HINDU FABLES

THE TIMID HARES

Once there was a timid little hare who was always afraid something dreadful was going to happen.

She was always saying, "What if the earth should fall in? What would happen to me then?"

One day, after she had been saying this to herself many times, a great coconut fell from a tree.

"What was that!" said the hare.

She jumped as if she had been shot.

"The earth must be falling in!" she cried.

So she ran and she ran as fast as she could run.

Soon she met another hare.

"O Brother Hare," she said, "run for your life! The earth is falling in!"

"What is that you say!" cried the other hare. "Then I will run, too."

This hare told another hare, and the other hare told other hares, and soon all the hares were running as fast as they could run, and crying:

"The earth is falling in! O, the earth is falling in!"

The big beasts heard them, and they too began to run and to cry:

"O, the earth is falling in! Run for your life!"

A wise old lion saw them running and heard them crying.

"I cannot see that the earth is falling in," he said.

Then he cried out to the poor frightened beasts to stop.

"What are you saying?" he asked.

"We said the earth is falling in," answered the elephants.

"What makes you think so?" asked the lion.

"The tigers told us," said the elephants.

"What makes the tigers think so?"

"The bears told us," said the tigers.

"What makes the bears think so?"

"The buffaloes told us," said the bears.

"Why do the buffaloes think so?"

"The deer told us," said the buffaloes.

"Why do the deer think so?"

"The monkeys told us so," said the deer.

"And how did the monkeys know?"

"The jackals said so," said the monkeys.

"And how did the jackals know?"

"The hares said it was so," said the jackals.

"And how did the hares know?"

One of the hares then said that another hare told him, and the other hare said that another told him, and so it went on until at last they came to the first little hare.

"Little hare," said the lion, "why did you say that the earth was falling in?"

"I saw it," said the little hare.

"Where?" asked the lion.

"I saw it there, under that big coconut tree," said the little hare.

"Come and show me," said the lion.

"O, no, no!" said the little hare. "I am so frightened. I couldn't go."

"Jump on my back," said the lion.

The little hare at last jumped up on the lion's back, and the lion took her back to the big tree.

Just then another coconut fell with a great noise among the leaves.

"O, run, run!" cried the timid hare. "There is that dreadful thing again!"

"Stop and look," said the lion.

As the hare could not get down from the lion's back, she had to stop and look.

"Now what do you think it is?" asked the lion.

"I think it must be a coconut," said the little hare.

"Then I think you had better go and tell the other beasts," said the lion.

So the little hare told the other beasts that the earth was not falling in, after all. It was a coconut that was falling.

THE SHOE

(A man once left his shoe in the woods. The beasts found it.

They had never seen anything like it before, so they came together and began to talk about it.)

Bear. It must be the husk or the outside of some fruit.

All the Birds. O, just hear him!

All the Beasts. O, just hear him!

Wolf. No, that is not it. It is some kind of nest. See! Here is the hole at the top, for the bird to go into, and here is the place for the eggs and the young birds.

Birds. O, just hear him!

Bear. Just hear him talk!

Goat. No, you are both wrong. It is the root of some plant.

(He showed them the shoe string hanging at the side.)

See this long, fine root. Surely it is a root!

Birds. O, just hear him talk!

Beasts. Just hear him!

Bear. I tell you it is the husk of a fruit.

Wolf. And I tell you it is a nest.

Goat. And I tell you it is a root. Surely it is a root!

Owl. Let me speak. I have lived among men, and I have seen many such things as this. It is a man's shoe.

Bear. What is a man?

Goat. What is a shoe?

Owl. A man is a thing with two legs. He can stand up like a monkey, he can walk like a bird, but he cannot fly. He can eat and talk, and he can do many things that we cannot do.

Beasts. O, no!

Birds. No, no!

Bear. How can that be? How can anything with two legs do more than we, who have four?

Birds. And this thing you call a man cannot be good for much if he cannot fly.

Goat. But what does the man do with this root?

Owl. It is not a root. I tell you it is a shoe.

Wolf. And what is a shoe?

Owl. It is what the man puts on his feet. He puts one of these shoes on each of his feet.

Birds. Hear the owl talk!

Beasts. Who ever heard of such a thing as a shoe?

Goat. Hear that! The man puts them on his feet!

Wolf. It is not true!

Bear. No, it is not true! The owl doesn't know.

Wolf. You know nothing, Owl. Get out of our woods. You are not fit to live with us.

Bear. Yes, Owl, go away!

Beasts. Leave us! Go away!

Birds. Leave us! Leave us, Owl! You surely don't know what you are talking about!

(The beasts chase the owl out of the woods.)

Owl. (Going off) But it is a shoe, anyway.

THE CAMEL AND THE JACKAL

Once upon a time a camel and a jackal lived together by the side of a river.

One fine morning the jackal said:

"There is a big field of sugar cane over on the other side of the river. Take me on your back, Brother Camel, and I will show you where it is. You may eat all the sugar cane, and I will find some crabs or fish on the shore."

This pleased the camel very much. So he waded through the river and carried the jackal on his back.

The jackal could not swim.

The camel found the sugar cane, and the jackal found some crabs.

The jackal ate much faster than the camel and soon had enough.

"Now, Brother Camel," he said, "take me back. I have had enough."

"But I haven't," said the camel.

So the camel went on eating.

The jackal tried to think how he could make the camel go home.

At last he thought of a way.

He began to bark and to cry and to make such a noise that all the men from the village ran out to see what was going on.

There they found the camel eating the sugar cane, and at once they beat the poor beast with sticks and so drove him out of the field.

"Brother Camel, hadn't you better go home now?" asked the jackal.

"Yes, jackal, jump on my back," said the camel.

The jackal jumped on his back, and the camel waded through the river with him.

As he went, he said to the jackal:

"Brother Jackal, I think you have not been very good to me to-day. Why did you make such a noise?"

"O, I don't know," said the jackal. "It's a way I sometimes have. I like to sing a little, after dinner."

The camel waded on.

When they got out where the water was deep, the camel stopped and said, "Jackal, I feel as if I must roll a little in the water.

"O, no, no!" said the jackal. "Why do you want to do that?"

"O, I don't know," said the camel. "It's a way I sometimes have. I like to roll a little, after dinner."

With that, he rolled over, and the jackal fell into the water.