THE KING WHO WAS FRIED
Once upon a time, a very long time ago indeed, there lived a King who had made a vow never to eat bread or break his fast until he had given away a hundredweight of gold in charity.
So, every day, before King Karan—for that was his name—had his breakfast, the palace servants would come out with baskets and baskets of gold pieces to scatter amongst the crowds of poor folk, who, you may be sure, never forgot to be there to receive the alms.
How they used to hustle and bustle and struggle and scramble! Then, when the last golden piece had been fought for, King Karan would sit down to his breakfast, and enjoy it as a man who has kept his word should do.
Now, when people saw the King lavishing his gold in this fashion, they naturally thought that sooner or later the royal treasuries must give out, the gold come to an end, and the King—who was evidently a man of his word—die of starvation. But, though months and years passed by, every day, just a quarter of an hour before breakfast-time, the servants came out of the palace with baskets and baskets of gold; and as the crowds dispersed they could see the King sitting down to his breakfast in the royal banqueting hall, as jolly, and fat, and hungry, as could be.
Now, of course, there was some secret in all this, and this secret I shall now tell you. King Karan had made a compact with a holy and very hungry old faqîr who lived at the top of the hill; and the compact was this: on condition of King Karan allowing himself to be fried and eaten for breakfast every day, the faqîr gave him a hundredweight of pure gold.
Of course, had the faqîr been an ordinary sort of person, the compact would not have lasted long, for once King Karan had been fried and eaten, there would have been an end of the matter. But the faqîr was a very remarkable faqîr indeed, and when he had eaten the King, and picked the bones quite quite clean, he just put them together, said a charm or two, and, hey presto! there was King Karan as fat and jolly as ever, ready for the next morning's breakfast. In fact, the faqîr made no bones at all over the affair, which, it must be confessed, was very convenient both for the breakfast and the breakfast eater. Nevertheless, it was of course not pleasant to be popped alive every morning into a great frying-pan of boiling oil; and for my part I think King Karan earned his hundredweight of gold handsomely. But after a time he got accustomed to the process, and would go up quite cheerfully to the holy and hungry one's house, where the biggest frying-pan was spitting and sputtering over the sacred fire. Then he would just pass the time of day to the faqîr to make sure he was punctual, and step gracefully into his hot oil bath. My goodness! how he sizzled and fizzled! When he was crisp and brown, the faqîr ate him, picked the bones, set them together, sang a charm, and finished the business by bringing out his dirty, old ragged coat, which he shook and shook, while the bright golden pieces came tumbling out of the pockets on to the floor.
So that was the way King Karan got his gold, and if you think it very extraordinary, so do I!
Now, in the great Mansarobar Lake, where, as of course you know, all the wild swans live when they leave us, and feed upon seed pearls, there was a great famine. Pearls were so scarce that one pair of swans determined to go out into the world and seek for food. So they flew into King Bikramâjît's garden, at Ujjayin. Now, when the gardener saw the beautiful birds, he was delighted, and, hoping to induce them to stay, he threw them grain to eat. But they would not touch it, nor any other food he offered them; so he went to his master, and told him there were a pair of swans in the garden who refused to eat anything.
Then King Bikramâjît went out, and asked them in birds' language (for, as every one knows, Bikramâjît understood both beasts and birds) why it was that they ate nothing.
'We don't eat grain!' said they, 'nor fruit, nor anything but fresh unpierced pearls!'
Whereupon King Bikramâjît, being very kind-hearted, sent for a basket of pearls; and every day, when he came into the garden, he fed the swans with his own hand.
But one day, when he was feeding them as usual, one of the pearls happened to be pierced. The dainty swans found it out at once, and coming to the conclusion that King Bikramâjît's supply of pearls was running short, they made up their minds to go farther afield. So, despite his entreaties, they spread their broad white wings, and flew up into the blue sky, their outstretched necks pointing straight towards home on the great Mansarobar Lake. Yet they were not ungrateful, for as they flew they sang the praises of Bikramâjît.
Now, King Karan was watching his servants bring out the baskets of gold, when the wild swans came flying over his head; and when he heard them singing, 'Glory to Bikramâjît! Glory to Bikramâjît!' he said to himself, 'Who is this whom even the birds praise? I let myself be fried and eaten every day in order that I may be able to give away a hundredweight of gold in charity, yet no swan sings my song!'
So, being jealous, he sent for a bird-catcher, who snared the poor swans with lime, and put them in a cage.
Then Karan hung the cage in the palace, and ordered his servants to bring every kind of birds' food; but the proud swans only curved their white necks in scorn, saying, 'Glory to Bikramâjît!—he gave us pearls to eat!'
Then King Karan, determined not to be outdone, sent for pearls; but still the scornful swans would not touch anything.
'Why will ye not eat?' quoth King Karan wrathfully; 'am I not as generous as Bikramâjît?'
Then the swan's wife answered, and said, 'Kings do not imprison the innocent. Kings do not war against women. If Bikramâjît were here, he would at any rate let me go!'
So Karan, not to be outdone in generosity, let the swan's wife go, and she spread her broad white wings and flew southwards to Bikramâjît, and told him how her husband lay a prisoner at the court of King Karan.
Of course Bikramâjît, who was, as every one knows, the most generous of kings, determined to* release the poor captive; and bidding the swan fly back and rejoin her mate, he put on the garb of a servant, and taking the name of Bikrû, journeyed northwards till he came to King Karan's kingdom. Then he took service with the King, and helped every day to carry out the baskets of golden pieces. He soon saw there was some secret in King Karan's endless wealth, and never rested until he had found it out. So, one day, hidden close by, he saw King Karan enter the faqîr's house and pop into the boiling oil. He saw him frizzle and sizzle, he saw him come out crisp and brown, he saw the hungry and holy faqîr pick the bones, and, finally, he saw King Karan, fat and jolly as ever, go down the mountain side with his hundredweight of gold!
Then Bikrû knew what to do! So the very next day he rose very early, and taking a carving-knife, he slashed himself all over. Next he took some pepper and salt, spices, pounded pomegranate seeds, and pea-flour; these he mixed together into a beautiful curry-stuff, and rubbed himself all over with it—right into the cuts in spite of the smarting. When he thought he was quite ready for cooking, he just went up the hill to the faqîr's house, and popped into the frying-pan. The faqîr was still asleep, but he soon awoke with the sizzling and the fizzling, and said to himself, 'Dear me! how uncommonly nice the King smells this morning!'
Indeed, so appetising was the smell, that he could hardly wait until the King was crisp and brown, but then–oh, my goodness! how he gobbled him up!
You see, he had been eating plain fried so long that a devilled king was quite a change. He picked the bones ever so clean, and it is my belief would have eaten them too, if he had not been afraid of killing the goose that laid the golden eggs.
Then, when it was all over, he put the King together again, and said, with tears in his eyes, 'What a breakfast that was, to be sure! Tell me how you managed to taste so nice, and I'll give you anything you ask.'
Whereupon Bikrû told him the way it was done, and promised to devil himself every morning, if he might have the old coat in return. 'For,' said he, 'it is not pleasant to be fried! and I don't see why I should in addition have the trouble of carrying a hundredweight of gold to the palace every day. Now, if I keep the coat, I can shake it down there.'
To this the faqîr agreed, and off went Bikrû with the coat.
Meanwhile, King Karan came toiling up the hill, and was surprised, when he entered the faqîr's house, to find the fire out, the frying-pan put away, and the faqîr himself as holy as ever, but not in the least hungry.
'Why, what is the matter?' faltered the King.
'Who are you?' asked the faqîr, who, to begin with, was somewhat short-sighted, and in addition felt drowsy after his heavy meal.
'Who! Why, I'm King Karan, come to be fried! Don't you want your breakfast?'
'I've had my breakfast!' sighed the faqîr regretfully. 'You tasted very nice when you were devilled, I can assure you!'
'I never was devilled in my life!' shouted the King; 'you must have eaten somebody else!'
'That's just what I was saying to myself!' returned the faqîr sleepily; 'I thought—it couldn't—be only—the spices—that— '—Snore, snore, snore!
'Look here!' cried King Karan, in a rage, shaking the faqîr,'you must eat me too!'
'Couldn't!' nodded the holy but satisfied faqîr, 'really—not another morsel—no, thanks!'
'Then give me my gold!' shrieked King Karan; 'you're bound to do that, for I'm ready to fulfil my part of the contract!'
'Sorry I can't oblige, but the devil—I mean the other person—went off with the coat!' nodded the faqîr.
Hearing this, King Karan returned home in despair and ordered the royal treasurer to send him gold; so that day he ate his breakfast in peace.
And the next day also, by ransacking all the private treasuries, a hundredweight of gold was forthcoming; so King Karan ate his breakfast as usual, though his heart was gloomy.
But the third day, the royal treasurer arrived with empty hands, and, casting himself on the ground, exclaimed, 'May it please your majesty! there is not any more gold in your majesty's domains!'
Then King Karan went solemnly to bed, without any breakfast, and the crowd, after waiting for hours expecting to see the palace doors open and the servants come out with the baskets of gold, melted away, saying it was a great shame to deceive poor folk in that way!
By dinner-time poor King Karan was visibly thinner; but he was a man of his word, and though the wily Bikrû came and tried to persuade him to eat, by saying he could not possibly be blamed, he shook his head, and turned his face to the wall.
Then Bikrû, or Bikramâjît, took the faqîr's old coat, and shaking it before the King, said, 'Take the money, my friend; and what is more, if you will set the wild swans you have in that cage at liberty, I will give you the coat into the bargain!'
So King Karan set the wild swans at liberty, and as the pair of them flew away to the great Mansarobar Lake, they sang as they went, 'Glory to Bikramâjît! the generous Bikramâjît!'
Then King Karan hung his head, and said to himself, 'The swans' song is true!—Bikramâjît is more generous than I; for if I was fried for the sake of a hundredweight of gold and my breakfast, he was devilled in order to set a bird at liberty!'
PRINCE HALF-A-SON
Once upon a time there was a King who had no children, and this disappointment preyed so dreadfully upon his mind that he chose the dirtiest and most broken-down old bed he could find, and lay down on it in the beautiful palace gardens. There he lay, amid the flowers and the fruit trees, the butterflies and the birds, quite regardless of the beauties around him;—that was his way of showing grief.
Now, as he lay thus, a holy faqîr passed through the garden, and seeing the King in this pitiful plight, asked him what the sorrow was which drove him to such a very dirty old bed.
'What is the use of asking?' returned the King; but when the faqîr asked for the third time what the sorrow was, the King took heart of grace, and answered gloomily, 'I have no children!'
'Is that all?' said the faqîr; 'that is easily remedied. Here! take this stick of mine, and throw it twice into yonder mango tree. At the first throw five mangoes will fall, at the second two. So many sons you shall have, if you give each of your seven Queens a mango apiece.'
Then the King, greatly delighted, took the faqîr's stick and went off to the mango tree. Sure enough, at the first throw five mangoes fell, at the second, two. Still the King was not satisfied, and, determining to make the most of the opportunity, he threw the stick into the tree a third time, hoping to get more children But, to his surprise and consternation, the stick remained in the tree, and the seven fallen mangoes flew back to their places, where they hung temptingly just out of reach.
There was nothing to be done but to go back to the faqîr, and tell him what had happened.
'That comes of being greedy!' retorted the faqîr; 'surely seven sons are enough for anybody, and yet you were not content! However, I will give you one more chance. Go back to the tree; you will find the stick upon the ground; throw it as I bade you, and beware of disobedience, for if you do not heed me this time, you may lie on your dirty old bed till doomsday for all I care!'
Then the King returned to the mango tree, and when the seven mangoes had fallen—the first time five, the second time two—he carried them straight into the palace, and gave them to his Queens, so as to be out of the way of temptation.
Now, as luck would have it, the youngest Queen was not in the house, so the King put her mango away in a tiny cupboard in the wall, against her return, and while it lay there a greedy little mouse came and nibbled away one half of it. Shortly afterwards, the seventh Queen came in, and seeing the other Queens just wiping their mouths, asked them what they had been eating.
'The King gave us each a mango,' they replied, 'and he put yours in the cupboard yonder.'
But, lo! when the youngest Queen ran in haste to find her mango, half of it was gone; nevertheless she ate the remaining half with great relish.
Now the result of this was, that when, some months afterwards, the six elder Queens each bore a son, the youngest Queen had only half-a-son—and that was what they called him at once,—just half-a-son, nothing more: he had one eye, one ear, one arm, one leg; in fact, looked at sideways, he was as handsome a young prince as you would wish to see, but frontways it was as plain as a pikestaff that he was only half-a-prince. Still he throve and grew strong, so that when his brothers went out shooting he begged to be allowed to go out also.
'How can you go a-shooting?' wept his mother, who did nothing but fret because her son was but half-a-son; 'you are only half-a-boy; how can you hold your crossbow?'
'Then let me go and play at shooting,' replied the prince, nothing daunted. 'Only give me some sweets to take with me, dear mother, as the other boys have, and I shall get on well enough.'
'How can I make sweets for half-a-son?' wept his mother; 'go and ask the other Queens to give you some,'
So he asked the other Queens, and they, to make fun of the poor lad, who was the butt of the palace, gave him sweets full of ashes.
Then the six whole princes, and little Half-a-son, set off a-shooting, and when they grew tired and hungry, they sat down to eat the sweets they had brought with them. Now when Prince Half-a-son put his into his half-a-mouth, lo and behold! though they were sweet enough outside, there was nothing but ashes and grit inside. He was a simple-hearted young prince, and imagining it must be a mistake, he went to his brothers and asked for some of theirs; but they jeered and laughed at him.
By and by they came to a field of melons, so carefully fenced in with thorns that only one tiny gap remained in one corner, and that was too small for any one to creep through, except half-a-boy; so while the six whole princes remained outside, little Half-a-son was feasting on the delicious melons inside, and though they begged and prayed him to throw a few over the hedge, he only laughed, saying, 'Remember the sweets!—it is my turn now!'
When they became very importunate, he threw over a few of the unripe and sour melons; whereupon his brothers became so enraged that they ran to the owner of the field and told him that half-a-boy was making sad havoc amongst his fruit. Then they watched him catch poor Prince Half-a-son, who of course could not run very fast, and tie him to a tree, after which they went away laughing.
But Prince Half-a-son had some compensation for being only half-a-boy, in that he possessed the magical power of making a rope do anything he bade it. Therefore, when he saw his brothers leaving him in the lurch, he called out, 'Break, rope, break! my companions have gone on,' and the rope obeyed at once, leaving him free to join his brothers.
By and by they came to a plum tree, where the fruit grew far out on slender branches that would only bear the weight of half-a-boy.
'Throw us down some!' cried the whole brothers, as they saw Half-a-son with his half-mouth full.
'Remember the sweets!' retorted the prince.
This made his brothers so angry that they ran off to the owner of the tree, and telling him how half-a-boy was feasting on his plums, watched while he caught the offender and tied him to the tree. Then they ran away laughing; but Prince Half-a-son called out, 'Break, rope, break! my companions have gone on,' and before they had gone out of sight he rejoined his brothers, who could not understand how this miserable half-a-boy outwitted them.
Being determined to be revenged on him, they waited until he began to draw water from a well, where they stopped to drink, and then they pushed him in.
'That is an end of little Half-a-son!' they said to themselves, and ran away laughing.
Now in the well there lived a one-eyed demon, a pigeon, and a serpent, and when it was dark these three returned home and began to talk amongst themselves, while Prince Half-a-son, who clung to the wall like a limpet, and took up no room at all, listened and held his breath.
'What is your power, my friend?' asked the demon of the serpent. Whereupon the serpent replied, 'I have the treasures of seven kings underneath me! What is yours, my friend?'
Then the demon said conceitedly, 'The King's daughter is possessed of me. She is always ill; some day I shall kill her.'
'Ah!' said the pigeon, 'I could cure her, for no matter what the disease is, any one who eats my droppings will become well instantly.'
When dawn came, the demon, the serpent, and the pigeon each went off to his own haunt without noticing Prince Half-a-son.
Soon afterwards, a camel-driver came to draw water from the well, and let down the bucket; whereupon Prince Half-a-son caught hold of the rope and held on.
The camel-driver, feeling a heavy weight, looked down to see what it was, and when he beheld half-a-boy clinging to the rope he was so frightened that he ran clean away. But all Half-a-son had to do was to say, 'Pull, rope, pull!' and the rope wound itself up immediately.
No sooner had he reached the surface once more than he set off to the neighbouring city, and proclaimed that he was a physician come to heal the King's daughter of her dreadful disease.
'Have a care! have a care!' cried the watchmen at the gate. 'If you fail, your head will be the forfeit. Many men have tried, and what can you do that are but half-a-man?'
Nevertheless, Prince Half-a-son, who had some of the pigeon's droppings in his pocket, was not in the least afraid, but boldly proclaimed he was ready to accept the terms; that is to say, if he failed to cure the princess his head was to be cut off, but if he succeeded, then her hand in marriage and half the kingdom should be his reward.
'Half the kingdom will just suit me,' he said,' seeing that I am but half-a-man!'
And, sure enough, no sooner had the princess taken her first dose, than she immediately became quite well—her cheeks grew rosy, her eyes bright; and the King was so delighted that he gave immediate orders for the marriage. Now amongst the wedding guests were Prince Half-a-son's wicked brothers, who were ready to die of spite and envy when they discovered that the happy bridegroom was none other than their despised half-a-boy. So they went to the King, and said, 'We know this lad: he is a sweeper's son, and quite unfit to be the husband of so charming a princess!'
The king at first believed this wicked story, and ordered the poor prince to be turned out of the kingdom; but Half-a-son asked for a train of mules, and one day's respite, in order to prove who and what he was. Then he went to the well, dug up the treasures of seven kings during the serpent's absence, loaded the mules, and came back glittering with gold and jewels. He laid the treasures at the King's feet, and told the whole story,—how, through no fault of his own, he was only half-a-son, and how unkindly his brothers had behaved to him.
Then the marriage festivities went on, and the wicked brothers crept away in disgrace.
They went to the well, full of envy and covetousness. 'Half-a-son got rich by falling in,' they said; 'let us try if we too cannot find some treasure,' So they threw themselves into the well.
As soon as it was dark, the demon, the serpent, and the pigeon came home together. 'Some thief has been here!' cried the pigeon, 'for my droppings are gone! Let us feel round, and see if he is here still.'
So they felt round, and when they came upon the six brothers, the demon ate them up one after another.
So that was an end of them, and Prince Half-a-son had the best of it, in spite of his only being half-a-boy.