“Lord! we are not sitting in this place to talk of any worldly thing: it is thy praises we are telling!” And they told him the subject of their talk. When he heard it the Teacher said, “Mendicants! Little Roadling has now through me become great in religion; now formerly through me he became great in riches.”
The monks asked the Buddha to explain how this was. Then the Blessed One made manifest that which had been hidden by change of birth.
Long ago,[256] when Brahma-datta was reigning in Benares, in the land of Kāsi, the Bodisat was born in a treasurer’s family; and when he grew up he received the post of treasurer, and was called Chullaka.[257] And he was wise and skilful, and understood all omens. One day as he was going to attend upon the king he saw a dead mouse lying on the road; and considering the state of the stars at the time, he said, “A young fellow with eyes in his head might, by picking this thing up, start a trade and support a wife.”
Now a certain young man of good birth, then fallen into poverty, heard what the official said, and thinking, “This is a man who wouldn’t say such a thing without good reason,” took the mouse, and gave it away in a certain shop for the use of the cat, and got a farthing for it.
With the farthing be bought molasses, and took water in a pot. And seeing garland-makers returning from the forest, he gave them bits of molasses, with water by the ladle-full.[258] They gave him each a bunch of flowers; and the next day, with the price of the flowers, he bought more molasses; and taking a potful of water, went to the flower garden. That day the garland-makers gave him, as they went away, flowering shrubs from which half the blossoms had been picked. In this way in a little time he gained eight pennies.
Some time after, on a rainy windy day, a quantity of dry sticks and branches and leaves were blown down by the wind in the king’s garden, and the gardener saw no way of getting rid of them. The young man went and said to the gardener, “If you will give me these sticks and leaves, I will get them out of the way.” The gardener agreed to this, and told him to take them.
Chullaka’s pupil[259] went to the children’s playground, and by giving them molasses had all the leaves and sticks collected in a twinkling, and placed in a heap at the garden gate. Just then the king’s potter was looking out for firewood to burn pots for the royal household, and seeing this heap he bought it from him. That day Chullaka’s pupil got by selling his firewood sixteen pennies and five vessels—water-pots, and such-like.
Having thus obtained possession of twenty-four pennies, he thought, “This will be a good scheme for me,” and went to a place not far from the city gate, and placing there a pot of water, supplied five hundred grass-cutters with drink.
“Friend! you have been of great service to us,” said they. “What shall we do for you?”
“You shall do me a good turn when need arises,” said he. And then, going about this way and that, he struck up a friendship with a trader by land and a trader by sea.