'The Jackal-knave, that starved his spirit so,
And died of saving, by a broken bow.'
"Did he, indeed," said Golden-skin; "and how was that?"
"I will tell you," answered Slow-toes:—
The Story of the Dead Game and the Jackal
"In a town called 'Well-to-Dwell' there lived a mighty hunter, whose name was 'Grim-face,' Feeling a desire one day for a little venison, he took his bow, and went into the woods; where he soon killed a deer. As he was carrying the deer home, he came upon a wild boar of prodigious proportions. Laying the deer upon the earth, he fixed and discharged an arrow and struck the boar, which instantly rushed upon him with a roar louder than the last thunder, and ripped the hunter up. He fell like a tree cut by the axe, and lay dead along with the boar, and a snake also, which had been crushed by the feet of the combatants. Not long afterwards, there came that way, in his prowl for food, a Jackal, named 'Howl o' Nights,' and cast eyes on the hunter, the deer, the boar, and the snake lying dead together. 'Aha!' said he,' what luck! Here's a grand dinner got ready for me! Good fortune can come, I see, as well as ill fortune. Let me think:—the man will be fine pickings for a month; the deer with the boar will last two more; the snake will do for to-morrow; and, as I am very particularly hungry, I will treat myself now to this bit of meat on the bow-horn,' So saying, he began to gnaw it asunder, and the bow-string slipping, the bow sprang back, and resolved Howl o' Nights into the five elements by death. That is my story," continued Slow-toes, "and its application is for the wise:—
'Sentences of studied wisdom, nought avail they unapplied;
Though the blind man hold a lantern, yet his footsteps stray aside.'
The secret of success, indeed, is a free, contented, and yet enterprising mind. How say the books thereon?—
'Wouldst thou know whose happy dwelling Fortune entereth unknown?
His, who careless of her favor, standeth fearless in his own;
His, who for the vague to-morrow barters not the sure to-day—
Master of himself, and sternly steadfast to the rightful way:
Very mindful of past service, valiant, faithful, true of heart—
Unto such comes Lakshmi[[9]] smiling—comes, and will not lightly part.'
"What indeed," continued Slow-toes, "is wealth, that we should prize it, or grieve to lose it?—