Page:Buddhist Birth Stories, or, Jātaka Tales.djvu/297

Rh away into the forest; and when I am dead, come back and reign in the city that is yours by right!" So, weeping and lamenting, he kissed them on their foreheads, and sent them forth.

As they were going down out of the palace, after taking leave of their father, the Sun Prince himself, who was playing there in the courtyard, caught sight of them. And when he learnt how the matter stood, he thought to himself, "I, too, will go away with my brothers!" And he departed with them accordingly. They went on till they entered the mountain region of Himālaya. There the Bodisat, leaving the path, sat down at the foot of a tree, and said to the Sun Prince:

"Sun Prince, dear! do you go to yonder pond; and after bathing and drinking yourself, bring us, too, some water in the leaves of the lotus plants."

Now that pond had been delivered over to a water-sprite by Vessavana (the King of the Fairies), who had said to him:

"Thou art hereby granted as thy prey all those who go down into the water, save only those who know what is true divinity. But over such as go not down thou hast no power."

So from that time forth, the water-sprite used to ask all those who went down into the water, what were the characteristic signs of divine beings, and if they did not know, he used to eat them up alive.

Now Sun Prince went to the pond, and stepped down into it without any hesitation. Then the demon seized him, and demanded of him:

"Do you know what is of divine nature?"