Volume 2 / Book 12 — Chapter XCIV. (Vetála 20.)

Then king Trivikramasena went and took down that Vetála from the aśoka-tree, and putting him on his shoulder, started off with him again. And when he had set out in silence, the Vetála spake to him from his shoulder; “King, what is the meaning of this persistency of yours? Go, enjoy the good of the night; it is not fitting that you should carry me to that wicked mendicant. However, if you are obstinately bent on it, so be it; but listen to this one story.”

Story of the Bráhman boy, who offered himself up to save the life of the king.

But when she saw him coming, her eyes were bewildered by his beauty, and her hand relaxed its grasp on the garland of flowers, which she had before begun to weave, and she said to herself; “Who is this that has found his way into such a wood as this? Is he a Siddha or a Vidyádhara? In truth his beauty might satisfy the eyes of the whole world.” When these thoughts had passed through her mind, she rose up, and modestly looking askance at him she proceeded to go away, though her legs seemed to want all power of movement.

Then the polite and dexterous monarch approached her and said, “Fair one, I do not ask you to welcome and entertain a person seen for the first time, who has come from a distance, and desires no fruit other than that of beholding you; but how is your running away from him to be reconciled with the obligations of hermit life?” When the king said this, the lady’s attendant, who was equally dexterous, sat down there, and entertained the king.

Then the eager king said to her with an affectionate manner, “Worthy lady, what auspicious family is adorned by this friend of yours? What are the ear-nectar-distilling syllables of her name? And why does she torture in this wilderness, with the discipline appropriate to ascetics, her body, which is soft as a flower?” When her friend heard this speech of the king’s, she answered; “This is the maiden daughter of the great hermit Kanva, born to him by Menaká; she has been brought up in the hermitage, and her name is Indívaraprabhá. She has come here to bathe in this lake by permission of her father, and her father’s hermitage is at no great distance from this place.”

When the king heard this dreadful threat, and saw that his wife was terrified, knowing that the monster was invulnerable, he humbly said to him in his terror, “Pardon the sin which I have ignorantly committed against you, for I am a guest come to this your hermitage, imploring your protection. And I will give you what you desire, by bringing a human victim, whose flesh will glut your appetite; so be appeased, and dismiss your anger.” When the Bráhman demon heard this speech of the king’s, he was pacified, and said to himself, “So be it! That will do.” Then he said to the king, “I will overlook the insult you have offered me on the following conditions. You must find a Bráhman boy, who, though seven years old and intelligent, is of so noble a character that he is ready to offer himself for your sake. And his mother and father must place him on the earth, and hold him firmly by the hands and feet, while he is being sacrificed. And when you have found such a human victim, you must yourself slay him with a sword-stroke, and so offer him up to me on the seventh day from this. If you comply with these conditions, well and good; but, if not, king, I will in a moment destroy you and all your court.” When the king heard this, in his terror he agreed at once to the conditions proposed, and the Bráhman demon immediately disappeared.

The next day he communicated to his ministers in secret all that had taken place, and a discreet minister among them said to him, “Do not be downcast, king, for I will search for and bring you such a victim, for the earth contains many marvels.”

When the minister had consoled the king in these words, he had made with the utmost rapidity a golden image of a seven-years-old child, and he adorned its ears with jewels, and placed it on a chariot, and had it carried about in the towns, villages, and stations of herdsmen. And while that image of a child was being carried about, the minister had the following proclamation continually made in front of it, with beat of drum; “If a Bráhman boy of seven years old will willingly offer himself to a Bráhman demon for the good of the community, and if his mother and father will permit the brave boy to offer himself, and will hold his hands and feet while he is being slain, the king will give to that boy, who is so eager to benefit his parents as to comply with these conditions, this image of gold and gems, together with a hundred villages.”

Now it happened that a certain seven-years-old Bráhman boy, living on a royal grant to Bráhmans, who was of great courage and admirable character, heard this proclamation. Even in his childhood this boy had always taken pleasure in benefiting his fellow-men, as he had practised that virtue in a former life; in fact he seemed like the ripe result of the merits of the king’s subjects incarnate in bodily form. So he came and said to the men who were making this proclamation, “I will offer myself up for your good; but first, I will go and inform my parents; then I will return to you.” When he said this to them, they were delighted, and they let him go. So he went home, and folding his hands in an attitude of supplication, he said to his parents; “I wish to offer for the good of the community this perishable body of mine; so permit me to do so, and put an end to your poverty. For if I do so, the king will give me this image of myself, made of gold and gems, together with a hundred villages, and on receiving them, I will make them over to you. In this way I shall pay my debt to you, and at the same time benefit my fellow-men; and your poverty will be at an end, and you will have many sons to replace me.”

At that moment the noble boy, in his joy, said to himself, “Let not the merit, which I acquire by this sacrifice of my body, gain for me heaven, or even a salvation which involves no benefits to others, but may I be privileged to offer up my body for the benefit of others in birth after birth!” While he was forming this aspiration, the heaven was suddenly filled with the chariots of the heavenly host, who rained flowers.

Then the boy was placed in front of the Bráhman demon, and his mother took hold of his hands and his father of his feet. Then the king drew his sword, and prepared to slay him; but at that moment the child laughed so loudly, that all there, the Bráhman demon included, abandoned the occupation in which they were engaged, and in their astonishment put their palms together, and bowing, looked at his face.

When the Vetála had told this entertaining and romantic tale, he once more put a question to king Trivikramasena; “So tell me, king, what was the reason that the boy laughed in such an awful moment as that of his own death? I feel great curiosity to know it, so, if you know, and do not tell me, your head shall split into a hundred pieces.”

When the king heard this from the Vetála, he answered him, “Hear what was the meaning of that child’s laugh. It is well known that a weak creature, when danger comes upon it, calls upon its father or mother to save its life. And if its father and mother be gone, it invokes the protection of the king who is appointed to succour the afflicted, and if it cannot obtain the aid of the king, it calls upon the deity under whose special protection it is. Now, in the case of that child, all those were present, and all behaved in exactly the opposite manner to what might have been expected of them. The child’s parents held its hands and feet out of greed of gain, and the king was eager to slay it, to save his own life, and the Bráhman demon, its protecting deity, was ready to devour it. The child said to itself; ‘To think that these should be thus deluded, being led so much astray for the sake of the body, which is perishable, loathsome within, and full of pain and disease. Why should they have such a strange longing for the continuance of the body, in a world in which Brahmá, Indra, Vishṇu, Śiva, and the other gods must certainly perish.’ Accordingly the Bráhman boy laughed out of joy and wonder, joy at feeling that he had accomplished his object, and wonder at beholding the marvellous strangeness of their delusion.”

When the king had said this, he ceased, and the Vetála immediately left his shoulder, and went back to his own place, disappearing by his magic power. But the king, without hesitating for a moment, rapidly pursued him; the hearts of great men, as of great seas, are firm and unshaken.

Note.

Oesterley (p. 210) tells us that a boy is in the same way sold to a king as a victim in the 32nd tale of the Turkish collection of tales, called “The Forty Viziers.” When the king is about to rip up the child’s body, the child laughs for the same reason as in our text. The cause of the sacrifice is however different. The king is to be healed by placing his feet in the body of a boy.

The promise of a golden image to any one who is willing to sacrifice his life is also found in the Bengali edition of the Sinhásana-dvátrinśati. A rich man makes a golden image, with an inscription on it to the effect that whoever is willing to sacrifice his life shall have it. Vikramáditya goes to the place disguised, and cuts off his head, but the goddess heals him, (Benfey’s Panchatantra, Vol. I, p. 109.)