Page:Indian Fairy Tales (Stokes, 1879).djvu/71

Rh screamed and said, "Oh! if you go with this letter you will surely die." So she tore it up into little bits and threw it into the fire. And she wrote another in which she said, "Make a great deal of this boy; see that he gets no hurt; give him the sari, for me; show him the garden; and be very kind to him." She then gave Hírálál the letter, and he journeyed on in safety till he reached his Rakshas-grannie's house.

The Rakshas-grannie was very good to him, showed him the garden, and gave him the sárí; and he then said his mother, the Rakshas-Rání, was in great trouble about her soul, and wanted very much to have it. So the Rakshas-grannie gave him a bird in which was the Rakshas-Rání's soul, charging him to take the greatest care of it. Then he said, "My mother, the Rakshas-Rání, also wants a stone such that, if you lay it on the ground, or if you put it in your clothes, it will become gold, and also your long heavy gold necklace that hangs down to the waist." Both these things the Rakshas-grannie gave to Hírálál. Then he returned to Sonahrí Rání's house, where he found her lying on her bed with the thick stick at her feet. "Oh, there you are," said Sonahrí Rání, laughing. "Yes," he said, "I have come." And he put the stick at her head, and she got up and gave him some food.

He told her he was going to fetch her Rakshas-father's soul, but that he did not quite know how to pass through the tigers and bears, and scorpions and snakes, that guarded it. So she gave him a feather and said, "As long as you hold this feather straight, you can come to no harm, for you will be invisible. You will see everything, but nothing will see you."

He carried the feather straight as she had bidden him and reached the tree safely. Then he climbed up it, took the little cage, and came down again. Though the Rakshas was far off, he knew at once something had happened to his bird. Hírálál pulled off the bird's right leg, and the Rakshas' right leg fell off, but on he hopped on one leg. Then the