Folk-Tales of the Khasis

by Mrs. Rafy

Part II

The husband and wife wandered about in the jungle for many days, living on any wild herbs or roots that they could pick up on their way, but all those days they did not see a village or a sign of a human habitation.

One day they happened to come to a very dry and barren hill, where they could get no water, and they began to suffer from thirst. In this arid place a son was born to them, and the young mother seemed likely to die for want of water. The husband roamed in every direction, but saw no water anywhere, until he climbed to the top of a tall tree in order to survey the country, and to his joy saw in the distance a pool of clear water. He hastened down and fetched his lota, and proceeded in the direction of the pool. The jungle was so dense that he was afraid of losing his way, so in order to improvise some sort of landmark, he tore his dottie (loin-cloth) into narrow strips which he hung on the bushes as he went.

After a long time he reached the pool, where he quenched his thirst and was refreshed. Then he filled his lota to return to his languishing wife, but was tempted to take a plunge in the cool water of the pool, for he was hot and dusty from his toilsome walk. Putting his lota on the ground and laying his clothes beside it, he plunged into the water, intending to stay only a few minutes.

Now it happened that a great dragon, called U Yak Jakor, lived in the pool, and he rose to the surface upon seeing the man, dragged him down to the bottom, and devoured him.

The anxious wife, parched with thirst, waited expectantly for the return of her husband, but, seeing no sign of him, she determined to go in search of him. So, folding her babe in a cloth, which she tied on her back, she began to trace the path along which she had seen her husband going, and by the help of the strips of cloth on the bushes, she came at last to the spot where her husband’s lota and his clothes had been left.

At sight of these she was filled with misgivings, and, failing to see her husband anywhere, she began to call out his name, searching for him in all directions. There were no more strips of cloth, so she knew that he had not gone farther.

When U Yak Jakor heard the woman calling, he came up to the surface of the pool, and seeing she was a woman, and alone, he drew near, intending to force her into the water, for the dragon who was the most powerful of all the dragons inside the pool lost his strength whenever he stood on dry land, and could then do no harm to any one.

In her confusion and fear on account of her husband, the woman did not take much notice of U Yak Jakor when he came, but shouted to him to ask if he had not seen a man passing that way; to which he replied that a man had come, who had been taken to the palace of the king beneath the pool. When she heard this she knew that they had come to the pool of U Yak Jakor, and, looking more closely at the being that had approached her, she saw that he was a dragon. She knew also that U Yak Jakor had no strength on dry land, and she lifted her arm with a threatening gesture, upon which he dived into the pool.

By these tokens the woman understood that her husband had been killed by the dragon. Taking up the lota and his clothes, she hurried from the fatal spot and beyond the precincts of the dragon’s pool, and, after coming to a safe and distant part of the jungle, she threw herself down on the ground in an abandonment of grief. She cried so loud and so bitterly that her babe awoke and cried in sympathy; to her astonishment she saw that his tears turned into lumps of gold as they fell. She knew this to be a token that the blessing of the mendicant, of which her husband had spoken, had rested upon her boy by virtue of the meat she had eaten.

This knowledge cheered and comforted her greatly, for she felt less defenceless and lonely in the dreary forest. After refreshing herself with water from the lota, she set out in search of some human habitation, and after a weary search she came at last to a large village, where the Siem (Chief) of that region lived, who, seeing that she possessed much gold, permitted her to dwell there.