In a certain country a son was born to a certain King, it is
said. Having caused Brahmanas to be brought to write this Prince's
horoscope, at the time when they handed it over, after they gave
information to the King that when the Prince arrived at maturity he
was to leave the country and go away, the King, for the Prince to be
most thoroughly guarded, caused a room on an upper story to be made
[for his occupation], it is said.
This infant Prince having become somewhat big, being suitable for game
amusements and the like, during the time while he was passing the days
he saw in the street a Wax Horse that [persons] brought to sell; and
having told his father the King to take and give him it, at the time
when he considered it his father the King paid the price, and taking
the horse gave it to his son, it is said. This horse, furnished with
two wings, was one possessing the ability to fly in the sky.
After he had got this horse for a little time, when the Prince became
big to a certain extent, not concealing it from anyone whatever,
by the help of the Wax Horse he went to fly. Well then, the saying,
too, of the soothsayer-Brahmana became true.
The Prince having gone flying by the power of the horse, went to
the house of an old mother, who having strung [chaplets or garlands
of] flowers gives them at the palace of yet [another] King. While
here, having hidden the Wax Horse somewhere, when staying at the
flower-mother's house he asked the flower-mother [about] the whole
of the circumstances of the royal house, and got to know them.
Ascertaining them in this way, and after a little time getting to know
the chamber, etc., on the floor of the upper story in which the King's
daughter stays, he went during the night time by the Wax Horse to a
room in which is the beautiful Princess; and for even several days,
without concealing himself having eaten and drunk the food and drink,
etc., that had been brought for the Princess, he went away [before
she awoke]. And the Princess, perceiving that after she got to sleep
some one or other had come to the chamber and gone, on the following
day not having slept, remained looking out, it is said.
At that time the Prince having come, when he is partaking of the food
and drink, etc., the Princess, taking a sword in one hand and seizing
the Prince with one hand, asked, "Who art thou?" [175]
The Prince having informed her that he was a person belonging to a
royal family, and while conversing with her having become friendly,
he, making a contract to marry her also, began to come during the
following days after that.
Well then, there was a custom of weighing this Princess in the morning
on all days. [176] During the days after the Prince became [accustomed]
to come, the Princess's weight having by degrees gone on increasing,
the King, ascertaining that she was pregnant, and having thought
that there will be a friendship of the Minister with the Princess,
settled to kill the Minister.
And during the time when the Minister was becoming very sorrowful,
when the other daughters of the King having come asked the Minister,
"Why are you in much grief?" he gave them information of the whole
of the circumstances. The Princesses having assembled together, in
order to save the Minister contrived a stratagem thus, that is, having
thought that without a fault of the Minister's indeed, some one or
other, a person from outside, by some stratagem or other will be coming
near the Princess, they put poison in the bathing scented-water boat,
and placed guards at the pool which is at the royal palace gateway.
The Prince having come, when he bathed in the scented water prior to
going to the Princess's chamber the poison burned him, and having gone
running, when he sprang into the pool the guards seized him. Having
gone [after] causing this Prince to be seized, when they gave the
explanation of the affair to the King he freed the Minister, and
ordered the Prince to be killed.
At the time when the executioners were taking the Prince, having said
"A thing of mine is [there]; I will take it and give it to you," he
climbed a tree, and taking the Wax Horse which at first he had placed
and hidden there among the leaves, he flew away. [177] Having gone
thus a little far, and stopped, during the night time he came again
to the royal palace; and calling the Princess, while they were going
[on the flying horse] by the middle of a great forest wilderness,
when pain in the body was felt by the Princess they alighted on the
ground. Having caused her to halt [there] he went to a village near by,
in order to bring medicine and other materials that she needed for it;
and having set the Wax Horse near a shop and gone to yet [another]
shop, when coming he saw that there having been a fire near the shop
the Wax Horse having been melted had gone. After the Wax Horse was lost
this Prince was unable to go to the place where the Princess stayed.
And the Princess while in the midst of the forest having borne a son,
said, "I don't want even the son of the base Prince"; and having put
the child down she went into the neighbourhood of villages. During the
time when this Princess's father went into the midst of the forest
for hunting he met with this child, and having brought it to the
royal house he reared it.
The Princess who was this child's mother, having joined a company of
girls, [178] during the time while she was dwelling [there] this boy
whom [the King] reared having arrived at maturity went and sought a
marriage; and having seen his own mother formed the design to marry
her. Having thought thus, when on even three days he set off to go
for the marriage contract there having been an unlucky omen while on
the road, on even three days having turned he came back.
One day, having mounted on horse-back, while he was on the journey
going for the marriage contract some young birds having been trampled
on by the horse, the hen in this way scolded the Prince, that is,
"As it is insufficient that this one is going to take his mother
[in marriage], he killed my few young ones." [Thus] she scolded
him. Because during this day there was [this] unlucky omen, having
turned back and come, he went on the following day.
When going on that [second] day, a young goat having been trampled on
by the horse the female goat also scolded him: "As it is insufficient
that he is going to take this one's mother [in marriage], he killed
our young ones."
When going on the third day also, just as before there was the
unlucky omen.
This Prince in this way sought a marriage from the girls' society
itself, because he being a foundling [179] no one gives a [daughter in]
marriage on that account. Before this, one day while at the playground,
when the other boys said, "He is base-born," he having asked the King
who reared him where his two parents were, had ascertained that having
brought him from the midst of the forest he reared him.
Well then, on the third day, also, there having been the unlucky omen,
not heeding it and having gone for the contract, not knowing even a
little about his mother, from her bearing him up to the time when she
came to the girls' society he asked about the principal occurrences
[of her life. Hearing her account of her abandonment of her child],
he said, "It was I indeed who was met with in the midst of the forest
in such and such a district; because of it this is indeed my mother."
Ascertaining it, and having gone spreading the news, and seeking out
even his father and having returned, he was also appointed to the
sovereignty in succession to the King his relative, or who was his
mother's father; and having married [a Princess] from a royal family,
he caused the time to go with glory, it is said.
Western Province.
See the first note after No. 81, vol. ii.
In The Story of Madana Kama Raja (Pandit Natesa Sastri), p. 50, a
Prince who had been adopted by a King of Madura, whom he had succeeded
on the throne, saw, at the house occupied by dancing-girls, his own
mother, from whom he had been separated since his birth, and who had
been banished,--and took a fancy for her. When he was about to visit
the house in the evening he trod on the tail of a calf and crushed
it. In reply to the calf's complaint, the cow exclaimed that such an
act might well not be considered a dishonour by one who was about to
visit his own mother. The young King, who understood the language of
animals, retraced his steps, prosecuted inquiries, learnt from the
Goddess Kali the story of his birth, his abandonment, and protection
by her, and the history of his mother. He brought his mother to the
palace, and thanks to Kali's advice recovered his father, who had
been spirited away by the Sapta-kanyas or Seven Divine Maids.
In The Kathakoça (Tawney), p. 49, a Prince, who when an infant had been
carried off and adopted by a Vidyadhara, afterwards saw his mother
seated at a window, fell in love with her, and by the magical art of
the Vidyadharas, which he had acquired, carried her off in an aerial
chariot. While he was in a garden with her he heard the conversation
of two monkeys, and learnt from it that he was her son. Two hermits
confirmed this, and in the end the Prince and his parents became
Jain hermits.
In Folk-Tales of Kashmir (Knowles), 2nd ed., pp. 177 ff., the son of
a woman who had been sent away during her husband's absence, in the
belief that she was an ogress, was sold to a Queen soon after birth by
the widow with whom his mother lodged, and was brought up as her son,
the King believing her false statement that she had borne him. When
he grew up, the supposed Prince saw his mother, who still lived with
the widow, fell in love with her, and induced the King to agree
to his marriage to her. She stated that she was already married,
and obtained a postponement of the wedding for six months. In the
meantime her husband returned, went in search of his wife, heard
that she was to be married to the Prince, sent her his ring, and
they were reunited. The Prince ascertained that he was their son,
the widow who sold him was executed, and the Queen was banished.
In the Katha Sarit Sagara (Tawney), vol. i, p. 79, a Brahmana who had
obtained a young Garuda or Rukh from Vibhisana, the Rakshasa King of
Ceylon, visited on it, on three successive nights, a courtesan with
whom he had fallen in love, whom he eventually married.
In Old Deccan Days (M. Frere), p. 145, there is an account of a
Princess who was weighed every day against five lotus flowers, being
no heavier than they were.
In Indian Fairy Tales (M. Stokes), p. 1 ff., there is a story of
a Princess who was weighed against one flower every day, after her
bath. She was married by her parents to a Raja of the same weight
as herself.
In Cinq Cents Contes et Apologues (Chavannes), vol. i, p. 376,
a girl who was reared by a crane in its nest on the top of a tree
was weighed daily by it. In this manner it ascertained that she had
improper relations with a young man who had climbed up the tree and
was concealed there by her.
In Folk-Tales of Hindustan (Shaik Chilli), p. 108, a Prince got
his grandfather, who was a carpenter, to make a wonderful wooden
horse which could either move on the earth or fly in the air, as it
was bidden.
In the Arabian Nights (Lady Burton's ed., vol. iii, p. 137 ff.), an
aged Persian sage presented a Persian King with a flying horse made
of ebony, which could carry its rider where he wished, and "cover
in a single day the space of a year." In return for it the King
promised him his daughter in marriage, but her brother objected to
this, tried the horse, and was carried far away before he found the
pin which controlled the descent. He alighted at night on a palace
roof, entered a Princess's room, was discovered, offered to fight
all the troops if he had his own horse, and while they awaited his
charge rose in the air and returned home. At night he sailed back
and brought away the Princess.
In a foot-note, p. 139, Sir R. Burton suggested that the Arabian
magic wooden horse may have originated in an Indian story of a wooden
Garuda [bird]. The legend of a flying horse, however, is found in the
earliest hymns of the Rig Veda. If this period was about 2,000 B.C.,
the notion may have arisen in the third millennium B.C. In the hymn
163 of Book I, the horse is mentioned as possessing wings--"Limbs of
the deer hadst thou, and eagle pinions" (Griffith's translation). In
iv, 40, 2, the horse Dadhikras is described as having wings. In i,
85, 6, the wings of the spotted deer (clouds) which draw the cars of
the Maruts, the Storm Gods, are referred to; the car of the Asvins
was drawn by winged asses (i, 116-117, 2).
At a later date, the account of the treasures produced by the great
Churning of the Ocean by the Gods and Asuras includes the winged
horse Uccaihsravas.
In the Jataka tale No. 196, the Bodhisatta is described as transforming
himself into a flying horse which carried a party of wrecked merchants
and sailors from Ceylon to India.
Two or three steps further bring us to the position in the
folk-tales:--(1) the creation of a wooden flying horse by a
supernatural being, (2) the construction of a similar animal by a
human being, by magical art, (3) the construction of one by mechanical
art. Thus, if this development occurred in India or Ceylon, the notion
of a wooden or wax flying horse, such as the folk-tales describe,
is possibly of earlier date than the time of Christ. Arabian traders
or travellers may have carried the idea to their own country either
by way of Persia or more directly by sea. They may have had a local
tradition of flying quadrupeds, however, based on the winged lions
and bulls of Assyria, belonging to the eighth and ninth centuries
B.C. Winged quadrupeds of a composite character were known to the
Babylonians in the time of Gudea, Patesi of Lagash (2450 B.C.), and
probably some centuries earlier; [180] the idea may have spread from
them to the early Aryans in the first place.