Page:Katha sarit sagara, vol2.djvu/96

 it, ate it up. The proprietor of the buffalo went and complained to the king, and he had the villagers, who had eaten the buffalo, brought before him. And the proprietor of the buffalo said before the king, in their presence; " These foolish men took my buffalo under a banyan-tree near the tank, and killed it and ate it before my eyes." Whereupon an old fool among the villagers said, " There is no tank or banyan-tree in our village. He says what is not true: where did we kill his buffalo or eat it?"

When the proprietor of the buffalo heard this, he said; " What ! is there not a banyan -tree and a tank on the east side of the village? Moreover, you ale my buffalo on the eighth day of the lunar month." When the proprietor of the buffalo said this, the old fool replied, " There is no east side or eighth day in our village." When the king heard this, he laughed, and said, to encourage the fool; " You are a truthful person, you never say anything false, so tell me the truth, did you eat that buffalo or did you not?" When the fool heard that, he said, " I was born three years after my father died, and he taught me skill in speaking. So I never say what is untrue, my sovereign; it is true that we ate his buffalo, but all the rest that he alleges is false." When the king heard this, he and his courtiers could not restrain their laughter; so the king restored the price of the buffalo to the plaintiff, and fined those villagers. " So, fools, in the conceit of their folly, while they deny what need not be denied, reveal what it is their interest to suppress, in order to get themselves believed. Story of the fool who behaved like a Brahmany drake.:— A certain foolish man had an angry wife, who said to him; " Tomorrow I shall go to my father's house, I am invited to a feast. So if you do not bring me a garland of blue lotuses from somewhere or other, you will cease to be my husband, and I shall cease to be your wife." Accordingly he went at night to the king's tank to fetch them. And when he entered it, the guards saw him, and cried out; " Who are you?" He said, " I am a Brahmany drake," but they took him prisoner; and in the morning he was brought before the king, and when questioned, he uttered in his presence the cry of that bird. Then the king himself summoned him and questioned him persistently, and when he told his story, being a merciful monarch, he let the wretched man go unpunished.

Story of the physician who tried to cure a hunchback.:— And a certain Bráhman said to a foolish physician; " Drive in the hump on the back of my son who is deformed." When the physician heard that, he said; " Give me ten panas, I will give you ten times as many, if I do not succeed in this," Having thus made a bet, and having taken the ten panas from the Bráhman, the physician only tortured the hunchback with sweating and other remedies. But he was not able to remove the