For Anātha Piṇḍika having squandered fifty-four thousands of thousands in money on the Buddhist Faith about the Monastery, and holding nothing elsewhere in the light of a treasure, save only the Three Treasures (the Buddha, the Truth, and the Order), used to go day after day to take part in the Three Great Services, once in the morning, once after breakfast, and once in the evening.
There are intermediate services too. And he never went empty-handed, lest the lads, and the younger brethren, should look to see what he might have brought. When he went in the morning he would take porridge; after breakfast ghee, butter, honey, molasses, and so on; in the evening perfumes, garlands, and robes. Thus offering day after day, the sum of his gifts was beyond all measure. Traders, too, left writings with him, and took money on loan from him up to eighteen thousands of thousands, and the great merchant asked it not again of them. Other eighteen thousands of thousands, the property of his family, was put away and buried in the river bank; and when the bank was broken in by a storm they were washed away to the sea, and the brazen pots rolled just as they were—closed and sealed—to the bottom of the ocean. In his house again a constant supply of rice was ordered to be kept in readiness for five hundred members of the Order, so that the Merchant’s house was to the Order like a public pool dug where four high roads meet; and he stood to them in the place of father and mother. On that account even the Supreme Buddha himself used to go to his residence; and the Eighty Chief Elders also; and the number of other monks coming and going was beyond measure.
Now his mansion was seven stories high, and there were seven great gates to it, with battlemented turrets over them; and in the fourth turret there dwelt a fairy who was a heretic. When the Supreme Buddha entered the house, she was unable to stop up above in the turret, but used to bring her children downstairs and stand on the ground floor; and so she did when the Eighty Chief Elders, or the other monks were coming in or going out.[338]
And she thought, “So long as this mendicant Gotama and his disciples come to the house, there is no peace for me. I can’t be eternally going downstairs again and again, to stand on the ground floor; I must manage so that they come no more to the house.”
So one day, as soon as the chief business manager had retired to rest, she went to him, and stood before him in visible shape.
“Who’s there?” said he.
“It’s I; the Fairy who dwells in the turret over the fourth gate.”
“What are you come for?”
“You are not looking after the Merchant’s affairs. Paying no thought to his last days, he takes out all his money, and makes the mendicant Gotama full of it. He undertakes no business, and sets no work on foot. Do you speak to the Merchant so that he may attend to his business; and make arrangements so that that mendicant Gotama and his disciples shall no longer come to the place.”
But the other said to her, “O foolish Fairy! the Merchant in spending his money spends it on the religion of the Buddhas, which leadeth to salvation. Though I should be seized by the hair, and sold for a slave, I will say no such thing. Begone with you!”