Page:The Mythology of the Aryan Nations.djvu/119

Rh CHAP, branch of a banyan-tree, from the fall of which Luxman will just save them by dragging them forcibly away ; the next will be from an insecure arch, and the third from a cobra. This serjDent, they said, Luxman would kill with his sword.

" But a drop of the cobra's blood shall fall on her forehead. The wuzeer will not care to wipe off the blood with his hands, but shall instead cover his face with a cloth, that he may lick it off with his tongue ; but for this the raja will be angry with him, and his re- proaches will turn this poor wuzeer into stone.

" ' Will he always remain stone ? ' asked the lady owl. ' Not for ever,' answered the husband, ' but for eight long years he will remain so.' ' And what then ? ' demanded she. * Then,' answered the other, ' when the young raja and ranee have a baby, it shall come to pass that one day the child shall be playing on the floor, and, to help itself along, shall clasp hold of the stony figure, and at that baby's touch the wuzeer will come to life again.' "

As in the German tale, everything turns out in accordance with the predictions of the birds. When, therefore, Luxman saw the cobra creep towards the queen, he knew that his life must be for- feited for his devotion, and so he took from the folds of his dress the record of the owl's talk and of his former life, and, having laid it beside the sleeping king, killed the cobra. The raja, of course, starts up just as his friend is licking the blood from his wife's forehead, and, drawing the same inference with the German prince, overwhelms him with reproaches.

" The raja had buried his face in his hands : he looked up, he turned to the wuzeer ; but from him came neither answer nor reply. He had become a senseless stone. Then Rama for the first time perceived the roll of paper which Luxman had laid beside him ; and when he read in it of what Luxman had been to him from boyhood, and of the end, his bitter grief broke through all bounds, and falling at the feet of the statue, he clasped its stony knees and wept aloud." Eight years passed on, and at length the child was born. A few months more, and in trying to walk, it -''stretched out its tiny hands and caught hold of the foot of the statue. The wuzeer instantly came back to life, and stooping down seized the little baby, who had rescued him, in his arms and kissed it." ^

' The calamity which overtakes into a frog. But this transformation is Luxman and P'aithful John is seen in merely the sinking of the sun into the an earlier and less developed form in western waters (see note 3, p. 165), and the German story of the Frog Prince. the time of his absence answers to the Here the faithful friend is overwhelmed charmed sleep of Endymion. Trusty with grief because his master is turned Henry is so grieved at the loss that he