In a certain country there is a Prince, it is said. After the Prince
became big, for the purpose of marrying him they began to visit all
cities to seek an unpolluted Princess. Because they did not meet
with one according to the Prince's thought, he began to look at many
sooth books.
While looking, from a book he got to know one circumstance. The
matter indeed [was this]:--There was [written] in the book that when
the Prince remains no long time inside the hollow of a large tree, a
Princess will be born from the Prince's very blood. Thereupon having
considered it, according to the manner in which it was mentioned he
stayed inside the tree. When he was there not much time he met with a
Princess, also, in that before-mentioned manner. The Prince thereupon
took the Princess in marriage.
After he took her in marriage, having constructed a palace in the
midst of that forest both of them stayed in it. While they are
[there], the Prince having come every day [after] shooting animals,
skinned them, and taking the skins and having fixed them on the wall,
asks the Princess, "What animals' skins are these?" He asks the names
from the Princess. Then the Princess says, "I don't know."
On the day after that, after the Prince went for hunting a Vaedda
came near the palace. The Princess having seen the Vaedda called
him. Then the Vaedda went to the palace.
After he went the Princess asked the Vaedda, "What animals' skins
are these?" The Vaedda informed (lit., told and gave) the Princess
of the names of the animals. Then the Princess asks the Vaedda,
"Where do you live?"
The Vaedda says, "I, also, live very near this palace, in the midst
of the forest."
The Princess says, "Vaedda, advise me how to cause you to be brought
to me at the time when I want you."
Then the Vaedda said, "I will tie a hawk's-bell in my house, and
having tied a cord to it, and tied it on a tree near the palace,
and pointed it out, at the time when the Princess wants me shake the
cord. Then I shall come," he said.
The Vaedda having informed the Princess about this matter,
after the Vaedda went away the Prince having come back [after]
doing hunting, just as on other days asked the Princess the names
of these animals. That day the Princess told him the names of the
animals. After that, she was unable to inform him of the name of the
animal he brought.
The Prince having reflected, walked round the palace. When he looked
about, having seen that a cord was tied to a tree he shook it. Then
having seen that the Vaedda comes to the palace the Prince remained
hidden. The Vaedda having come and spoken to the Princess, after the
Vaedda went away the Prince having gone to the palace went for hunting.
Walking in the midst of the forest he went near a river, and when he
was looking about having heard the talk of men the Prince went into
a tree. Having gone [there], while he was looking three men (minis)
came, and having slipped off their clothes and finished, after they
descended to bathe from the three betel boxes of the three persons
three women came out. They having opened the mouths of the three
betel boxes of the three women, when he was looking the Prince saw
that three men are inside their three betel boxes.
After that, the Prince descended from the tree to the ground, and
asked the three men [when they had bathed], "Who are you?"
Then the men say, "We all three are ascetics," they said. After that
the Prince, calling the three persons, went to the palace. Having gone
[there] the Prince told the Princess to cook rice for twelve.
After she cooked he said, "Having set twelve plates of cooked rice,
place them on the table."
After she put them [there] the Prince told the ascetics to sit down
to eat cooked rice. After they sat down he said, "Tell the three wives
of you three persons to sit down." [They came out and sat down.] Then
when he told the three men (minis) who are in the three betel boxes
of the three women to sit down, all were astonished.
Then he told the Princess to call that Vaedda, and return. "I don't
know [anything about him]," the Princess said untruthfully. Then
the Prince pulled that cord; the Vaedda came running. Afterwards the
whole twelve sitting down ate cooked rice.
Afterwards, those said three ascetics and the Prince having talked,
abandoned this party, and the whole four went again to practise
austerities (tapas rakinda).
Tom-tom Beater. North-western Province.
In The Jataka, No. 145 (vol. i, p. 310), the Bodhisatta is represented
as remarking, "You might carry a woman about in your arms and yet she
would not be safe." In No. 436 (vol. iii, p. 314), an Asura demon
who had seized a woman kept her in a box, which he swallowed. When
he ejected it and allowed her liberty while he bathed, she managed to
hide a magician with her in the box, which the unsuspecting demon again
swallowed. An ascetic knew by his power of insight what had occurred,
and informed the demon, who at once ejected the box. On his opening
it the magician uttered a spell and escaped.
In the Arabian Nights (Lady Burton's ed., vol. i, p. 9), two Kings
whose wives had been unfaithful, saw a Jinni (or Rakshasa) take a
lady out of a casket fastened with seven steel padlocks and placed
in a crystal box; he went to sleep with his head on her lap under
the tree in which they were hidden. Noticing the men in the tree,
she put the Jinni's head softly on the ground, and by threatening to
rouse her husband made them descend. In her purse she had a knotted
string on which were strung five hundred and seventy seal rings of
the persons she had met in this way though kept at the bottom of the
sea, and adding their rings to her collection she sent them away. In
vol. iv, p. 130, the story is told of a Prince, and the woman had
more than eighty rings.
In the Tota Kahani (Small), p. 41, a Yogi took the form of an elephant,
and to insure his wife's chastity carried her in a hauda or litter
on his back. A man climbed up a tree for safety from the elephant,
which halted under the tree, put down the litter, and went off to
feed. The man descended and joined the woman, who took out a knotted
cord and added another knot on it, making a hundred and one, which
represented the number of men she had met in that way.
In the Katha Sarit Sagara (Tawney), vol. ii, p. 80, two young
Brahmanas, hiding at night in a tree close to a lake, saw a number
of men appear out of the water and prepare a place and food which
a handsome person, who came out of the water also, came to eat. He
ejected from his mouth two ladies who were his wives; they ate the
meal and he went to sleep. The Brahmanas descended from the tree to
inquire about it. When the elder youth declined the advances of one
of the women she showed him a hundred rings taken from the lovers
she had had. She then awoke her husband and charged the youth with
attempted violence, but the other told the truth and saved him. The
being whose wives the women were is termed a water-genius and later
on a Yaksha, who was subject to a curse. He told the youths that he
kept his wives in his heart, out of jealousy.
There is a nearly similar story in the same work, vol. ii, p. 98, in
which the being who came out of the water was a snake-god who ejected
a couch and his wife. When he went to sleep a traveller who was lying
under the tree became her hundredth lover. When the snake-god awoke and
saw them he reduced them to ashes by fire discharged from his mouth.
In Cinq Cents Contes et Apologues (Chavannes), vol. i, p. 378, a Prince
who had climbed up a tree saw a Brahmana, who first bathed there,
eject from his mouth a pot, out of which came a woman. While the
Brahmana was asleep she also ejected a pot out of which came a young
man, her lover; when he afterwards re-entered the pot she swallowed
it again. Then the Brahmana awoke, swallowed her in the same way,
and went off. The Prince told the King to invite the Brahmana to a
feast, at which food for three was set near him. On his saying he
was alone the Prince invited him to produce the woman, and when he
had done so, she was made to bring out her lover, and all three ate
the meal together. The Prince thus proved to his father, who had kept
his wives in seclusion, that it was useless to shut women up.