Note 2 — XXVI. THE GRATEFUL ANIMALS AND THE UNGRATEFUL MAN.1

In long past times the Bodisat, his accumulations2 as yet incomplete, was born again among birds as a woodpecker, dwelling in a villageless solitude in a hill district, rich in mountain streams, fruits, and flowers. In the same district there lived a king of the beasts, a lion, which was in the habit of killing and devouring gazelles at its pleasure. One day it had been eating meat; a bone stuck fast between its teeth, and the lion, which had never known fear or anxiety, now that toothache was plaguing its body, was quite prostrated and could eat nothing.