Thereupon the Jackal said to the Lion, “O Lord, is that which should be done a difficult thing? Your Majesty will stay thus. I will go, and will return calling some animal or other [to come] near Your Majesty.” Having instructed him to spring up and seize it as soon as it comes, the Jackal went to seek animals.
While going for this purpose [it saw that] a Goat was tied in a field. Having told many falsehoods to the Goat it returned, inviting it [to come] near the Lion. Then the Lion sprang to seize it. Thereupon the Goat, having become afraid, ran away. The Jackal went [after it], and causing it to turn back again, returned [with it].
Then the Lion, having killed the Goat, went to bathe in order [to purify himself, so as] to eat the small quantity of brains. In the meantime the Jackal removed the brains, and having eaten them replaced the skin.
The Lion having returned after bathing, when he came to split open the skin in order to eat the brains, saw that there were no brains. Having seen it, the Lion asked the Jackal, “Where are my brains?”
Thereupon the Jackal said, “O Lord, if this one had any brains would it have come twice near Your Majesty? It came twice because it had no brains.” So saying the Jackal ate the small quantity of flesh also.
Western Province.
Improbable as the notion appears that an animal, other than insects or fishes, would return into the same danger shortly after escaping from it, one instance of this has come under the observation of myself and a friend, with whose approval I insert this account of the occurrence.
As Mr. H. E. H. Hayes, late of the Public Works Department, Ceylon, was walking one day near the water, at the embankment of the Vilānkuḷam tank in the Northern Province, a crocodile made its appearance suddenly in the water near him, apparently attracted by his young terrier. He fired a charge of snipe shot at its head, and it disappeared.
He and I went to the spot on the following day. I remained on the look-out on the top of the bank, while he was partly hidden behind a tree nearer the water. There he tweaked or pinched the dog so as to make it yelp a little. Then we observed a crocodile’s head raised among some weeds far out in the tank. Not many minutes afterwards the crocodile’s head appeared out of the water only a few feet away from the dog. Mr. Hayes at once shot it with his rifle; and when he recovered it found the shot marks of the previous day in its head.