Having seen that the Yakā of the box of decorations had come and was [there], he spoke to the other men and bounded off. Thereupon they also becoming afraid, the whole of them began to run away. Having heard the noise, this one also got up, and he having gone running behind them, the whole of them fell into a well and died.[3]
Finished.
North-western Province.
In Indian Nights’ Entertainment (Swynnerton), p. 140, a silly weaver went with three friends who were thieves, to break into a house. They made a hole through the wall, and telling him to wait outside and keep watch, the thieves entered. After waiting some time he followed them, and began to cook some food that he found near the fire. The owner’s wife was sleeping close by on a low bed; on turning over in her sleep her arm, palm uppermost, was stretched out in front of the weaver. Thinking she was asking for some of the food, he placed a spoonful boiling hot in her hand. She shrieked out, the men were caught, and the King imprisoned the others, but released the weaver.
In Les Avadānas (Julien), No. xcvii, vol. ii, p. 76, a party of comedians who were benighted on a mountain haunted by men-eating demons, slept beside a fire. On account of the cold, one who played as a Rākshasa put on his own costume while the rest were asleep. Several others on looking up saw a Rākshasa there, and fled; the rest followed, the man who had alarmed them running close behind them. They left the mountain, crossed a river, threw themselves into pools, and at last fell down worn out with fatigue. In the morning they recognised their comrade. This story is also given in Cinq Cents Contes et Apologues (Chavannes), vol. ii, p. 203.
In The Orientalist, vol. i, p. 136 ff., in the tale of the twenty-five idiots referred to in the notes to the last story, Miss S. J. Goonetilleke gave an account of the attempt to remove the millet-grinding stone, the scalding of the old woman’s mouth, and the assuming of the dress of the Yakā (said to be the Garā Yakā), and the subsequent drowning of the party in the well.
In the same work, vol. i, p. 131, the editor gave the incident of the covering of the Mahagē with straw, in a tale termed “The Story of Hokkā.” The old woman, who was the Gamarāla’s mother, was suffocated.
[1] Trimming of the earthen ridges which surround the plots of the field. [↑]