Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 13, 1902.djvu/94

 82 Collectanea.

the well, and said, " Merchant, fit a set of bangles on my wrists." " How can I come into the well ? " he asked. " Come down the steps," said she.i So he came down, and while he was fitting on the bangles her son cried, and she sang to him thus :

" My darling ! my princeling ! the tiger's own son, No garland was needed to make thee a man, O hush thee, the old man will do thee no harm While he fits pretty bangles on mother's soft arm." -

And the bangle-seller was amazed at her gentle words.

He then went to the palace of the Tiger Prince, and began to cry, " Bangles to sell ! Who wants bangles ? " The false Prin- cess called to him to come in, and as he was fitting the bangles on her wrists her baby cried, and she cursed him as low-born mothers are wont to curse their children. The bangle-merchant reproved her, and said, " Why do you curse your child as the low- born use to do, and you a Princess ? But lately I saw in the under-world a lady who soothed her child when he cried, and sang thus to him :

" My darling ! my princeling ! the tiger's own son, No garland was needed to make thee a man, O hush thee, the old man will do thee no harm \\Tiile he fits pretty bangles on mother's soft arm."

The Tiger Prince was close by and heard his words. Then he bethought himself of his tiger-birth, and of his wife and the gar- land ; and when the bangle-merchant left the pretended wife's room he called him and said, "Lead me to the lady of whom you just now spoke."

So they went to the well, and the merchant caused the Prince to put two strings of bangles round his neck that he might look like a brother bangle-seller ; and descending the steps of the well he called, " Bangles to sell ! who needs bangles ? " The lady called

' The well was what is called a badli, with long flights of steps down to the water.

2 " Puli kadupuna puttina bhupati kumara,

Kasinda puvuluku anda kudan puttina kunda kumara, Ravayya Vyankajya vonkulu tonduk kundam."

" King's son, tiger-begotten. Bom without touching the kasinda-^o\stxs, my darling child. Come, father Vyankayya, let us put zigzag bangles on our wrists."

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