephant.
Having made the Prince sit upon the tusk elephant, they went near the upper story where the Princess was. The elephant-driver was a servant who was inside the palace for much time. As he was a man to whom the Princess several times had given to eat and drink, the Princess said for the elephant-keeper to hear, “With the tusk-elephant face don’t smash the tips of the cooked rice.”[4]
The elephant-keeper also understanding the speech, without killing the Prince saved him. Although he employed the tusk elephant even three times, and made it trample on his bonds, at the three times he escaped.
Thereupon the King [said], “This one is a meritorious person;”[5] and having caused him to be summoned, and made notification of these things after he came, at the time when he asked, “Who art thou? What is thy name?” he told all, without concealing [anything]. Thereupon he married and gave the Princess to the Prince.
While the two persons were living thus, a longing arose for the Princess to wear blue-lotus flowers. As this time was a season without flowers, having heard that there would be flowers only at one pool at a Kinnara village at a great distance, the Prince went there. While he was there, a Roḍi (Kinnara) woman by means of a [knowledge of the] teaching of the Kala[6] spells caused the Prince to stop there, it is said.
When time went in this manner without the Prince’s coming, the King started off and sent four Ministers for the purpose of finding him. The four persons, ascertaining that the Prince had been captured and taken into the Kinnara caste, went there, and spoke to the Prince.
Perceiving that while by the mouth of the Roḍi (Kinnara)[7] woman the word “Go” was being said, he was unable to go,[8] they spoke to the Prince, and did a trick thus, it is said; that is, they told the Prince to say, “Certain of my friends have come; we must give them amply to eat and drink.” “Because of it [be pleased] to tell the Kinnara woman to cook food amply,” they said. When the Prince told the Kinnarī to cook food in that manner she did so.
When the Prince summoned the Ministers to the food, they, the four persons, putting sand in their waist pockets and mixing it with the food, endeavoured to eat, it is said. Having done so, the four Ministers said, “Although we came so far seeking our friend, we were unable to eat even a mouthful of rice from our friend without sand and stones [being] in it,” and having scolded the Prince they went away. At that time the Prince appeared as though approaching great grief.
The Roḍi (Kinnara) woman who saw this spoke to the Prince, “Go, calling your friends to come,” she said. After the way in which she said this [word] “Go,” the Prince very speedily having started, went with the four Ministers to his own country. Having gone thus and arrived at the palace, he told of the beauty of the Kinnara woman, and all his story.
In the meantime the Kinnara woman also having arrived in front of him, the Kinnara woman having said, “Here he is,” when she seized the Prince’s hand the King, having pushed the Roḍi (Kinnara) woman from there, sent her out of the way.
The Kinnara woman because of this trouble drew out her tongue, and having bit it died, it is said; and after that having cast out the dead body they burned it. On the grave mound a plant [used as a] vegetable grew.
Two women of the village near this place came here to break fire-wood. Because one of the two women had pregnancy longing, uprooting the plant [used as a] vegetable, she cooked and ate it to allay the longing. After she ate thus, the woman having given birth to a female child she grew up extremely beautiful, like the dead Kinnara woman.
During this time, the Prince in succession to his father-in-law had come to the sovereignty, it is said. At the time when the child born like the Kinnara woman had arrived at sufficient age, the King having come and having seen her when he was going [past], remembered the dead Kinnara woman, and having tied his affections on the young woman endeavoured to obtain her, it is said. But her two parents not being pleased at it, as the King was going to walk away beat him, and killed him.
After the King died, when the King’s men were burying him they gave the kingship to his son. After this son arrived at the time when he understood matters, he asked his mother how his father the King died, and ascertaining it he seized the men of the village at which they killed the King, and having put them in a ship he launched it on the sea. The men having cast nets, catching fish [in them] got their livelihood. After this, having cast the net and made efforts, catching a hundred Seer fishes they went to the village that was visible on shore. That village, indeed, is now Mīgamuwa (Negombo).
Western Province.
The capture of the Prince by a low-caste village girl is apparently borrowed from Sinhalese history. In the second century before Christ, Prince Sāli, the only son of King Duṭṭha-Gāmaṇi, fell in love with a beautiful village girl of low-caste,—according to tradition a Duraya girl—married her, and in order to retain her abandoned his succession to the throne. According to the historians, his infatuation was due to his grandfather’s having been a pious man of low-caste in his former life, and to the Prince’s marrying the girl in a previous existence, both of them then being of the same caste.
[1] Tun pas-wissak, lit., three [times] a five [and] twenty. [↑]
[4] Æt-muhunin bat munu bin̆ḍinṭa epāya. [↑]
[5] Because he thought the elephant was supernaturally prevented from killing him. [↑]
[6] Apparently from Skt. kal, to impel, hold, fasten. (See p. 340.) [↑]
[7] The narrator thought that Roḍiyās are Kinnarās. [↑]
[8] That is, she said the word with a mental reservation that he should be unable to act accordingly. [↑]
No. 246
The Way in which the Prince traded
In a certain country the son of a King having thought that he himself earning it he must obtain a living, asked permission for it from his father the King.
Then the King said, “Son, if the goods that there are of mine will do without your earning a living and [thus] obtaining it, you can live happily, enjoying the possession of this wealth which there is,” he said.
But the Prince, being dissatisfied with it, said to his father the King, “In order for me to do trading, having loaded goods in a ship please give me charge of it,” he said.
Because of the strong wish of the Prince in this matter, the King having caused three ships to be constructed, loaded goods in one and gave the Prince charge of it, and sent the other two ships for the purpose of his protection.
After these three ships had sailed a considerable distance, a strong wind struck them; and the two ships which went for his protection having sunk, the ship in which was the Prince drifted to a shore.
Thereupon the Prince having said, “At what country have we arrived?” when he began to walk there for the purpose of looking, he saw a city in which were houses without men, and an abandoned palace. At that time, in order to find a country in which are men, he caused a dependant of this Prince to climb up a very high tree; when he looked he saw at a place not far from there a city at which men are dwelling, and they went there.
When the Prince asked the men who were at the city the reason of there being a city with abandoned houses and an abandoned palace, the men said thus, that is, “Because the King who exercised the sovereignty over that city did much wrong, a deity having sent a fire-ball[1] through the whole city once in three months, began to destroy it.”
Thereupon this Prince who owned the ship, asking for a very clever clerk from the Minister who ruled the city, arrived there on the day on which he sends the fire-ball to destroy the city. When he is sending the fire-ball the Prince asked the deity, “What is the reason for sending this fire-ball?”
The deity said, “The King who ruled here stole the goods of such and such men to these extents, put in prison falsely such and such men.” When he is saying a quantity of such-like matters, the clerk who went with the Prince wrote down the whole.
Thereupon the Prince said to the deity, “The goods which the King stole from the men I will apportion and give to them. I will assist the men who were put in prison without cause. Because of it, henceforward do not send the fire-ball and destroy the city.” When he said it the deity accepted it.
After that, the Prince having sold the goods that were in the ship and the ship also, and having assisted the families whom the wicked King had injured, together with the Minister governed the country.
One day this Prince having gone for hunting-sport, when he was going hunting, a deer, feeling the wound at the shooting and shooting, ran off in front. The Prince having run after the deer, became separated from his retinue. Having seen, when going along, that a very beautiful Princess is at a rock cave in the midst of the forest, when he asked her [regarding] the circumstance, she said, “A Yakā brought me and put me in this rock cave. Once in three months he comes to look [at me].” Thereupon the Prince, calling for his retinue, and when it came having gone away taking this Princess, gave her in marriage to the Minister.
After this, because neither this Princess nor the Minister, both of them, paid regard to this Prince who had assisted them, the Prince having become angry went away.
Having gone thus, becoming wearied he went to sleep near a pool in the midst of the forest. At this time, two robbers having come, placed [there] a very beautiful Princess on a golden bed, and being unable to divide them, [each] cried out, saying, “The bed for me; the Princess for me. Give me them.”
Thereupon the Prince, having opened his eyes and said, “Who are ye?” sprang near them, taking his sword, and said, “I am such and such a Prince. I will kill you. If I am not to kill you, give me the Princess, and if ye want the bed take ye it away.” The two robbers having become afraid, taking the bed went away.
This Prince went away, taking the Princess, and having arrived at a country, dwelt there in misery. At this time, her father the King made public that to the person who, having found, gave him this Princess, he will give a share from the kingdom, and marry and give her.
Well then, for the purpose of finding her, a young man from the Princess’s country having walked to all places, at last arrived by chance at the place where both of them are residing. Recognising the Princess, and during that day night getting a resting-place there and having stayed at it, he stole the Princess, and went near her father the King.
Thereupon the Princess said to her father the King, “Do not give me in marriage to this wicked one. There is a Prince who at the very first delivered me from robbers. While that Prince was there [after] finding me, this wicked one having gone [there], stealing me by force came away.” Thereupon the King commanded them to impale this man, and kill him.
Through grief at [her loss], that Prince who was [there] having come after seeking her for three months, [the King] gave him this Princess in marriage, and gave him the kingship of that country, also.
No. 247
A Princess and a Prince
In a certain country a King had an only daughter, it is said. The Princess was a possessor of an extremely beautiful figure. The King taught her the sciences to the extent to which she was able to learn. This Princess having arrived at maturity, the King ordained that a Prince who having heaped up masuran [amounting] to five tusk elephants’ loads, should show [and give] him them, may marry her.
After that, although from several countries Princes came to marry her because this Princess’s figure is beautiful, having been unable to procure masuran [amounting] to five tusk elephants’ loads their minds became disheartened, and they went away.
At last, out of the seven sons of a certain Emperor-King, one person said to his father the King, “Father,[1] should you not give me masuran [equal] to five tusk elephants’ loads, undoubtedly, cutting my throat (lit., neck) myself, I shall die.”
The King asked, “What is that for?”
“In such and such a country there is a very beautiful daughter of the King. To marry her, first it is necessary to give masuran [equal] to five tusk elephants’ loads.”
Thereupon the Emperor-King having loaded the masuran into a number of carts, handed them over to the Prince. Well then, this Prince, taking the masuran also, approached near the Princess’s father, the King. Having weighed his masuran, when he looked [into the account] still a few were short. Because of it having sold even the tusk elephant which the Prince brought, and having righted the five tusk elephants’ loads, after he showed them to the King, the father of the Princess, he gave the Princess in marriage to this Prince.
Because of this Prince’s act, the Princes who having come first to marry the Princess and having been unable went away, became angry, and formed the design to steal the Princess for themselves.
After the Prince lived in happiness for a little time at the palace of the King, the father of the Princess, he asked the King, the Princess’s father, for permission to go to his own country with the Princess. When he had asked permission even many a time because the father of the Princess was very unwilling, by very strong effort he set off to go, together with the Princess.
When going thus, the Princess’s father gave her ten masuran. As these two persons, taking the ten masuran, were going journeying they fell into a great forest wilderness. Leaving behind the forest wilderness, when they arrived at another country, because [only] two masuran remained over for them, getting a living became very difficult.
Thereupon the Princess said to the Prince, “I know the means to earn our living, therefore be not afraid. For [the value of] the remaining two masuran bring threads of such and such colours,” she said.
The Prince having brought them, the beautiful Princess knitted a scarf [like one] she was wearing, and having put flower work, etc., [in it], and finished, gave it to the Prince, and said, “Having gone taking this scarf and sold it to a shop, please bring and give me the money,” she said. Thereupon the Prince having taken it and gone, and having sold it for twenty masuran, thereafter bought at the price the requisite threads of several colours, and gave them to the Princess. Well then, while the Princess is making ready scarves, having obtained money and rented a house at the city, she dwelt with the Prince.
While [they were] dwelling thus, a Prince came to the shop at which she sold the scarves, and buying an invaluable scarf of these, and ascertaining that it was the scarf woven by such and such a Princess, asked the shopkeeper, “Who brought and sold the scarves?”
Then the shopkeeper said, “Such and such a handsome man sold them to me,” he said.
Having said, “When will the scarf trader come again to the shop?” and having ascertained it from the shopkeeper, he came on the day which the shopkeeper mentioned, in order to meet the Prince scarf trader.
Having come thus, and met with the very Prince who trades in the scarves, and conversed well, he asked, “Who knits the scarves?”
Then the Prince gave answer, “My wife knits them.”
Thereupon the other Prince said, “The scarves are extremely good. I want to get knitted and to take about ten or fifteen of them.”
Having said [this], and having come to the place where this Princess and Prince are living, and given a deposit of part of the money for the month, he got a resting-place there that day night.
In this manner getting a resting-place and having been there, in the middle of the night stealing the Princess, the Prince who got the resting-place took her to his palace. This Prince, for the Princess whom he stole and the Prince who was her lord to become unconscious, caused them to drink a poisonous drug while they were sleeping. This Prince who stole the Princess was a person who at first having gone to marry her, was not wealthy [enough] to procure the masuran [amounting] to five tusk elephants’ loads.
Well then, on the day on which he went stealing the Princess, he received a letter from his father the King, that he must go for a war. Because of it, having put the Princess whom he stole in the palace, and placed guards, and commanded that they should not allow her to go outside it, he went for the war.
While she was [there] in this manner, in the morning consciousness having come to the Prince who had married the Princess and become her lord, he opened his eyes, and having seen that the Princess was not there, as though with madness he began to walk to that and this hand. While going thus, he went to go by the street near the palace in which his Princess is put. When going there, after the Princess had looked in the direction of the street from the floor of the upper story, she saw that her Prince is going; and at that very time having written a letter she sent it to the Prince by the hand of a messenger.
In the letter was said, “At night, at such and such a time please come to such and such a place. Then I having arrived there, and both of us having joined together, let us go by stealth to another country.”
The Prince as soon as he received the letter went near a jungle, and thinking, “Here are no men,” read the letter somewhat loudly.
Then a man who, having gone into the jungle to draw out creepers and having become fatigued, was lying down near there, heard his reading of the letter. Because the man heard this matter, in the night time, at the time which was written in the Princess’s letter, taking a sword also, he went to the place which she mentioned. When the Princess, too, at the appointed time went to the said place, the man who went to cut creepers having waited there, seized her hand, and they quickly travelled away. While they were going, in order that the guards and city residents should not be able to recognise them, not doing much talking they journeyed quickly in the darkness, by the jungle, to the road.
The Prince who was appointed the husband of the Princess, having read without patience the letter which the Princess sent, arrived at the place mentioned before the appointed time; and having [sat down and] leaned against a tree until she comes, after the journey he made went to sleep. At this time the man who went to cut creepers came, bringing the sword. If he had met with the Prince, he would have even killed him, with the design to take away the Princess.
This Princess, together with that man, having arrived at a great forest wilderness, both persons went to sleep under a tree. After it became light, having opened her eyes, and when she looked having seen that she had come with a very ugly man, unpleasing to look at, becoming very distressed she began to weep.
Then the man said, “After you have now come so far with me, should you leave me you will appoint yourself to destruction. Because of it, are you willing that I should marry you?” he asked.
The Princess said, “I am willing; but in our country there is a custom. In that manner we must keep it,” she said.
The creeper cutter agreed to it, that is, the woman and man, both of them, who are to marry, having looked face to face, with two ropes of fine thread are to be tied at a post, and after they have proclaimed their willingness or unwillingness for their marrying, they must marry. “Well then, because in this forest wilderness there are not ropes of fine thread, let us tie ourselves with creepers,” she said.
Because there was not anyone to tie the two persons at once (eka pāraṭa), the other having tied one person, after this one proclaimed her or his willingness the other was to be tied. Firstly having tied the Princess with a turn of creeper, after she proclaimed her consent he unloosed her. After that, the Princess, having very thoroughly made tight and tied to the tree the creeper cutter, quickly went away backward to seek her lord.
While going in that way she met with two Vaeddās. Thereupon the two Vaeddās, with the design to take this Princess, began to make uproar.
Thereupon the Princess said, “Out of you two, I am willing to come with the skilful one in shooting furthest,” she said.
At that time the two Vaeddās, having exerted themselves as much as possible, shot the two arrows [so as] to go very far, and to fetch the arrows went running to the place where they fell. While they were in the midst of it the Princess went off very stealthily.
The two Vaeddās having come and having seen that the Princess had gone, began to seek her. When they were thus seeking her, that creeper cutter whom she had tied and placed there when she came away, somehow or other unfastening the tying, came seeking the Princess; and having joined with these Vaeddās began to seek [her with them].
While they were in the midst of it, the Princess having gone walking, met with a trader. The trader, taking her and having journeyed, at noon became wearied, and went to sleep in the shade under a tree. Then the Princess taking a part of the trader’s clothes and putting them on, went like a man, and arrived at a royal palace. The King having said to this one, “What can you do?” [after] ascertaining it, gave this one the charge to teach the King’s son and also the Minister’s son.
During the time while she is thus educating in the sciences these two Princes, one day the Minister’s son, because of an accidental necessary matter went into the room where this Princess who was made his teacher is sleeping. At the time when he went, the Princess’s outer robe having been aslant, the Minister-Prince saw her two breasts, and went seeking the King’s son to inform him that she was a woman.
The Princess, ascertaining this circumstance, stealing from the palace the clothes of a royal Prince and putting them on, went away very hastily. She went away thus in the disguise of a Prince, by a street near a palace of the chief city in another country.
Because a handsome husband, pleasing to the mind of the daughter of the King of that country, had not been obtained by her, she remained for much time without having married. Although many royal Princes came she was not pleased with them. But having been looking in the direction of the street from a window of the upper story floor, and having seen this Princess of extremely beautiful figure going in the disguise of a Prince, very hastily she sent to her father the King, and informed him, “Please give me the hand of that Prince who is travelling in the street, as my lord-husband.”
Then the King, having sent a messenger and caused this Prince to be brought near the King, and shown him the Princess, said, “You must marry this Princess. If not, I shall appoint you to death.” This Princess who was in the disguise of a Prince through fear of death consented to it.
After that, having appointed the wedding festival in a great ostentatious manner, they married these two persons. In that night the Princess who was in the disguise of a Prince, having told the other Princess all the dangers that occurred to her, and told her that she is a Princess, said to her, “Don’t inform any one about it.”
Remaining in this manner, the Princess who is in the Prince disguise began to seek her husband. It was thus:—This Princess having caused to be made ready a very spacious hall which causes the minds of the spectators who saw it to rejoice to the degree that from the outer districts men come to look at it, began to cause donations [of food] to be given to all who arrive there.
Having caused her own figure to be made from wax, and having put clothes on it, and established it at a place in front of this hall, she caused guards to be stationed around, and commanded them, “Any person having come near this wax figure, at the very time when he has touched it you are to bring that person near me.” She said [thus] to the guards.
While a few days were going, men came from many districts to look at this hall. Among them, having walked and walked seeking this Princess, were her Prince and the creeper cutter, the two Vaeddās and the trader, the royal Prince and the Minister-Prince. The whole of them having come and seen this wax figure, touched the hand of the wax figure. The guards who were stationed there, because the whole of these said persons touched the wax figure, arrested them and gave charge of them to the Princess.
Thereupon the Princess commanded them to kill the creeper cutter. Having censured the Vaeddās she told them to go. To the son of the King who caused her to teach, she gave in marriage the Princess whom, having come in the disguise of the Prince, she married. Taking charge of her own Lord she from that time lived in happiness.
The story of the Prince and Princess (No. 8, vol. i) bears a close resemblance to this tale in some of the incidents; see also No. 108 in vol. ii.
In the Arabian Nights (Lady Burton’s ed., vol. iii, p. 62) the story of Āli Shār and Zumurrud also contains similarities. When the two had no other means of support, Zumurrud sent her master or husband to buy a piece of silk and thread for working on it. She then embroidered it for eight days as a curtain, which Āli Shār sold for fifty dīnārs to a merchant in the bazaar, after she had warned him not to part with it to a passer-by. They lived thus for a year, till at last he sold one to a stranger, owing to the urging of the merchants. The purchaser followed him home, inserted opiates into a half plantain which he presented to him, and when Āli Shār became unconscious fetched his brother, a former would-be purchaser of Zumurrud, and they carried off the girl. By arrangement with an old woman, a friend of the youth’s, she lowered herself from a window at midnight, but Āli Shār, who waited there for her, had fallen asleep, and a Kurdish thief in the darkness took her away, and left her in charge of his mother. When this woman fell asleep she escaped on horse-back in male attire, was elected King at a city at which she arrived, and by giving a monthly feast to all comers in a great pavilion that she erected for the purpose, seized all her captors, and caused them to be flayed alive. At last she found her husband in this way.
In Folklore of the Santal Parganas (collected by Rev. Dr. Bodding), p. 301, the marriage of the disguised wife of a Prince to a Princess occurs. While they were travelling the Prince was imprisoned on a false charge, his wife dressed as a man, was seen by a Princess who fell in love with her, and agreed to marry the Princess if according to the custom of her own country the vermilion were applied to the bride’s forehead with a sword (the marriage to the sword). When she told the Princess her story the latter informed the Raja, who released the Prince and remarried his daughter to him.
No. 248
Concerning a Royal Princess and Two Thieves
In a certain country there was a King. There was one Princess, only, of the King’s. Except the King’s Queen and Princess, only, there was not any other child. At the time when the Princess was twelve years old the King died. After he died any person does not go to do the work at the royal house as in the time when the King was there. By reason of this, the Princess and Queen are doing the work in the palace without any one.
When not much time had gone, two men came to the royal house without [anything] to eat and to wear. At that time this royal Queen asked, “What have ye come for?”
Thereupon these men said that being without [anything] to eat and to wear they came seeking a means of subsistence.
Then the Queen said, “It is good. If so, remain ye here.” The men having said, “It is good,” stayed there. The work she gave them, indeed, was [this]: she told one person to cause the cattle to graze; she told one person to pour water [on the plants] at the flower garden.
After that, the man who looks after the cattle having taken the cattle to a garden of someone or other and left them, was lying down under a tree. At that time the owner of the garden having come, and having beaten him and the cattle, drove them away. After that, the man having put the cattle somewhere else, [after] causing them to graze there went to the palace.
The man to whom was given the charge to pour the water, from morning until evening comes having drawn water, became much fatigued. On the following day, with the thought of changing [the work of] both persons that day, he asked the man who went to cause the cattle to graze, “Friend, how is the work you went for? Is it easy or difficult?”
Thereupon the man who looks after the cattle said, “Anē! Friend, having taken the cattle and put them in a garden, I lie down. When it becomes evening I come driving them, and tie them up. Except that, there is not any difficulty for me,” he said. Having said thus, the man who looks after the cattle asked the man who pours the water, “How, friend, is your work?”
The man said, “What, friend, is my work? Having poured a bucket or two of water on the flower trees I simply amuse myself.”
Then the man who looks after the cattle said, “If so, friend, I will pour the water at the flower garden to-morrow; you take the cattle.” Thereupon the man, being thankful, said, “It is good.”
On the following day both persons did accordingly. That day, also, he beat the man who looks after the cattle, in an inordinate manner. The man who remained at home, having poured water until it became night, was wearied.
Having seen that these two works were difficult, both these men in the evening spoke together very softly. The Queen and Princess having become frightened at it, put all the money into an iron box, and having shut it and taken care of it, put it away.
These men having heard that noise, and having waited until the time when the Princess and the Queen were sleeping, these two, lifting up that box, came away with it. There was a waterless well. Having said they would hide it in the well, one told [the other] to descend into the well. What did the other do? Taking a large round stone, he dropped it into the well, so that the man who was in the well should die. Having dropped it, the man, taking the cash-box, went somewhere else. That stone not having struck the man who descended into the well, with much exertion he came to the surface of the ground, and when he looked the man was not [there].
On the following day, the Queen having arisen, at the time when she looked she perceived that the cash-box was not [there]. Having perceived it, she asked the man who remained [regarding it]. The man said, “Anē! I don’t know.”
When the Queen asked, “Where is the other man?” this man said, “That man himself will have taken it. The man is not here.”
The Queen having said, “Well, what can I do?” remained without doing anything.
The man who stayed at the palace having inquired on the following day, when he looked about met with the cash-box, [the other man] having placed it in the chena jungle. Having taken it, he came back and gave it to the Queen.
Thereupon, the Queen being very thankful, and having married and given that Princess to the man, he remained [there] exercising the kingship virtuously, as [was done] before.
Western Province.
In Folk-Tales of Bengal (L. Behari Day), p. 160, two thieves determined to live honestly, and were engaged by a householder, one to tend a cow, the other to water a Champaka plant, at which he was told to pour water until some collected round it. The dry earth absorbed all he poured, and in the afternoon, tired out, he went to sleep. The cow taken out by the other man to graze was a wild vicious one; it galloped about into rice fields and sugar-cane plantations, and did much damage, for which the man was well scolded, together with fourteen generations of his forefathers. At last he managed to catch the cow, and bring it home. Each man told the other of the easy day he had had, intending to get the other man’s work; and at last they arranged to exchange duties. On the following day, when they met in the evening, both worn out, they laughed, and agreed that stealing was preferable to what people called honest labour. They decided to dig at the root of the plant, and learn why it took so much water. Their subsequent adventures are given in vol. ii, p. 94. A similar story is given in Folklore of the Santal Parganas (Dr. Bodding), p. 139, the men being two brothers who went off and were engaged as labourers, one by an oilman and the other by a potter.
In The Indian Antiquary, vol. xxv, p. 21, in a story by Naṭēśa Sāstrī, two rogues who agreed to work for an old woman had similar experiences, each boasting of the easy day he had had. In this tale the woman had secret subterranean channels which carried the water to a field that she cultivated. Afterwards, as she overheard them arranging to rob her she buried her treasure in a corner of the house, filled the box which had contained it with stones and pieces of old iron, told them she hid it in the well during the dark half of the month (when thieves might try to take it), and made them carry it there and drop it in. At night they went to remove it, the man who descended opened it in the well and found she had tricked them, but being afraid the other would leave him in the well he emptied it, sat in it, said it was full of treasure, and told the other to draw it up. The man absconded with it as soon as he raised it, until a voice told him to walk more slowly, on which he opened it and found the other rogue in it.
No. 249
How the Nāgayā became the Princess
In a certain country there was a royal Prince, it is said. This Prince one day having gone for garden sport, and while on his return journey having seen a beautiful woman belonging to a nobleman’s family, his mind was attracted towards her, it is said. When the Prince with his mind thus greatly attracted towards the woman is feeling keen sorrow, not obtaining sleep, dwelling foodless, for several days in succession not having eaten, his body grew extremely emaciated.
At the time when his father the King inquired what were the reasons of it, he informed him that he wanted to take in marriage a nobleman’s daughter, it is said. The King having heard his word, asked the assemblage of Ministers whether the transaction was suitable or unsuitable. And the assemblage of Ministers having said that should he take At the time when he is thus, having concealed from the King that he does not pay regard to his married wife, since thereafter the Prince attempted the obtaining of the nobleman’s daughter for himself [the King] ordered the Prince to go out of the country. The Prince, upon the word of his father the King having mounted on a ship and become ready to go to the foreign country, put the Princess whom he took in marriage into a rock house (cave), and having placed guards around, and made them give her food once in four days, said thus to the Princess, “When, having gone to a foreign country, I come again to this country, having borne a Prince like me do thou keep and rear him virtuously. Should it not be so I will speedily cause thee to be killed and cut into bits,” he said. The Prince said thus with the intention of indeed killing the Princess. Why was that? Because from the day when he contracted the marriage there had not been a [conjugal] association of these two. Well then, she ascertained that she cannot perform even one of the orders that were told to the Princess. Well, this Princess’s father had presented and given to her two tunnelling rats.[1] By the help of these rats having made a tunnel [by which] to go outside from the rock house, she came out by the tunnel, and making even the guards her friends, went near a woman who knows extremely clever dances; and having given money, [after] learning up to the other shore itself[2] her art of dancing, she went to the neighbourhood [of the place] from which on the first occasion the Prince was to mount into the ship, putting on a dress that was attracting the wonder of each of the persons who saw it, in such a manner that anyone should be unable to recognise her. Having shown dances in front of the Prince, and caused his mind to long for her, and that day night having slept with him, on the following day she went to the house of the King her father. The Prince having gone to foreign countries, the Princess was living in happiness at the house of her father until learning news of his coming again to his own country. Having heard news that the Prince descended from the ship, and having gone to the rock house together with the guards of whom at first she was making friends, she remained [there] in the manner which the Prince ordered on going. Because the Prince came after a number of years had passed away, she had a fine infant Prince. Well then, the Prince, having descended from the ship and having come with the intention [after] having killed his wife to take in marriage the nobleman’s Princess, opened the door of the rock house, and at the time when he looked saw that the Princess is [there] with an infant Prince in the very manner he said. While he was in extreme anger, the Princess, while in the midst between the Royal Council and her husband, related the method by which she obtained her child. After that, when in a very public manner the Prince completely abandoned his wife her parents did not take charge of her. Because of it, having gone near an indigent woman she dwelt with her child. Because the Prince had extreme affection for the child he thought to take the child [after] having given poison to the Princess and killed her. At this time, because the Siṭu Princess whom the Prince was intending to take in marriage had been taken and given and settled for another person, he contracted marriage with another Princess. On the day of the festival at which he contracts[3] this marriage, on his sending to his indigent former wife a sort of cakes in which poison was mixed, when she was partaking of them she performed the act of Yama.[4] After she died, a Nāga maiden began to give milk to the infant. The Prince having gone on horseback to bring the infant, at the time when he brought it to the royal house the Nāga maiden also went behind [in her snake form]. The Prince having seen the Nāga maiden while the head part of the Nāgayā was inside the doorway and the tail part outside the doorway, when he cut it in two with his sword the Nāgayā vanished, and the Princess who was the mother of the infant remained in front [of him].[5] The Prince ascertaining [thereby] that he was unable to kill her, established her in the post of Chief Queen. [1] Uman̥-mīyō. Compare p. 81, vol. ii. [↑] [2] Para-teraṭama, completely, from top to bottom. [↑] [5] Compare the similar incident in vol. i, p. 133. [↑] In a certain country there was a King, it is said. Belonging to that King there was only a single son-Prince. He handed over this Prince to a Royal Preceptor for teaching him the arts and sciences. Although until this Prince became big to a [considerable] degree he was learning near the Royal Preceptor, he did not properly get to know even a single letter. While he was staying thus, a King of another country sent a letter to his father the King. Thereupon he gave this letter to the Prince to read. The Prince, bringing the letter near his forehead, looked at it, rubbing his eye he looked, (after) running round the house he looked; but he was unable to read it. The royal retinue who saw this laughed. At that time anger having arisen in the King concerning this, he very quickly caused the Royal Preceptor to be brought. He spoke to him angrily. The Royal Preceptor, becoming afraid [said], “Your Majesty, your son is unable to learn. Let this [other] child who learnt at the same time with that Prince, and this child who came to learn after that, read, if you please;” and he presented two children before him. Thereupon the two children read the letter with ease. After that, the King being angry with his Prince, settled to kill him on the following day. His mother the Queen having arrived at much grief concerning this, on the following day, at the point of its becoming light, having tied up a packet of masuran and given it to him, ordered him to set off and go away from the country. And the Prince, in the manner his mother said, taking the packet of masuran set off and went away from the country. While he was thus going he saw a place where an astrologer, assembling children (lamō) together, is teaching. The Prince having halted at that place and spoken to the teacher about learning [under him], remained there. And although, having stayed there much time, he endeavoured to learn, while he was there also he was unable to learn. During this time the astrologer-teacher having become afflicted with disease, dismissed and started off the whole of the scholars. He told the Prince to go away. At the time when the Prince was going, he approached to take permission from the teacher. Thereupon the teacher, having spoken to the Prince, said, “Learning even the advice which I now give to yourself, take it and establish it in your mind as long as there is life.” The Prince answered, “It is good.” The advice indeed was this:—“Having gone to a place to which you did not go [before], should they give any seat for sitting down, without sitting there at once you must draw out and shake the seat, and [then] sit down. While you are at any place, should they give to eat, not eating the food at once, [but] taking a very little from the food, after having given it to an animal and looked at it a little time you must eat. Having come to an evil place to take sleep, not lying down at once you must lie down at the time of being sleepy. Not believing anything that any person has only said, should you hear it with the ear and see it with the eye [even], not believing it on that account only, [but] having inquired still further, you must act.” [After] hearing this advice the Prince having set out from there, went away. At the time when he had gone a considerable distance, the Prince became hungry; and the Prince having halted at a place, said to the house man, “Anē! Friend, I am very hungry. I will give you the expenses; give me to eat for one meal.” Having said [this], the Prince unfastened the packet of masuran that was in his hand, and from it gave him a single masurama. The man after having seen these told his wife about the packet of masuran that the Prince had.[1] The wife also having become desirous to take the packet of masuran, told her husband the stratagem to kill the Prince and take them. Talking in this way, they dug a secret (boru) hole and covered it, and having fixed a seat upon it made him sit there to eat food. The Prince having established in his mind the advice which the astrologer-teacher gave, drew away and shook the seat; at the time when he endeavoured to look [at the place] all the things that were there fell into the secret hole. Having seen this and arrived at fear, the Prince set off from there and began to go away. Having thus gone a considerable distance, and having halted at a place because of hunger, the Prince said to a man, “On my giving the expenses give me to eat for one meal.” Thereupon the man said, “It is good.” Then the Prince, having unfastened the packet of masuran, bringing a masurama gave it to the man. The man having told his wife also about the matter of the masuran, they arranged a means to kill the Prince and take the masuran. Having thought of giving poison to the Prince to kill him while here, they put poison into the food, and having set a seat and brought a kettle of water for washing himself, gave it to him. The Prince, after washing his [right] hand and mouth, having gone and sat down, according to the advice of the astrologer-teacher taking from all the food a very little gave it to the dog and cat that were near the Prince, and remained looking [at them] a little time. While he was [waiting] thus, in a little time the dog and cat died and fell down. Having seen this and become afraid, the Prince set off from there and began to go away. Having gone on and on in this way, near the palace of another King through hunger-weakness he fell, and struck the ground. The men who saw this having gone running, said to the King [that] a man like a royal Prince had fallen down, and was not far from the palace. The King gave orders, “Very speedily bring him here.” Thereupon the men having lifted him up, took him to the royal house. While he was there, when he asked him [regarding] the circumstances, “I am very weak through hunger;[2] for many days I have not obtained any food,” he said. “At first having made rice gruel, give ye him a little,” the King said. Thereupon the servants having said, “It is good” (Yahapataeyi), prepared and gave it. After his weakness was removed in this way, he asked him [about] the circumstances. Commencing at the beginning, from the time (taen) when he went near the Royal Preceptor, he told the story before the King (raju). Then the King spoke, “Wast thou unable to learn letters? Not thus should a royal Prince understand. Wast thou unable to learn the art of swords, the art of bows, etc.?” he asked. Thereupon, when answering he said he knew the whole of those arts; only letters he did not know. At that time the King thought thus, “Because of his not knowing only letters, ordering them to kill him was wrong, the first-born son. Remain thou near me,” he commanded. Belonging to the King there was a single daughter only. As there were no sons he regarded this Prince like a son. When not much time had gone thus, the King thought of giving And the Prince when replying on all the occasions said, “I am not willing to leave His Majesty the King and go away.” Thereupon ascertaining that he says thus through willingness that he should marry the King’s daughter to him, he said, “I am not willing to give my daughter to thee. Shouldst thou say, ‘Why is that?’ seven times now, seven Princes married (baen̆dēya) that person. They having died, on the following day after the Princes married her it befel that I must bury them. Because death will occur to thee in the very same way, I am not willing to give my daughter to thee,” he said. Thereupon the Prince said thus, “To a person for whom death is not ordained death does not come; death having been ordained that person will die. Because of that, I am wishful to marry (ban̆dinṭa) that very Princess,” he said. Then the King fulfilled his wish. Thus they two having married, according to the custom he sent them away [into a separate dwelling]. While he was with that very Princess, having remembered the warning given on that day by the astrologer-teacher, being heavy with sleepiness while eating betel, he woke up many times. At this time the Princess had gone to sleep. [At last] he hears a sound in the house. The Prince having heard it and become afraid, at the time when he was looking about [after] taking his sword in his hand, he saw a cobra of a size equal to a Palmira trunk descending from the roof. This cobra, indeed, was a young man who had tied his affection to this Princess, a person who having died through his love [for her] was [re-]born a cobra. Through anger towards all who marry the Princess he killed them. The royal Prince having gone aside, in a little time it descended until it was near the ground. [Then] the Prince by one stroke of the sword cut the cobra into three pieces. Thus the danger which there had been for much time that day was destroyed. On the following day, according to custom with fear the servants arrived in front of the Princess’s house. But the Prince having come out, placed the three pieces of the cobra upon a post. Thereupon having been amazed, the royal servants very speedily ran off and told the King (rajuhaṭa) about this. The King, also, having arrived there was astonished, and commanded them to take the trunk of the cobra to the cemetery, and burn it. During these very days, another King having asked the Great King for assistance for a war, sent letters. And the King sent this Prince to the war, with the army. When he had thus gone, in a few days the Princess bore a son. The war lasted twelve years. After twelve years, having conquered in the war he was ready to come to his own country. By this time the Princess’s son had become big. But the people of the country, not knowing whose son [he was], thought him a person who had married the Princess. And this news had become spread through the country. The royal Prince having arrived near his own country, the Prince got to hear the news; but having remembered the warning of the astrologer-teacher, he thought that to believe it in the future he must make inquiry. Coming close to the royal palace by degrees, he addressed the army; and thereafter, after he had beaten on the notification tom-tom, “Assemble ye,” having allowed them to go, when it became night he arrived inside the palace by an outer window. Thus he arrived in the house called after the Princess. Having come in that way and seen that a youth was living with the Princess, he became angry, and said, “I will cut down the two persons,” taking the sword in his hand. [But] having remembered the warning of the astrologer-teacher, he said, “Without being hasty I will still test them,” and again he put the sword into the sheath. At the sound, the [young] Prince who was with his mother opened his eyes, and having seen his father and become afraid, saying, “Mother, mother,” crept under the bed. The mother, too, having opened her eyes at this time and when she looked having seen her lord, spoke [to him]. Thereupon he told the Princess the whole circumstances, and for the Princess there was great sorrow [at the report spread regarding her]. On the morning of the following day, the Prince having seen the Great King told him about the war, and the manner in which he got the victory in it. And the King, being much pleased, appointed great festivals at the city; and having decorated the Prince with the Crown and given him the kingship, the King began to perform acts in view of the other world. Compare the advice given to the Brāhmaṇa in No. 209 in this vol., and the variants appended. In Folk-Tales of Bengal (L. Behari Day), p. 100, a Queen was married afresh every day to a person selected by the royal elephant, this new King each morning being found dead in some mysterious manner in the bed-room. A merchant’s son who had been obliged to leave his home was chosen as King by the elephant, and heard of the nocturnal danger. While he lay awake armed, he saw a long thread issue from the Queen’s left nostril; it grew thicker until at last it was a huge snake. He at once cut off its head, and remained there as the permanent King. In the Kathā Sarit Sāgara (Tawney), vol. i, p. 137, each time the daughter of a King was married the bride-groom was found dead in the chamber on the following morning. When royal bride-grooms could be obtained no longer, the King ordered that from each house in turn a person of either the royal or Brāhmaṇa caste should be brought and allowed to remain in the room for one night, on the understanding that anyone who survived should be married to the Princess. All died, until at last a brave Brāhmaṇa from another country offered to take the place of the son of the widow with whom he was lodging. He remained awake, and in the night saw a terrible Rākshasa open the door, and stretch out his arm. The Brāhmaṇa at once stepped forward and cut off the arm, and the Rākshasa fled. The hero was afterwards married to the Princess. He met with the Rākshasa in the same way at another city, and learnt from him that by Śiva’s orders he was preventing the Princesses from being married to cowards. In the same work, vol. ii, p. 449, there is an account of a Brāhmaṇa who placed himself under a teacher at Pāṭaliputra, but was so stupid that he did not manage to learn a single syllable. In Folk-Tales of Kashmir (Knowles), 2nd ed., p. 32 ff., there is a variant; see note after No. 209 in this volume. The closest resemblance is in the episode in which the Prince takes the place of the Potter’s son who was about to be summoned to be married to the Princess whose husbands had all died on their wedding night. During the night the Prince was careful not to sleep; he lay down with his sword in his hand. In the middle of the night he saw two snakes issue from the nostrils of the Princess, and come towards him. He struck at them and killed them. Next morning the King was surprised to find him alive, and chatting with his daughters. The Prince then told the King who he was, and he became the heir apparent. In Sagas from the Far East, p. 291, after a certain King died, the persons who were elected in turn as his successor died each night without any apparent cause. Vikramāditya and his companion, a youth who had been reared by wolves, took the place of a youth who had been chosen as King, and on inquiry learnt that as secret offerings that were made by the former King to the devas and spirits had been discontinued, it must be the offended spirits who killed each new King every night. When the offerings were made the deities were appeased, and no more deaths occurred in this way. In the Arabian Nights (Lady Burton’s ed., vol. iii, p. 263), there is an account of a haunted house in Baghdad; any person who stayed during the night in it was found dead in the morning. This was the act of a Jinni (demon) who was guarding a treasure which was to be made over to a specified person only. He broke the necks of all others, but when the right man came he gave him the treasure. There is a variant of the first danger from which the youth escaped, in a Sierra Leone story given in Cunnie Rabbit, Mr. Spider, and the Other Beef (Cronise and Ward), p. 251. A King who had been falsely told that his son was likely to depose him, gave him two tasks which he accomplished successfully, and afterwards caused a deep hole to be dug, placed broken bottles in the bottom, spread a mat over it, set a chair on it, and told the boy to sit on it. The boy replied that he never sat down without first shaking the place. When he beat the mat with a heavy stick the chair fell into the hole, and the boy escaped. For the pit-fall compare No. 159, vol. ii, and the appended notes. [1] Lit., that was near the Prince. [↑] [2] Lit., “For me [there is] much hunger-weakness.” [↑] In a certain country there was a King, it is said. This King’s palace having been dug into by three dexterous thieves, they stole and got the goods. Having seized these very three robbers, for the purpose of effecting their trial they brought them into the presence of the King. When the King asked these three robbers if they committed the robbery or not, they said that they committed the robbery. “If you thus committed the robbery are ye guilty or not guilty persons?” he asked. Thereupon they gave notice that they were not guilty persons. When he asked, “How is that?” [they said that], as it was easy for them to dig into [the wall], because when the mason built the palace the mortar had been put in loosely, the mason was the guilty person owing to his doing that matter. Thereupon the King having summoned the mason, when he asked him whether, because he put in the mortar loosely, he was guilty or not guilty, he gave notice that he was not guilty. When he asked again, “How is that?” the mason said thus, “I had appointed a labourer to mix the lime. Owing to his inattention when doing it the mortar had become loose. Because of that, the labourer is the guilty person,” the mason said. Thereupon having summoned the said labourer, he asked him whether because he put the mortar in loose (i.e., improperly mixed) he was guilty or not guilty. Then he gave notice that he was not the guilty person. How is that? While he was staying mixing the lime, having seen a beautiful woman going by that road, because his mind became attached to her the work became neglected. The labourer said that the woman was the guilty person. Thereupon having summoned the woman, just as before he asked whether, regarding the circumstance that having gone by that road she caused the neglect of the labourer’s work, she was guilty or not guilty. She, too, said that she was not guilty. Why was that? A goldsmith having promised some of her goods, through her going to fetch them because he did not give them on the [appointed] day, this fault having occurred owing to her doing this business, the goldsmith was the guilty person. Thereupon having summoned the goldsmith, when he asked him just as before he was not inclined to give any reply. Because of that, the King, having declared the goldsmith the guilty person, commanded them to kill the goldsmith by [causing him to be] gored by the tusk of the festival tusk elephant. He ordered them to kill this goldsmith, having set him against a large slab of rock, and causing the tusk elephant to gore him through the middle of the belly. Well then, when the executioner was taking the goldsmith he began to weep. When [the King] asked him why that was, the goldsmith said thus, “Two such shining clean tusks of the King’s festival tusk elephant having bored a hole through my extremely thin body and having struck against the stone slab, will be broken. Because of sorrow for that I wept,” he gave answer. “What is proper to be done concerning it?” the King asked. Then the goldsmith says, “In the street I saw an extremely great-bellied Tambi. If in the case of that Tambi, indeed, the tusk elephant gore the belly, no wound will occur to the two tusks,” the goldsmith said. Thereupon the King having summoned the great-bellied Tambi, caused the tusk elephant to gore him through his belly. The goldsmith and the whole of the aforesaid [persons] went away in happiness. Western Province. In The Indian Antiquary, vol. xx, p. 78, a South-Indian variant was given by Naṭēśa Sāstrī. In order to commit robbery, a thief made a hole through a wall newly built of mud which slipped down on his neck and killed him. His comrade found the body, and reported that the owner of the house had murdered him. The owner blamed the cooly who built the wall; he blamed the cooly who used too much water in mixing the mud; he attributed it to the potter’s making too large a mouth for the water-pot; he blamed a dancing-girl for passing at the time and distracting his attention. She in turn laid the blame on a goldsmith who had not re-set in time a jewel which she gave him; he blamed a merchant who had not supplied it in time, though often demanded. He being unintelligent could offer no excuse, and was therefore impaled for causing the thief’s death. [1] Moorman, a Muhammadan trader. [↑] In a certain country, a woman without a husband in marriage bore a son, it is said. At that time the men living in the neighbourhood having come, asked the woman, “Who is thy husband?” Then the woman replied, “My husband is Mārayā.”[1] Mārayā having heard this word and being much pleased, thought, “I must get this woman’s son into a successful state.” Having thought thus, after some time had gone, speaking to the son Mārayā said thus, that is to say, “Become a Vedarāla. I will give you one medicine only. Should I stay at the head side of any sick person, by giving the sick person the medicine the sick person will become well. Should I be at the feet side you cannot cure the sick person.” After that, this son having gone from place to place and having applied medical treatment, became a very celebrated doctor. One day when this Vedarāla went to look at a sick person whom he very greatly liked, Mārayā was at the feet part of the sick person. At that time the Vedarāla having thought, “I must do a good work,” told them to completely turn round the bed and the sick person. Then the head side became the part where Mārayā stayed. Well then, when he had given him the Vedarāla’s medicine the sick person became well. Mārayā having become angry with the Vedarāla concerning this matter, and having thought, “I must kill him,” Mārayā sat on a chair of the Vedarāla’s. Because the Vedarāla had a spell which enabled him to perform the matters that he thought [of doing],[2] he [repeated it mentally and] thought, “May it be as though Mārayā is unable to rise from the chair.” Having thought thus, “Now then, kill me,” the Vedarāla said to Mārayā. Well then, because Mārayā could not rise from the chair he told the Vedarāla to release him from it. Then the Vedarāla said to Mārayā, “If, prior to killing me, you will give me time for three years I will release you,” he said. Mārayā, being helpless,[3] having given the Vedarāla three years’ time went away. After the three years were ended Mārayā went to the Vedarāla’s house. The Vedarāla having become afraid, did a trick for this. The Vedarāla said to Mārayā, “Kill me, but before you kill me, having climbed[4] up the coconut tree at this door you must pluck a young coconut to give me,” he said. After Mārayā climbed up the coconut tree, having uttered the Vedarāla’s spell the Vedarāla thought, “May Mārayā be unable to descend from the tree.” Well then, Mārayā, ascertaining that he could not descend from the tree, told the Vedarāla to release him. At that time the Vedarāla, asking [and obtaining] from Mārayā The three years having been ended, on the day when Mārayā comes to the Vedarāla’s house the Vedarāla entered a room, and shutting the door remained [there]. But Mārayā entered straightway (kelimma) inside the room. Then the Vedarāla asked, “How did you come into a room the doors of which were closed?” Thereupon Mārayā said, “I came by the hole into which the key is put.” The Vedarāla then said, it is said, “If I am to believe that matter, be pleased to creep inside this bottle,” he said. Well then, after Mārayā crept into the bottle the Vedarāla tightened the lid (mūḍiya) of the bottle, and having beaten it down put it away. From that day, when going to apply medical treatment on all days having gone taking the bottle in which he put Mārayā, he placed the bottle at the head side of the sick person; and having applied medical treatment cured the sick person. In this manner he got his livelihood. Western Province. In The Indian Antiquary, vol. i, p. 345, in a Bengal story by Mr. G. H. Damant, a shepherd discriminates a demon from a man whose form he has taken,—living with his wife during the man’s absence,—by boring through a reed, and saying that the true person must be the one who could pass through it. As the demon was passing through it he stopped both ends of the reed with mud, and killed him. In the South Indian Tales of Mariyada Rāman (P. Ramachandra Rao), p. 43, a husband was returning home on an unlucky day (the ninth of the lunar fortnight), with his wife, who had been visiting her parents. When he left her on the path for a few moments, “Navami Purusha,” the deity who presided over the ninth day, made his appearance in the form of the husband and went away with the wife. The husband followed, and took the matter before Mariyada Rāman. The judge got a very narrow-necked jug prepared, and declared that he would give her to the claimant who could enter and leave the jug without damaging it or himself. When the deity did it the judge made obeisance to him, and was informed that the man’s form had been taken by him to punish him for travelling on an unlucky day against the Purōhita’s advice. In Folk-Tales of Bengal (Day), p. 182, when a Brāhmaṇa returned home after some years’ absence he was turned away by a person of his own appearance, and the King could not decide the matter. A boy elected as King by others in their play offered to settle it, and producing a narrow-mouthed phial stated that the one who entered it should have judgment in his favour. When the ghost transformed himself into “a small creature like an insect” and crept inside, the boy corked it up and ordered the Brāhmaṇa to throw it into the sea and repossess his home. The first part resembles a story in the Kathākoça (Tawney), p. 41, the interloper being a deity in it. In the well-known tale in the Arabian Nights (Lady Burton’s ed., vol. i, p. 33), the receptacle in which the Jinni was imprisoned was “a cucumber-shaped jar of yellow copper” or brass, closed by a leaden cap stamped with the seal-ring of Solomon. In vol. iii, p. 54, and vol. iv, p. 32, other Ifrits were enclosed in similar jars made of brass, sealed with lead. [1] Māra, the God of Death, or Death personified. [↑] [2] Compare the Kala spell in No. 245 of this vol., and the notes, p. 342, vol. ii. and p. 70 in this vol. [↑] [3] Baeri taena, in a position of inability [to do anything]. [↑] [4] Baḍa gālā, that is, by clasping his arms round it and rubbing his body on it, as he “swarmed” up it. [↑] At a city there was a very rich Heṭṭi young man. During the time when he was [there], they brought a bride[2] for the young man. What of their bringing her! The Heṭṭi young man was [engaged] in giving goods to many ships. Because of it, while the bride[3] married (lit., tied) to the Heṭṭi young man was staying at home, the Heṭṭiyā went to give goods to ships. Having gone, [before his] coming back about six months passed. At that time, [while he was absent], the Heṭṭi girl who was married [to him] one day went to the well to bring [water]. When she was going, a beard-cutting Barber man having stayed on the path and seen this beautiful woman, laughed. Thereupon the woman, not looking completely on that hand, looked at him with the roguish eye (hora aehin), and went to the village. On the following day also, the Barber having come, just as before laughed. At that time also the woman, just as before, looked with the roguish eye, and went away. The woman on the following day also came in order to go for water. That day also, the Barber having stayed on the path laughed. That day the woman having spoken to the Barber, asked, “What did you laugh for when I was coming? Why?” The Barber said, “I did not laugh at anything whatever but because of the affection which you caused.” Thereupon the woman asked, “Were you inclined to come with me?” The Barber said, “Yes.” Then this woman said, “If you come, you cannot come in that way.[4] The Great King having gone, after the Second King has come to Ceylon (Seyilama), after jasmine flowers have blossomed without [being on] creepers, having cut twenty, having stabbed thirty persons, having pounded three persons into one, when two dead sticks are being kneaded into one having mounted on two dead ones, should you come you can talk with me.” Thereupon the Barber went home, and grief having bound him because he could not do [according to] the words which this woman said, he remained unable to eat cooked rice also. At that time the Barber woman asked, “What are you staying [in this way] for, not eating cooked rice, without life in your body?” The Barber said, “I thought of taking in marriage such and such a Heṭṭi woman. Owing to it the Heṭṭi woman said, ‘When the Great King has gone, when the Second King has come to Ceylon, when the flower of the creeperless jasmine has blossomed, having cut twenty, having stabbed thirty, having pounded three persons into one, when two dead sticks are becoming knocked into one, come mounted on the back of two dead ones.’ Because I cannot do it I remain in grief.” Thereupon the Barber woman said, “Indō! Don’t you get so much grief over that. For it, I will tell you an advice. ‘The Great King having gone, when the Second King came to Ceylon,’ meant (lit., said), when the sun has set and when the moon is rising. ‘When the creeperless jasmine flower is blossoming,’ meant, when the stars are becoming clear. ‘Having cut twenty,’ meant, having cut the twenty finger [and toe] nails. ‘Having stabbed thirty,’ meant, having well cleaned the teeth (with the tooth-stick), to wash them well. ‘Having pounded three persons into one,’ meant, having eaten a mouthful of betel (consisting of betel leaf, areka-nut, and lime) you are to come. [These] are the matters she said.[5] Because of it, why are you staying without eating? If you must go, without getting grieved go in this manner, and come back.” Thereupon the Barber having gone in that manner, while he was there yet two [other] persons heard that those two are talking. When they heard—there is a custom in that country. The custom indeed is [this]: There is a temple [kōvila] in the country. Except that they give [adulterers, or perhaps only offenders against caste prohibitions in such cases as this?] as demon offerings (bili) for the temple, they do not inflict a different punishment [on them]. Because of it, seizing these two they took them for the purpose of giving [them as] demon offerings for the temple. This Barber woman, learning about it, in order to save her husband undertook the charge of the food offering[6] for the temple, and went to the temple taking rice and coconuts. Having gone there, and said that they were for the kapuwā[7] (priest) of the temple, she came away calling her husband, too. Then to that Heṭṭi woman this Barber woman [said], “Having said that you are cooking the food offering (pusē) which I brought, stay at the temple until the time when the Heṭṭirāla comes. The deity will not take you as the demon offering (billa).[8] Your husband having come back will seek and look [for you]. When he comes seeking, say, ‘I having married my husband, he went away now six months ago. Because of it, having told my husband to come I undertook the charge for [cooking] the food offering.[9] Just as I was undertaking the charge he came. Because of it, not having seen the face of my lord (himiyā), paying respect to the deity I came to cook the food offering.’ Continue to say this.” Thereupon the Heṭṭi woman having done in that very manner, the Heṭṭiyā came. Well then, she having made the woman [appear] a good woman, [her husband], taking charge of her, came calling her to the house, and she remained [there] virtuously (hon̆da seyin). This story was related by a woman in the North-central Province, to a man whom I sent to write down some stories at a village at which I had been promised them. Her name, given as Sayimanhāmī (Lady Simon), and expressions she used, show that she probably belonged originally to the Western Province. It is difficult to understand how the condemned persons escaped. The interesting fact of the tale is the reference to the presentation of human offerings at a temple devoted to either one of the demons or the goddess Kālī. The Sinhalese expression, deviyan wahansē, deity, given in the text, might be applied to either. In the Kathā Sarit Sāgara (Tawney), vol. i, p. 91, it is related in one story that “whenever a man is found at night with another man’s wife, he is placed with her within the inner chamber of the Yaksha’s (Maṇibhadra) temple.” In the morning the man was punished by the King; the country in which this occurred is not stated, but it was far from Tāmraliptā. When a merchant and a woman were so imprisoned, the merchant’s wife, hearing of it, went at night with offerings, and was permitted to enter. She changed clothes with the woman, and sent her out; and in the morning, as the woman in the temple was found to be the merchant’s own wife, the King dismissed the case, and freed the merchant “as it were from the mouth of death.” Thus the usual punishment appears to have been death, as in the Sinhalese tale. [1] Prayōga parannāwanta ga͞enī. [↑] [2] Man̆gulak, a word which usually means a [wedding] feast, but is often used in the villages to signify the bride. [↑] [3] Kasādē, literally “marriage,” here also used to signify the bride. [↑] [4] That is, merely because he was inclined to go. [↑] [5] The narrator omitted to make the woman explain the last two cryptic sayings. The final one, that he was to go mounted on the back of two dead ones, of course means that he was to wear a pair of shoes or sandals. [↑] [6] Puseka, also pusē later on. Doubtless this is the Tamil pūsei (Skt. pūja), one meaning of which is food given as a religious offering. Puseka is puse + eka, one, used in such instances to express the definite article, as in kōṭeka, the coat. [↑] [7] Kapiwaṭa in the text. The meaning is uncertain, kapi being a monkey, a sacred animal at Hindu temples. [↑] [8] Perhaps because she would acquire sanctity through cooking the consecrated food. [↑] [9] That is, made a vow to present or cook a food offering. [↑] In a certain country there was a man called Mātalānā, it is said. This man was the son of the concubine of the King of that country, it is said. That Mātalānā from infancy was getting his living by committing robbery. Having been committing robbery in this manner, and having arrived at the age of a young man, Mātalānā having spoken to his mother, asked, “Mother, who is our father?” Thereupon his mother says to him, “Son, thou art not a so-so (esē-mesē) person. The King of this country is thy father.” When his mother said thus, having said, “It is good. If so, I will do a good work,” he began to steal things belonging to the King. During the time while he is thus committing robbery, the King in various ways having fixed guards, endeavoured to catch the thief, but he was unable to seize him. Mātalānā getting to know that guard has been very carefully placed at the royal house, without going for robbery to the royal house began to steal the goods belonging to the King that are outside. Thereupon the King, having thought that somehow or other having caught the thief he must put him in the stocks, and having made the guards stop everywhere, caused a carpenter to be brought and said, “Having seized the thief who steals the things that are the King’s property, to make him fast in the stocks make a pair of stocks in a thorough manner. Regarding it, ask for and take the whole of the requisite things from the royal house.” When the King ordered it, the carpenter, taking all the things suitable for it and having gone, made the stocks. On the day on which they were finished, Mātalānā, having arrived at the carpenter’s house, and having been talking very well [with him], asks the carpenter, “Friend, what is this you are making?” Thereupon the carpenter says, “Why, friend, don’t you know? These are indeed the stocks I am making for the purpose of putting in the stocks the thief who steals the goods belonging to the King,” he said. When Mātalānā asked, “Anē! How do you put the thief in the stocks in this,” the carpenter having put his two legs in the two holes of the stocks, to show him the method of putting him in the stocks at the time while he is making them, Mātalānā, having [thus] put the carpenter in the stocks, taking the key in his hand [after locking them], struck the carpenter seven or eight blows, and said, “[After] opening a hard trap remain sitting in it your own self, master,” and saying a four line verse also,[1] went away. On the following day, when the King came to look at the stocks he saw that the carpenter has been put in the stocks. When he asked, “What is this?” he ascertained that the thief named Mātalānā, who is stealing the goods belonging to the King, had come, and having put the carpenter in the stocks and struck him blows went away. Thereupon the King having said, “It is good, the way the thief was put in the stocks!” dismissed the carpenter and went away. After that, Mātalānā having gone stealing the King’s own clothes that were given for washing at the washerman’s house, at night descended to the King’s pool, and began to wash them very hard. The washerman, ascertaining that circumstance, gave information to the King. Thereupon the King, having mounted upon the back of a horse and the army also surrounding him, went near the pool to seize Mātalānā. Mātalānā getting to know that the King is coming, the army surrounding him, came to the bank at one side of the pool, carrying a cooking pot that he himself had taken, and having launched [it bottom upwards] and sent it [into the pool], began to cry out, “Your Majesty, look there! The thief sank under the water; [that is his head]. We will descend into the pool from this side; Your Majesty will please look out from that side.” While he was making the uproar, the foolish King, having unfastened [and thrown down] his clothes, descended into the pool. Then Mātalānā [quickly came round in the dark, and] putting on the King’s clothes, and having mounted upon the back of the horse, says, “Look there, Bola, the thief! It is indeed he.” When he said, “Seize ye him,” the royal soldiers having seized the King, who had unloosed [and thrown off] his clothes, tied him even while he was saying, “I am the King.” Having tied the King to the leg of the horse on which Mātalānā had mounted, and, employing the King’s retinue, having caused them to thrash him, Mātalānā, in the very manner in which he was [before], having unloosed [and thrown off] the clothes [of the King], bounded off and went away. After that, the retinue who came with the King having gone taking the [supposed] thief to the royal house, when they were looking perceiving that instead of the thief they had gone tying the King, were in fear of death. The King, not becoming angry at it, consoled his servants; and having been exceedingly angry regarding the deed done by Mātalānā, and having thought by what method he must seize Mātalānā, made them send the notification tom-tom everywhere. After that, Mātalānā, again arranging a stratagem to steal clothes from the washerman, and preparing a very tasty sort of cakes, hung the cakes on the trees in the jungle, in the district where the washerman washes. Mātalānā, taking in his hand two or three cakes and having gone eating and eating one, asked the washerman for a little water. Thereupon the washerman asked Mātalānā, “What is that you are eating?” “Why, friend, haven’t you eaten the Kaeppiṭiyā[2] cakes that are on the trees near this, where you wash?” he asked. Thereupon the washerman says, “Anē! Friend, although I washed so many days I have not eaten cakes of trees of the style you mention that are in this district,” he said. “If so, please eat one from these, to look [what they are like].” When he gave it to the washerman, the washerman having eaten the cake and having found much flavour in it,[3] says, “Anē! Ōyi! Until the time when I have gone [there] and come [after] plucking a few of these cakes, you please remain here.” When he said it, having said, “It is good. Because of the heat of the sun I will stay beneath this tree,” Mātalānā, having sent the washerman to pluck the Kaeppiṭiyā cakes and return, [after] tying in a bundle as many of the King’s clothes as there were, went away [with them]. When the washerman comes [after] plucking the cakes, either the clothes or the man he had set for their protection, not being visible, he went speedily and gave information to the King. The King having become more angry than he was before, again employed the notification tom-tom [to proclaim] that to a person who, having seized, gives him this Mātalānā who steals the things belonging to the King, he will give goods [amounting] to a tusk elephant’s load, and a share from the kingdom. Mātalānā, ascertaining that he sent the notification tom-tom, having stayed on the path and made the notification tom-tom halt, promised: “I know Mātalānā. Within still three months I will seize and give that Mātalānā while in a courtesan’s house.” The notification tom-tom beater, accepting this word, went, and when he gave information to the King, the King, because of the anger there was [in him] with this thief, having become much pleased told him to summon the man to come. Thereupon, after Mātalānā came to the royal house, when he asked, “In about how many days can you seize and give Mātalānā?” he said, “In about three months I can.” After that, Mātalānā having been like a friend of the King until three months are coming to an end, one day, at the time when the King is going to the courtesan’s house, he said to the King’s Ministers and servants, “To-day I saw the place where the Mātalan-thief is. In order to seize him [be pleased] to come.” Summoning in the night time the whole royal retinue, and having gone and surrounded the house of the courtesan, and said [the King] was Mātalānā, there and then also they seized the King. When they seized him in this way, the King through shame remained without speaking. After that, seizing the King and having gone, and having very thoroughly struck him blows, and put him in prison, and kept [him there], in the morning when they looked, just as before they saw that the King had been seized, and struck blows, and put in the stocks. After all these things, Mātalānā, having again broken into the King’s house, stealing a great quantity of goods, reached an outside district, and dwelt there. Western Province. This story is partly a variant of No. 92 in vol. ii. [1] Not given by the narrator. [↑] [2] A jungle bush or small tree on which lac is formed, Croton lacciferum. [↑] [3] Lit., much flavour having fallen. [↑] A certain King sent for his Minister and informed him that if he could not tell him next morning five lies so closely resembling the truth that he would believe them, he should be beheaded. The Minister went home with a sorrowful heart; he refused to eat or drink, and threw himself on his bed. His wife came and inquired the reason for such behaviour. “What has a dying man to do with eating and drinking?” he replied, “to-morrow morning I must die;” and then he told her what the King had said. His wife answered, “Don’t be afraid; I will tell you what to say to the King;” and she persuaded him to take his food as usual. She then related to him this story:—In a certain country there were four friends, a carpenter, a goldsmith, an areka-nut seller, and a dried-fish seller. The three latter persons decided to go and trade, and for that purpose they requested the carpenter to build them a ship. The carpenter did so; and understanding that large profits were to be made in other countries, he also decided to join them. The four men then wished to engage a servant to cook for them on board the ship, but they had considerable difficulty in finding one. At last they met with a youth who lived with an old woman named Hokkī, who had adopted him as her son. The youth was willing to go, and as there was no one at home to take charge of the old woman after he left, it was settled that she should accompany them. Then they all sailed away, the goldsmith taking a number of hair-pins (koṇḍa-kūru) for sale, and the other traders taking areka-nuts (puwak) and sun-dried fish (karawala). After going some distance the ship ran on a rock and was totally wrecked, and all the party were drowned. In his next life the carpenter became a Barbet, which bores holes in trees, looking for a good tree with which to build a ship. The goldsmith became a Mosquito, which always comes to the ears and asks for the hair-pins (kūru-kūru) that he lost. The dried-fish seller became a Darter, and constantly searches for his dried-fish in the water. The areka-nut seller became a Water-hen (Gallinula phœnicura), and every morning calls out, “Areka-nuts [amounting] to a ship [-load], areka-nuts!” (a good imitation of the cry of the bird, Kapparakaṭa puwak′, puwak′). And the cook became a Jackal, who still always cries for his mother, “Seek for Hokkī, seek” (Hokkī hoyā, hoyā, the beginning of the Jackal’s howl). Next morning the Minister told the story to the King, who fully believed the whole of it. The Minister then explained that it was pure fiction, whereupon the King instead of cutting off his head gave him presents of great value. Mātara, Southern Province. I met with a story of this kind among the Mandiṅkō of the Gambia, in West Africa, and as it is unpublished I give it here. It was related in the Mandiṅkā language, and translated by the clerk on the Government river steamer, the Mansa Kīlah. [1] This story appeared in The Orientalist, vol. ii, p. 54. [↑] One day a Hyæna met a Goat by the way. He tells the Goat, “Before you move from this place you tell me three words which shall all be true, or I eat you.” The Goat said, “You met me in this place. If you return, [and if] you reach the other Hyænas and tell them, ‘I have met a Goat by the way, but I did not kill him,’ they will say, ‘You are telling a lie.’ ” The Hyæna said, “It is true.” The Goat said, “If I get out here myself, if I reach the other Goats at home, and I tell them, ‘I met a Hyæna by the way, but he did not kill me,’ they will say, ‘You are telling a lie.’ ” The Hyæna said, “It is true.” He said to him, “The third one is:—If you see us two talking about this matter you are not hungry.” Then the Hyæna said, “Pass, and go your way. I am not hungry; if I were hungry we should not be here talking about it.” At a certain city there was a poor family, it is said. In that family there were only a man called Hendrik, a female called Lusihāmī, and a boy called Poḍi-Appu. There was a brother younger than Hendrik, it is said. That person’s name was Juwan-Appu. At the time when the two brothers were getting a living in one house, they having quarrelled, Juwan-Appu in the day time went away into the country. While the afore-said three persons are getting a living in that way, Poḍi-Appu’s father died. The boy was very young. While Lusihāmī was doing work for hire, her boy got to be a little big. At that time the boy is a boy of the size for walking about and playing. One day, when the boy went to another house he saw that the children are playing. Having thought, “This boy must go for those games,” he went there. From that day the boy goes for those games daily. In another city there is a soothsayer. The soothsayer is a very good clever person for bringing hidden treasures, it is said, the city in which the soothsayer stayed not being included in this talk. When he was going looking in the manner of his sooth, it appeared to him that there is an outside city at which is a very great hidden treasure. For taking the hidden treasure it appeared, according to his sooth, that he must give a human demon offering (nara billak). When he looked who is the man for the human demon offering, it appeared, according to the sooth, that he must give for the demon offering Poḍi-Appu, being the son of the aforesaid Lusihāmī. The soothsayer set off to seek this boy. What did he bring? Plantains, biscuits, lozenges (losinjar); in that manner he brought things that gladden the mind of the child. Having come to the district in which is the boy, walking to the places where children are playing, when walking in that district while dwelling there, one day having gone to the place where Poḍi-Appu and the like are playing he stayed looking on. Meanwhile, according to the soothsayer’s thought, he had in mind that Poḍi-Appu was good [for his purpose]. Next, the soothsayer having gone to one side, taking his medicine wallet, when he turned over and looked at the book there was mentioned that it was Poḍi-Appu [who should be offered]. Afterwards calling the boy near him he gave him sorts of food. Meanwhile the boy’s mind was delighted. Next, he gave him a little money. To the boy said the soothsayer, “Your father is lost, is it not so?” he asked; “that is I,” the soothsayer said. The soothsayer by some device or other ascertained that the person’s father[1] had left the country and gone. Afterwards the boy, he having told that tale, went home and informed his mother. And the mother said, “Anē! Son, that your father indeed was [here] is true. For this difficult time for us, if that livelihood-bringing excellent person were here how good it would be! You go, and calling that very one return.” Afterwards the boy having gone, came home with the soothsayer. While both are spending the days with much happiness, one day in the morning he said, “Son, let us go on a journey, and having gone, come; let us go,” he said. [The boy] having said, “It is good,” with the little boy the soothsayer went away. Well then, the boy goes and goes. Both his legs ache. The boy says, “Father, I indeed cannot go; carry me,” he said. Having said, “It is a little more; come, son,” while on the road in that way the boy, being [almost] unable to go, weeping and weeping went near the hidden treasure. The soothsayer, having offered there things suitable to offer, began to repeat spells. Then the door of the hidden treasure was opened; the path was [there]. He said to the boy, “Son, having descended into this, when you are going along it, in the chamber a standard lamp[2] is burning. Without rubbing that kettle (the round body of the lamp) with your body, having removed the lamp and immediately for the light to go out having tilted it from the top, come back bringing the lamp.” Having said [this], he caused the boy to descend inside the hidden treasure [chamber]. The boy having descended, when he looked about the boy had not the mind to come from it. He says, “It will be exactly a heavenly world. I will mention an abridgement of the things that are in it: golden king-coconuts, golden oranges, golden pine-apples, golden mandarin-oranges.” Having told him in that manner, “I cannot make an end of them, indeed,” he said. The boy, plucking a great many of them and having gone into the chamber as the soothsayer said, placing the lamp on his shoulder came away near the door. The soothsayer says, “First give me the lamp, in order to get you to the surface.” The boy says, “I cannot in that way; first take me out,” he says. In that manner there is a struggle of the two persons there. At the time when they are going on struggling in that way, anger having come to the soothsayer he moved the door, for it to shut. Then the boy having got into the middle of [the doorway] the door shut. The soothsayer went away. While the boy quite alone is wriggling and wriggling about there, in some way or other again, as it was at first the door of the hidden treasure opened. The boy placing the lamp on his shoulder and having become very tired, [carried away and] put the lamp and book in his house; and because of too much weariness fell down and went to sleep. The soothsayer went to his village. Western Province. This appears to be the first part of the story of Ala-addin, transformed into a Sinhalese folk-tale; but the variant quoted below shows that the general idea is of much older date and of Indian origin. A variant from the Ūva Province is nearly the same, and also ends with the boy’s return home. In the Kathā Sarit Sāgara (Tawney), vol. i, p. 558, an ascetic induced a King to join him in obtaining a magical sword. Accompanied by the King, the ascetic went at night, and in the King’s words, “having by means of a burnt-offering and other rites discovered an opening in the earth, the ascetic said to me, ‘Hero, enter thou first, and after thou hast obtained the sword, come out, and cause me also to enter; make a compact with me to do this.’ ” The King entered, found a palace of jewels, and “the chief of the Asura maidens who dwelt there” gave him a sword, the possession of which conferred the power of flying through the air and bestowed “all magical faculties.” The ascetic took it from him afterwards, but the King at last recovered it. [1] The son’s father’s brothers are called his fathers in Sinhalese, the father’s sisters being, however, his aunts, not mothers. [↑] In a certain country there were two brothers, it is said. Of these two the elder one got married. The younger brother had a secret friendship with his elder brother’s wife. One day, the elder brother having succeeded in ascertaining about this, and having gone summoning the younger brother into the midst of the forest, cut off his two hands and his two feet. Then the younger brother says, “Elder brother, you having cut off my hands and feet gave me the punishment that is to be inflicted. Please stop even now,” he said. Thereupon the elder brother, having placed this Koṭā[1] without hands and feet in a boat and launched it in the river, sent him away. Prior to launching and sending him off, because he told him to bring and give him a Bana[2] book that was at the younger brother’s house, he brought the book and having placed it on Koṭā’s breast sent him away. Well then, this boat with Koṭā also, going drifting by the margin of the river, two old women having been [there], one said, “That boat which comes drifting is for me.” The other woman said, “Should there be anything whatever inside the boat it is for me.” Well then, when the boat drifted ashore, out of these two women one took the boat, one having taken Koṭā gave him to eat. During the time when he is thus, having heard that they were beating a notification tom-tom on the road [to proclaim] that to a person who having seized gave him the thieves who are stealing flowers in the King’s flower garden, [the King] will give goods [amounting] to a tusk elephant’s load, Koṭā caused this notice tom-tom to stop, having said, “I can.” Causing them to build a little house in the flower garden, and he himself having told men, they lifted him up and went [with him there]; and lying down inside the little house, on the loft, in a very sweet voice he began to read his Bana book. At the time when he is saying Bana in this way, at night seven Princesses having come to pluck flowers, and having heard the sweet sound of Koṭā’s saying Bana, went near the house and told him to open the door. Then, because in order to arise he had not two feet nor also two hands, when Koṭā said that he was unable to open the door, one person out of these Princesses having put on a ring able to display extreme power which she had, caused Koṭā’s hands and feet to be created [afresh]. Then Koṭā having opened the door said Bana for the Princesses. The Princesses having heard the Bana, when they were going the youngest Princess on whose hand was the ring went after the whole. Then Koṭā having seized the hand of the Princess who went after, and drawn her into the house, shut the door. After it became light, having gone taking the Princess, and having given charge of her to the old woman who took charge of Koṭā, Koṭā went to the royal house to say that he caught the thief who plucks the flowers. When going there, Koṭā went [after] putting on the Princess’s ring of power,[3] having given part of [the Princess’s] clothes to the old woman. Koṭā having gone, told the King that he caught the thief. He told him to come with the thief. When Koṭā came home to bring the thief, he saw that having cheated the old woman, the Princess [after] asking for [and getting] her clothes had gone, and had concealed herself; and Koṭā’s mind having become disheartened, he went away out of that country. While thus travelling, having seen six Princesses taking water from a pool that was in the middle of the forest, when Koṭā went near them he recognised that they were the Princesses who went to steal the flowers; and having seen that the Princess whom he seized was not there, for the purpose of obtaining the Princess he invented a false story in order to go to the place where they are staying. That is, this one, having asked the Princesses for a little water to drink, and having drunk, put into one’s water jar the ring of power that was on his hand, and having allowed them to go, he went behind. When these six royal Princesses went to the palace of their father the King, Koṭā also went. Then when the royal servants asked Koṭā, “Why have you come to the royal house without permission?” he said that the Princesses had stolen his priceless ring. He came in order to tell the King, and ask for and take the ring, he said. “The ring will be in one of the Princesses’ water jars,” he said. But the whole seven Princesses, ascertaining that it was the ring of the youngest Princess of them, gave information accordingly to the King. Thereupon the King having much warned Koṭā, told him to give information of the circumstances under which he had come, without concealing them. Then Koṭā in order to obtain the youngest Princess told him how he came. Having said, “If you are a clever person able to perform and give the works I tell you, I will give [you] the Princess in marriage,” the King ordered Koṭā to plough and give in a little time a yam enclosure of hundreds of acres. This Koṭā, while going quickly from the old woman after having left the country, obtaining for money a pingo (carrying-stick) load of young pigs that Again, when going, having seen that [men] are carrying a flock of doves to sell, and a collection of fire-flies, taking them for money, for the sake of religious merit [he released them, and] they went away. These doves and fire-flies promised to be of assistance to Koṭā. Because he had done these things in this manner, when [the King] told Koṭā to dig and give the yams he remembered about the young pigs. Then the young pigs having come, dug and gave all the yam enclosure. Well then Koṭā having [thus] dug and given the yams, pleased the King. Again, the King having sown a number of bushels of mustard [seed] in a chena, told him to collect the whole of it and give it to the King. Thereupon, when Koṭā remembered about the doves, all of them having come and collected the whole of the mustard seeds with their bills, gave him them. Having gone to the King and given that also, he pleased the King. At the last, the King having put all his seven daughters in a dark room, told him to take the youngest Princess by the hand among them, and come out into the light. Thereupon, when Koṭā remembered the fire-flies, the whole of them having come, when they began to light up the chamber, Koṭā, recognising the youngest Princess and taking her by the hand, came into the light. After that, the King gave the Princess in marriage to Koṭā. They two lived happily. Western Province. Regarding the ring in the jar of water, and the tasks to be performed before the Princess could be married, see vol. i, p. 294. In the Kathā Sarit Sāgara (Tawney), vol. i, p. 142, a Brāhmaṇa who wished to let his wife, a Vidyādharī who had taken refuge on Udaya, the Dawn Mountain, know of his arrival, dropped a jewelled ring into a water pitcher when one of the attendants who had come for water in which to bathe her, asked him to lift it up to her shoulder. When the water was poured over his wife she saw and recognised the ring, and sent for him. In A. von Schiefner’s Tibetan Tales (Ralston), p. 71, Prince Sudhana, who had made his way to the city of the Kinnara King in search of his wife, the Kinnarī Manōharā, met with some Kinnara females drawing water for pouring over Manōharā, to purify her after her residence with him. He placed her finger-ring in one pot, and requested that it might be the first to be emptied over her. When the ring fell down she recognised it and sent for him, introduced him to her father the King, and after he performed three tasks was formally married to him. The third task was the identification of Manōharā among a thousand Kinnarīs. In this she assisted him by stepping forward at his request. The incident of the ring sent in the water that was taken for a Princess’s bath, also occurs in Cinq Cents Contes et Apologues (Chavannes), vol. i, p. 302. She recognised it, and sent for her husband who had thus notified his arrival in search of her.No. 250
The Story of the Cobra’s Bite
No. 251.
How they killed the Great-bellied Tambi[1]
No. 252
How Mārayā was put in the Bottle
No. 253
The Woman Pre-eminent in Cunning[1]
No. 254
Mātalānā
No. 255
The Five Lies quite like Truth[1]
No. 256
The Three Truths
No. 257
The False Tale
No. 258
The Story of Koṭā