Then the Prince, seizing the Rākshasī’s hair knot, prepared to chop at her with the sword. “Give me quickly my three men; if not, I shall chop thy head off,” he said.
Then the Rākshasī, saying, “Anē! Do not kill me. At any place where you want it I will assist you,” gave him the three men.
After that, the Prince and the three giants having gone away without killing the Rākshasī, the Prince caused the three giants to stay at a city; and having given into their hands a Blue-lotus flower, said, “Should I not be alive, this Blue-lotus flower will fade, and the lime trees at your house will die.” So saying, the Prince, taking his sword, went quite alone.
After going a long way he came to a city, and having gone to the house of a Rākshasa, when he looked, the Rākshasa had gone for human flesh as food and only a girl was there. The Prince asked the girl for a resting-place.
The girl said, “Anē! What have you come here for? A Rākshasa lives at this house. The Rākshasa having eaten the men of this city they are now finished.”
The Prince said, “I will kill him. Are there dried coconuts and menēri[1] here?” The girl said there were. The Prince told her to bring them, and the girl brought them.
Then the Prince asked, “How does he come to eat men?”
The girl said, “Having come twelve miles—(three gawwas)—away, he cries, ‘Hū’; having come eight miles away, he cries, ‘Hū’; and having come four miles away, he cries, ‘Hū’; and then he comes to this house.”
After that, the Prince having spread out, from the stile at the fence, the menēri seed and the dried coconuts, over the whole of the open ground near the front of the house, went to sleep in the veranda, placing the sword near him, and laying his head on the waist pocket of the girl.
Then the Rākshasa, when twelve miles away, cried, “Hū.” Tears fell from the girl’s eyes, and dropped on the Prince’s head. The Prince arose, and said to the girl, “What are you weeping for?”