PÁNWPATTÍ RÁNÍ

PÁNWPATTÍ RÁNÍ To notes I N a country a big fair was held, to which came a great many people and Rájás from all the countries round. Among them was a Rájá who brought his daughter with him. Opposite their tent another tent was pitched, in which lived a Rájá’s son. He was very beautiful; so was the little Rání, the other Rájá’s daughter. Now, the Rájá’s son and the Rájá’s daughter did not even know each other’s names, but they looked at each other a great deal, and each thought the other very beautiful. “How lovely the Rájá’s daughter is!” thought the prince. “How beautiful the Rájá’s son is!” thought the princess. They lived opposite each other for a whole month, and all that time they never spoke to each other nor did they speak of each other to any one. But they thought of each other a great deal. When the month was over, the little Rání’s father said he would go back to his own country. The Rájá’s son sat in his tent and watched the servants getting ready the little Rání’s palanquin. As soon as the princess herself was dressed and ready for the journey, she came out of her tent, and took a rose in her hand. She first put the rose to her teeth; then she stuck it behind her ear; and lastly, she laid it at her feet. All this time the Rájá’s son sat in his tent and looked at her. Then she got into her palanquin and was carried away. [ Pg 209] The Rájá’s son was now very sad. “How lovely the princess is!” he thought. “And I do not know her name, or her father’s name, or the name of her country. So how can I ever find her? I shall never see her again.” He was very sorrowful, and determined he would go home to his country. When he got home he laid himself down on his bed, and night and day he lay there. He would not eat, or drink, or bathe, or change his clothes. This made his father and mother very unhappy. They went to him often, and asked him, “What is the matter with you? Are you ill?” “I want nothing,” he would answer. “I don’t want any doctor, or any medicine.” Not one word did he say to them, or to any one else, about the lovely little Rání. The son of the Rájá’s kotwál [6] was the prince’s great friend. The two had always gone to school together, and had there read in the same book; they had always bathed, eaten, and played together. So when the prince had been at home for two days, and yet had not been to school or seen his friend, the kotwál’s son grew very anxious. “Why does the prince not come to school?” he said to himself. “He has been here for two days, and yet I have not seen him. I will go and find out if anything is the matter. Perhaps he is ill.” He went, therefore, to see the prince, who was lying very miserable on his bed. “Why do you not come to school? Are you ill?” asked his friend. “Oh, it is nothing,” said the prince. “Tell me what is the matter,” said the kotwál’s son; but the Rájá’s son would not answer. “Have you told any one what is the matter with you?” said the kotwál’s son. “No,” answered the prince. “Then tell me,” said his friend; “tell me the truth: what is it that troubles you?” “Well,” said the prince, “at the fair there was a Rájá who had a most beautiful daughter. They lived in a tent opposite [ Pg 210] mine, and I used to see her every day. She is so beautiful! But I do not know her name, or her father’s name, or her country’s name; so how can I ever find her?” “I will take you to her,” said his friend; “only get up and bathe, and eat.” “How can you take me to her?” said the prince. “You do not even know where she is; so how can you take me to her?” “Did she never speak to you?” said the kotwál’s son. “Never,” said the prince. “But when she was going away, just before she got into her palanquin, she took a rose in her hand; and first she put this rose to her teeth; then she stuck it behind her ear; and then she laid it at her feet.” “Now I know all about her,” said his friend. “When she put the rose to her teeth, she meant to tell you her father’s name was Rájá Dánt [Rájá Tooth]; when she put it behind her ear she meant you to know her country’s name was Karnátak [on the ear]; and when she laid the rose at her feet, she meant that her name was Pánwpattí [Foot-leaf]. Get up; bathe and dress, eat and drink, and we will go and find her.” The prince got up directly, and told his father and mother he was going for a few days to eat the air of another country. At first they forbad his going; but then they reflected that he had been very ill, and that perhaps the air of another country might make him well; so at last they consented. The prince and his friend had two horses saddled and bridled, and set off together. At the end of a month they arrived in a country where they asked (as they had asked in every other country through which they had ridden), “What is the name of this country?” “Karnátak” [the Carnatic]. “What is your Rájá’s name?” “Rájá Dánt.” Then the two friends were glad. They stopped at an old woman’s house, and said to her, “Let us stay with you for a few days. We are men from another country and do not know where to go in this place.” The [ Pg 211] old woman said, “You may stay with me if you like. I live all alone, and there is plenty of room for you.” After two or three days the kotwál’s son said to the old woman, “Has your Rájá a daughter?” “Yes,” she answered; “he has a daughter; her name is Pánwpattí Rání.” “Can you go to see her?” asked the kotwál’s son. “Yes,” she said, “I can go to see her. I was her nurse, and she drank my milk. It is the Rájá who gives me my house, and my food, and clothes—everything that I have.” “Then go and see her,” said the kotwál’s son, “and tell her that the prince whom she called to her at the fair has come.” The old woman went up to the palace, and saw the princess. After they had talked together for some time, she said to the little Rání, “The prince you called to you at the fair is come.” “Good,” she said; “tell him to come to see me to-night at twelve o’clock. He is not to come in through the door, but through the window.” (This she said because she did not want her father to know that the prince had come, until she had made up her mind whether she would marry him.) The old woman went home and told the kotwál’s son what the Princess Pánwpattí said. That night the prince went to see her, and every night for three or four nights he went to talk with her for an hour. Then she told her mother she wished to be married, and her mother told her father. Her father asked whom she wished to marry, and she said, “The Rájá’s son who lives in my nurse’s house.” Her father said she might marry him if she liked; so the wedding was held. The kotwál’s son went to the wedding, and then returned to the old woman’s house; but the prince lived in the Rájá’s palace. Here he stayed for a month, and all that time he never saw his friend. At last he began to fret for him, and was very unhappy. “What makes you so sad?” said Pánwpattí Rání. [ Pg 212] “I am sad because I have not seen my friend for a whole month,” answered her husband. “I must go and see him.” “Yes, go and see him,” said his wife. The Rájá’s son went to the old woman’s house, and there he stayed a week, for he was so glad to see the kotwál’s son. Then he returned to his wife. Now she thought he would only have been away a day, and was very angry at his having stayed so long from her. “How could you leave me for a whole week?” she said to him. “I had not seen my friend for a month,” he answered. Pánwpattí Rání did not let her husband see how angry she was; but in her heart she thought, “I am sure he loves his friend best.” The prince remained with her for a month. Then he said, “I must go and see my friend.” This made her very angry indeed. However, she said, “Good; go and see your friend, and I will make you some delicious sweetmeats to take him from me.” She set to work, and made the most tempting sweetmeats she could; only in each she put a strong poison. Then she wrapped them in a beautiful handkerchief, and her husband took them to the kotwál’s son. “My Rání has made you these herself,” he said to his friend, “and she sends you a great many salaams.” The Rájá’s son knew nothing of the poison. The kotwál’s son put the sweetmeats on one side, and said, “Let us talk, and I will eat them by and by.” So they sat and talked for a long time. Then the kotwál’s son said, “Your Rání herself made these sweetmeats for me?” “Yes,” said the Rájá’s son. His friend was very wise, and he thought, “Pánwpattí Rání does not like me. Of that I am sure.” So he took some of the sweetmeats, and broke them into bits and threw them to the crows. The crows came flying down, and all the crows who ate the sweetmeats died instantly. Then the kotwál’s son threw a sweetmeat to a dog that was passing. The dog devoured it and fell [ Pg 213] dead. This put the Rájá’s son into great rage. “I will never see my Rání again!” he exclaimed. “What a wicked woman she is to try and poison my friend—my friend whom I love so dearly; but for whom I should never have married her!” He would not go back to his wife, and stayed in the old woman’s house. The kotwál’s son often told him he ought to return to his wife, but the prince would not do so. “No,” he said, “she is a wicked woman. You never did her any evil or hurt; yet she has tried to poison you. I will never see her again.” When a month had passed, the kotwál’s son said to the prince, “You really must go back to Pánwpattí Rání; she is your wife, and you must go to her, and take her away to your own country.” Still the Rájá’s son declared he would never see her again. “If you would like to see something that will please you,” said his friend, “go back to your wife for one day; and to-night ‘when she is asleep’ you must take off all her jewels, and tie them up in a handkerchief, and bring them to me. But before you leave her you must wound her in the leg with this trident.” So saying, he gave him a small iron trident. The prince went back to the palace. His wife was very angry with him, though she did not show her anger. At night ‘when she was fast asleep’ he took off all her jewels and tied them in a handkerchief, and he gave her a thrust in the leg with his trident. Then he went quickly back to his friend. The princess awoke and found herself badly hurt and alone; and she saw that her jewels were all gone. In the morning she told her father and mother that her jewels had been stolen; but she said nothing about the wound in her leg. The king called his servants, and told them a thief had come in the night and stolen his daughter’s jewels, and he sent them to look for the thief and seize him. [ Pg 214] That morning the kotwál’s son got up and dressed himself like a yogí. He made the prince put on common clothes such as every one wears, so that he could not be recognized, and sent him to the bazar to sell his wife’s jewels. He told him, too, all he was to say. The pretended yogí went to the river and sat down by it, and the Rájá’s son went through the bazar and tried to sell the jewels. The Rájá’s servants seized him immediately. “You thief!” they said to him, “what made you steal our Rájá’s daughter’s jewels?” “I know nothing about the jewels,” said the prince. “I am no thief; I did not steal them. The holy man, who is my teacher, gave them to me to sell in the bazar for him. If you want to know anything more about them, you must ask him.” “Where is this holy man?” said the servants. “He is sitting by the river,” said the Rájá’s son. “Let us go to him. I will show you where he is.” They all went down to the river, and there sat the yogí. “What is all this?” said the servants to him. “Are you a yogí, and yet a thief? Why did you steal the little Rání’s jewels?” “Are those the little Rání’s jewels?” said the yogí. “I did not steal them; I did not know to whom they belonged. Listen, and I will tell you. Last night at twelve o’clock I was sitting by this river when a woman came down to it—a woman I did not know. She took a dead body out of the river, and began to eat it. This made me so angry, that I took all her jewels from her, and she ran away. I ran after her and wounded her in the leg with my trident. I don’t know if she were your Rájá’s daughter, or who she was; but whoever she may be, she has the mark of the trident’s teeth in her leg.” The servants took the jewels up to the palace, and told the Rájá all the yogí had said. The Rájá asked his wife whether the Princess Pánwpattí had any hurt in her leg, and told her all the yogí’s story. The Rání went to see her daughter, [ Pg 215] and found her lying on her bed and unable to get up from the pain she was in, and when she looked at her leg she saw the wound. She returned to the Rájá and said to him, “Our daughter has the mark of the trident’s teeth in her leg.” The Rájá got very angry, and called his servants and said to them, “Bring a palanquin, and take my daughter at once to the jungle, and there leave her. She is a wicked woman, who goes to the river at night to eat dead people. I will not have her in my house any more. Cast her out in the jungle.” The servants did as they were bid, and left Pánwpattí Rání, crying and sobbing in the jungle, partly from the pain in her leg, and partly because she did not know where to go, and had no food or water. Meanwhile her husband and the kotwál’s son heard of her being sent into the jungle, so they returned to the old woman’s house and put on their own clothes. Then they went to the jungle to find her. She was still crying, and her husband asked her why she cried. She told him, and he said, “Why did you try to poison my friend? You were very wicked to do so.” “Yes,” said the kotwál’s son; “Why did you try to kill me? I have never done you any wrong or hurt you. It was I who told your husband what you meant by putting the rose to your teeth, behind your ear, and at your feet. Without me he would never have found you, never have married you.” Then she knew at once who had brought all this trouble to her, and she was very sorry she had tried to kill her husband’s friend. They all three now went home to her husband’s country; and his father and mother were very glad indeed that their son had married a Rájá’s daughter, and the Rájá gave the kotwál’s son a very grand present. The young Rájá and his wife lived with his father and mother, and were always very happy together. Told by Múniyá, February, 1879. FOOTNOTE: [6] The chief police officer in a town. [6] The chief police officer in a town. [6] The chief police officer in a town. [ Pg 216]