The Stone Lion
A Tibetan story, retold from the excellent collection of Captain O’Connor. Although a fairy-tale in form, it has the well marked purposive quality so characteristic of Eastern stories. Adapted from Folk-Tales from Tibet, by Captain W. P. O’Connor.
This story was voted to be the best story told during two years to a class of younger children at Bancroft School, Worcester. Twenty-two children whispered their votes to the story teller. Ten chose The Stone Lion, while no other story received more than four votes.
This story, by permission of authors and publishers, is taken from Story Telling in School and Home, by Emelyn Newcomb Partridge and George E. Partridge. Sturgis & Walton Company, New York.
Once there were two brothers who lived with their mother in a large house on a farm. Their father was dead. The older brother was clever and selfish; but the younger was kind and gentle. The older brother did not like the younger because he was honest, and never could get the best of a bargain; so one day he said to him:
“You must go away. I cannot support you any longer.”
So the younger brother packed all his belongings, and went to bid his mother good-bye. When she heard what the older brother had done, she said:
“I will go with you, my son. I will not live here any longer with so hard-hearted a man as your brother.”
The next morning the mother and the younger brother started out together. Toward night they came to a hut at the foot of a hill. It was empty except for an axe, which stood behind the door. But they managed to get their supper, and stayed in the hut all night.
In the morning they saw that on the side of the hill near the hut was a great forest. The son took the axe, and went up on the hill side and chopped enough wood for a load to carry to the town on the other side of the hill. He easily sold it, and with a happy heart brought back food and some clothing to make them both comfortable.