I hope no one will imagine this to be a scientific book. It is meant to
amuse children; and if it succeeds in this, its aim will be hit. Thus
the stories here given, although grounded upon the great Buddhist
collection named below, have been ruthlessly altered wherever this
would better suit them for the purpose in view; and probably some of
them Buddha himself would fail to recognise.
My thanks are due to the Syndics of the Cambridge University Press
for permitting the use of their translation of the Jataka Book; [1]
from which comes the groundwork of the stories, and occasionally a
phrase or a versicle is borrowed. To this work I refer all scholars,
folk-lorists and scientific persons generally: warning them that if
they plunge deeper into these pages, they will be horribly shocked.