The Minister said, "The stratagem indeed is in this manner:--You, Sir,
be good enough to say to the Prince, 'Dear Prince, our mother and
father died. Those persons are staying in the God-world. Canst thou
[go there and after] looking [at their condition] come back?' Then
the Prince through not understanding will say, 'I can.' Then, having
summoned all them of the city and having cut an underground tunnel
about a mile (haetaekma) deep (that is, in length), when you have
told him to go by that way to the God-world, he will go. Then having
put a stone on [the entrance to] it, and brought tusk elephants,
and made them trample on it, you can take the Gem Princess."
The King having become pleased at the word, caused the Prince to be
brought, and asked, "Dear Prince, canst thou go to the God-world in
three weeks' [time, to inquire after our father and mother], and come
back?" The Prince said, "I can."
Then the King having collected together the men of the city, and said
falsely that he is cutting a path to go to the God-world, began to
cause a tunnel to be cut, in order to kill the Prince.
Thereupon the Prince said to the Gem Princess, "In this manner the
King asked me: 'Can you go to the God-world and come back?' I said,
'I can.'"
Then, owing to the wisdom of the Gem Princess she perceived that he
is making the plan (suttare) to kill this Prince, and said, "Why,
through foolishness did you, Sir, say you can? Since you said you can,
[you must do as follows]:--Under the gem river an elder sister of
ours is rearing rats. Having gone, and given her this ring of mine,
be good enough to say, 'In such and such a city your younger sister
is living. She said [you are] to send there two or three thousand
rats.' Then she will send the rats. You [then] be good enough to come
back, Sir."
The Prince went, and having given her the ring, and told her in
that very manner, the elder sister of the Gem Princess then said,
"It is good; I will send them. You, Sir, be good enough to go." Then
he came back.
That day night, having started them off, she sent three thousand
rats. The rats having come before the light fell, went to the room
in which was the Gem Princess. At the time when they went, she gave
food and drink to the rats, and said, "Before a week has gone they
will cut the tunnel which the King is cutting, a mile deep. Because
of it, you must cut [a path from here leading] into that tunnel at
a mile from this room in which we are staying."
So they cut and finished both tunnels on one day. Regarding the
tunnel which the rats cut, the King was unable to learn even a little
bit. Without making the tunnel which the rats cut break into and
become part of [251] the King's tunnel, they turned it a little across
[towards it at the end].
After that, having cut the [other] tunnel and finished it, and given
the Prince a horse, and given him a sword, the King said, "Look
here. We have cleared the path to go to the God-world. Having gone,
come back."
Then the Prince said, "It is good." Having said it, and gone near the
Gem Princess, at the time when he was saying, "I will go, and come,"
[252] the Princess said, "Say to the King that you will come in a week;
and go," she said.
Then the Prince having told the King, "I shall come in a week,"
went. Having driven the horse into that tunnel which the King cut,
and gone along the tunnel, and come to the other tunnel [excavated
by the rats], during the daytime he stays in the tunnel. At night,
having come near the Gem Princess, and eaten rice, and been sleeping,
again as the light falls he goes to the tunnel and remains [there].
At the time when the Prince sprang into that tunnel, men threw stones
into the tunnel, and heaped them up. They do not know the fact that
that Prince is staying in the tunnel which the rats cut.
After that, the King came, and spoke to the Princess, "Now then,
let us two be married."
Then the Princess said, "I will not. My husband has said that he will
come in a week. Because of it, until he comes I will not marry any
one whatever. If he come not I will marry," she said.
The King having heard that word [said], "It is good. After a week has
gone I will marry [you]." Thinking, "The Prince having been put into
the tunnel, and stones trampled down [over it], when will he come
again? That Princess, the Prince not [being here], in perplexity at
his death is talking nonsense," he went away.
What does the Princess do? Having taken gem-stones to the extent of
many millions (in value), she caused to be sewn a diadem-wreath (otunu
malawak), and a dress. Having sewn them, at early dawn (rae pandara)
of the day following the week, having dressed this Prince, she said,
"As the light is falling, having waited behind the King's palace be
good enough to come as though returning," and sent him [there].
Thereupon, the Prince in that manner at the time when the King
arises in the morning, presented himself for the King's cognizance
(indiriyata). Then the King,--after becoming afraid concerning the
return of the Prince whom he had put in the tunnel in which he had
placed stones, and having employed tusk elephants had trampled them
down,--asked, "Prince, whence camest thou?"
Thereupon the Prince said, "O Lord, Your Majesty, your father the
King and mother the Queen, also, are staying in happiness in the
God-world. I went there. Having said my dress was bad (nakayi) they
gave me, for wearing, a dress which, those persons having worn it,
had become old," he said.
When the King looked in the direction of his dress [he thought that]
except that in the God-world [there might be] such a dress, it is of
the kind which is not in this world. Because of it, it seemed to the
King to be true.
The Prince said, "The party said that you also, Sir, are to go. They
tried not to permit me, also, to come back. Having said, 'I will come
back,' for the purpose of what I am saying to you I returned.
"When I went in the tunnel and looked about yet [another] path
[leading] there had been cleared. Having gone on that path, when I
looked the God-world was quite near."
After that, the King, having collected the citizens, began to remove
the earth at that tunnel which he cut to kill the Prince.
Having heard of it, that Prince in order that the tunnel which the
rats had cut should be closed, told the rats, and again made them
push back the earth.
Having pushed it back, while he is staying [there], on the following
day the King alone went, and having said, "[After] looking [at the
God-world] I shall return," went off.
When he is descending into the hole to go, what does this Prince
do? Having thrown down those stones that had been taken out, and
blocked up the tunnel so as not to allow the King to return, the King
died in the tunnel.
After that, this Prince, having seized and beheaded the Minister who
had told [the King] the stratagem for the purpose of killing him,
summoned the whole of the citizens, and said to the people, "For the
offence which the King committed against me I put the King into the
tunnel, and killed him. From to-day the King of this city is I myself."
[Thereafter] exercising the sovereignty, marrying the Gem Princess, and
establishing that King's Queen as a female servant, he remained there.
Siwurala (ex-monk). North-central Province.
In Sagas from the Far East, p. 97, in a Kalmuk story a painter who
was jealous of a wood-carver presented to the Khan a pretended note
from his dead father, requesting that the carver might be sent to
the kingdom of the Gods, and stating that the painter would show
the way. The painter explained that the carver must be burnt in a
pyre, with much drum beating, and rise to heaven on a horse through
the clouds of smoke. The carver escaped by a tunnel which his wife
excavated to the centre of the pyre, getting into it while the timber
by which he was surrounded was burning. After a month he gave the
Khan a letter from his father in heaven, ordering him to reward the
carver richly, and to send the painter to decorate the temple which
had been built. The painter was thus killed in the way he designed
for the carver's death.
There is a variant in the Sierra Leone country, given in Cunnie Rabbit,
etc. (Cronise and Ward), p. 254. As advised by a messenger, a King who
wished to kill his son told him that he should be King, and that in
order to be crowned he must be tied in a mat, thrown into a deep pool,
and left there three days. When the party halted on the way and left
the bundle on the path for a time, the youth got a child to unfasten
the package, and inserted a large stone which was afterwards duly
thrown into the water. After three days the youth made his appearance
wearing a crown and riding a horse. He was acclaimed as King, and he
stated that he had been ordered to send his father's messenger to be
crowned in the same way. He was seized, tied up, and drowned.