Thereupon the Prince through grief that the Princess had got fever
does not eat the cooked rice. Then the Princess said all the words
which the robber told her. So having said, "I will bring the lotus
flower," the Prince went.
Having gone and found the pool, when he looked there was a large
lotus flower in the manner she said. The Prince, putting on the
bathing cloth, [246] and fastening his sword in his waist string,
prepared to descend into the pool.
Thereupon, the three animals that went with the Prince said, "Don't
descend," and began to say it again and again. Out of them the Parrot
said, "Elder brother, having gone flying, I will bring each pollen
grain of the flower. Don't you descend."
The Prince said, "While thou art going and bringing each grain of
pollen it will become night. On that account I will go, and cutting
the flower from the outside will come back"; and he descended into the
pool. As he descended, the Crocodile having come swallowed him. When
it was swallowing him the sword fixed at the Prince's waist pierced
the Crocodile's stomach, and the Crocodile and the Prince died.
Thereupon the three animals which remained on the bank, rolling over
and over on the ground, breaking and breaking up the soil of the earth,
began to cry out.
At that time the Celestial Nymphs came to the pool to bathe. Having
come, and seen the lamentation of these animals, they told the Devatawa
of the pool to come, and splitting open the stomach of the Crocodile
he caused the Prince to be [re]-born. Having come to life, the Prince,
plucking the lotus flower, came to the bank.
Then the four, taking the lotus flower and having come back, and
boiled and given it to that Princess, the false fever of the Princess
was cured. Well then, by that they were unable to kill him.
So the robber asked the Princess, "Now then, how to kill your elder
brother?"
Then the Princess said, "Elder brother having come [after] walking,
goes from this side near the screen to wash his face. You stay on
the other side [of the screen] and cut him with your sword." So he
remained that day in that way.
That day the Prince having come [after] walking did not go to the side
to which he goes before; he went to the other side. At that time the
man having been [there] tried to spring away. Then having cut down
the man with the sword that was in the Prince's hand, he asked the
Princess, "Whence this man?" The Princess remained silent.
Thereupon the Prince said, "I shall not do anything to you; say the
fact." The Princess told him the fact.
Then the Prince having said, "Thou faithless one! Go thou also,"
cut her down with the sword; and taking those things, went with the
three animals to the city where he killed that tusk elephant.
Having gone there, and told the King the manner in which he killed
the robbers, and all the dangers that had befallen him, the King,
having been pleased, married the King's Princess [to him]; and having
given the kingdom also to that very Prince, he remained there.
The Prince having gone to his [father's] city, said to the King,
"Father, having destroyed the word which you, Sir, said, by the acts
that I performed, I was made to ascertain [the wisdom of] it."
Having made obeisance to his father the King, and told him all
the circumstances that had occurred, thereafter he came back with
contentment to that city. Having come, he remained ruling over
that city.
Western Province.
In the Kolhan tales (Bompas) appended to Folklore of the Santal
Parganas, p. 468, a girl and her brother, fearing their father wished
to kill them, ran away and lived in the jungle. While the brother
was hunting, a Raja met with the sister and wanted to marry her;
thinking the youth would object the Raja persuaded the girl to try
to get him killed. She pretended to be ill, and told him she could
not recover unless he brought a flower which grew in a lake. When
the boy was swimming to the flower a gigantic fish swallowed him;
but a Rakshasa friend drank the pool dry, caught the fish, and took
out the boy alive. The Raja carried off the girl, but was defeated
by the youth and Rakshasa and some animal friends, gave the youth
half his kingdom, and married him to his own daughter.
In the actions of the animals, expressive of their grief at the death
of the Prince, there is a striking resemblance to those ascribed to the
Werewolf in William of Palerne (E.E.T.S., ed. Skeat), on discovering
that the child he was rearing was missing:
For reuliche (ruefully) gan he rore · and rente al his hide,
And fret (gnawed) oft of the erthe · and fel doun on swowe,
And made the most dool (sorrow) · that man mizt diuise.
The English translation of this twelfth-century Romance is said to
date from about A.D. 1350.
In vol. i, p. 130, a dog shows its grief by rolling about and howling,
and in vol. iii, p. 446, a man rolls on the ground in feigned sorrow.