A History of Indian Literature v2.c19.s3.t2.244

v2.c19.s3.t2.244

Then the monkeys do not want to hear any more, they cover their ears and run away. (Jāt. No. 219.) Remarkable on account of its relation to Greek literature, is the anecdote of the woman whose husband, son and brother are to be executed, and who is offered by the king the choice of the life of one of her three relatives. She decides for the brother, giving as a reason that she could easily obtain a husband and a son, but could never again obtain a brother. The same anecdote is told by Herodotus of the wife of Intaphernes, and Sophocles lets Antigone argue in the same way. The same idea recurs in India in the Rāmāyaṇa, in connection with an old Indian proverb which says that one can have everything in the world more easily than a real brother. The anecdote, therefore, is very old in India as well as in Greece ; but it is just as little characteristically Indian as specifically Greek, so that it can hardly be determined where its actual home is to be found.