[1] Spelt by the narrator both haepinna and haepinnī. [↑]
[2] Udēṭa udēṭa eka eka kiri goṭuwa. [↑]
No. 168
The Ant Story
At a city there is a King who knows the Ant language. At the time when the King and his Queen, both of them, are continuing to eat sugar-cane, a male Red Ant (kūm̆biyā) and the Ant’s wife having said, “Let us go to eat sugar-cane,” went to the place where the two persons are eating it.
Thereupon, the male Ant says, “Anē! Bolan, the things that women eat I cannot eat. Do you eat them. I will eat the things that the King is eating,” the male Ant said to the Ant-wife. She having said, “It is good,” out of the refuse which the King and Queen having eaten and eaten throw down, the male Ant eats the refuse which the King throws down, and the female Ant eats the refuse which the Queen throws down.
Then the male Ant’s belly being filled, he spoke to the Ant-wife, and said, “Now then, let us go.” Then she says, “It is insufficient for me yet.” Thereupon the male Ant says, “In any case women would be gluttonous; their bellies are large,” he said.
The King, understanding it, laughed. These two filling their bellies went away. Thereupon the Queen asks the King, “What did you laugh at? Please tell me,” she asks. The King does not tell her. Well then, every day she asks.