18. 'And how shall I succeed in traversing this wilderness hard to pass, if I am infirm? Yet, in the body of this ape I should have food amply sufficient to get out of this troublesome wilderness.
19. 'Although he has done good to me, I may feed on him, I may, for he has been created such a being. I may, for here the rules given for times of distress[177] are applicable, to be sure. For this reason I have to get my provisions from his body.
20. 'But I am only able to kill him while he is sleeping the profound and quiet sleep of trustfulness. For if he were to be attacked in open fight, even a lion would not be assured of victory.
'Therefore, there is no time to lose now.' Having thus made up his mind, that scoundrel, troubled in his thoughts by sinful lust which had destroyed within him his gratitude, his consciousness of the moral precepts, and even his tender innate feeling of compassion, not minding his great weakness of body, and listening only to his extreme desire to perform that vile action, took a stone, and made it fall straight down on the head of the great ape.
21, 22. But, being sent by a hand trembling with weakness and hastily, because of his great cupidity, that stone, flung with the desire of sending the monkey to the complete sleep (of death), destroyed his sleep. It did not strike him with its whole weight, so that it did not dash his head to pieces; it only bruised it with one of its edges, and fell down on the earth with a thundering noise.
23, 24. The Bodhisattva, whose head had been injured by the stone, jumped up hastily; and looking around him that he might discover his injurer, saw nobody else but that very man who stood before him in the attitude of shame, confounded, timid, perplexed, and dejected, betraying his confusion by the ashy-pale colour of his face, which had lost its brightness; sudden fright had dried up his throat, drops of sweat covered his body, and he did not venture to lift up his eyes.
As soon as the great ape realised that the man himself was the evildoer, without minding the pain of his wound any longer, he felt himself utterly moved. He did not become angry, nor was he subdued by the sinful feeling of wrath. He was rather affected with compassion for him who, disregarding his own happiness, had committed that exceedingly vile deed. Looking at him with eyes wet with tears, he lamented over the man, saying:
25, 26. 'Friend, how hast thou, a man, been capable of doing an action like this? How couldst thou conceive it? how undertake it? Thou, who wast bound to oppose with heroic valour any foe whosoever eager to hurt me would have assailed me!
27. 'If I felt something like pride, thinking I performed a deed hard to be done, thou hast cast away from me that idea of haughtiness, having done something still more difficult to do.