Page:Buddhist Birth Stories, or, Jātaka Tales.djvu/338

222 of a captive. Then the herd took to flight, and let the mother know that her son had been caught in a snare. She went to her brother, and asked him, —

"Brother! was your nephew instructed in the devices of the deer?"

"Suspect not your son of any fault," said the Bodisat. "He has well learnt the devices of the deer. Even now he will come back to us and make you laugh for joy." And he uttered this stanza:

I've trained the deer to be most swift, To drink at midnight only, and, abounding in disguise, To keep in any posture that he likes. Breathing through one nostril hid upon the ground, My nephew, by six tricks at his command Will yet outdo the foe!

Thus the Bodisat, pointing out how thoroughly his nephew had learnt the devices of the deer, comforted his sister.

But the young stag, when he was caught in the trap, struggled not at all. He lay down on the ground as best he could; stretched out his legs; struck the ground near his feet with his hoofs, so as to throw up earth and grass; let fall his head; put out his tongue; made his body wet with spittle; swelled out his belly by drawing in his breath; breathed through the lower nostril only, holding his breath with the upper; made his whole frame stiff and stark, and presented the appearance of a corpse. Even the bluebottles flew round him, and here and there crows settled!

When the hunter came up, he gave him a blow on the stomach; and saying to himself, "He must have been