A History of Indian Literature v2.c19.s3.t2.214

v2.c19.s3.t2.214

More numerous than the purely animal fairy tales are the fairy tales of animals and human beings, in which the animals, as a rule, cut a better figure than the people, as, in the fairy tale of the wise partridge, which has learned the Vedas from a celebrated teacher. Many youths come to it in order to learn. The lion and the tiger are among its friends. It lives in a golden cage and is guarded by a lizard. One day there comes a wicked ascetic who has an interesting past career (he was formerly a porter, a hawker, a juggler, a hunter, a fencer, a bird-catcher, corn-measurer, dice-player and hangman’s assistant), kills the young of the lizard and also the partridge, and, as a punishment, is torn to pieces by the tiger.² This class includes more especially those fairy tales, so widespread in universal literature, of grateful animals and ungrateful man, of which there are several in our collection. One of the prettiest is No. 73:³