COUPLET. To this glad-omened place thou hast arrived auspiciously, Well hast thou come, and on thee peace and benediction be! My happy fate drew thee to these precincts, and the strength of my fortune raised the star of thy beauty above the horizon of this neighborhood.' The Mouse said, 'How can I sufficiently acknowledge these kindnesses which thou shewest to me? and with what tongue can I repeat thanks for the gracious manner in which thou condescendest to encourage me. It is from the burning heat of the sun of accidents, that I have sought refuge in the shade of thy clemency, estimating the acquisition of the happiness of communion with thee as the goal of my wishes and desires. COUPLET. It was favor from above made me ask my way of thee, And by the eternal guidance I was led thy face to see.' After they had rested from the toils of the way and had reposed themselves in that abode, which was a place of perfect safety :-secure from the assaults of the army of mischief, and unsullied by the dust of perturbation of rivals; the Crow, turning his face towards Zírak, requested that, if he thought good, he would narrate to the Tortoise the tales and adventures which he had promised the Crow to recount, in order to strengthen the friendship between them, and that they might derive all imaginable gratification from the recital. COUPLET. Open thy lips, thy pleasant story tell, And our heart's mouth with sugar fill as well.' The Mouse, commencing his story, said to the Tortoise,' 'O brother! my birth-place and native country was in a city of the country of Hind, which they call Nádút; and in that city I had taken up my abode in the cell of a solitary recluse, and in the corner of his hermitage had made a cell for myself, and I had several mice as attendants, and every day the numbers of my dependants increased. Now, a devoted disciple brought every morning for the holy man a tray of viands, a small portion of which the recluse used to take for his breakfast, and store up the rest for the evening; while I used to be on the watch for his going out of the house, in order that I might immediately leap on the table, and after eating such dainty bits as I liked, scatter the rest among the other mice. The holy man employed many stratagems to get rid of me, but in vain; and devised various schemes to kill me, but they were all to no purpose; until one day a friend came as guest to the abode of the recluse. After they had finished the usual salutations and 1 This is the fifth story of the 1st. Book of the Hitopadesha, where the town is called Champaka, and the recluse Chára-karna. The relator is there said to be Mushika-rajá, 'king of mice or rats,' for the word múshika too may mean either a mouse or a rat. T the requisite repast, and had spread out the beneficial table of discourse, the recluse inquired of his guest the news at home, and his destination, and the cause of his journey, and motive for his change of place. Now, the stranger was a man of experience, who had tasted the sweets and bitters of fortune, COUPLET. One who for years had ranged o'er land and sea, And proved the change of varied destiny. He replied to the recluse in a pleasing manner, and recounted with captivating eloquence what strange cities and marvelous countries he had beheld, and, during his discourse, the recluse kept every moment clapping his hands, in order that the mice might be scared by the sound. The guest was annoyed at this circumstance, which bore the appearance of an indignity, and enraged at an action which was so removed from due respect, and said, 'O recluse! to clap the hands when one is speaking appears like turning the speaker into ridicule, and I do not think that the character of a jester or the part of a mocker accords with thy position, nor that it is consistent with thy profession to deviate from the highway of good manners towards sarcasm and jokes. STANZA. Incline not thou to mockery and jeers, For ill do these the pious man befit. Will reap dishonor for his scurril wit.' The holy man replied, Heaven forbid that the thorn of jesting should ever be fastened in the skirt of my condition, and that the dust of raillery should be mingled with the atmosphere of the purity of my heart! This action which thou noticest, is to drive away a host of mice, who have overrun the realm of my board and table, and extending the hand of plunder and spoliation to all that I store up, leave not even a crust on my table safe from their assaults, nor permit me to preserve from their injuries any food in my house. COUPLET. Like me a hundred could not drive away, Their bands descending to bear off the prey.' The guest asked, 'Are they all bold and blindly audacious, or do some show more temerity than others?' The recluse answered, 'One of them is so hardy that in my presence he will carry off a thing from the board, and before my very eyes will display his audacity in plundering my viands.' The guest replied, 'There must be some reason for his boldness, and his story has a similar complexion to that of the man who insisted to the wife of the host, that there must surely be some cause why she should barter husked sesamum on equal terms for unhusked.' The recluse said, 'If thou seest fit, tell me, how was that?' STORY IV. The guest said, 'In this road that I came, I arrived at night at a certain village and alighted at the house of an acquaintance, and after supper was over and we had done talking, they spread a garment for me to sleep on, and I put on it a pillow, but I did not go to sleep. My host went to his wife, and there being no other screen between me and them than a mat, I overheard their conversation, and what they said on both sides from first to last reached my ears. The man said, 'O wife! I wish to invite a party of the heads of the village to-morrow, and seat them in the presence of this my respected guest, who is a present to us from the invisible world, and prepare an entertainment for them suitable to my position.' The wife rejoined, 'I am astonished, that when thou hast not sufficient in the house for the wants of thy family, and hast not the means of procuring a diram' to purchase greens and salt, thou shouldst still, with such powerful resources and ample means, entertain the notion of receiving guests! Well, at least, to-day that thou hast the power to lay up, make a store for the morrow, and leave something behind thee for thy wife and children, that after thy decease, they may not be dependant on any one.' The husband replied, COUPLET. Blind is the man, who nought enjoying, yet hoards up his useless pelf, But blest is he, who much bestowing, still can expend his gold on self. If the power of doing a kindness and the ability to benefit others be attainable, we must not shrink from it, since, in fact, that will be a store for the next world; and whoever lays up a store for himself in this world will, in the next, be punished with the loss of his soul, for to amass and hoard up wealth is unblest, and its consequences disastrous, as was the case with that Wolf.' The wife asked, 'How was that?' STORY V.2 The man said, 'They have related that a skilful hunter (such that through fear of his net the deer was not stepping forth into the plain, and the mountain-goat, through dread of his artifices and stratagems, would not leave its lair, COUPLET. Sharp-sighted, full of quickness and address, Acute, not mild of heart, but merciless), 1 A silver coin, in value about two pence. This is the 7th. story of the 1st. Book of the Hitopadesha. had set a snare, and a deer had been caught in the net. On his issuing from his place of concealment and coming towards the net, the stag, in fear for its life, made an effort, tore up the net, and started off in the plain. The hunter was ashamed, and fixing an arrow to his bow, shot at the deer, which fell, and the hunter, coming up, took it on its back and set off home. On the way a wild boar met and charged the hunter, who discharged an arrow at him. It so happened that the deadly arrow transfixed the hog as he came on, and, infuriated by the pain of the wound, he ripped up the breast of the hunter with his lacerating tusk, and both fell down dead on the spot. In the midst of this a hungry wolf came there, and saw the man and the hog and the deer slain. Pleased at the sight, he felt himself supplied with an abundance of delicacies and ample means of support, and said to himself, COUPLET. 'Time enow must pass ere we, Such good cheer again can see. This is the time for reflection and consideration, and the season for amassing and laying up a store, for to be remiss here would be opposed to all prudence and forethought, while if I am profuse, I should be censurable for folly and carelessness. I consider my advisable course and that most beneficial to be this, that I should consume for to-day's meal, the bowstring, and not string the bow of wasteful expenditure and impropriety, and placing this fresh meat in a retired spot, each day impel the arrow of desire to the target of my wish, and conveying these treasures to a corner, make a magazine for hardness of times and times of hardship. For the wise have said, VERSE. Consume not all, or thou mayest, long, for more Stand waiting; want ill suits the hoary head. The Wolf from excessive greediness turned towards the bow-string and began to gnaw it, and at a single motion of his teeth it broke asunder. The moment the string snapped, the horns of the bow struck him on the heart, and he instantaneously gave up the ghost. HEMISTICH. Untasted, all were left, and he, too, died. And the moral of this story is, that greediness in amassing wealth and the being swayed by distant hopes to lay up stores, has disastrous results and fatal consequences. COUPLET. Eat what thou hast to day, nor for the coming future vainly care, For when the morrow comes, be sure the morrow's bread will, too, be there. Ah! what a hapless band are they who, from their earliest years painfully accumulate worldly gear and resign it at the close of life with infinite anguish. STANZA. How long wilt thou amass? good sir, reflect! Thy greedy pangs would still the same be left: Light not then flames from which none can themselves protect.' When the wife of the host heard these words, which bore the stamp of wisdom, and a happy inspiration had whispered in her listening ear the glad tidings that, 'Sustenance is with God,' she adopted a gentle tone, and said, 'O dear one! I have stored up in the house a little rice sesamum for the children; and now that it has been disclosed to me that storing up is unlucky, I will, to-morrow morning, prepare a meal sufficient for ten persons. Do thou invite whom thou wilt, and make whomsoever thou desirest, thy guests.' COUPLET. Next morning, when the glittering orb of day The wife husked the sesamum and placed it in the sun, and enjoined her husband to keep a good watch till the grain was dry, lest the birds should carry away some of it; and she herself turned to some other business. Sleep overcame the husband; and a dog came up and touched the grain with his mouth. The wife observing this, was too disgusted to think of preparing a dish from it, and therefore taking it up, set off for the bázár. I, too, having some necessary business in the bázár, was going along behind her. I saw her go to the shop of one that sold grain, and she wanted to barter her sesamum for unhusked grain of the same description, measure for measure.' The man made a great outcry, saying, 'O woman! surely there is some trick here, that thou shouldest wish to barter on equal terms sesamum which has been cleaned from the husk for that which is still in the husk.' And I have told this story because that I, too, am of opinion that the said bold mouse has so much strength and hardihood, and courage, from the place of its abode; and the probability is that it has a treasure of coin in its house, sustained by which it exhibits all this prowess; and if the plant of its condition should meet with the autumn of poverty, this freshness and vigor would not be evinced in the coppice of its actions. For they have said, 'He who is moneyless is like a bird that is wingless and featherless.' 1 Lit. 'sa'a for sa'a.' The sa'a is a dry measure of the largest description, containing 4 mudds, and each mudd = 1} ritl. |