“Oh, he ran away because he was so miserable; he has a Cobra that lives in his throat,” answered the second.
“Can no one get it out?” said the first.
“No,” replied the other; “because they do not know the secret.” “What secret?” asked the first Cobra. “Don’t you know?” said the second; “why, if his wife only took a few marking nuts,[66] and pounded them well, and mixed them in cocoa-nut oil, and set the whole on fire, and hung the Rajah, her husband, head downward up in a tree above it, the smoke, rising upward, would instantly kill the Cobra in his mouth, which would tumble down dead.”
“I never heard of that before,” said the first Cobra.
“Didn’t you?” exclaimed the second. “Why, if they did the same thing at the mouth of your hole, they’d kill you in no time; and then, perhaps, they might find all the fine treasure you have there!” “Don’t joke in that way,” said the first Cobra; “I don’t like it;” and he crawled away quite offended, and the second Cobra followed him.
No sooner had the Princess heard this than she determined to try the experiment. So next morning she sent for all the villagers living near (who all knew and loved her, and would do anything she told them, because she was the Rajah’s daughter), and bade them take a great cauldron and fill it with cocoa-nut oil, and pound down an immense number of marking nuts and throw them into it, and then bring the cauldron to her. They did so, and she set the whole on fire, and caused Vicram to be hung up in a tree overhead; and as soon as the smoke from the cauldron rose in the air it suffocated the Cobra in Vicram Maharajah’s throat, which fell down quite dead. Then the Rajah Vicram said to his wife, “O worthy Buccoulee! what a noble woman you are! You have delivered me from this torment, which was more than all the wise men in my kingdom could do.”
Buccoulee then caused the cauldron of oil to be placed close to the hole of the first Cobra, which she had heard speaking the night before, and he was suffocated.
She then ordered the people to dig him out of his hole, and in it they found a vast amount of treasure—gold, silver and jewels. Then Buccoulee sent for royal robes for herself and her husband, and bade him cut his hair and shave him; and when they were all ready, she took the remainder of the treasure and returned with it to her father’s house; and her father and mother, who had repented of their harshness, gladly welcomed her back, and were both surprised and delighted to see all the vast treasures she had, and what a handsome, princely-looking man her husband was.
Then one day news was brought to Vicram that a stranger Wuzeer had arrived in the palace as the Rajah’s guest, and that this Wuzeer had for twelve years been wandering round the world in search of his master, but, not having found him, was returning to his own home. Vicram thought to himself, “Can this possibly be Butti?” and he ran to see.
It was indeed Butti, who cried for joy to see him, saying, “Oh Vicram, Vicram! do you know it is twelve years since you left us all?”