Page:The Katha Sarit Sagara.djvu/317

{{C|293|| field, who had furrowed the earth with his plough, singing. That cultivator was asked about the road by a certain wandering hermit, who had come that way, but did not hear what he said, being wholly occupied with his song. Then the hermit was angry with that cultivator, and began to talk in a distracted manner; and the cultivator, stopping his song, said to him— ' Alas ! though you are a hermit, you will not learn even a fraction of virtue; even I, though a fool, have discovered what is the highest essence of virtue.' When he heard that, the hermit asked him out of curiosity— ' What have you discovered?' And the cultivator answered him— ' Sit here in the shade, and listen, while I tell you a tale.' Story of the three Bráhman brothers.:— In this land there were three Bráhman brothers, Brahmadatta, Somadatta, and Viśvadatta of holy deeds. Of these the two eldest possessed wives, but the youngest was unmarried; he remained as their servant without being angry, obeying their orders along with me; for I was their ploughman. And those elder brothers thought that he was soft, and devoid of intellect, good, not swerving from the light path, simple, and unenterprising. Then, once on a time, the youngest brother Visvadatta was solicited by his two brothers' wives who fell in love with him, but he rejected their advances as if each of them had been his mother. Then they both of them went and said falsely to their own husbands, " This younger brother of yours makes love to us in secret." This speech made those two elder brothers cherish anger against him in their hearts, for men bewildered by the speeches of wicked women, do not know the difference between truth and falsehood. Then those brothers said once on a time to Visvadatta— " Go and level that ant-hill in the middle of the field !" He said—" I will"— and went and proceeded to dig up the ant-hill with his spade, though I said to him, " Do not do it, a venomous snake lives there." Though he heard what I said, he continued to dig at the ant-hill, exclaiming— " Let what will happen, happen," for he would not disobey the order of his two elder brothers, though they wished him ill. Then, while he was digging it up, he got out of it a pitcher filled with gold, and not a venomous snake, for virtue is an auxiliary to the good. So he took that pitcher and gave it all to his elder brothers out of his constant affection for them, though I tried to dissuade him. But they sent assassins, luring them with a portion of that gold, and had his hands and feet cut off, in their desire to seize his wealth. But he was free from anger, and in spite of that treatment, did not wax wroth with his brothers, and on account of that virtue of his, his hands and feet grew again.

' After beholding that, I renounced from that time all anger, but you, though you are a hermit, have not even now renounced anger. The. man who is free from anger has gained heaven, behold now a proof of this.'