No. 79
How Gourds were put in Small-Mouthed Pots
At a certain time a man cut a sesame chena. In the sesame chena the sesame flowers blossomed. There was a female child of the man’s.
The child one day having gone to the sesame chena, while she was there the King came, in order to go near the sesame chena. Thereupon the King asked at the hand of the girl, “Girl, the flower that has blossomed, where did it come from in the plant?”
Then the girl asked at the hand of the King, “Before your mother was married where were you?”
At that time, the King having become angry at the word which the girl said, told the girl’s father to come. After he came he said, “Because your girl said such a wicked word, come [to me after] putting a hundred gourd fruits in a hundred [small-mouthed] copper pots.”
Thereupon, the man being afraid at this word went home, and remained a dead dolt (mandā). Then the girl asked, “Why, father, are you without sense?” Then the man told her the word said by the King.
Having heard it, the girl said, “Father, why are you frightened at that? I will tell you a stratagem for that,” and told him to bring a hundred [small-mouthed] copper pots. After he brought them, she told him to bring a hundred gourd-flower fruits (the small fruit at the base of the flower). After he brought them, she told him to put the hundred gourds into those hundred copper pots, and after he put them in, the girl and the man went to the King, and handed them over.
Having given them, as they were coming away, the King said to the girl, “I will cause thee to be in widowhood.”