Thereupon the woman having warmed water, and made him bathe, and given him to eat, and given him betel to eat, asked the man, “What have you brought?” The man showed her the three pills.
The woman, taking the three pills in her hand, and having looked at them, said, “Are these ani that you have brought?” and threw them away. Then in every place on the woman’s body ani were created.
Then for three years having striven, finding the three pills she said, “Leaving the anus which was there, may the others be obliterated,” and having picked up the three pills she threw them away. Thereupon she became as at first.
North-central Province.
The plight of the woman is nearly similar to that of Indra after he had been cursed by Gautama for visiting Ahalyā, as related in the Kathā Sarit Sāgara, vol. i, p. 123.
In Folklore in Southern India (Naṭēśa Sāstrī), p. 208, while an indigent Brāhmaṇa was asleep in a forest, the God Śiva and his wife Pārvatī ate his cooked rice, leaving in its place five magic cups of gold out of each of which an Apsaras came and served him with delicious food. After he had returned home and given a feast to the villagers, a rich landholder went off to obtain similar prizes, the God and Goddess ate his rice, and left five cups for him. As soon as he returned home he summoned the whole village to a feast; but when the cups were opened out several barbers issued from each, and held and shaved all the guests clean.
In the Arabian Nights (Lady Burton’s ed., vol. iv, p. 114) a man heard in the Night of Power that three prayers would be granted to him. After consulting his wife, he prayed that his nose might be magnified, as a sign of his nobility, and it became so large that he could not move. He then prayed to be rid of it, and his nose disappeared altogether; his last prayer caused it to be restored to its first state.