Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 3 1885.djvu/130

 122 At that very instant a bilva-fruit fell upon a leaf of the palm-sapling. At that sound the hare started up and at once fled, and did not dare to look behind, thinking, "This firm and solid earth is coming to an end." Another hare, that saw him running away as if afraid of death, asked, "Why, pray, are you hurrying away in such a fright?" "Oh, don't ask me," he replied, scampering off while the other kept on crying out, "Oh! what can it be? oh I what can it be?" Stopping for a moment, but not looking back, he said, "The earth is now coming to an end." On hearing this the second hare ran away after the other. A third hare saw him (taking to flight and followed his example), and he was seen by a fourth, and so on until one hundred thousand hares in like manner, one by one, betook themselves to flight.

As these hares were running away they were seen respectively by an antelope, a hog, an elk, a buffalo, an ox, a rhinoceros, a tiger, a lion, and an elephant, all of whom asked, "Why is this? What's the meaning of this flight?" and when they heard say, "The earth is now coming to an end!" they one by one also took to flight.

Thus in succession within the circuit of twelve yojanas there was a host of frightened animals. At that time the Bodhisat chanced to see this army of beasts in headlong flight, and asked, "How's this? " When he heard that the earth was now coming to an end he thought to himself, "It's no such thing, the earth is not coming to an end. These creatures must surely have heard some inauspicious sound, and if I don't at once bestir myself they'll all come to grief. However, I'll save their lives." Going with the speed of a lion to the foot of a mountain, thrice he roared a lion's roar. Terrified and afraid of the lion, they halted and stood all of a heap. The lion entered their midst and inquired, "Why are you running away?" "The earth is now coming to an end," they answered. "Pray who has seen (any sign) that the earth is coming to an end?" he asked. "The elephants know all about it," they replied. He asked the elephants, and they said, "We know nothing about it, but the lions know"; and the lions said, "We know nothing of it, the tigers know"; and the tigers said, "The rhinoceroses know"; and the rhinoceroses said "the oxen," and the oxen "the buffaloes," and the buffaloes "the elks," and the