The Parrot and the rat having gone [there], the rat cut into that
box. Then the gem-set ring was there. [The rat took it to the Parrot,
who handed it over to the Prince. By means of it he recovered the
Princess.]
Taking the ring, and having brought back the Princess, they all
remained at the palace.
Tom-tom Beater. North-western Province.
In The Jataka, No. 73 (vol. i, p. 178), a snake, a parrot, and a rat
assisted a Brahmana who had saved their lives.
In The Story of Madana Kama Raja (Natesa Sastri), p. 20, a Prince
whose uncle had usurped the throne received a hundred pagodas from
his mother in order that he might trade. He first bought a kitten
for the money, and subsequently, when she gave him another hundred,
a snake; with these he went about begging for twelve years. The snake
took him to visit its father, Adisesha, the Snake King, who in return
for it gave him his ring which supplied everything wanted while it was
worn. By means of the ring the Prince got a palace and kingdom and a
capital; he married a Princess also. While she was bathing in the sea
one of the hairs from her head came off and was cast on the shore. The
King of Cochin found it, ascertained that it was twenty yards long,
and promised rewards for the discovery of its owner. An old woman who
was received into the Prince's palace learnt about the powers of the
magic ring, and borrowing it to cure a headache returned to Cochin;
by its power the Princess was brought there. She demanded a delay
of eight days before marrying the King, in order to fast and make a
religious donation to the poor. On the seventh day the Prince and his
cat joined those who were fed. When rats came to eat the remnants the
cat seized the largest one, who proved to be the Rat King, and offered
him his liberty in return for the magic ring. His subjects found it
in a box, and brought it to the cat, who gave it to the Prince. By
means of it he recovered the Princess and his kingdom, and caused
the Cochin kingdom to be destroyed and its King to become insane.
In Folklore of the Santal Pargana (collected by Rev. Dr. Bodding),
p. 24, a youth set afloat in a leaf some hairs that came out while
he was bathing. Two Princesses who were bathing lower down got the
packet, found that the hairs were twelve cubits long, and the younger
one refused food until their owner was discovered. A parrot met with
him in the forest, and a crow enticed him to come by flying off with
his flute. He married the Princess and became a Raja. See p. 75 ff.,
and Campbell's Santal Folk Tales, pp. 16 and 113.
In a variant, p. 88, a youth bought a cat, an otter, a rat, and a snake
that were about to be killed. The snake took him to its parents, from
whom he received a magic ring which provided everything required if it
were placed in a quart of milk. After he got married his wife stole
the ring, and eloped with a former lover. The youth was imprisoned
on a charge of murdering her, but the animals recovered the ring
after the rat made the Prince's wife sneeze it up by tickling her
nose with his tail. By means of it he brought up the absconders and
was released. On p. 129 there is an account of the four animals and
the ring given by the snake, by the aid of which a palace was made.
On p. 228 ff., a boy who had a caterpillar's shape took off the skin
when bathing in his own form. He set two hairs afloat in a leaf which
a Princess bathing lower down the river recovered. She found that
the hairs were twelve fathoms long, and refused to eat until their
owner was brought. When he came she married him, saw him remove his
skin covering at night, burnt it, and he remained in his own form
afterwards.
In the Kolhan tales (Bompas) appended to the same volume, p. 458,
a man whose hair reached to his knees, while bathing set a hair
afloat inside a split fruit. A Princess who found it determined to
marry the owner, her father sent men who fetched him, and they were
united. There is a similar story on p. 460.
In Indian Fairy Tales (Thornhill), p. 67, a merchant's son who had
saved the brother of the Snake King received from the latter a copper
ring which converted into gold everything on which it was rubbed. By
means of it he turned a palace into gold and married a Princess,
whose hair touched the ring and became golden. A single hair fell into
a stream, and was found by a Prince a thousand leagues lower down. A
woman who was a magician went in search of the owner in a magic ebony
boat smeared with the blood and fat of a tiger, which sailed upstream
as she sang. She was engaged by the Princess, induced her to enter the
boat to see the fishes, and carried her off. Before saving the snake,
her husband had obtained a sea parrot and a white cat which divers
brought up out of the sea, and he had left these at home on going
away. When these two came in search of him and heard of the loss of
the Princess they looked for her, the parrot carrying a letter tied
on its leg. They delivered the letter and got a reply from her, the
cat stole the ring from the old woman, and they returned and informed
the Prince, who took an army and rescued his wife.
In Tales of the Punjab (Mrs. F. A. Steel), p. 185, a Prince bought
a cat, a dog, a parrot, and a snake, which he reared. The snake
took him to its father, who in return for it gave him a ring which
granted everything wished for. By means of it he obtained a Princess
in marriage, after making a palace of gold in the sea; he also made
her golden. One day she set afloat in a leaf cup two hairs which came
out as she was washing. In another country a fisherman found them and
gave them to the King, who sent a wise woman in search of their owner
in a golden boat. She met with the Princess, stayed at the palace,
learnt about the ring, induced the Princess to enter the boat, and
took her away. The Princess refused to look at the King's son for six
months. The parrot gave her husband the news, went in search of her
with the cat, and learnt that the wise woman kept the ring in her
mouth. The cat seized the longest-tailed rat that came to eat rice
which the Princess scattered; it thrust its tail up the nose of the
sleeping woman, and the sneeze she gave caused the ring to fly out
of her mouth. The parrot took it to its master, who recovered the
Princess by its aid. The ring was only effective when placed in the
centre of a clean square place purified by being smeared with cow-dung,
and there sprinkled with butter-milk. [114]
In Folk-Tales of Bengal (L. Behari Day), p. 86, a Brahmana's son
married a Princess whom he rescued from Rakshasas. She tied to a
floating shell a hair that came off while she bathed; it was found by
her husband's half-brother, who ascertained that it was seven cubits
long. The Queen-Mother sent her servant, a Rakshasi, in search of the
owner, in a magic boat which flew along the water wherever required
when she uttered a spell and thrice snapped her fingers. She went
to the palace, one day persuaded the Princess to enter the boat,
and carried her away in it. The Princess said she had vowed not to
look at a strange man's face for six months, her husband found her,
was recognised by the King, and all ended happily; but the Rakshasi
was buried alive, surrounded by thorns.
A golden-haired Princess is often described in folk-tales. See No. 240
in this volume, and Indian Fairy Tales (M. Stokes), pp. 62 and 98. In
one of the Santal variants a grateful snake made a man's hair like
gold by breathing on it (op. cit., p. 75).
In Folk-Tales of Kashmir (Knowles), 2nd ed., p. 20, a merchant's son
bought a dog, cat, and snake that were likely to be killed. By means
of a ring which the snake's father gave him he got a mansion and a
wife with golden hair. She set afloat some hairs inside a reed; a
Prince found them lower down the river, and his father sent his aunt,
an ogress, to bring their possessor. She flew to the place in the
form of a bee, became an old hag, was received as the girl's aunt,
borrowed the ring, flew off with it, and by its means the Princess
was brought away. She demanded a month's delay before marrying, the
cat and dog found her, and secured the ring (which the ogress kept
in her stomach) by seizing the Rat King's eldest son and getting it
as his ransom, a rat having made the ogress cough it up by inserting
its tail in her throat while she slept. They returned with it, and
the Prince recovered his wife by it.
At p. 132, a crow carried off the comb of a Princess whom a Prince had
rescued from a Rakshasa and married, and it was discovered at a palace,
inside a fish that had swallowed it when it was dropped in the sea. A
woman sent to find the owner poisoned the Prince; the King carried off
the widow, but she refused to marry him for six months. The Prince's
two friends, a Brahmana and a Carpenter, found her, and by means of
a magic horse of sandal wood which the latter made, that flew where
required, they returned with her. By a touch the Brahmana restored
to life the Prince's corpse which his wife had enclosed in a box.
In Sagas from the Far East, p. 108, in a Kalmuk story, a Khan carried
off a youth's wife who dropped in a stream, while bathing, a gem-set
ring, which the Khan got. Her husband was killed and buried by his
emissaries. When his life-index tree withered, his five comrades
found and revived him, and made a flying bird by means of which he
regained his wife.
At p. 222, in a Kalmuk story, a maidservant gave a Khan some wonderful
hairs which clung to her water jar, and which a wife whom the Snake
King gave to a man had lost when bathing. The Khan's men captured her;
after a year she made her husband dance, dressed in feathers, before
her and the Khan. When the Khan to please her exchanged dresses with
him, she ordered the Khan to be driven out, the dogs overtook and
killed him, and her husband became King. Compare the ending of No. 18,
vol. i.
At p. 135, in a Kalmuk tale, a Brahmana's son bought and set free a
mouse, a young ape and a young bear; when he was afterwards enclosed
in a chest and thrown into the river the animals rescued him. He
found a talisman as large as a pigeon's egg, made by its aid a city,
palace, etc., exchanged the talisman for a caravan-load of goods, and
all vanished. The animals recovered it, the palace was reconstructed,
and he got a divine wife.
In Korean Tales (Dr. Allen), p. 43, a man lost an amber talisman
that a supernatural caller gave him. His dog and cat found it, and
regained it by the aid of the rat-chief, who made a mouse creep into
the soap-stone box in which it was hidden, after the rats gnawed a
hole through the side.
In Cinq Cents Contes et Apologues (Chavannes), vol. iii, p. 258, a
King sent a youth for a Naga girl whose hairs, one hundred feet long,
were found in a swallow's nest. By means of a cap of invisibility
and shoes for walking on water, which he stole from two persons who
were quarrelling about them, the youth fetched her; but seeing that
the King was ugly she threw at him a cake of gold she had brought,
the blow killed him, and the youth became King and married her.