She did not at all like the change, and having to give up her habits of bullying, and so she argued to herself thus:—
“This jade of a mother-in-law became young through the fruit of the Kâlî, why should not my mother also do the same, if I instruct her and send her to the same temple.”
So she instructed her mother as to the story she ought to give to the goddess and sent her there. Her old mother, agreeably to her daughter’s injunctions, went to the temple, and on meeting with the goddess at midnight, gave a false story that she was being greatly ill-treated by her daughter-in-law, though, in truth, she had nothing of the kind to complain of. The goddess perceived the lie through her divine powers, but pretending to pity her, gave her also a fruit. Her daughter had instructed her not to eat it till next morning, and till she saw her son-in-law.
As soon as morning approached, the poor hen-pecked Brâhmaṇ was ordered by his wife to go to the temple and fetch his mother-in-law, as he had some time back fetched away his mother. He accordingly went, and invited her to come home. She wanted him to eat part of the fruit, as she had been instructed, but he refused, and so she swallowed it all, fully expecting to become young again on reaching home. Meanwhile her son-in-law took her on his shoulders and returned home, expecting, as his former experience had taught him, to see his mother-in-law also turn into a young woman. Anxiety to see how the change came on over-came him, and half way he turned his head, and found such part of the burden on his shoulders as he could see, to be like parts of an ass, but he took this to be a mere preliminary stage towards youthful womanhood! Again he turned, and again he saw the same thing several times, and the more he looked the more his burden became like an ass, till at last when he reached home, his burden jumped down braying like an ass and ran away.
Thus the Kâlî, perceiving the evil intentions of the wife, disappointed her by turning her mother into an ass, but no one knew of it till she actually jumped down from the shoulders of her son-in-law.
This story is always cited as the explanation of the proverb quoted above—vara vara mâmi kaludai pôl ânâl—little by little the mother-in-law became an ass, to which is also commonly added ûr varumbôdu ûlaiyida talaippattal—and as she approached the village, she began to bray.
IX.
The Story of Appayya.[1]
अपूपेन हताः चोराः