Page:Buddhist Birth Stories, or, Jātaka Tales.djvu/399

Rh "Dear me! there's one thing we haven't provided for!"

"What's that?" said they.

"We ought to have got a pinnacle."

"Very well! let's have one brought."

"But it can't be made out of timber just cut; we ought to have had a pinnacle cut and planed, and bored some time ago, and laid aside for use."

"What's to be done now then?" said they.

"You must look about and see if there be such a thing as a finished pinnacle for sale put aside in any one's house."

And when they began to search, they found one on Piety's premises; but it could not be bought for money.

"If you let me be partaker in the building of the hall, I will give it you?" said she.

"No!" replied they, "it was settled that women should have no share in it."

Then the builder said, "Sirs! what is this you are saying? Save the heavenly world of the Brahma-angels, there is no place where womankind is not. Accept the pinnacle; and so will our work be accomplished!"

Then they agreed; and took the pinnacle and completed their hall with it. They fixed benches in the hall, and set up pots of water in it, and provided for it a constant supply of boiled rice. They surrounded the hall with a wall, furnished it with a gate, spread it over with sand inside the wall, and planted a row of palmyra-trees outside, it.

And Thoughtful made a pleasure ground there; and so