Page:Folk-lore of the Telugus.djvu/106

98 brother and vice versa, and they both rose up. She was now on the horns of a dilemma, and did not know what to do." Bethala then asked Vikramarka who should be taken to husband by the girl. Vikramarka replied that as the head is the most essential part of the whole body, to whatsoever body the head of her  husband was attached, that man should become  her husband. Bethala upon this immediately disappeared.

Bethala, however, was once more fetched, and he again began to tell a story. "There remained with Sakatasringa, King of Mallikapura, without a moment's severance, his attendant, Karpataka by name. Once upon a time, the king set out on a hunting excursion with his large army to a wood, mounted a horse, went with Karpataka to an uninhabited place a great distance off, and being very much fatigued, rested under the leafy spreading branches of a huge barh tree, when Karpataka brought and gave him two fruits of the emblic myrobalan (amalaka). The king then went home, and some time after informed Karpataka