Page:Panchatantra.djvu/259

250 When he heard this, the policeman said: "This temple is deserted. Go and sleep in my bed." And he agreed, but made a blunder, lying down in the wrong bed. In that bed lay the policeman's daughter, a big girl named Naughty, beautiful and young. She had made a date with a man she loved, and when she saw Mister Duly, she thought: "Here is my sweetheart." So, her blunder due to the pitchy darkness of the night, she rose, gave herself in marriage by the ceremony used in heaven, then lay with him in bed, her lotus-eyes and lily-face ablossom. But she said: "Even yet you do not talk nicely with me. Why not?" And he replied:

On hearing this, she thought: "This is what one gets for being careless." So she gave him a sorrowful scolding and sent him packing.

As he walked along a business street, there approached a bridegroom named Fine-Fame. He came from another district and marched with a great whanging of tom-toms. So Mister Duly joined the procession. Since the happy moment was near at hand, the bride, a merchant's daughter, was standing at the door of her father's house near the highway. She stood on a raised step under an awning provided for the occasion, and displayed her wedding finery.

At this moment an elephant reached the spot, running amuck. He had killed his driver, had got