PHÚLMATI RÁNÍ

PHÚLMATI RÁNÍ

To notes T HERE were once a Rájá and a Rání who had an

only daughter called the Phúlmati Rání, or the

Pink-rose Queen. She was so beautiful that if

she went into a very dark room it was all lighted up by her

beauty. On her head was the sun; on her hands, moons;

and her face was covered with stars. She had hair that

reached to the ground, and it was made of pure gold.

Every day after she had had her bath, her father and

mother used to weigh her in a pair of scales. She only

weighed one flower. She ate very, very little food. This

made her father most unhappy, and he said, “I cannot let

my daughter marry any one who weighs more than one

flower.” Now, God loved this girl dearly, so he went down

under the ground to see if any of the fairy Rájás was fit to

be the Phúlmati Rání’s husband, and he thought none of

them good enough. So he went in the form of a Fakír to

see the great Indrásan Rájá who ruled over all the other

fairy Rájás. This Rájá was exceedingly beautiful. On his

head was the sun; and on his hands, moons; and on his

face, stars. God made him weigh very little. Then he said

to the Rájá, “Come up with me, and we will go to the palace [ Pg 2] of the Phúlmati Rání.” God had told the Rájá that he

was God and not a Fakír, for he loved the Indrásan Rájá.

“Very well,” said the Indrásan Rájá. So they travelled on

until they came to the Phúlmati Rání’s palace. When they

arrived there they pitched a tent in her compound, and they

used to walk about, and whenever they saw the Phúlmati

Rání they looked at her. One day they saw her having

her hair combed, so God said to the Indrásan Rájá, “Get a

horse and ride where the Phúlmati Rání can see you, and

if any one asks you who you are, say, ‘Oh, it’s only a poor

Fakír, and I am his son. We have come to stay here a

little while just to see the country. We will go away very

soon.’” Well, he got a horse and rode about, and Phúlmati

Rání, who was having her hair combed in the verandah,

said, “I am sure that must be some Rájá; only see how

beautiful he is.” And she sent one of her servants to ask

him who he was. So the servant said to the Indrásan Rájá,

“Who are you? why are you here? what do you want?”

“Oh, it’s only a poor Fakír, and I am his son. We have

just come here for a little while to see the country. We will

go away very soon.” So the servants returned to the Phúlmati

Rání and told her what the Indrásan Rájá had said.

The Phúlmati Rání told her father about this. The next

day, when the Phúlmati Rání and her father were standing

in the verandah, God took a pair of scales and weighed the

Indrásan Rájá in them. His weight was only that of one

flower! “Oh,” said the Rájá, when he saw that, “here is

the husband for the Phúlmati Rání!” The next day, after

the Phúlmati Rání had had her bath, her father took her

and weighed her, and he also weighed the Indrásan Rájá.

And they were each the same weight. Each weighed one

flower, although the Indrásan Rájá was fat and the Phúlmati

Rání thin. The next day they were married, and there

was a grand wedding. God said he was too poor-looking [ Pg 3] to appear, so he bought a quantity of elephants, and camels,

and horses, and cows, and sheep, and goats, and made a

procession, and came to the wedding. Then he went back

to heaven, but before he went he said to the Indrásan Rájá

“You must stay here one whole year; then go back to your

father and to your kingdom. As long as you put flowers

on your ears no danger will come near you.” (This was in

order that the fairies might know that he was a very great

Rájá and not hurt him.) “All right,” said the Indrásan

Rájá. And God went back to heaven.

So the Indrásan Rájá stayed for a whole year. Then he

told the Rájá, the Phúlmati Rání’s father, that he wished to

go back to his own kingdom. “All right,” said the Rájá,

and he wanted to give him horses, and camels, and elephants.

But the Indrásan Rájá and the Phúlmati Rání said they

wanted nothing but a tent and a cooly. Well, they set out;

but the Indrásan Rájá forgot to put flowers on his ears, and

after some days the Indrásan Rájá was very, very tired, so

he said, “We will sit down under these big trees and rest

awhile. Our baggage will soon be here; it is only a little

way behind.” So they sat down, and the Rájá said he felt

so tired he must sleep. “Very well,” said the Rání; “lay

your head in my lap and sleep.” After a while a shoemaker’s

wife came by to get some water from a tank which was close

to the spot where the Rájá and Rání were resting. Now, the

shoemaker’s wife was very black and ugly, and she had only

one eye, and she was exceedingly wicked. The Rání was

very thirsty and she said to the woman, “Please give me

some water, I am so thirsty.” “If you want any,” said the

shoemaker’s wife, “come to the tank and get it yourself.”

“But I cannot,” said the Rání, “for the Rájá is sleeping

in my lap.” At last the poor Rání got so very, very thirsty,

she said she must have some water; so laying the Rájá’s

head very gently on the ground she went to the tank. Then [ Pg 4] the wicked shoemaker’s wife, instead of giving her to drink,

gave her a push and sent the beautiful Rání into the water,

where she was drowned. The shoemaker’s wife then went

back to the Rájá, and, taking his head on her knee, sat still

until he woke. When the Rájá woke he was much frightened,

and he said, “This is not my wife. My wife was not

black, and she had two eyes.” The poor Rájá felt very

unhappy. He said, “I am sure something has happened to

my wife.” He went to the tank, and he saw flowers floating

on the water and he caught them, and as he caught them his

own true wife stood before him.

They travelled on till they came to a little house. The

shoemaker’s wife went with them. They went into the house

and laid themselves down to sleep, and the Rájá laid beside

him the flowers he had found floating in the tank. The

Rání’s life was in the flowers. As soon as the Rájá and Rání

were asleep, the shoemaker’s wife took the flowers, broke

them into little bits, and burnt them. The Rání died immediately,

for the second time. Then the poor Rájá, feeling

very lonely and unhappy, travelled on to his kingdom,

and the shoemaker’s wife went after him. God brought the

Phúlmati Rání to life a second time, and led her to the

Indrásan Rájá’s gardener.

One day as the Indrásan Rájá was going out hunting, he

passed by the gardener’s house, and saw a beautiful girl sitting

in it. He thought she looked very like his wife, the Phúlmati

Rání. So he went home to his father and said,

“Father, I should like to be married to the girl who lives in

our gardener’s house.” “All right,” said the father; “you can

be married at once.” So they were married the next day.

One night the shoemaker’s wife took a ram, killed it, and

put some of its blood on the Phúlmati Rání’s mouth while

the Rání slept. The next morning she went to the Indrásan

Rájá and said, “Whom have you married? You have [ Pg 5] married a Rakshas. Just see. She has been eating cows, and

sheep, and chickens. Just come and see.” The Rájá went,

and when he saw the blood on his wife’s mouth he was

frightened, and he thought she was really a Rakshas. The

shoemaker’s wife said to him, “If you do not cut this

woman in pieces, some harm will happen to you.” So the

Rájá took a knife and cut his beautiful wife into pieces.

He then went away very sorrowful. The Phúlmati Rání’s

arms and legs grew into four houses; her chest became a

tank, and her head a house in the middle of the tank; her

eyes turned into two little doves; and these five houses, the

tank and the doves, were transported to the jungle. No one

knew this. The little doves lived in the house that stood in

the middle of the tank. The other four houses stood round

the tank.

One day when the Indrásan Rájá was hunting by himself

in the jungle he was very tired, and he saw the house in the

tank. So he said, “I will go into that house to rest a little

while, and to-morrow I will return home to my father.” So,

tying his horse outside, he went into the house and lay down

to sleep. By and by, the two little birds came and perched

on the roof above his head. They began to talk, and the

Rájá listened. The little husband-dove said to his wife,

“This is the man who cut his wife to pieces.” And then he

told her how the Indrásan Rájá had married the beautiful

Phúlmati Rání, who weighed only one flower, and how the

shoemaker’s wife had drowned her; how God had brought

her to life again; how the shoemaker’s wife had burned her;

and last of all, how the Rájá himself had cut her to pieces.

“And cannot the Rájá find her again?” said the little wife-dove.

“Oh, yes, he can,” said her husband, “but he does

not know how to do so.” “But do tell me how he can find

her,” said the little wife-dove. “Well,” said her husband,

“every night, at twelve o’clock, the Rání and her servants [ Pg 6] come to bathe in the tank. Her servants wear yellow

dresses, but she wears a red one. Now, if the Rájá could

get all their dresses, every one, when they lay them down

and go into the tank to bathe, and throw away all the

yellow dresses one by one, keeping only the red one, he

would recover his wife.”

The Rájá heard all these things, and at midnight the Rání

and her servants came to bathe. The Rájá lay very quiet,

and after they all had taken off their dresses and gone into

the tank, he jumped up and seized every one of the dresses,—he

did not leave one of them,—and ran away as hard as he

could. Then each of the servants, who were only fairies,

screamed out, “Give me my dress! What are you doing?

why do you take it away?” Then the Rájá dropped one by

one the yellow dresses and kept the red one. The fairy

servants picked up the dresses, and forsook the Phúlmati

Rání and ran away. The Rájá came back to her with her

dress in his hand, and she said, “Oh, give me back my

dress. If you keep it I shall die. Three times has God

brought me to life, but he will bring me to life no more.”

The Rájá fell at her feet and begged her pardon, and they

were reconciled. And he gave her back her dress. Then

they went home, and Indrásan Rájá had the shoemaker’s

wife cut to pieces, and buried in the jungle. And they lived

happily ever after.

Told by Dunkní at Simla, July 25th, 1876.

[ Pg 7]