Folklore of the Santal Parganas - Cecil Henry Bompas (paper ebook reader .TXT) 📗

Raja's palace who would let no one go

in to sell anything to the Raja until they first promised to give him

half the price they received from the Raja, and the poor traders had

to promise, for their livelihood depended on selling their goods. One

day a fisherman caught an enormous fish and he thought that if he

took it to the Raja he would get a big price for it.

 

So he went off to the palace, but when he came to the gate the sentry

stopped him and would not let him go in, until he promised to give him

half of what he got, and after some argument he had to promise. So

he was admitted to the Raja's presence and when the Raja asked what

was the price of the fish, the fisherman said "A hundred blows with

a stick."

 

The Raja was very astonished and asked the meaning of such a

request. Then the fisherman said that the sentry had extorted a

promise that he should get half the price and he wanted him to get

fifty blows. At this the Raja was very angry and he had the sentry

beaten with one hundred stripes and dismissed him.

XLI. (The Broken Friendship.)

 

Once upon a time there was a Raja and his Dewan and they each had

one son, and the two boys were great friends, and, when they grew old

enough, they took to hunting and when they became young men they were

so devoted to the sport that they spent their whole time in pursuit of

game; they followed every animal they could find until they killed it,

and they shot every bird in the town.

 

Their parents were much distressed at this, for they thought that

if their boys spent all their time together hunting they would grow

up unruly and ignorant; so they made up their minds that they must

separate the young men so that they would not be tempted to spend so

much time in sport, but would be able to learn something useful; they

scolded the youths and told them to give up their friendship and their

hunting, but this had no effect. Then the Raja told the villagers

that he would reward any one who would break up the friendship,

and the villagers tried their best but effected nothing.

 

There was however an old woman in the village who one day said,

"If the Raja gave me ten rupees I would soon put a stop to their

friendship." This came to the ears of the Raja and he exclaimed "What

is ten rupees to me! bring the old woman to me and I will give her

ten rupees, if she can put an end to this friendship." So the old

woman was brought trembling before the Raja and on being questioned

undertook to break up the friendship if she were properly rewarded;

and when this was promised she asked for two men to be given to her

and she took them to her house and there she made them sling a bed

on a pole, such as is used for carrying a man on a journey and she

hung curtains all round it and drew them close and inside, on an old

winnowing fan, they put some rotten manure from a dung hill.

 

Then she made the two men take up the bed and she fetched a drum

and she paraded all through the bazar beating the drum with the

bed following behind her. She told the two carriers not to answer

any questions as to what was in the bed. Thus they passed out of

the town and went in the direction in which the two young men had

gone hunting. When these heard the sound of the drum and saw the

two men carrying the bed they ran up to see what it was and told

the carriers to put It down that they might look inside; so the bed

was put on the ground and the Raja's son peeped inside the curtain,

but as he caught the smell he jumped back and the Dewan's son asked

what was the matter and he said "it stinks: it is dung." The Dewan's

son would not believe him and also looked to convince himself; then

they both asked what the meaning of this was: the old woman said

that she would explain the meaning of it but only to one of them,

and the one who had heard could tell the other.

 

So she made the carriers take away the bed and she called the Raja's

son aside saying "Come I will tell you what it means" then she put

her arms round the neck of the Raja's son and put her lips to his

ear and pretended to whisper to him, but really she said nothing;

then she let him go and followed the carriers. The Dewan's son at

once ran to his friend and asked what the old woman had told him; the

Raja's son answered "She told me nothing at all, she only pretended

to whisper." The Dewan's son would not believe this and pressed him

to tell, saying "We have been friends for so long and have had no

secrets from each other, why won't you tell me this? if you refuse

to tell me there is an end of our friendship," but the Raja's son

persisted that he had been told nothing and proposed that they should

go and ask the old woman if it were not so; but the Dewan's son said

that that was no good because the old woman and the Raja's son had

plainly made a plot to keep him in the dark. The quarrel grew hotter

and hotter, till at last they parted in anger and each went to his

own home and from that time their friendship was broken off.

 

And being separated they gave up hunting and took to useful

pursuits. Thus the old woman earned her reward from the Raja.

XLII. (A Story Told by a Hindu.)

 

Once upon a time there was a Raja who had two sons and after their

father's death they divided the kingdom between them. The two brothers

were inveterate gamblers and spent their time playing cards with

each other; for a long time fortune was equal, but one day it turned

against the elder brother and he lost and lost until his money and his

jewelry, his horses and his elephants and every thing that he had,

had been won by his younger brother. Then in desperation he staked

his share in the kingdom and that too he lost.

 

Then the younger brother sent drummers through the city to proclaim

that the whole kingdom was his; the shame of this was more than the

elder prince could bear, so he resolved to quit the country and he

told his wife of his intention and bade her stay behind. But his

faithful wife refused to be parted from him; she vowed that he had

married her not for one day nor for two but for good and all, and

that where he went, there she would go, and whatever troubles he met,

she would share. So he allowed her to come with him and the two set

off to foreign parts. After sometime their path led them through an

extensive jungle and after travelling through it for two days they

at last lost their way completely; their food gave out, they were

faint with starvation and torn with briars.

 

The prince urged his wife to return but she would not hear of it, so

they pushed on, supporting life on jungle fruits; sometimes the prince

would go far ahead, for his faithful wife could only travel slowly,

and then he would return and wait for her; at last he got tired of

leading her on and made up his mind to abandon her. At night they lay

down at the foot of a tree and the prince thought "If wild animals

would come and eat us it would be the best that could happen. I cannot

bear to see my wife suffer any more; although her flesh is torn with

thorns, she will not leave me. I will leave her here; may wild beasts

kill both her and me, but I cannot see her die before my eyes." So

thinking he got up quietly and went off as quickly as he could.

 

When the princess woke and found that she had been abandoned, she began

to weep and wept from dawn to noon without ceasing; at noon a being,

in the guise of an old woman appeared and asked her why she wept,

and comforted her and promised to lead her out of the wood and told

her that Chando had had compassion on her and would allow her to find

her husband again if they both lived.

 

So saying the old woman led the princess from the forest and showed

her the way to a great city where a Raja lived. The princess went

begging her way through the city to the Raja's palace and there they

engaged her as a servant.

 

Now her husband had also escaped from the jungle and sought employment

as a labourer but no one would give him work for more than a day

or two, and at last his search for work brought him to the city in

which the princess was; and there he was engaged as a groom in the

palace stables. The prince had changed his name and he had no chance

of knowing that his wife was in the palace, because she was confined

to the women's appartments; so some years passed without their having

news of each other.

 

At last one day the princess happened to go on to the roof and looking

down at the stables saw and thought she recognised her husband;

then she leaned over and listened till she heard his voice and at

that she was sure that it was he, so she hastened to the Raja and

begged to be allowed to meet her husband, and the Raja sent to call

the syce with the name which the princess had given but no one came,

for the prince would not reveal himself. Then the princess told their

story and how her husband had gambled away his half of the kingdom. The

Raja ordered any one with such a history to come forward, as his wife

was in the palace; but the prince did not reveal himself.

 

Then the princess said "Let all the syces cook rice and bring me a

bit of each man's cooking to taste." They did so, and when she tasted

the rice cooked by her husband, she at once said that it was his; her

husband was unable to deny it and admitted everything. Then they took

him away from his work in the stables and let him live with his wife.

 

After a time the Raja wrote to the younger brother asking whether

he would restore the half of the kingdom which he had won; and the

younger brother answered that he would gladly do so, if his brother

would sign an agreement never to gamble any more; it was with this

object in view and to teach him the folly of his ways