The Jātaka, vol. IV (nos. 439-510)

When the Prince arrived at Kapilavatthu, the Sakyas had assembled in the royal rest-house. The Prince approached the rest-house, and waited. Then they said to him, “This is your mother’s father, this is her brother,” pointing them out. He walked from one to the other, saluting them. But although he bowed to them till his back ached, not one of them vouchsafed a greeting; so he asked, “ Why is it that none of you greet me?” The Sakyas replied, “My dear, the youngest princes are all in the country ;” then they entertained him grandly. ~ After a few days’ stay, he set out for home with all his retinue. Just then a slave woman washed the seat which he had used in the rest-house with milkwater, saying insultingly, “ Here’s the seat where sat the son of Vasabhakhattiya, the slave girl!” A man who had left his spear behind was just fetching it, when he overheard the abuse of Prince Vidtdabha. He asked what it meant. He was told that Vasabhakhattiya was born of a slave to Mahanama the Sakya. This he told to the soldiers: a great uproar arose, all shouting—“ Vasabhakhattiya is a slave woman’s daughter, so they say!” The Prince heard it. “Yes,” thought he, “let them pour milk-water over the seat I sat in, to wash it! When I am king, I will wash the place with their hearts’ blood !”

When he returned to Savatthi, the courtiers told the whole matter to the king. The king was enraged against the Sakyas for giving him a slave’s daughter to wife. He cut off all allowances made to Vasabhakhattiya and her son, and gave them only what is proper to be given to slave men and women. Some few days later the Master came to the palace, and took a seat. The king approached him, and with a greeting said, “Sir, I am told that your clansmen gave me a slave’s daughter to wife. I have cut off their allowances, mother and son, and grant them only what slaves would get.” Said the Master, “The Sakyas have done wrong, O great king! [148] If they gave any one, they ought to have given a girl of their own blood. But, O king, this I say: Vasabhakhattiya is a king’s daughter, and in the house of a noble king she has received the ceremonial sprinkling; Vidtdabha too was begotten by a noble king. Wise men of old have said, what matters the mother’s birth? The birth of the father is the measure: and to a poor wife, a picker of sticks, they gave the position of queen consort ; and the son born of her obtained the sovereignty of Benares, twelve leagues in extent, and became King Kattha-vahana, the Wood-carrier :” whereupon he told him the story of the Katthahari Birth?.

When the king heard this speech he was pleased; and saying to himself, “The father’s birth is the measure of the man,” he again gave mother and son the treatment suited to them. nhhagt Now the king’s commander-in-chief was a man named Bandhula. His wife, Mallika, was barren, and he sent her away to Kusinara, telling her to return to her own family. “TI will go,” said she, “when I have saluted the Master.” She went to Jetavana, and greeting the Tathagata stood waiting on one side. “Where are you going?” he asked. She replied, “My husband has sent me home, Sir.” “Why?” asked the Master. “I am barren, Sir, I have no son.” “Tf that is all,” said he, “there is no reason why you should go. Return.” She was much pleased, and saluting the Master went home again. Her husband 94 The Jataka. Book XII. asked her why she had come back. She answered, “The Dasabala sent me back, my lord.” “Then,” said the commander-in-chief, “the Tathagata must have seen good reason.” The woman soon after conceived, and when her cravings began, told him of it. “What is it you want?” he asked, “ My lord,” said she, “T desire to go and bathe and drink the water of the tank in Vesali City where the families of the kings get water for the ceremonial sprinkling.” The commander-in-chief promised to try. Seizing his bow, strong as a thousand bows, he put his wife in a chariot, and left Savatthi, and drove his chariot to Vesali.

Now at this time there lived close to the gate a Licchavi named Mahali}, who had been educated by the same teacher as the king of Kosala’s general, Bandhula. This man was blind, and used to advise the Licchavis on all matters temporal and spiritual. Hearing the clatter of the chariot as it went over the threshold, he said, “The noise of the chariot of Bandhula the Mallian ! [149] This day there will be fear for the Licchavis!” By the tank there was set a strong guard, within and without; above it was spread an iron net; not even a bird could find room to get through. But the general, dismounting from his car, put the guards to flight with the blows of his sword, and burst through the iron network, and in the tank bathed his wife and gave her to drink of the water ; then after bathing himself, he set Mallika in the chariot, and left the town, and went back by the way he came. The guards went and told all to the Licchavis. Then were the kings of the Licchavis angry ; and five hundred of them, mounted in five hundred chariots, departed to capture Bandhula the Mallian. They informed Mahiali of it, and he said, “Go not! for he will slay you all.” But they said, “Nay, but we will go.” “Then if you come to a place where a wheel has sunk up to the nave, you must return.

If you return not then, return back from that place when you hear the noise of a thunderbolt. If then you turn not, turn back from that place where you shall see a hole in front of your chariots. Go no further!” But they did not turn back according to his word, but pursued on and on. Mallika espied them and said, “There are chariots in sight, my lord.” “Then tell me,” said he, “when they all look like one chariot.” When they all in a line looked like one, she said, “‘ My lord, I see as it were the head of one chariot.” “Take the reins, then,” said he, and gave the reins into her hand: he stood upright in the chariot, and strung his bow. The chariot-wheel sank into the earth navedeep. The Licchavis came to the place, and saw it, but turned not back. The other went on a little further, and twanged the bow string; then came a noise as the noise of a thunderbolt, yet even then they turned not, but pursued on and on. Bandhula stood up in the chariot and sped a shaft, and it cleft the heads of all the five hundred chariots, and passed right through the five hundred kings in the place where the girdle is fastened, and then buried itself in the earth. They not perceiving that they were wounded pursued still, shouting, “Stop, holloa, stop!” Bandhula stopt his chariot, and said, “You are dead men, and I cannot fight with the dead.” “What!” said they, “dead, such as we now are?” ‘Loose the girdle of the first man,” said Bandhula.

[150] They loosed his girdle, and at the instant the girdle was loosed, he fell dead. Then he said to them, “You are all of you in the same condition : go to your homes, and set in order what should be ordered, and give your directions to your wives and families, and then doff your armour.” They did so, and then all of them gave up the ghost?.

And Bandhula conveyed Mallika to Savatthi. She bore twin sons sixteen times in succession, and they were all mighty men and heroes, and became perfected in all manner of accomplishments. Each one of them had a thousand: 1 Called Maha-licchavi in Dhammapada (p. 219). 2 This is a variation of a well-known incident. A headsman slices off a man’s head so skilfully, that the victim does not know it is done. The victim then takes a pinch of snuff, sneezes, and his head falls off. Another form is: Two men dispute, and one swings his sword round. They go on talking, and by and bye the other gets up to depart, and falls in two parts. men to attend him, and when they went with their father to wait on the king, they alone filled the courtyard of the palace to overflowing. One day some men who had been defeated in court on a false charge, seeing Bandhula approach, raised a great outcry, and informed him that the judges of the court had supported a false charge. So Bandhula went into the court, and judged the case, and gave each man his own. The crowd uttered loud shouts of applause. The king asked what it meant, and on hearing was much pleased; all those officers he sent away, and gave Bandhula charge of the Judgement court, and thenceforward he judged aright. Then the former judges became poor, because they no longer received bribes, and they slandered Bandhula in the king’s ear, accusing him of aiming at the kingdom himself.

The king listened to their words, and could not control his suspicions. “But,” he reflected, “if he be slain here, I shall be blamed.” He suborned certain men to harry the frontier districts ; then sending for Bandhula, he said, “The borders are in a blaze; go with your sons and capture the brigands.” With him he also sent other men sufficient, mighty men of war, with instructions to kill him and his two-and-thirty sons, and cut off their heads, and bring them back.

While he was yet on the way, the hired brigands got wind of the general’s coming, and took to flight. He settled the people of that district in their homes, and quieted the province, and set out for home. Then when he was not far from the city, those warriors cut off his head and the heads of his sons. On that day Mallika had sent an invitation to the two chief disciples along with five hundred of the Brethren. Early in the forenoon a letter was brought to her, with news that her husband and sons had lost their heads. [151] When she heard this, without a word to a soul, she tucked the letter in her dress, and waited upon the company of the Brethren. Her attendants had given rice to the Brethren, when bringing in a bowl of ghee they happened to break the bowl just in front of the Elders. Then the Captain of the Faith said, ‘ Pots are made to be broken ; do not trouble about it.” The lady produced her letter from the fold of her dress, saying, “ Here I have a letter informing me that my husband and his two-and-thirty sons have been beheaded. If I do not trouble about that, am I likely to trouble when a bowl is broken?” The Captain of the Faith now began, “Unseen, unknown!,” and so forth, then rising from his seat uttered a discourse, and went home.

She summoned her two-and-thirty daughters-in-law, and to them said, “Your husbands, though innocent, have reaped the fruit of their former deeds. Do not you grieve, nor commit a sin of the soul worse even than the king’s.” This was her advice. The king’s spies hearing this speech brought word to him that they were not angry. Then the king was distrest, and went to her dwelling, and craving pardon of Mallika and her sons’ wives, offered a boon. She replied, “Be it accepted.” She set out the funeral feast, and bathed, and then went before the king. “My lord,” said she, “you granted me a boon, I want nothing but this, that you permit my two-and-thirty daughters-in-law and me to go back to our own homes.” The king consented. Each of her two-and-thirty sons’ wives she sent away to her home, and herself returned to the home of her family in the city of Kusinara. And the king gave the post of commander-in-chief to one Digha-karayana, sister’s son to the general Bandhula. But he went about picking faults in the king and saying, “He murdered my uncle.”

Ever after the murder of the innocent Bandhula the king was devoured by remorse, and had no peace of mind, felt no joy in being king. At that time the Master dwelt near a country town of the Sakyas, named Ulumpa. Thither went the king, pitched a camp not far from the park, and with a few attendants went to the monastery to salute the Master. The five symbols of royalty? he handed to Karayana, and alone entered the Perfumed Chamber. All that followed must be described as in the Dhammacetiya Sutta. When he 1 Sutta-Nipadta 574: ‘Unseen, unknown, is the life of men here below:” and so forth, for twenty stanzas. This is the Sallasutta. 2 See above, p. 80 note. 96 The Jataka. Book XII. entered the Perfumed Chamber, Karayana took those symbols of royalty, [152] and made Vidadabha king; and leaving behind for the king one horse and a serving woman, he went to Savatthi. . After a pleasant conversation with the Master, the king on his return saw no army. He enquired of the woman, and learnt what had been done. Then set out for the city of Rajagaha, resolved to take his nephew with him!, and capture Vidtdabha. It was late when he came to the city, and the gates were shut: and lying down in a shed, exhausted by exposure to wind and sun, he died there. ;

When the night began to grow brighter, the woman began to wail, “My lord, the king of Kosala is past help!” The sound was heard, and news came to the king. He performed the obsequies of his uncle with great magnificence. Vididabha once firmly established on the throne remembered that grudge of his, and determined to destroy the Sakyas one and all; to which end he set out with a large army. That day at dawn the Master, looking forth over the world, saw destruction threatening his kin. “I must help my kindred,” thought he. In the forenoon he went in search of alms, then after returning from his meal lay down lion-like in his Perfumed Chamber, and in the evening-time, having past through the air to a spot near Kapilavatthu, sat beneath a tree that gave scanty shade. Hard by that place, a huge and shady banyan tree stood on the boundary of Vidtdabha’s realms. Vididabha seeing the Master approached and saluting him, said, “Why, Sir, are you sitting under so thin a tree in all this heat? Sit beneath this shady banyan, Sir.” He replied, “ Let be, O king ! the shade of my kindred keeps me cool.”—‘‘The Master,” thought the other, “must have come here to protect his clansmen.” So he saluted the Master, and returned again to Savatthi. And the Master rising went to Jetavana. A second time the king called to mind his grudge against the Sakyas, a second time he set forth, and again saw the Master seated in the same place, then again returned. <A fourth time he set out; and the Master, scanning the former deeds of the Sakyas, perceived that nothing could do away with the effect of their evildoing, in casting poison into the river; so he did not go thither the fourth time. Then king Vidtdabha slew all the Sakyas, beginning with babes at the breast, and with their hearts’ blood washed the bench, and returned.

On the day after the Master had gone out for the third time and returned, he, [153] having gone his rounds for alms, and his meal over, was resting in his Perfumed Chamber, the Brethren gathered from all directions into the Hall of Truth, and seating themselves, began to tell of the virtues of the Great Being: “Sirs, the Master but showed himself, and turned the king back, and set free his kinsmen from fear of death. A helpful friend is the Master to his clan!” The Master entered, and asked what they talked of as they sat there. They told him. Then he said, “Not now only, Brethren, does the Tathagata act for the benefit of his kinsmen; he did the same long ago.” With these words, he told a story of the past. Once upon a time, when Brahmadatta ruled as king in Benares, and observed the Ten Royal Virtues, he thought to himself: ‘All over India the kings live in palaces supported by many a column. There is no marvel, then, in a palace supported by many columns; but what if I make a palace with one column only to support it? ‘Then I shall be the chiefest king of all kings!” So he summoned his builders, and told them to build him a magnificent palace supported on one column. “ Very good,” said they, and away they went into the forest.

There they beheld many a tree, straight and great, worthy to be the 1 The quotation should begin at bhagineyyam, since the king was alone. single column of such a palace. ‘ Here are these trees,” said they, “but the road is rough, and we can never transport them; we will go ask the king about it.” When they did so, the king said, ‘By hook or by crook you must bring them, and that quickly.” But they answered, “Neither by hook nor by crook can the thing be done.” “Then,” said the king, “search for a tree in my park.” The builders went to the park, and there they espied a lordly sal tree, straight and well grown, worshipt by village and town, and to it the royal family also were wont to pay tribute and worship; and they told the king. Said the king, “In my park ye have found me a tree: good—go and cut it down.” “So be it,” said they, and repaired to the park, with their hands full of perfumed garlands and the like; then hanging upon it a five-spray garland’, and encircling it with a string, fastening to it a nosegay of flowers, and kindling a lamp, they did worship, explaining, [154] ‘““On the seventh day from now we shall cut down this tree: it is the king’s command so to cut it down. Let the deities who dwell in this tree go elsewhither, and not unto us be the blame.”

The god who dwelt in the tree hearing this, thought to himself: “These builders are determined to cut down this tree, and to destroy my place of dwelling. Now my life only lasts as long as this my abiding place. And all the young sal trees that stand around this, where dwell the deities my kinsfolk, and they are many, will be destroyed. My own destruction does not touch me so near as the destruction of my children: therefore I must protect their lives.” Accordingly at the hour of midnight, adorned in divine splendour, he entered into the magnificent chamber of the king, and filling the whole chamber with a bright radiance, stood weeping beside the king’s pillow. At sight of him the king, overcome by terror, uttered the first stanza : “Who art thou, standing high in air, with heavenly vesture swathed : Whence come thy fears, why flow the tears in which thine eyes are bathed ?” On hearing which the king of the gods repeated two stanzas: “Within thy realm, O King, they know me as the Lucky Tree: For sixty thousand years I stood, and all have worshipt me. “Though many a town and house they made, and many a king’s dwelling, Yet me they never did molest, to me no harm did bring: © Then even as they did worship pay, so worship thou, O King !”

[155] Then the king repeated two stanzas : “But such another mighty trunk I never yet did see, So fine a kind in girth and height, so thick and strong a tree. “A lovely palace I will build, one column for support: There I will place thee to abide—thy life shall not be short.” 1 See note in vol. il. p. 72. Jia Vi. ; 7 98 The Jataka. Book XII. On hearing this the king of the gods repeated two stanzas : “Since thou art bent to tear my body*from me, cut me small, And cut me piecemeal limb from limb, O King, or not at all. [156] “Cut first the top, the middle next, then last the root of me: And if thou cut me so, O King, death will not painful be.” Then the king repeated two stanzas: “First hands and feet, then nose and ears, while yet the victim lives, And last of all the head let fall—a painful death this gives. “OQ Lucky Tree! O woodland king! what pleasure couldst thou feel, Why, for what reason dost thou wish to be cut up piecemeal ?” Then the Lucky Tree answered by repeating two stanzas : “The reason (and a reason ’tis full noble) why piecemeal I would be cut, O mighty king! come listen while I tell. “My kith and kin all prospering round me well-sheltered grow : These I should crush by one huge fall,—and great would be their woe.” [157] The king, hearing this, was much pleased:

‘‘’Tis a worthy god this,” thought he, “he does not wish that his kinsfolk should lose their dwelling-place because he loses his; he acts for his kinsfolk’s good.” And he repeated the remaining stanza : “OQ Lucky Tree! O woodland king! thy thoughts must noble be: Thou wouldst befriend thy kindred, so from fear I set thee free.” The king of the gods, having discoursed to this king, then departed. And the king being established according to his admonition, gave gifts and did other good deeds, till he went to fill the hosts of heaven.

The Master having ended this discourse said: “Thus it is, Brethren, that the Tathagata acts so as to do good to his kith and kin ;” and then he identified the Birth: “At that time Ananda was the king, the followers of the Buddha were the deities which were embodied in the young saplings of the sal tree, and I was myself Lucky Tree, the king of the gods.”

[158] “Others sow,” ete—This story the Master told while dwelling at Jetavana, about Devadatta, when he had gone down into Hell, taking with him five hundred families. ' The introductory story is given in Dhammapada, p. 147 ff. Now Devadatta, when the Chief Disciples! had gone away, taking his followers with them?, being unable to swallow his pain, spat up hot blood from his mouth, and departed; then tormented by great agony, as he remembered the virtues of the Tathagata, he said to himself, “I for nine months have thought evil of the Tathagata, but in the Master’s heart is never a sinful thought for me; in the eighty chief elders is no malice towards me; by my own deeds that I have done I am become all forlorn, and I am renounced by the Master, by the great Elders, by Elder Rahula chief of my family, and by all the royal clans of the Sakyas. I will go to the Master, and reconcile myself with him.” So beckoning to his followers, he caused himself to be pod in a litter, and travelling always by night made his way to the city of Ananda the Elder told the Master, saying, ‘ Devadatta is coming, they say,

to make his peace with you.”—“ Ananda, Devadatta shall not see me.” Again when he had arrived at the city of Savatthi, the Elder told it to the Master ; and the Blessed One replied as before. When he was at the gate of Jetavana, and moving towards the Jetavana lake, his sin came to a head: a fever arose in his body, and desiring to bathe and drink, he commanded them to let him out of the litter, that he might drink. No sooner had he alighted, and stood upon the ground, than before he could refresh himself the great earth gaped, a flame arose from the nethermost hell of Avici and surrounded him. Then he knew that his deeds of sin had come to a head, and remembering the virtues of the Tathagata, he repeated this stanza!: ; “With these my bones to that supremest Being, Marked with an hundred lucky marks, all-seeing, God, more than God, who man’s bull-spirit tames, With all my soul to Buddha I am fleeing !” But in the very act of taking refuge, he was doomed to the Hell Avici. And there were five hundred families of his attendants, which families following him reviled the Dasabala, and abused him, and in the Avici hell were born, they also. Thus he went to Avici, taking with him five hundred families.

So one day they were talking in the Hall of Truth: “ Brother, the sinful Devadatta, [159] through greed of gain, set his anger causelessly against the Supreme Buddha, and with no regard for the terrors of the future, with five hundred families was doomed to hell.” The Master entering asked of what they were speaking : they told him. Said he, “Brethren, Devadatta being greedy of gain and honour had no eye for the terrors of the future ; and in former times, as now, regarding not the terrors of the future, he with his followers through greed of present happiness came to utter ruin.” So saying, he told them a story of the past. Once upon a time, when Brahmadatta was king of Benares, there stood near Benares a great town of carpenters, containing a thousand families. The carpenters from this town used to profess that they would make a bed, or a chair, or a house, and after receiving a large advance from men’s hands, they proved able to make nothing whatever. The people used to upbraid every carpenter they met with, and interfered 1 Sariputta and Moggallana. 2 Cf. Hardy, Buddhism, p. 328. 3 Devadatta was brother-in-law of the Buddha. 4 Dhammapada, p. 148.

100 The Jataka. Book XII. with them. So those debtors were so much harassed that they could live there no longer. ‘Let us go into some foreign land,” said they, ‘and find some place or other to dwell in;” so to the forest they went. They cut down trees, they built # mighty ship, and launched her in the river, and took her away from that town, and‘ at a distance of some threequarters of a league’ they laid her up. Then in the middle of the night they returned to the town to fetch their families, whom they conveyed on board ship, and then proceeded in due course to the ocean. There they sailed at the wind’s will, until they reached an island that lay in the midst of the sea. Now in that island grew wild all manner of plants and wild fruit-trees, rice, sugar-cane, banana, mango, rose-apple, jack, cocoanut, and what not. There was another man who had been shipwrecked and had taken possession of that island before them, and lived therein, eating the rice and enjoying the sugar-cane and all the rest, by which he had grown stout and sturdy ; naked he went, and his hair and beard were grown long. The carpenters thought, “If yonder island is haunted of demons, we shall all perish ; so we will explore it.” Then seven brave men [160] and strong, arming them with the five kinds of weapons’, disembarked and explored that island.

At that moment the castaway had just broken his fast, and drunk of the juice of the sugar-cane, and in high contentment was lying on his back in a lovely spot, cool in the shade on some sand which glistered like silver plate; and he was thinking, ‘No such happiness as this have they who dwell in India, that plough and sow ; better to me is this island than India!” He sang for joy, and was at the height of bliss. The Master, to explain how this castaway sang for joy and bliss, repeated the first stanza : “Others sow and others plough, Living by the sweat o’ the brow ; In my realm they have no share: India? this is better far!” The scouts who were exploring the isle caught the sound of his singing, and said, “It seems the voice of man that we hear; let us make acquaintance with him.” Following the sound, they came upon the man, but his aspect horrified them. “’Tis a goblin!” they cried, and put arrow to bow. When the man saw them, he was in fear of being wounded, so he called out—‘I am no goblin, sirs, but a man: spare my

1 See vol. ii. p. 147, note. * Sword, spear, bow, shield, axe. life :”—“ What !” said they, ‘““do men go all naked and defenceless like you?” and asked him again and again, only to receive the same answer, that he was aman. At last they approached him, and all began to talk pleasantly together, and the new-comers asked how he came thither. The other told them the truth of it. ‘As a reward for your good deeds you have come hither,” said he, ‘this is a first-rate island. No need here to work with your hands for a living; of rice and sugar-cane, and all the rest, there is no end here, and all growing wild; you may live here without anxiety.” ‘‘Is there nothing else,” they asked, [161] “to hinder our living here?” ‘No fear is there but this: the isle is haunted by demons, and the demons would be incensed to see the excretions of your bodies ; so when you would relieve yourselves, dig a hole in the sand and hide it there. That is the only danger; there is no other; only always be careful on this point.” Then they took up their abode in the place.

But among these thousand families there were two master workmen, one at the head of each five hundred of them; and one of these was foolish and greedy of the best food, the other wise and not bent on getting the best of everything. In course of time as they continued to dwell there, all grew stout and sturdy. Then they thought, ‘‘We have not been merry men this long time’: we will make some toddy from the juice of the sugar-cane.” So they caused the strong drink to be made, and being drunken, sang, danced, sported, then in thoughtlessness relieved themselves here, there, and everywhere without hiding it, so that they made the island foul and disgusting. The deities were incensed because these men made their playing-place all foul. ‘‘Shall we bring the sea over it,” they deliberated, ‘‘and cleanse the island?—This is the dark fortnight: now our gathering is broken up. Well, on the fifteenth day from now, at the first of the full moon, at the time of the moon’s rising, we will bring up the sea and make an end of them all.” Thus they fixed the day. At this a righteous deity who was one of them thought, “TI would not that these should perish before my eyes.” So in his compassion, at the time when the men were sitting at their doors in pleasant converse, after their evening meal, he made the whole island one blaze of light, and adorned in all splendour stayed. poised in the air towards the north, and spoke to them thus: ‘‘O ye carpenters! the deities are wroth with you. Dwell no longer in this place, for in half a month from this time, the

1 There seems to be something wrong with the text: as it stands, the meaning is: ‘For a long time these have not been heroes.” But the word suo is used idiomatically, sao hutvd ‘as bold as brass,’ i. 262. 30, ii. 119. 22. It might well be used of ‘Dutch courage.’—Or perhaps sur@ (brandy) in some form may lurk 102 The Jataka. Book XII. deities will bring up the sea, [162] and destroy you one and all. Therefore flee from this place.” And he repeated the second stanza : “In thrice five days the moon will rise to view: Then from the sea a mighty flood is due This mighty island to o’erwhelm: then haste, Elsewhere take shelter, that it hurt not you.” With this advice, he returned to his own place. He gone, another comrade of his, a cruel god, thought, “Perhaps they will follow his advice and escape; I will prevent their going, and bring them all to utter destruction.” So adorned in divine splendour, he made a great blaze of light over the whole place, and approaching them, remained poised in the air towards the south, as he asked, ‘‘ Has there been a god here?” ‘There has,” was the reply. ‘“ What did he tell you?” They answered, ‘“‘Thus and thus, my lord.” He then said, “This god does not wish you to live here, and in anger speaks. Go not elsewhither, but stay even here.” And with these words, he repeated two stanzas:

“To me by many signs it is made clear, That mighty ocean flood of which you hear Shall never this great island overwhelm : Then take your pleasure, grieve not, never fear. “Here you have lit upon a wide abode, Full of all things to eat, of drink and food; I see no danger for you: come, enjoy Unto all generations this your good.” [163] Having thus in these two stanzas offered to relieve their anxiety, he departed. When he was gone, the foolish carpenter lifted up his voice, and paying no heed to the saying of the righteous deity, he cried, “Let your honours listen to me!” and addressed all the carpenters in the fifth stanza: “That god, who from the southern quarter clear Cries out, All safe! from him the truth we hear; Fear or fear not, the northern knows no whit: Why grieve, then? take your pleasure—never fear!” On hearing him, the five hundred carpenters who were greedy of good things inclined to the counsel of the foolish carpenter. But then the wise carpenter refused to hearken to his saying, and addressing the carpenters repeated four stanzas : “While these two goblins gainst each other cry, One calling fear, and one security, Come hear my rede, lest soon and out of hand Ye all together perish utterly.

“Let us join all to build a mighty bark, A vessel stout, and place within this ark All fittings: if this southern spoke the truth, And the other said but folly, off the mark “This vessel for us good at need shall be; Nor will we leave this isle incontinent ; But if the northern god spake truthfully, The southern did but foolishness present— [164] Then in the ship we all embark together, . And where our safety lies, all hie us thither. “Take not for best or worst what first you hear ; But whoso lets all pass within the ear, And then deliberating takes the mean, That man to safest harbourage will steer!.” After this, he again said: “Come now, let us follow the words of both the deities. Let us build a ship, and then if the words of the first be true, into that ship we will climb and depart; but if the words of the other be true, we will put the ship out of the way, and dwell here.” When he had thus spoken, said the foolish carpenter: [165] “Go to! you see a crocodile in a teacup! you are too-too slow! The first god spake in anger against us, the second in affection. If we leave this choicest of isles, whither shall we go? But if you needs must go, take your tail with you, and make your ship: we want no ship, we !”

The wise man with those that followed him, built a ship, and put all the fittings aboard, and he and the whole company stood in the ship. Then on the day of the full moon, at the time of moon-rising, up from the ocean a wave arose, and knee-deep it swept over the whole island. The wise man, when he observed the rising of the wave, cast loose the ship. Those of the foolish carpenter’s party, five hundred families they were, sat still, saying to one another, “‘ A wave has arisen, to sweep over the island, but it will be no deeper.” Then the ocean-wave rose waistdeep, man-deep, deep as a palm-tree, as seven palm-trees, and over the whole island it rolled. The wise man, fertile in resource, not snared by greed of good things, departed in safety; but the foolish carpenter, greedy of good things, not regarding the fear of the future, with five hundred families was destroyed. The other three stanzas, full of instruction, illustrating this matter, are stanzas of the Perfect Wisdom : “As through mid-ocean, by the deeds they did, The traders scaped away in happiness : So wise men, comprehending what lies hid Within the future, will no jot transgress.

“Fools in their folly, eaten up with greed Who future dangers do not comprehend, Sink overwhelmed, in face of present need, As these in middest-ocean found their end. 1 This metaphor is not in the Pali. 104 The Jataka. Book XII. [166] “Accomplish then the deed before the need, — Let not lack hurt me of the needful thing. Who timely do the necessary deed é Come time, come never into suffering.” When the Master had ended this discourse, he said : “ Not now for the first time, Brethren, but formerly also, has Devadatta been ensnared by pleasures of the present, and without a look to the future, has come to destruction with all his companions.” So saying, he identified the Birth: “At that time, Devadatta was the foolish carpenter, Kokalika was the unrighteous deity that stood in the southern region, Sariputta was the deity who stood in the northern part, and I was myself the wise carpenter.”

[167] “He that desires,” etc. This story the Master told while dwelling at Jetavana, about a certain brahmin. A brahmin, so they say, who dwelt at Savatthi, was felling trees on the bank of the Aciravati, in order to cultivate the land. The Master perceiving his destiny, when he visited Savatthi for alms, went out of his road to talk sweetly with him. ‘What are you doing, brahmin?” he asked. ‘O Gotama,” said the man, ‘‘I am cutting a space free for cultivation.” “Very good,” he replied, “go on with your work, brahmin.” In the same manner the Master came and talked with him when the felled trunks were all away, and the man was clearing his acre, and again at plowing time, and at making the little embanked squares for water*. Now on the day of sowing, the brahmin said, “To-day, O Gotama, is my plowing festival*. When this corn is ripe, I will give alms in plenty to the Order, with the Buddha at their head.” The Master accepted his offer, and went away. On another day he came, and saw the brahmin watching the corn. “What are you doing, brahmin?” asked he. “Watching the corn, O Gotama !” “Very good, brahmin,” said the Master, and away he went. Then the brahmin thought, “ How often Gotama the ascetic comes this way! Without doubt he wants food. Well, food I will give him.” On the day when this thought came into his mind, when he went home, there he found the Master come also. Thereat arose in the brahmin a wondrous great confidence.

By and bye, when ripe was the corn, the brahmin resolved, to-morrow he would reap the field. But while he lay in bed, in the upper reaches of the Aciravati the rain poured in bucketsful: down came a flood, and carried the whole crop away to the sea, so that not one stalk was left. When the flood 1 See No. 228 (ii. p. 149 of this translation). 2 T.e. his capacity in the spiritual life. ® Refer to the following passage in Veddntaparibhdsha: ‘yatha tadagodakam kulyatmana keddrdn pravicgya tadvadeva catuskonadyakaram bhavati.’ (For this note I am indebted to Prof. Cowell.) See also Sleeman, Rambles cc. ii, 178. 4 There was a great yearly ceremony of this kind, at which the King held the plough; see Hardy’s Manual of Buddhism, p. 150. subsided, and the brahmin beheld the destruction of his crops, he had not the strength to stand: pressing his hand to his heart (for he was overcome with great sorrow) he went weeping home, and lay down lamenting. In the morning the Master saw this brahmin overwhelmed with his woe, and thought he, “I will be the brahmin’s support.” So next day, after his alms-round in Savatthi, on his return from receipt of food he sent the Brethren back to their monastery, and himself with the junior who attended him visited the man’s house. [168] When the brahmin heard of his coming, he took heart, thinking—“My friend must be come for a kindly talk.” He offered him a seat;

the Master entering sat upon the seat indicated, and asked, “Why are you downhearted, brahmin ? what has happened to displease you?” “O Gotama!” said the man, “from the time that I cut down the trees on the bank of the Aciravati, you know what I have been doing. I have been going about, and promising gifts to you when that crop should be ripe: now a flood has carried off the whole crop, away to the sea, nothing is left at all! Grain has been destroyed to the amount of a hundred waggon-loads, and so I am deep in grief !”—“ Why, will what is lost come back for grieving ?”—‘“ No, Gotama, that will it not.”—“If that is so, why grieve? The wealth of beings in this world, or their corn, when they have it, they have it, and when it is gone, why, gone it is. No composite thing but is subject to destruction ; do not brood over it.” Thus comforting him, the Master repeated the Kama! Scripture as appropriate to his case. At the conclusion of the Kama, the mourning brahmin was established in the Fruit of the First Path. The Master having eased him of his pain, arose from his seat, and returned to the monastery.

All the town heard how the Master had found such a brahmin pierced with the pangs of grief, had consoled him and established him in the Fruit of the First Path. The Brethren talked of it in the Hall of Truth: “ Hear, Sirs! The Dasabala made friends with a brahmin, grew intimate, took his opportunity to declare the Law to him, when pierced with the pangs of grief, eased him of pain, established him in the Fruit of the First Path!” The Master came in, and asked, “What speak ye of, Brethren, as ye sit here together?” They told him. He replied, “This is not the first time, Brethren, I have cured his grief, but I did the same long, long ago:” and with these words he told a story of the past. Once upon a time, Brahmadatta king of Benares had two sons. To the elder he gave the viceroyalty, the younger he made commanderin-chief. Afterwards when Brahmadatta was dead, the courtiers were for making the elder son king by the ceremonial sprinkling. But he said, “T care nought for a kingdom: let my younger brother have it.” They begged and besought him, but he would none of it; and the younger was sprinkled to be king. The elder cared not for the viceroyalty, or any such thing; and when they begged him to remain, and feed on the fat of the land, “Nay,” quoth he, “I have nothing to do in this city,” [169] and he departed from Benares. To the frontier he went; and dwelt with a rich merchant’s family, working with his own hands. These after a while, learning that he was a king’s son, would not allow him to work, but waited upon him as a prince should be attended.

Now after a time the king’s officers came to that village, for taking a survey of the fields. Then the merchant came to the prince, and said, 1 Kamasuttam: in Sutta-Nipata, tv. i. (p. 146). See first stanza below. 106 The Jdataka. Book XII, ‘““My lord, we support you; will you send a letter to your younger brother, and procure for us remission of taxes?” To this he agreed, and wrote as follows: ‘I am living with the family of such a merchant ; I pray you remit their taxes for my sake.” The king consented, and so did. Thereupon all the villagers, and the people of the country side, came to him, and said, “Get our taxes remitted, and we will pay taxes to you.” For them too he sent his petition, and got the taxes remitted. After that the people paid their taxes to him. Then his receipts and honour were great ; and with this greatness grew his covetousness also. So by degrees he asked for all the district, he asked for the office of viceroy, and the younger brother gave it all. Then as his greed kept growing, he was not content even with viceroyalty, and determined to seize the kingdom; to which end he set out with a host of people, and taking up a position outside the city, sent a letter to his younger brother—“‘Give me the kingdom, or fight for it.”

The younger brother thought: ‘This fool refused once kingdom, and viceroyalty, and all; and now says he, I will take it by battle! If I slay him in battle, it will be my shame; what care I for being king?” So he sent a message, “I have no wish to fight: you may have the kingdom.” The other accepted it, and made his younger brother viceroy. Thenceforward he ruled the kingdom. But so greedy was he, that one kingdom could not content him, but he craved for two kingdoms, then for three, [170] and yet saw no end to his greed. At that time Sakka, king of the Gods, looked abroad: ‘‘Who are they,” thought he, ‘carefully tend their parents? who give alms and do good? who are in the power of greed?” He perceived that this man was subject to greed: ‘‘ Yon fool,” thought he, ‘‘is not satisfied with being king of Benares. Well, I will teach him a lesson.” So in the guise of a young brahmin, he stood at the door of the palace, and sent in word, that at the door stood a clever young man. He was admitted, and wished victory to the king; then the king said, ‘“‘ Why have you come?” ‘‘Mighty King!” he answered, “I have a thing to say to you, but I desire privacy.” By power of Sakka, at that very instant the people retired. Then said the young man, ‘O great king! I know three cities, prosperous, thronged with men, strong in troops and horses: of these by my own power I will obtain the lordship, and deliver it to you. But you must make no delaying, and go at once.” The king being full of covetise gave his consent. (But by Sakka’s power he was prevented from asking, ‘‘Who are you? whence come? and what are you to receive?”) So much Sakka said, and then returned to the abode of the Thirty-three.

Then the king summoned his courtiers, and thus addressed them’. 1 The quotation of the youth’s words begins at tini. “A youth has been here, promising to capture and give me the lordship of three kingdoms! Go, look for him! Send the drum a-beating about the city, assemble the army, make no delay, for I am about to take three kingdoms!” “O great king!” they said, “did you offer hospitality to the young man, or did you ask where he dwelt?” “No, no, I offered him no hospitality, I did not ask where he dwelt: go, and look for him!” They searched, but found him not; they informed the king, they could not in the whole city find the young man, On hearing this the king became gloomy. “The lordship over three cities is lost,” he thought again and again: ‘‘I am shorn of great glory. Doubtless the young man went away angry with me, that I gave him no money for his expenses, nor a place to dwell in.” [171] Then in his body, full of greed, a burning arose ; as the body burnt, his bowels were moved to a bloody flux; as the food went in, so it came out; physicians could not cure him, the king was exhausted. His illness was bruited abroad all through the city.

At that time, the Bodhisatta had returned to his parents in Benares from Takkasila, after mastering all branches of learning. He hearing the news about the king, proceeded to the palace door, with intent to cure him, and sent in a message, that a young man was there ready to cure the king. The king said, ‘“‘Great and most renowned physicians, known far and near, are not able to cure me: what can a young lad do? Pay his expenses, and let him depart.” The young man made answer, “T want no fee for my physic, but I will cure him; let him simply and solely pay me the price of my remedy.” When the king heard this, he agreed, and admitted him. The young man saluted the king, “‘ Fear nothing, O king!” said he; “I will cure you; do but tell me the origin of yeur disorder.” The king answered in wrath, “What is that to you? make up your medicine.” ‘‘O great king,” quoth he, ‘“it is the way of physicians, first to learn whence the disease arises, then to make a remedy to suit.” ‘ Well, well, my son,” said the king, and proceeded to tell the origin of the disease, beginning where that young man had come, and made his promise, that he would take and give to him the

lordship over three cities, “Thus, my son, the disease arose from greed ; now cure it if you can.” ‘What, O king!” quoth he, “can you capture those cities by grieving?”—‘‘ Why no, my son.”—‘Since that is s0, why grieve, O great king? Every thing, animate or inanimate, must pass away, and leave all behind, even its own body. [172] Even should you obtain rule over four cities, you could not at one time eat four plates of food, recline on four couches, wear four sets of robes. You ought not to be the slave of desire ; for desire, when it increases, allows no release from the four states of suffering.” Thus having admonished him, the Great Being declared the Law in the following stanzas : 108 The Jataka. Book XII. “He that desires a thing, and then this his desire fulfilment blesses, Sure a glad-hearted man is he, because his wish he now possesses’. “He that desires a thing, and then this his desire fulfilment blesses, Desires throng on him more and more, as thirst in time of heat oppresses. “Ag in the hornéd kine, the horn with their growth larger grows : So, in a foolish undiscerning man, that nothing knows, ; While grows the man, the more and more grows thirst, and craving grows

“Give all the rice and corn on earth, slave-men, and kine, and horse, Tis not enough for one: this know, and keep a righteous course. “A king that should subdue the whole world wide, The whole wide world up to the ocean bound, With this side of the sea unsatisfied Would crave what might beyond the sea be found. “Brood on desires within the heart—content will ne’er arise. Who turns from these, and the true cure descries, He is content, whom wisdom satisfies. “Best to be full of wisdom: these no lust can set afire ; Never the man with wisdom filled is slave unto desire. “Crush your desires, and little want, not greedy all to win: He that is like the sea is not burnt by desire within, But like a cobbler, cuts the shoe according to the skin. [173] “For each desire that is let go a happiness is won: He that all happiness would have, must with all lust have done.” [174] But as the Bodhisatta was repeating these stanzas, his mind being concentrated on the king’s white sunshade, there arose in him the mystic rapture attained through white light®. The king on his part became whole and well; he arose in joy from his seat, and addressed him thus: ‘“ When all those physicians could not heal me, a wise youth has made me whole by the medicine of his wisdom!” And he then repeated the tenth stanza :

[175] “Eight? verses have you uttered, worth a thousand pieces each: Take, O great brahmin! take the sum, for sweet is this your speech.” ’ At which the Great Being repeated the eleventh : “For thousands, hundreds, million times a million‘, nought care I: As the last verse I uttered, in my heart desire did die.” More and yet more delighted, the king recited the last stanza in praise of the Great Being: “Wise and good is indeed this youth, all the lore of all worlds knowing: All desire in very truth is mother of misery by his showing.” 1 Sutta-Nipdta, tv. 1 (p. 146), verse 766. » This is one of the ten kinds of Kasina, or ways in which the devotee may fall into the mystic trance. See Childers, s.v. ’ «Beginning with the second, those which explain the misery of desire are eight,’ quoth the Scholiast. The first stanza, it will be remembered, is a quotation from Sutta-Nipdta, and possibly may have been added later. 4 The number nahutam is 1 followed by 28 ciphers. “Great king!” said the Bodhisatta, “be circumspect, and walk in righteousness.” Thus admonishing the king, he passed through the air to Himalaya, and living the life of a recluse, while life lasted, cultivated the Excellences, and became destined for the world of Brahma.

This discourse ended, the Master said, “Thus, Brethren, in former days as now, I made this brahmin whole :” so saying, he identified the Birth : “At that time this brahmin was the king, and I was the wise young man.”

[176] “Thus spake,” ete. This story the Master told while dwelling at Jetavana, for the instruction of the King of Kosala. At one time, they say the king, intoxicated with power, and devoted to the pleasures of sin, held no court of justice, and grew remiss in attending upon the Buddha. One day he remembered the Dasabala; thought he, “I must visit him.” So after breaking his fast, he ascended his magnificent chariot, and proceeding to the monastery, greeted him and took a seat. “ How is it, great King,” asked the Bodhisatta, “that you have not showed yourself for so long ?” “QO, sir,” replied the king, “I have been so busy, that there has been no opportunity of waiting upon you.” “Great King,” quoth he, “not meet is it to neglect such as I am, who can give admonition, Supreme Buddhas, dwelling too in a monastery in front. A king ought to rule vigilant in all kingly duties, to his subjects like mother or father, forsaking all evil courses, never omitting the ten virtues of a king. When a king is righteous, those who surround him are righteous also. No marvel were it, in truth, if under my instruction you were to rule in righteousness; but wise men of old, even when there was no teacher to instruct them, by their own understanding established in the threefold practice of well-doing, declared the Law to a great multitude of people, and with all their attendants went to swell the hosts of heaven.” With these words, at his request, the Master told a story of the past.

Once upon a time, when Brahmadatta was king in Benares, the Bodhisatta was born as son of his Queen Consort. They gave him the name of Prince Janasandha. Now when he came of age, and had returned from Takkasila, where he had been educated in all accomplishments, the king gave a general pardon to all prisoners, and gave him the viceroyalty. Afterwards when his father died, he became king, and then he caused to be built six almonries: at the four gates of the city, in the 110 The Jataka. Book XII. midst of it, and at the palace gate. There day by day he used to distribute six hundred thousand pieces of money, and stirred up all India with his almsgiving: the prison doors he opened for good and all, the places of execution he destroyed, all the world he protected with the four sorts of beneficence', [177] he kept the five virtues, observed the holy fast-day, and ruled in righteousness. From time to time he would gather together his subjects, and declare the Law to them: “Give alms, practise virtue, righteously follow your business and calling, educate yourselves in the days of your youth, gain wealth, do not behave like a village cheat or a dog, be not harsh nor cruel, do your duty in caring for mother and for father, in family life honour your elders.” Thus he confirmed multitudes of people in good living.

Once on the holy day, fifteenth of the fortnight, having undertaken to keep the holy day, he thought to himself, ‘I will declare the Law to the multitudes, for the continual increase of good and blessing to them, and to make them vigilant in their life.” Then he caused the drum to beat, and beginning with the women of his own household, gathered together all the people of the city. In the courtyard of his palace he sat, on a splendid couch set apart, beneath a pavilion adorned with jewels, and declared the Law in these words: “‘O people of the city! to you I will declare the practices that will cause you suffering, and those which will not. Be vigilant, and hear with care and attention.” The Master opened his mouth, a precious jewel among mouths, full of truth, and with a voice sweet as honey explained this address of the king of Kosala : “Thus spake King Janasandha: Ten things in truth there be, Which if a man omit to do, he suffers presently. “Not to have got nor gathered store in time, the heart torments; To think he sought no wealth before he afterwards repents. “How hard is life for men untaught! he thinks, repenting sore That learning, which he now might use, he would not learn before.

“A slanderer once, dishonest once, a backbiter unkind, Cruel, and harsh was I: good cause for sorrow now I find. [178] “A slayer was I, merciless, and to no creature gave, Contemptible: for this (quoth he) much sorrow now I have. ‘“When I had many wives (thinks he) to whom I owed their due, I left them for another’s wife; which now I dearly rue. “When plenteous store of food and drink there was, he sorrows sore, To think he never gave a gift in the old time before. “He grieves to think that when he could, he would not care and tend Mother and father, now grown old, their youth now at an end2. 1 Liberality, Affability, Impartiality, Good Rule. > Compare Sutta-Nipdta, 98, 124. “To have slighted teacher, monitor, or father, who would try To gratify his every wish, causes deep misery. “To have treated brahmins with neglect, ascetics many a one Holy, and learned, in the past, makes him repent anon. “Sweet is austerity performed, a good man honoured well: That he did no such thing before ’tis sad to have to tell. “Who these ten things in wisdom brings to full accomplishment, And to all men his duty does, will never need repent.”

[180] Thus twice in the month did the Great Being discourse in the same way to the multitude. And the multitude, established in his admonition, fulfilled these ten things, and became destined for heaven. When the Master had ended this discourse, he said, “Thus, O great king, wise men of old, untaught and from their own intelligence, declared the Law, and established multitudes in the way to heaven.” With these words, he identified the Birth: “At that time the Buddha’s followers were the people, and I was myself King Janasandha.”

“A black, black hound,’ etc. This story the Master told while dwelling at Jetavana, about living for the benefit of the world. One day, they say, the Brethren as they sat in the Hall of ‘Truth, were talking together. “Sirs,” one would say, “the Master, ever practising friendship towards the multitudes of the people, has forsaken an agreeable abode, and lives just for the good of the world. He has attained supreme wisdom, yet of his own accord takes bowl and robe, and goes on a journey of eighteen leagues or more. For the Five Elders! he set a-rolling the Wheel of the Law; on the fifth day of the half-month he recited the Anattalakkhana Scriptures, and bestowed sainthood upon them all; he went to Uruvela’, and to the ascetics with matted hair he showed miracles three thousand and half a thousand, and persuaded them to join the Order; at Gayasisa’ he recited the Discourse upon Fire, and bestowed sainthood upon a thousand of these ascetics ; 1 The five who accompanied Buddha when he began his life as an ascetic: Afiinakondaiifia, Bhaddiya, Vappa, Assaji, Mahanama. See Hardy, Manual, p. 165. ‘2 Hardy, p. 188. He there preached to the fire-worshippers.

3 Now Brahmayoni, a mountain near Gaya. See Hardy, p. 191. Le The Jataka. Book XII. to Mahakassapa1, when he had gone forward three miles to meet him, after three discourses he gave the higher Orders; all alone, after the noon-day meal, he went a journey of forty-five leagues, and then established in the Fruit of the Third Path Pukkusa (a youth of very good birth); to meet Mahakappina? he went forward a space of two thousand leagues, and bestowed sainthood upon him; alone, in the afternoon he went a journey of thirty leagues, and established in sainthood that cruel and harsh man Angulimala?; thirty leagues also he traversed, and established Alavaka? in the Fruit of the First Path, and saved the prince; in the Heaven of the Thirty-Three he dwelt three months, and taught full comprehension of the Law to eight hundred millions of deities?; to Brahma’s world he went, and destroyed the false doctrine of Baka Brahma‘, and bestowed sainthood on ten thousand Brahmas; every year he goes on pilgrimage in three districts, and to such men as are capable of receiving, he gives the Refuges, the Virtues, and the fruits of the different stages; [181] he even acts for the good of snakes and garula birds and the like, in many ways.” In such words they praised the goodness and worth of the Dasabala’s life for the good of the world. The Master came in, and asked what they talked of as they sat there? They told him. ‘And no wonder, Brethren,” said he. “TI who now in my perfect wisdom would live for the world’s good, even I in the past, in the days of passion, lived for the good of the world.” So saying, he told a story of the past.

Once upon a time, in the days of the Supreme Buddha Kassapa, there reigned a king named Usinara. It was a long time after the Supreme Buddha Kassapa had declared the Four Truths, and liberated multitudes of people from bondage, and had been translated to swell the number of those who dwell in Nirvana; and the religion had fallen into decay. The Brethren gained their livelihood in the twenty-one unlawful ways°; they associated with the Sisters, and sons and daughters were born to them; Brethren forsook the duties of the Brotherhood, and Sisters forsook the duties of Sisters, lay Brethren and Sisters the duties of such, brahmins did no longer the duties of a brahmin: men for the most part followed the ten paths of evil-doing, and as they died thus filled the hosts of all states of suffering. Then Sakka, observing that no new deities came into being, looked abroad upon the world; and then he perceived how men were born into states of suffering, and that the religion of the Buddha had decayed. ‘“What shall I do, now?” he wondered.—‘Ah, T have it!” thought he: “T will scare and terrify mankind ; and when I see they are terrified,

1 See J. P. T. S. 1888, p. 67. 2 Hardy, p. 249. 3 This was a tree-demon, who claimed sacrifice of one victim every day. The King’s own son was to be eaten, when Buddha saved him. Hardy, p. 261. 4 Hardy, p. 298. > The beings who dwelt in the three worlds of Brahma were called ‘brahma. The story alluded to here is given in No, 405 (iii. 219 of this translation); Hardy, Manual, p. 336. 6 Cp. ii. p. 57 of this translation. IT will console them, I will declare the Law, I will restore religion which has decayed, I will make it last for another thousand years!” With this resolve, he made the god Matali’ into the shape of a huge black hound, of pure breed, having four tusks as big as a plantain, horrible, with a hideous shape and a fat belly, as of a woman ready to be delivered of a child ; him fastening with five-fold chain, [182] and putting on him a red wreath, he led by a cord. Himself he put on a pair of yellow garments, and bound his hair behind his head, and donned a red wreath; taking a huge bow, fitted with bowstring of the colour of coral, and twirling in his fingers a javelin tipt with adamant, he assumed the aspect of a forester, and descended at a spot one league away from the city. ‘The world is doomed to destruction, is doomed to destruction !” he called out thrice with a loud sound, so that he terrified the people;

aud when he reached the entering in of the city, he repeated the cry. The people on seeing the hound were frightened, and hasted into the city, and told the king what had happened. The king speedily caused the city gates to be closed. But Sakka overleapt the wall, eighteen cubits in height, and with his hound stood within the city. The people in terror ran away into the houses, and made the doors fast. Big Blackie gave chase to every man he saw, and scared them, and finally entered into the king’s palace. The people who in their fright had taken refuge in the courtyard, ran into the palace, and shut to the door. And as for the king, he with the ladies of his household went up on the terrace. Big Blackie raised his forefeet, and putting them in at the window roared a great roar! The sound of his roaring reached from hell to the highest heaven: the whole universe was one great roar. The three great roars that were the loudest ever heard in India are these: the cry of king Punnaka in the Punnaka’ Birth, the cry of the snake-king Sudassana in the Bhiridatta Birth*®, and this roar in the Maha-Kanha Birth, or the story of Big Blackie*. The people were terrified and horrified, and not a man of them could say a word to Sakka.

The king plucked up heart, and approaching the window, cried out to Sakka—“ Ho, huntsman! [183] why did your hound roar?” Quoth he, “The hound is hungry.” ‘“ Well,” said the king, ‘‘I will order some food to be given him.” So he told them to give him his own food, and the food of all his household. The hound seemed to make but one mouthful of the whole, then roared again. Again the king put his question. “My hound is still hungry,” was the reply. Then he had all the food of 2 No such title occurs in this collection. 3 No. 548 (vi. 157). 4 Four sounds are given as proverbial by Hardy, Manual, p. 263; two of which are the first and third of these. ee! The Jataka. Book XII. his elephants and horses and so forth brought and given to him. This also he finished off all at once; and then the king had all the food in the city given him. He swallowed this in like manner, and roared again. Said the king, “This is no hound. Beyond all doubt he is a goblin. I will ask him wherefore he is come.” So‘terrified with fear, he asked his question by repeating the first stanza :

“A black, black hound, with five cords bound, with fangs all white of hue, Majestic, awful—mighty one! what makes he here with you?” On hearing this, Sakka repeated the second stanza : “Not to hunt game the Black Hound came, but he shall be of use To punish men, Usinara, when I shall let him loose.” Then said the king, ‘‘ What, huntsman! will the hound devour the flesh of all men, [184] or of your enemies only?” ‘Only my enemies, great king.” “And who are your enemies?” ‘Those, O king, who love unrighteousness, and walk wickedly.” “Describe them to us,” he asked. And the king of the gods described them in the stanzas : “When the false Brethren, bowl in hand, in one robe clad, shall choose Tonsured the plough to follow, then the Black Hound I will loose. “When Sisters of the Order shall in single robe be found, Tonsured, yet walking in the world, I will let loose the Hound. “What time ascetics, usurers, protruding the upper lip, Foul-toothed and filthy-haired shall be—the Black Hound I'll let slip. “When brahmins, skilled in sacred books and holy rites, shall use Their skill to sacrifice for pelf, the Black Hound shall go loose.

“Whoso his parents now grown old, their youth now come to an end, Would not maintain, although he might}, gainst him the Hound Ill send. “Who to his parents now grown old, their youth now come to an end, Cries, Fools are ye! gainst such as he the Black Hound I will send. “When men go after others’ wives, of teacher, or of friend, Sister of father, uncle’s wife, the Black Hound I will send. “When shield on shoulder, sword in hand, full-armed as highway men They take the road to kill and rob, [’ll loose the Black Hound then. “When widows’ sons, with skin groomed white, in skill all useless found, Strong-armed, shall quarrel and shall fight, then I will loose the Hound. ‘When men with hearts of evil full, false and deceitful men, Walk in and out the world about, ’ll loose the Black Hound then.” [186] When he had thus spoken, “These,” said he, “are my enemies, O king!” and he made as though he would let the hound leap forth and devour all those who did the deeds of enemies, But as all the multitude was terror-struck, he held in the hound by the leash, and seemed as

' Thus far the two verses occur in Sutta-Nipdta, 98 and 124. it were to fix him to the spot; then putting off the disguise of a hunter, by his power he rose and poised himself in the air, all blazing as it appeared, and said: “O great king, I am Sakka king of the gods! Seeing that the world was about to be destroyed, I came hither. Now indeed men as they die are filling the states of suffering, because their deeds are evil, and heaven is become empty. From henceforth I will know how to deal with the wicked, but do you be vigilant.” Then having in four stanzas well worth remembering declared the Law, and established the people in the virtues of liberality, he strengthened the waning power of religion so that it lasted for yet another thousand years, and then with Matali returned to his own place. When the Master had ended this discourse, he added: “Thus, Brethren, in former times as now I have lived for the good of the world ;” and then he identified the Birth ; “At that time Ananda was Matali, and I was Sakka.”

The Kosiya Birth will be given under the Sudhabhojana Birth',

MENDAKA-JATAKA, The Problem of Mendaka will be given under the Ummagga Birth?. 1 No. 535, vol. v, p. 382 (Pali). 2 No. 546, vol. vi, p. 329 (Pali). 116 The Jataka. Book XII.

[187] “Wo king should,” etc. This story the Master told while dwelling in Jetavana, about Cificamanavika?. When the Dasabala first attained supreme wisdom, after disciples had multiplied, and innumerable gods and men had been born into heavenly states, and the seeds of goodness had been cast abroad, great honour was shown him, and great gifts given. The heretics were like fireflies after sunrise ; no honours and no gifts had they; in the street they stood, and cried out to the people, “What, is the ascetic Gotama the Buddha? We are Buddhas also! Does that gift only bring great fruit, which is given to him? That which is given to us also has great fruit for you! Give to us also, work for us!” But ery as they would, no honour nor gifts they got. Then they came together in secret, and consulted : “ How can we cast a stain upon Gotama the ascetic in the face of men, and put an end to his honour and his gifts ?” Now there was at that time in Savatthi a certain Sister, named Cincamanayika ; passing fair she was, full of all grace, a very sylph ; rays of brilliancy shone forth from her body. Some one uttered a counsel of cruelty thus: “ By the help of Cifitcamanavika we will cast a stain upon the ascetic Gotama, and put an end to his honour and the gifts he receives.” ‘‘ Yes,” they all agreed, “that is the way to do it.”

She came to the monastery of the heretics, and greeted them, and stood still. The heretics said nothing to her. She said, “What blemish is there in me? Three times I have greeted you!” She said again, “Sirs, what blemish is in me? why do you not speak to me?” They replied, “ Know you not, Sister, that Gotama the ascetic is going about and doing us harm, cutting off all the honour and liberality that was shown us?”—“T did not know it, Sirs ; but what can I do?”—“If you wish us well, Sister, by your own doing bring a stain upon the ascetic Gotama, and put an end to his honour and the gifts he receives.” She replied, “‘ Very good, Sirs, leave that to me; do not trouble about it.” With these words she departed. After that, she used all a woman’s skill in deceit. When the people of Savatthi had heard the Law, and were coming away from Jetavana, she used to go towards Jetavana, clad in a robe dyed with cochineal, and with fragrant garlands in her hands. [188] When any one asked her, ‘‘ Whither away at this hour?” she would reply “What have you to do with my goings and comings ?” She spent the night in the heretics’ monastery, which was close by Jetavana : and when early in the morning, the lay associates of the order came forth from the city to pay their morning salutation, she would meet them as though she had spent the night in Jetavana, going towards the city.

If any one asked where she had stayed, she would answer, “What are my stayings and lodgings to you?” But after some six weeks, she replied, “I spent the night in Jetavana, with Gotama the ascetic, in one fragrant cell.” Then the unconverted began to wonder, could this be true, or not. After three or four months, she bound bandages about her belly, and made it appear as though she were with child, and wrapt a red robe around her. Then she declared that she was with child by the ascetic Gotama, and made blind fools believe. After eight or nine months, she fastened about her pieces of wood in a bundle, and over all her

The introductory story, with a brief abstract of the other, is given in Dhammapada, p. 238 ff. * Who falsely accused the Buddha of incontinence: Hardy, Manual, p. 275. red robe; hands, feet, and back she caused to be beaten with the jawbone of an ox, So as to produce swellings ; and made as though all her senses were wearied. One evening, when the Tathagata was sitting on the splendid seat of preaching, and was preaching the Law, she went among the congregation, and standing in front of the Tathagata, said—“O great ascetic! You preach indeed to great multitudes ; sweet is your voice, and soft is the lip that covers your teeth; but you have got me with child, and my time is near; yet you assign me no chamber for the childbirth, you give me no ghee nor oil ; what you will not do yourself, you do not ask another of the lay associates to do, the king of Kosala, or Anathapindika, or Visakha the great lay Sister. Why do you not tell one of them to do what is to be done for me? You know how to take your pleasure, but you do not know how to care for that which shall be born!” So she reviled the Tathagata in the midst of the congregation, as one might try to besmirch the moon’s face with a handful of filth. The Tathagata stopt his discourse, and crying like a lion in clarion tones, he said, “Sister, whether that which you have said be true or false, you know and I know only.” “Yes, truly,” said she, “this happened through something that you and I only know of.”

Just at that moment, Sakka’s throne became hot. Reflecting, he perceived the reason: “Cincamanavika is accusing the Tathagata of what is not true.” Determined to clear up this matter, he came thither with four gods in his company. The gods took on them the shape of mice, [189] and all at once gnawed through the cords that bound the bundle of wood : a wind-puff blew up the robe she wore, and the bundle of wood was disclosed and fell at her feet: the toes of both her feet were cut off’. The people cried out—“A witch is accusing the Supreme Buddha!” They spat on her head, and drove her forth from Jetavana with staves and clods in their hands. And as she passed beyond the range of the Tathagata’s vision, the great earth yawned and showed a huge cleft, flames came up from the lowest hell, and she, enveloped in it as it were with a garment? which her friends should wrap about her, fell to the lowest hell and there was born again. The honour and receipts of the other heretics ceased, those of the Dasabala grew more abundantly. Next day they were conversing in the Hall of Truth: “ Brother, Cificamanavika falsely accused the Supreme Buddha, great in virtue, worthy of all gifts! and she came to dire destruction.” The Master entered, and asked what they talked of, sitting there together. They told him. Said he, “ Not now only, Brethren, has this woman falsely accused me, and come to dire destruction, but it was the same before.” So saying, he told a story of the past.

Once upon a time*, when Brahmadatta was king of Benares, the Bodhisatta was born as the son of his chief queen; and for that his all-blessed countenance was like to a lotus full-blown, Paduma-Kumara they named him, which is to say, the Lotus Prince. When he grew 1 That this is the meaning is clear from the passive in the Dhammapada version, chijjimsu, p. 340. 2 The meaning of this phrase is doubtful: in vol. ii. pp. 28 and 120, it is rendered ‘royal woollen garment’: it may mean ‘wedding-garment’ given to the bride by the bridegroom’s friends (Grierson’s Bihar Peasant Life, § 1322). 3 This theme, which resembles the story of Joseph and the wife of Potiphar, or Phaedra and Hippolytus, is common in various forms in India. One example is the Legend of Puran Mal (MS. written by Rim Gharib Sharma, Chaturvaidya, and collected by Mr W. Crooke). Another is the Legend of Rup and Basant, or Sit and Basant (MS.). In both of these the Queen falls in love with her step-son. 118 The Jataka. Book XII. up he was educated in all arts and accomplishments. Then his mother departed this life; the king took another consort, and appointed his son viceroy.

After this the king, being about to set forth to quell a rising on the frontier, said to his consort, ‘Do you, lady, stay here, while I go forth to quell the frontier insurrection.” But she replied, “No, my lord, here I will not remain, but I will go with you.” Then he showed her the danger which lay on the field of battle, adding to it this: “Stay then here without vexation until my return, and I will give charge to Prince Paduma, that he be careful in all that should be done for you, and then I will go.” So thus he did, and departed. When he had scattered his enemies, and pacified the country, he returned, and pitched his camp without the city. The Bodhisatta learning of his father’s return, [190] adorned the city, and setting a watch over the royal palace, went forth alone to meet his father. The Queen observing the beauty of his appearance, became enamoured of him. In taking leave of her, the Bodhisatta said, “Can I do anything for you, mother?” “Mother, do you call me?” quoth she. She rose up and seized his hands, saying, “Lie on my couch!” “Why?” heasked. “Just until the king comes,” she said, “let us both enjoy the bliss of love!” ‘ Mother, my mother you are, and you have a husband living. Such a thing was never before heard of, that a woman, a matron, should break the moral law in the way of fleshly lust.

How can I do such a deed of pollution with you?” Twice and thrice she besought him, and when he would not, said she, ‘‘Then you refuse to do as I ask?”—‘‘Indeed I do refuse.” —‘‘ Then I will speak to the king, and cause you to be beheaded.” “Do as you will,” answered the Great Being; and he left her ashamed. Then in great terror she thought: ‘‘If he tell the king first, there is no life for me! I must get speech of him first myself.” Accordingly leaving her food untouched she donned a soiled robe’, and made nailscratches upon her body ; giving orders to her attendants, that what time the king should ask of the queen’s whereabouts, he should be told she was ill, she lay down making a pretence of illness.

Now the king made solemn procession about the city right-wise, and went up into his dwelling. When he saw her not, he asked, “ Where is the queen?” “She is ill,” they said. He entered the state chamber, and asked her, ‘What is amiss with you, lady?” She made as though she heard nothing. Twice and yet thrice he asked, and then she answered, “O great king, why do you ask? Be silent: women that have a husband must be even as Tam.” ‘Who has annoyed you?” said he. [191] “Tell me quickly, and I will have him beheaded.”—“ Whom did you leave be- | hind you in this city, when you went away ?”—‘*‘ Prince Paduma,” ‘And he,” she went on, “came into my room, and I said, My son, do not so, I am your mother: but say what I would, he cried, None is king here but I, and I will take you to my dwelling, and enjoy your love; then he seized me by the hair of my head, and plucked it out again and again, and as I would not yield to his will, he wounded and beat me, and departed.” The king made no investigation, but furious as a serpent, commanded his men, ‘“‘Go and bind Prince Paduma, and bring him to me!” They went to his house, swarming as it were through the city, and bound him and beat him, bound his hands fast behind his back, put about his neck the garland of red flowers’, making him a condemned criminal, and led him thither, beating him the while.

It was clear to him that this was the queen’s doing, and as he went along he cried out, “Ho fellows, I am not one that has offended against the king! I am innocent.” All the city was a-bubble with the news: “They say the king is going to execute Prince Paduma at the bidding of a woman!” They flocked together, they fell at the prince’s feet, lamenting with a great noise, ‘““'You have not deserved this, my lord !”

At last they brought him before the king. At sight of him, the king could not restrain what was in his heart, and cried out, ‘‘This fellow is no king, but he plays the king finely! My son he is, yet he has insulted the queen. Away with him, down with him over the thieves’ cliff, make an end of him!” But the prince said to his father, ‘‘ No such crime lies at my door, father. Do not kill me on a woman’s word.” The king would not listen to him. Then all those of the royal seraglio, in number sixteen thousand, raised a great lamentation, saying, ‘‘ Dear Paduma, mighty Prince, this dealing you have never deserved!” [192] And all the warrior chiefs and great magnates of the land, and all the attendant courtiers cried, “ My lord! the prince is a man of goodness and virtuous life, observes the traditions of his race, heir to the kingdom! Do not slay him at a woman’s word, without a hearing! A king’s duty it is to act with all circumspection.” So saying, they repeated seven stanzas : “No king should punish an offence, and hear no pleas at all, Not throughly sifting it himself in all points, great and small?

“The warrior chief who punishes a fault before he tries, Is like a man born blind, who eats his food all bones and flies. “Who punishes the guiltless, and lets go the guilty, knows No more than one who blind upon a rugged highway goes. 1 This was the vajjhamdla, put on the head or neck of a criminal condemned to death. In the Toy Cart, Act x, one being led forth to execution wears a wreath of Karavira flowers. The Pali has Kanavera, which is not known as a flower: this may be a corrupt form of the Sanskrit word. 2 These lines occur in Dhammapada, p. 341. 120 The Jataka. Book XII. “He who all this examines well, in things both great and small, And so administers, deserves to be the head of all. “He that would set himself on high must not all-gentle be Nor all-severe: but both these things practise in company. “Contempt the all-gentle wins, and he that’s all-severe, has wrath : So of the pair be well aware, and keep a middle path. “Much can the angry man, O king, and much the knave can say: And therefore for a woman’s sake thy son thou must not slay.”

[193] But for all they could say in many ways the courtiers could not win him to do their bidding. The Bodhisatta also, for all his beseeching, could not persuade him to listen: nay, the king said, blind fool—“ Away ! down with him over the thieves’ cliff!” repeating the eighth stanza : “One side the whole world stands, my queen on the other all alone ; Yet her I cleave to: cast him down the cliff, and get you gone!” At these words, not one among the sixteen thousand women could remain unmoved, while all the populace stretched out their hands, and tore their hair, with lamentations. The king said, [194] “Let these but try to prevent the throwing of this fellow over the cliff!” and amidst his followers, though the crowd wailed around, he caused the prince to be seized, and cast down the precipice over heels head-first. Then the deity that dwelt in the hill, by power of his own kindliness, comforted the prince, saying, ‘“‘ Fear not, Paduma!” and in both hands he caught him, pressed him to his heart, sent a divine thrill through him, set him in the abode of the serpents of the eight ranges’, within the hood of the king of the serpents. The serpent king received the Bodhisatta into the abode of the serpents, and gave him the half of his own glory and state. There for one year he dwelt. Then he said, “I would go back to the ways of men.” ‘‘ Whither?” they asked. ‘To Himalaya, where I will live a religious life.” The serpent king gave his consent; taking him, he conveyed him to the place where men go to and fro, and gave him the requisites of the religious, and went back to his own place.

So he proceeded to Himalaya, and embraced the religious life, and cultivated the faculty of ecstatic bliss; there he abode, feeding upon fruits and roots of the woodland. Now a certain wood-ranger, who dwelt in Benares, came to that place, and recognised the Great Being. ‘Are you not,” he asked, “the great Prince Paduma, my lord?” ‘Yes, Sir,” he replied. The other saluted him, and there for some days he remained. Then he returned to Benares, and said to the king; “ Your son, my lord, has embraced the religious life in the region of Himalaya, and lives in a hut of leaves. I have been staying with him, and thence I come.” ‘“ Have you seen him with your 1 See Wilson’s Vishnu Purana, ii. p. 123. own eyes?” asked the king. ‘Yes, my lord.” The king with a great host went thither, and on the outskirts of the forest he pitched his camp ; then with his courtiers around him, went to salute the Great Being, who sat at the door of his hut of leaves, in all the glory of his golden form, and sat on one side; the courtiers also greeted him, and spoke pleasantly to him, and sat on one side. The Bodhisatta on his part invited the king to share his wild fruits, and talked pleasantly with him. Then said the king, ‘‘ My son, [195] by me you were cast down a deep precipice, and how is it you are yet alive?” Asking which, he repeated the ninth stanza :

“As into hell-mouth, you were cast over a beetling hill, No succour—many palm-trees deep: how are you living still?” These are the remaining stanzas, and of the five, taken alternately, three were spoken by the Bodhisatta, and two by the king. “A Serpent mighty, full of force, born on that mountain land, Caught me within his coils; and so here safe from death I stand.” “Lo! I will take you back, O prince, to my own home again: And there—what is the wood to you?—with blessing you shall reign.” “As who a hook has swallowéd, and draws it forth all blood, Drawn forth, is happy: so I see in me this bliss and good.” “Why speak you thus about a hook, why speak you thus of gore, Why speak about the drawing out? come tell me, I implore.” “Lust is the hook: fine elephants and horse by blood I show ; These by renouncing I have drawn; this, chieftain, you must know.” [196] “Thus, O great king, to be king is nothing to me; but do you see to it, that you break not the Ten Royal Virtues, but forsake evildoing, and rule in righteousness.” In those words the Great Being admonished the king. He with weeping and wailing departed, and on the way to his city he asked his courtiers: “On whose account was it that I made a breach with a son so virtuous?” they replied, ‘The

queen’s.” Her the king caused to be seized, and cast headlong over the thieves’ cliff, and entering his city ruled in righteousness. When the Master had ended this discourse, he said, “Thus, Brethren, this woman maligned me in days of yore, and came to dire destruction ;” and then identified the Birth by repeating the last stanza : “Lady Ciic&é was my mother, Devadatta was my father, I was then the Prince their son: Sariputta was the spirit, And the good snake, I declare it, Was Ananda. I have done.” 122, The Jataka. Book XII.

“How should the wise,” etec.—This story the Master told while dwelling in Jetavana, about an upright courtier of the king of Kosala. This man, they say, was most useful to the king, and then the king bestowed on him great honour. The other courtiers being unable to stomach him, accused him to the king of having done things to the king’s hurt. The king made enquiry about him, and finding in him no fault, thought, “I see no fault in the man; how can I know whether he be my friend or foe?” Then he thought, “No one, save the Tathagata, [197] will be able to decide this question ; I will go and ask him.” So after he had broken his fast he visited the Master, and said, “ How can one tell, Sir, of any man, whether he be friend or foe?” Then the Master replied, ‘‘Wise men of old, O king, have pondered this problem, and have questioned the wise about it, and following their advice, have discovered the truth, and renouncing their enemies have paid attention to their friends.” This said, at his request, he told a story of the past. Once upon a time, when Brahmadatta was king of Benares, the Bodhisatta was a courtier who advised him on things spiritual and things temporal. At that time, the rest slandered a certain courtier who was upright. The king seeing no fault in him, asked the Great Being, ‘¢ Now in what can one tell friend or foe?” repeating the first stanza:

“How should the wise and prudent strive, how may discernment know, What deeds declare to eye or ear the man that is a foe?” Then the Great Being repeated these five stanzas to explain the marks of an enemy : “He smiles not when you see him, no welcome will he show, He will not turn his eyes that way, and answers you with No.! “Your enemies he honours, he cares not for your friends, Those who would praise your worth, he stays, your slanderers commends. “No secret tells he to you, your secret he betrays, Speaks never well of what you do, your wisdom will not praise. “He joys not at your welfare, but at your evil fame: Should he receive some dainty, he thinks not of your name, Nor pities you, nor cries aloud—O, had my friend the same ! “These are the sixteen tokens by which a foe you see These if a wise man sees or hears he knows his enemy?.” [198] “How should the wise and prudent strive, what will discernment lend What deeds declare to eye and ear the man that is a friend?” ‘ 1 This couplet has occurred already in vol. ii. p. 92, of the translation. ? This also occurs above, vol. ii. p. 92, of this translation (two words differ).

The other, thus questioned in these lines, recited the remaining stanzas : “The absent he remembers; returned, he will rejoice : Then in the height of his delight he greets you with his voice. “Your foes he never honours, he loves to serve your friends, Those who would slander you, he stays; who praise you, he commends. “He tells his secrets to you, your secret ne’er betrays, Speaks ever well of all you do, your wisdom loves to praise. “He joys to hear your welfare, not in your evil fame: Should he receive some dainty, he straight thinks on your name, And pities you, and cries aloud—O had my friend the same! “These are the sixteen tokens in friends established well, Which if a wise man sees or hears he can a true friend tell.” [199] The king, delighted at the speech of the Great Being, gave him the highest honour. The Master, having ended this discourse, said, “Thus, great king, this question arose in days of yore, even as now, and wise men said their say ; by these two-and-thirty signs may friend or foe be known.” With those words, he identified the Birth: “ At that time, Ananda was the king, and I myself was the wise courtier.”

[200] “Young student, when,” etc. This story the Master told while dwelling in Jetavana, about Devadatta. Devadatta repudiated his teacher, saying, “I will be Buddha myself, and Gotama the ascetic is no teacher or monitor of mine!” So, aroused from his mystic meditation, he made a breach in the Order. Then step by step he proceeded to Savatthi, and outside Jetavana, the earth yawned, and he went down into the hell Avici. Then they were all talking of it in the Hall of Truth:—‘ Brother, Devadatta deserted his Teacher, and came to dire destruction, being born to another life in the deep hell Avici!” The Master, entering, asked what they spoke of, and they told him. Said he,—‘* Not now only, but in former days, as now, Devadatta deserted his teacher, and came to dire destruction.” So saying, he told a story of the past. Once upon a time, when Brahmadatta was King of Benares, his chaplain’s family was destroyed by malarial fever’. One son only broke through the wall’ and escaped. He came to Takkasilaé, and under a world-renowned teacher, learnt all the arts and accomplishments. Then he bade his teacher farewell, and departed, with the intent to travel in different regions; and on his travels he arrived at a frontier village. Near to this was a great village of low-caste Candalas. Then the Bodhisatta abode in this village, a learned sage. A charm he knew which could make fruit to be gathered out of due season. Early of a morning he would take his carrying pole, forth from that village he would go, until he reached a mango tree which grew in the forest; and standing seven foot off, he would recite that charm, [201] and throw a handful of water so as to strike on that tree. In a twinkling down fall the sere

1 See No. 178, and note on p. 55 of vol. ii. of this translation. 2 See l.c. note 2. leaves, sprout forth the new, flowers blow and flowers fall, the mango fruits swell out: but one moment—they are ripe, they are sweet and luscious, they grow like fruit divine, they drop from the tree! The Great Being chooses and eats such as he will, then fills the baskets hung from his pole, goes home and sells the fruit, and so finds a living for wife and child. Now the young brahmin saw the Great Being offer ripe mangoes for sale out of season. “ Without doubt,” thought he, “it must be by virtue of some charm that these are grown. ‘This man can teach me a charm which has no price.” He watched to see the manner in which the Great Being procured his fruit, and found it out exactly. Then he went to the Great Being’s house at the time when he was not yet returned from the forest, and making as though he knew nothing, asked the wise man’s wife, ‘‘ Where is the Teacher?” Quoth she, “Gone to the woods,” He stood waiting until he saw him come, then went to him, and taking the pole and baskets from him, carried them into the house and there set them. The Great Being looked at him, and said to his wife, “ Lady, this youth has come to get the charm; but no charm will stay with him, for no good man is he.” But the youth was thinking, “I will get the charm by being my teacher’s servant ;” and so from that time he did all that was to be done in the house: brought wood, pounded the rice, did the cooking, brought all that was needed for washing the face, washed the feet.

One day when the Great Being said to him, ‘‘ My son, bring me a stool to support my feet,” the youth, seeing no other way, kept the Great Teacher’s feet on his own thigh all night. When at a later season the Great Being’s wife brought forth a son, he did all the service that has to be done at a childbirth. The wife said one day to the Great Being :— * Husband, this lad, well-born though he is, for the charm’s sake performs menial service for us. Let him have the charm, whether it stays with him or no.” To this he agreed. [202] He taught him the charm, and spoke after this fashion: ‘‘ My son, ’tis a priceless charm ; and you will get great gain and honour thereby. But when the king, or his great minister, shall ask you who was your teacher, do not conceal my name ; for if you are ashamed that a low-caste man taught you the charm, and say your teacher was a great magnate of the brahmins, you will have no fruit of the charm.” ‘“ Why should I hide your name?” quoth the lad. “Whenever I am asked, I shall say it is you.” Then he saluted his teacher, and from the low-caste village he departed, pondering on the charm, and in due time came to Benares. There he sold mangoes, and gained much wealth.

Now on a day the keeper of the park presented to the king a mango which he had bought from him. The king, having eaten it, asked whence 126 The Jataka. Book XIII. he procured so fine a fruit. ‘‘My lord,” was the answer, “there is a young man who brings mangoes out of season, and sells them: from him I procured it.” “Tell him,” says the king, “from henceforth to bring the mangoes hither to me” This the man did; and from that time the young man took his mangoes to ‘the king’s household. The king, inviting him to enter his service, he became a servant of the king; and gaining great wealth, by degrees he grew into the king’s confidence. One day the king asked him, and said :—“ Young man, where do you get these mangoes out of season, so sweet and fragrant and of fine colour ? Does some serpent or garula give them to you, or a god, or is this the power of magic?” ‘No one gives them to me, O mighty king!” replied the young man, ‘“‘but I have a priceless charm, and this is the power of the charm.” ‘Well, what do you say to showing me the power of the charm one of these days?” ‘By all means, my lord, and so I will,” quoth he. Next day the king went with him into the park, and asked to be shown this charm.

The young man was willing, and approaching a mango tree, stood at a distance of seven foot from it, and repeated the charm, throwing water against the tree. On the instant the mango tree had fruit in the manner above described: [203] a shower of mangoes fell, a very storm; the company showed great delight, waving their kerchiefs ; the king ate of the fruit, and gave him a great reward, and said, ‘Young man, who taught you this charm so marvellous?” Now thought the young man, If I say a low-caste candala taught me, I shall be put to shame, and they will flout at me; I know the charm by heart, and now I can never lose it; well, I will say it was a worldrenowned teacher. So he lied, and said, ‘I learnt it at Takkasila, from a teacher renowned the wide world over.” As he said the words, denying his teacher, that very instant the charm was gone, But the king, greatly pleased, returned with him into the city.

On another day the king desired mangoes to eat; and going into the park, and taking his seat upon a stone bench, which was used on state occasions, he bade the youth get him mangoes. The youth, willing enough, went up to a mango tree, and standing at a distance of seven foot from the tree, set about repeating the charm; but the charm would not come. Then he knew that he had lost it, and stood there ashamed. But the king thought, “ Formerly this fellow gave me mangoes even in the midst of a crowd, and like a heavy shower the fruit rained down. Now there he stands like a stock: what can the reason be?” Which he enquired by repeating the first stanza: “Young student, when I asked it you of late, You brought me mango fruit both small and great: Now no fruit, brahmin, on the tree appears, Though the same charm you still reiterate!” When he heard this, the young man thought to himself, if he should say this day no fruit was to be had, the king would be wroth; wherefore he thought to deceive him with a lie, and repeated the second stanza:

“The hour and moment suit not: so wait I Fit junction of the planets in the sky. [204] The due conjunction and the moment come, Then will I bring you mangoes plenteously.” “What is this?” the king wondered. ‘The fellow said nothing of planetary conjunctions before!” To resolve which questions, he repeated two stanzas : “You said no word of times and seasons, nor Of planetary junctions heretofore: But mangoes, fragrant, delicate in taste, Of colour fine, you brought in plenteous store. “ Aforetime, brahmin, you produced so well Fruit on the tree by muttering of your spell: To-day you cannot, mutter as you may. What means this conduct, I would have you tell?” Hearing this, the youth thought, “There is no deceiving the king with lies. If, when the truth is told, he punishes me, let him punish me: but the truth I will tell.” Then he recited two stanzas : “A low-caste man my teacher was, who taught Duly and well the charm, and how it wrought: Saying, ‘If you are asked my name and birth, Hide nothing, or the charm will come to nought.’ “Asked by the Lord of Men, though well I knew, Yet in deceit I said what was not true; ‘A brahmin’s spells,’ I lying said; and now, Charm lost, my folly bitterly I rue.”

[205] This heard, the king thought within himself, “The sinful man to take no care of such a treasure! When one has a treasure so priceless, what has birth to do with it?” And in anger he repeated the following stanzas : “Nimb, castor oil, or plassey tree!, whatever be the tree Where he who seeks finds honeycombs, ’tis best of trees, thinks he. “Be it Khattiya, Brahmin, Vessa, he from whom a man learns right— Sudda, Candala, Pukkusa—seems chiefest in his sight?.” 1 Butea Frondosa. As Plassey was named from this tree, it is perhaps admissible as a name of the tree. 2 These are the names of six castes: Kshatriya, Brahman, Vaicya, Cudra, the four castes familiar in Sanskrit books, together with two Candala and Pukkaca, both mixed castes and much despised. More about these castes, and the Buddhist system as contrasted with the Brahminical, may be seen in R. Fick’s Sociale Gliederung im N.-0. 128 The Jataka. Book XIII. “Punish the worthless churl, or even slay, Hence hale him by the throat without delay, _ Who having gained a treasure with great toil, Throws it with overweening pride away !” The king’s men so did, saying, “Go back to your teacher, and win his forgiveness ; then, if you can learn the charm once more, you may come

hither again, but if not, never more may you set eyes on this country.” Thus they banished him. The man was all forlorn. ‘There is no refuge for me,” he thought, “except my teacher. To him I will go, and win his pardon, and learn the charm again.” So lamenting he went on his way to that village. [206] The Great Being perceived him coming, and pointed him out to his wife, saying, “See, lady, there comes that scoundrel again, with his charm lost and gone!” The man approached the Great Being, and greeted hin, and sat on one side. “ Why are you here?” asked the other. ‘“O my teacher!” the man said, ‘““I uttered a lie, and denied my teacher, and I am utterly ruined and undone!” ‘Then he recited his transgression in a stanza, asking again for the charms: “Oft he who thinks the level ground is lying at his foot, Falls in a pool, pit, precipice, trips on a rotten root; Another treads what seems a cord, a jet-black snake to find ; Another steps into the fire because his eyes are blind: So I have sinned, and lost my spell; but you, O teacher wise, Forgive! and let me once again find favour in your eyes!”

Then his teacher replied, ‘‘ What say you, my son? Give but a sign to the blind, he goes me clear of pools and what not; but I told it to you once, and what do you want here now?” Then he repeated the following stanzas : “To you in right due manner I did tell, You in due manner rightly learnt the spell, Full willingly its nature I explained : Ne’er had it left you, had you acted well. [207] “Who with much toil, O fool! hath learnt a spell Full hard for those who now in this world dwell, Then, foolish one! a living gained at last, Throws all away, because he lies will tell, “To such a fool, unwise, of lying fain, Ungrateful, who can not himself restrain,— Spells, quotha! mighty spells we give not him: Go hence away, and ask me not again !” Indien zu Buddha’s Zeit, Kiel, 1897. Fick denies that the Suddas were ever a real caste (p. 202). For Candala, see p. 203; for Pukkusa, p. 206; both, in his opinion, non-Aryan subject races, serfs almost. The order of the list in our verse should be noticed. The Jataka gives the Khattiyas, or Warriors, precedence over the Brahmins.

Thus dismissed by his teacher, the man thought, “ What is life to me?” and plunging into the woods, died forlorn. The Master having made an end of this discourse, said, “Not now only, Brother, has Devadatta denied his teacher, and come to dire destruction ;” and so saying, he identified the Birth: “At that time Devadatta was the ungrateful man, Ananda was the king, and I was the low caste man.”

“O man, who stand,” ete.—This story the Master told on the bank of the river Rohini, about a family quarrel. The circumstances will be described at large under the Kunala! Birth. On this occasion the Master addressed himself to the kinsmen, O king, and said : Once upon a time, when Brahmadatta was king of Benares, there stood without the city a village of carpenters. In it was a brahmin carpenter, who gained his livelihood by bringing wood from the forest, and making carts. At that time there was a great plassey”® tree in the region of Himalaya. [208] A black Lion used to go and lie at its root when a-hunting for food. One day a wind smote the tree, and a dry branch fell, and came down upon his shoulder. The blow gave him pain, and speedily in fear he uprose, and sprang away; then turning, he looked on the path he came by, and seeing nothing, thought, “There is no other lion or tiger, nor any in pursuit. Well, wethinks, the deity of yon tree cannot away with my lying there. I will find out if so it be.” So thinking, he grew angry out of season, and struck the tree, and cried—‘ Not a leaf on your tree I eat, not a branch I break; you can put up with other creatures abiding here, and you cannot put up with me! What is wrong with me? Wait

1 No. 536. 2 The phandana (Ge) is a tree of the same kind as the paldsa, ‘butea 130 The Jataka. . Book XIII. a few days, and I will tear you out root and branch, I will get you chopt up chipmeal!” Thus he upbraided the déity of the tree, and then away he went in search of a man. At that time the brahmin carpenter aforesaid with two or three other men, had come in a waggon to that neighbourhood, to get wood for his trade of cartwright. He left his waggon in a certain spot, and then adze and hatchet in hand went searching for trees. He happened to come near this plassey tree. The Lion seeing him went and stood under the tree, for, thought he, “to-day I must see the back of my enemy!” But the wright looking this way and that fled from the neighbourhood of the tree. “T will speak to him before he gets quite away,” thought the Lion, and repeated the first stanza : “OQ man, who stand with axe in hand, within this woodland haunt, Come tell me true, I ask of you, what tree is it you want?” ‘Lo, a miracle!” quoth the man, on hearing this address, “I swear, I never yet saw beast that could talk like a man. [209] Of course he will know what kinds of wood are good for the cartwright. Tl ask him.” Thus thinking, he repeated the second stanza:

“Up hill, down dale, along the plain, a king you range the wood : Come tell me true, I ask of you—what tree for wheels is good ?” The Lion listened, and said to himself, ‘‘ Now I shall gain my heart’s desire!” then he repeated the third stanza: “Not sal, acacia, not mare’s-ear!, much less a shrub? is good ; There is a tree they call plassey, and there’s your best wheel-wood.” The man was pleased to hear this, and thought, “A happy day it was brought me into the woodland. Here’s a creature in the shape of a beast to tell me what wood is good for the wheelwright! Hey, but that’s fine!” So he questioned the Lion in the fourth stanza: “What is the fashion of the leaves, what sort the trunk to see, Come tell me true, -I ask of you, that I may know that tree ?” In reply the Lion repeated two stanzas : “This is the tree whose branch you see droop, bend, but never break ; This is the plassey, on whose roots my standing-place I take. “For spoke or felloe, pole of car, or wheel, or any part, This plassey tree will do for thee in making of a cart.” After this declaration, the Lion moved aside, joy in his heart. The wright began to fell the tree. Then the tree-deity thought, “I never dropt anything on that beast; he fell in a rage out of season, and now he

1 Vatiea Robusta: so called from the shape of its leaves. 2 dhavo: Grislea Tomentosa. No. 475. > oie et is for destroying my home, and I too shall be destroyed. [210] I must find some way of destroying his majesty.” So assuming the shape of a woodman, he came up to the wright, and said to him, “Ho man! a fine tree you have there! what will you do with it when it is down?”—‘“Make a cart wheel.”—“ What! has any one told you that tree is good for a cart?” “Yes, a black Lion.”—‘ Very good, well said black Lion. You can make a fine cart out of that tree, says he. But I tell you that if you flay off the skin from a black lion’s neck, and put it around the outer edge of the wheel, like a sheath of iron, just a strip four fingers wide, the wheel will be very strong, and you will gain a great deal by it.”—“ But where can I get the skin of a black lion?”—“ How stupid you are! The tree stands fast in the forest, and won’t run away. You go and find the lion who told you about this tree, and ask him in what part of the tree you are to cut, and bring him here. Then while he suspects nothing, and points out this place or that, wait till he sticks his jaw out, and smite him as he speaks with your sharpest axe, kill him, take the skin, eat the best of the flesh, and fell the tree at your leisure.” Thus he indulged his wrath.

To explain this matter, the Master repeated the following stanzas : “Thus did at once the plassey tree his will and wish make clear : ‘I too a message have to tell: O Bharadvaja, hear ! “*From shoulder of the king of beasts cut off four inches wide, And put it round the wheel, for so more strong it will abide.’ “So in a trice the plassey tree, indulging in his ire, On lions born and those unborn brought down destruction dire.” The cartwright hearing the tree-deity’s directions, cried out, “ Ah, this is a lucky day for me!” He killed the Lion, cut down the tree, and away he went. [211] The Master explained the matter by reciting : “Thus plassey tree contends with beast}, and beast with tree contends, So each with mutual dispute to death the other sends. “So among men, where’er a feud or quarrel doth arise, They, as the beast and tree did now, cut capers peacock-wise’. “This tell I you, that well is you what time ye are at one: Be of one mind, and quarrel not, as beast and tree have done. 1 The word is iso, ‘lord,’ i.e. lion, king of beasts, So above. 2 The scholiast explains that men expose themselves in a quarrel, as peacocks expose their privy parts. This is perhaps an allusion to No. 32,

132 The Jataka. Book XIII. “Learn peace with all men; this the wise all praise; and who is fain Of peace and righteousness, he sure will ‘final peace attain.” When they heard the discourse of the king, they were reconciled. The Master, having brought this discourse to an end, identified the Birth : “At that time, I was the deity who lived in that wood, and saw the whole business.”

“Come, Goose,” etc.—This story the Master told at Jetavana about the Dalhadhamma Suttanta or the Parable of the Strong Men. The Blessed One said: ‘Suppose, Brethren, four archers to stand at the four points of the compass, strong men, well trained and of great skill, perfect in archery ; and then let a man come and say, ‘If these four archers, strong, well trained, and of great skill, perfect in archery [212] shoot forth arrows from four points, I will catch those arrows as they are shot, and before they touch the ground’: would you not agree, sure enough, that he must be a very swift man and the perfection of swiftness? Well, Brethren, great as the swiftness of such a man might be, great as the swiftness of sun and moon, there is something swifter : great, I say, Brethren, as the swiftness of such a man might be, great as the swiftness of the sun and moon, and though the gods outfly sun or moon in swiftness, there is something swifter than the gods: great, Brethren, as the swiftness of that man (and so forth), yet more swiftly than the gods can go, the elements which make up life do decay. Therefore, Brethren, this ye must learn, to be careful; verily I say unto you, this ye must learn.” Two days after this teaching, they were talking about it in the Hall of Truth: “Brethren, the Master in his own peculiar province as Buddha, illustrating the nature of what makes up life, showed it to be transient and weak, and smote with extreme terror Brethren and unconverted alike.

Oh, the might of a Buddha!” The Master entering asked what they talked of. They told him; and he said, “It is no marvel, Brethren, if I in my omniscience alarm the Brethren by my teaching, and show how transient are life’s elements. Even I, when without natural cause! I was conceived by a Goose, showed forth the transient nature of the elements of life, and by my teaching alarmed the

whole court of a king, together with the king of Benares himself.” So saying, he told a story of the past. Once upon a time, when Brahmadatta was king in Benares, the Great Being was born as a swift Goose, which lived in Mount Cittakita in a 1 A mode of coming into existence all of a sudden, without the natural processes, flock of ninety thousand other such Geese. One day, having along with his flock eaten the wild rice that grew in a certain pool in the plains of India, he flew through the air (and it was as though a golden mat were spread from end to end of the city of Benares), and he flew slowly as in sport to Cittakita. Now the king of Benares saw him; and said to his courtiers, “ Yon bird must be a king, as 1am.” He took a fancy to the bird, and taking with him garlands, perfumes and unguents, went looking for the Great Being; and with him he caused to go all manner of musick. When the Great Being saw him doing honour in this way, he asked the other Geese, [213] “ When a king would do such honour to me, what does he want?” ‘He wants to make friends with you, my lord.” ‘“‘ Well, let me be friends with the king,” quoth he; and he made friends with the king, and then returned.

One day after this, when the king was in his park, and went to Lake Anotatta, the bird flew to the king, having water on one wing and powder of sandalwood on the other; with the water he sprinkled the king, and cast the powder upon him, then while the company looked on, away he flew with his flock to Cittakita. From that time the king used to long for the Great Being; he would linger, watching the way by which he came, and thinking—‘“ To-day my comrade will come.” Now the two youngest Geese belonging to the flock of the Great Being, made up their minds to fly a race with the sun; so they asked leave of the Great Being, to try a race with the sun. ‘My lads,” quoth he, ‘‘ the sun’s speed is swift, and you will never be able to race with him. You will perish in the course, so do not go.” A second time they asked, and a third time; but the Bodhisatta withstood them up to the third time of asking. But they stood to it, not knowing their own strength, and were resolved without telling the king to fly with the sun. So before sunrise they had taken their places on the peak of the Mount Yugandhara’. The Great Being missed them, and asked whither they had gone. When he heard what had happened, he thought, ‘“‘They will never be able to fly with the sun, but will perish in the course.

I will save their lives.” So he too went to the peak of Yugandhara, and sat beside them. When the sun’s round showed over the horizon, the young Geese rose, and darted forward along with the sun; the Great Being flew forward with them. The youngest flew on into the forenoon, then grew faint; in the joints of his wings he felt as if a fire had been kindled. Then he made a signal to the Great Being: “ Brother, I can’t do it!” ‘Fear not,” said the Great Being, “I will save you;” and taking him on his outspread wings, he soothed him, and conveyed him to Mount Cittakiita, and placed him in the midst of the Geese. Then he flew off, and catching up the sun, went

1 One of the seven great ranges that surround Mount Meru. 134 The Jataka. Book XIII. on side by side with the other. Until near midday [214] the other flew with the sun, and then he grew faint and’ felt as though a fire had been kindled in the joints of his wings. Making a sign to the Great Being, he cried, “Brother, I cannot do it!” Him too the Great Being comforted in the same way, and taking him on his outspread wings, bore him to Cittakiita. At that moment the sun was plumb overhead. The Great Being thought, “To-day I will test the sun’s strength;” and darting back with one swoop, he perched on Yugandhara. Then rising with one swoop he overtook the sun, and flying now in front, now behind, thought to himself, “For me to fly with the sun is profitless, born of mere folly: what is he to me? Away I will to Benares, and there tell my comrade the king a message of righteousness and truth.” Then turning, ere yet the sun had moved from the middle of the sky, he traversed the whole world from end to end; then slackening speed, traversed from end to end the whole of India, and came at last to Benares. The whole city, twelve leagues in compass, was as it were under the bird’s shadow’, there was not a crack or crevice; then as by degrees the speed slackened, holes and crevices appeared in the sky. The Great Being went slower, and came down from the air, and alighted in front of a window. “My comrade is come!” cried the king in great joy; and getting a golden seat for the bird to perch on, said, “Come in, friend, and sit here,” and recited the first stanza: