When in long-past times the Bodisat, in consequence of his aggregation
of merits remaining incomplete, had been born in a herd of horned
cattle as a bull, he used to go out of the city in the evenings to a
bean-field belonging to the king, and there take his food. But by day
he lived in the city. There an ass joined him. It said one day, “O
uncle, your flesh and your blood and your hide thrive, and yet I have
never seen you change your abode.”
The bull answered, “O nephew, I feed at eventide in the king’s
bean-field.”
The ass said, “Uncle, I will go with you too.”
The bull objected, “O nephew, as you are wont to let your voice
resound, we might run a risk.”
The ass replied, “O uncle, let us go, I will not raise my voice.”
After they two had broken through the enclosure of the bean-field and
reached the interior, the ass uttered no sound until it had eaten its
fill. Then it said, “Uncle, shall not I sing a little?”
The bull replied, “Wait an instant, until I have gone away. Then do
just as you please.”
The bull ran off, and the ass lifted up its voice. As soon as the
king’s people heard that, they seized the ass, and in order to punish
it, as in their opinion it had devoured the whole produce of the king’s
bean-field, they cut off its ears, fastened a pestle to its neck, and
then set it free. As it wandered to and fro, the bull saw it, and
pronounced this verse—
“Excellently hast thou sung forsooth, and therefore obtained thy
recompense. In consequence of thy song I also well-nigh lost my ears.
“He who knows not how to keep his word, to him may easily happen some
such thing as this; to wander to and fro, adorned with a club and
destitute of ears.”
The ass also gave utterance to a verse, “Keep silence thou with broken
teeth, be silent then, O old bull; for three men are searching for thee
with clubs in their hands.”