Page:Tales of the Sun.djvu/256

240 “My dear lord, we have heard that your father was a great mahâtmâ. This disciple must equally be a mahâtmâ. His holiness would not advise us to our ruin. Let us follow the sage’s advise.”

When Kapâlî’s wife thus supported the sage, he resolved to dispose of his beast and sack the next morning, and he did so accordingly. The provisions he bought were enough to feed fifty Brâhmiṇs morning and evening, as well as his own family. So that day he fed Brâhmiṇs for the first time in his life. Night came on, and after an adventurous day Kapâlî retired to sleep, but sleep he could not. Meanwhile Subrahmanya was sleeping on the bare verandah outside the house, and he came to the sage and said:—

“Holy sage, nearly half the night is spent, and there are only fifteen ghaṭikâs more for the dawn. What shall I do for the morrow for my hungry children? All that I had I have spent. I have not even a morsel of cold rice for the morning.”

Subrahmanya showed him some money that he had in his hand, enough to buy a buffalo and a sack of corn in case the great god did not help him, and asked him to spend that night, at lesatleast [sic] the remainder of it, in calm sleep. So Kapâlî, with his heart as ease, retired to rest.

He had not slept more than ten ghaṭikâs when he dreamt that all his family—his wife and