Page:Katha sarit sagara, vol2.djvu/326

 proudly above all other mountains; and as such its praises are sung in strains of sooth in the three worlds. On the ridge of that Himavat there is that city rightly named the Golden City, which gleams like a mass of the sun's rays deposited by him on earth.

Of old there lived in that splendid city a fortunate lord of the Vidyádharas, named Jímútaketu, who dwelt there like Indra on Meru. In his palace-garden there was a wishing-tree, which was an heirloom in his family, which was well known as the Granter of Desires, and not named so without reason. The king supplicated that divine tree, and obtained by its favour a son, who remembered his former birth, and was the incarnation of a portion of a Bodhisattva. He was a hero in munificence, of great courage, compassionate to all creatures, attentive to the instructions of his spiritual adviser, and his name was Jímútaváhana. And when he grew up to manhood, his father, the king, made him crown-prince, being impelled thereto by his excellent qualities, and the advice of the ministers.

And when Jímútaváhana was made crown-prince, the ministers of his father, desiring his welfare, came to him and said, " Prince, you must continually worship this wishing-tree invincible by all creatures,* which grants all our desires. For, as long as we have this, not even Indra could injure us, much less any other enemy." When Jímútaváhana heard this, he inly reflected, " Alas ! our predecessors, though they possessed such a divine tree, never obtained from it any fruit worthy of it; some of them asked it for wealth and did nothing more; so the mean creatures made themselves and this noble tree contemptible. Well, I will make it inserve a design which I have in my mind."

After the noble prince had formed this resolution, he went to his father, and gained his goodwill by paying him all kinds of attentions, and said to him in private, as he was sitting at ease; " Father, you know that in this sea of mundane existence, all that we behold is unsubstantial, fleeting as the twinkling of the wave. Especially are the twilight, the dawn, and Fortune shortlived, disappearing as soon as revealed; where and when have they been seen to abide? Charity to one's neighbour is the only thing that is permanent in this cycle of change; it produces holiness and fame that bear witness for hundreds of yugas. So with what object, father, do we keep for ourselves such an unfailing wishing-tree, as all these phenomenal conditions are but momentary? Where, I ask, are those our predecessors who kept it so strenuously, exclaiming, ' It is mine, it is mine? Where is it now to them? For which of them does it exist, and which of them exists for it? So, if you permit, father, I will employ this wishing-tree, that grants all desires, for attaining the matchless fruit of charity to one's neighbour."