Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 3, 1892.djvu/528

 520 He called to his daughter to bring him some food. She replied, "Your food is not ready yet." After a while the king again asked for his food, and again his daughter said, "Your food is not ready yet." Then a third time he demanded his food, and his daughter said: "My Lord the King! the griddle is on the house-top, and the fire is in the yard; as soon as the griddle heats I will cook your food." The king said: "The griddle is on the housetop, and the fire down below? How, then, can the griddle get hot?" Then his daughter said: "That man was in the river, and the fire was on the hill: how then could he warm himself at the fire? Thou art king, and kings should keep their word. Thou madest a promise with thy mouth and with thy tongue. Do not do such injustice, but have fear of God." Then the king said: "Thou, my daughter, hast proved me to be false!" and thereupon he gave his daughter in marriage to the man.

IV.

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There were once two wrestlers: one lived at Shikàrpur, and the other at Dera Ghàzi Khan. The Shikàrpur wrestler started off to pay a visit to the Dera wrestler. When he arrived at Dera he asked where that wrestler lived, and someone told him that he lived in such-and-such a ward of the town. So he went to the house, and asked the wrestler's wife where her husband was. She replied: "My man's gone for wood; he will gather it, and carry it off and bring it home." Then the good wife called out to her daughter: "Stick a needle into that rat that's lying dead in there, and bring it out, or it will stink!" The daughter went and stuck a spear into it, and when she brought it out the Shikàrpur wrestler saw a young elephant on the point of the spear! Then he said to himself: "If his daughter is so strong, what must he be himself! I will go out and see him