Part 1

TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE

* Italics are denoted by underscores as in _italics_. * Small caps are represented in upper case as in SMALL CAPS. * Obvious printer errors have been silently corrected. * Original spelling, hyphenation and punctuation have been kept, but variant spellings were made consistent when a predominant usage was found. * Illustrations have been slightly moved so that they do not break up paragraphs while remaining close to the text they illustrate. * Illustration captions have been harmonized and made consistent so that the same expressions appear both in them and in the List of Illustrations. * Both “Bramha” and “Brahma” have been kept as distinct even though they probably denote the same deity.

TALES OF HINDU DEVILRY.

LONDON: PRINTED BY SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE AND PARLIAMENT STREET

VIKRAM AND THE VAMPIRE OR TALES OF HINDU DEVILRY.

ADAPTED BY RICHARD F. BURTON, F.R.G.S. &c.

‘Les fables, loin de grandir les hommes, la Nature et Dieu, rapetissent tout.’ LAMARTINE (_Milton_).

‘One who had eyes saw it; the blind will not understand it. A poet, who is a boy, he has perceived it; he who understands it will be his sire’s sire.’—RIG-VEDA (I. 164, 16).

_WITH THIRTY-THREE ILLUSTRATIONS_ BY _ERNEST GRISET_.

LONDON: LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 1870.

TO MY UNCLE,

ROBERT BAGSHAW, OF DOVERCOURT,

THESE TALES, THAT WILL REMIND HIM OF A LAND WHICH HE KNOWS SO WELL, ARE AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED.

PREFACE.

‘The genius of Eastern nations,’ says an established and respectable authority, ‘was, from the earliest times, much turned towards invention and the love of fiction. The Indians, the Persians, and the Arabians, were all famous for their fables. Amongst the ancient Greeks we hear of the Ionian and Milesian tales, but they have now perished, and, from every account that we hear of them, appear to have been loose and indelicate.’ Similarly, the classical dictionaries define ‘Milesiæ fabulæ’ to be ‘licentious themes,’ ‘stories of an amatory or mirthful nature,’ or ‘ludicrous and indecent plays.’ M. Deriége seems indeed to confound them with the ‘Mœurs du Temps’ illustrated with artistic _gouaches_, when he says, ‘une de ces fables milésiennes, rehaussées de peintures, que la corruption romaine recherchait alors avec une folle ardeur.’

My friend, Mr. Richard Charnock, F.A.S.L., more correctly defines Milesian fables to have been originally ‘certain tales or novels, composed by Aristides of Miletus;’ gay in matter and graceful in manner. ‘They were translated into Latin by the historian Sisenna, the friend of Atticus, and they had a great success at Rome. Plutarch, in his life of Crassus, tells us that after the defeat of Carhes (Carrhæ?) some Milesiacs were found in the baggage of the Roman prisoners. The Greek text and the Latin translation have long been lost. The only surviving fable is the tale of Cupid and Psyche,[1] which Apuleius calls “Milesius sermo,” and it makes us deeply regret the disappearance of the others.’ Besides this there are the remains of Apollodorus and Conon, and a few traces to be found in Pausanias, Athenæus, and the scholiasts.

[1] _Metamorphoseon, seu de Asino Aureo, libri XI._ The well known and beautiful episode is in the fourth, the fifth, and the sixth books.

I do not, therefore, agree with Blair, with the dictionaries, or with M. Deriége. Miletus, the great maritime city of Asiatic Ionia, was of old the meeting place of the East and the West. Here the Phœnician trader from the Baltic would meet the Hindu wandering to Intra, from Extra, Gangem; and the Hyperborean would step on shore side by side with the Nubian and the Æthiop. Here was produced and published for the use of the then civilised world, the genuine Oriental apologue, myth and tale combined, which, by amusing narrative and romantic adventure, insinuates a lesson in morals or in humanity, of which we often in our days must fail to perceive the drift. The book of Apuleius, before quoted, is subject to as many discoveries of recondite meaning as Rabelais. As regards the licentiousness of the Milesian fables, this sign of semi-civilisation is still inherent in most Eastern books of the description which we call ‘light literature,’ and the ancestral tale-teller never collects a larger purse of coppers than when he relates the worst of his ‘aurei.’ But this looseness, resulting from the separation of the sexes, is accidental, not necessary. The following collection will show that it can be dispensed with, and that there is such a thing as comparative purity in Hindu literature. The author, indeed, almost always takes the trouble to marry his hero and his heroine, and if he cannot find a priest, he generally adopts an exceedingly left-hand and Caledonian but legal rite called ‘gandharbavivaha.’[2]

[2] This ceremony will be explained in a future page.

The work of Apuleius, as ample internal evidence shows, is borrowed from the East. The groundwork of the tale is the metamorphosis of Lucius of Corinth into an ass, and the strange accidents which precede his recovering the human form.

Another old Hindu story-book relates, in the popular fairy-book style, the wondrous adventures of the hero and demigod, the great Gandharba-Sena. That son of Indra, who was also the father of Vikramajit, the subject of this and another collection, offended the ruler of the firmament by his fondness for a certain nymph, and was doomed to wander over earth under the form of a donkey. Through the interposition of the gods, however, he was permitted to become a man during the hours of darkness, thus comparing with the English legend—

Amundeville is lord by day, But the monk is lord by night.

Whilst labouring under this curse, Gandharba-Sena persuaded the King of Dhara to give him a daughter in marriage, but it unfortunately so happened that at the wedding hour he was unable to show himself in any but asinine shape. After bathing, however, he proceeded to the assembly, and, hearing songs and music, he resolved to give them a specimen of his voice.

The guests were filled with sorrow that so beautiful a virgin should be married to a donkey. They were afraid to express their feelings to the king, but they could not refrain from smiling, covering their mouths with their garments. At length some one interrupted the general silence and said:

‘O king, is this the son of Indra? You have found a fine bridegroom; you are indeed happy; don’t delay the marriage; delay is improper in doing good; we never saw so glorious a wedding! It is true that we once heard of a camel being married to a jenny-ass; when the ass, looking up to the camel, said, “Bless me, what a bridegroom!” and the camel, hearing the voice of the ass, exclaimed, “Bless me, what a musical voice!” In that wedding, however, the bride and the bridegroom were equal; but in this marriage, that such a bride should have such a bridegroom is truly wonderful.’

Other Brahmans then present said:

‘O king, at the marriage hour, in sign of joy the sacred shell is blown, but thou hast no need of that’ (alluding to the donkey’s braying).

The women all cried out:

‘O my mother![3] what is this? at the time of marriage to have an ass! What a miserable thing! What! will he give that angelic girl in wedlock to a donkey?’

[3] A common exclamation of sorrow, surprise, fear, and other emotions. It is especially used by women.

At length Gandharba-Sena, addressing the king in Sanskrit, urged him to perform his promise. He reminded his future father-in-law that there is no act more meritorious than speaking truth; that the mortal frame is a mere dress, and that wise men never estimate the value of a person by his clothes. He added that he was in that shape from the curse of his sire, and that during the night he had the body of a man. Of his being the son of Indra there could be no doubt.

Hearing the donkey thus speak Sanskrit, for it was never known that an ass could discourse in that classical tongue, the minds of the people were changed, and they confessed that, although he had an asinine form, he was unquestionably the son of Indra. The king, therefore, gave him his daughter in marriage.[4] The metamorphosis brings with it many misfortunes and strange occurrences, and it lasts till Fate in the author’s hand restores the hero to his former shape and honours.

[4] Quoted from _View of the Hindoos_, by William Ward, of Serampore (vol. i. p. 25).

Gandharba-Sena is a quasi-historical personage, who lived in the century preceding the Christian era. The story had, therefore, ample time to reach the ears of the learned African Apuleius, who was born A.D. 130.

The _Baital-Pachisi_, or _Twenty-five_ (tales of a) _Baital_[5]—a Vampire or evil spirit which animates dead bodies—is an old and thoroughly Hindu repertory. It is the rude beginning of that fictitious history which ripened to the _Arabian Nights’ Entertainments_, and which, fostered by the genius of Boccaccio, produced the romance of the chivalrous days, and its last development, the novel—that prose-epic of modern Europe.

[5] In Sanskrit, _Vétála-pancha-Vinshatí_. ‘Baital’ is the modern form of ‘Vétála.’

Composed in Sanskrit, ‘the language of the gods,’ alias the Latin of India, it has been translated into all the Prakrit or vernacular and modern dialects of the great peninsula. The reason why it has not found favour with the Moslems is doubtless the highly polytheistic spirit which pervades it; moreover, the Faithful had already a specimen of that style of composition. This was the Hitopadesa, or _Advice of a Friend_, which, as a line in its introduction informs us, was borrowed from an older book, the _Panchatantra_, or _Five Chapters_. It is a collection of apologues recited by a learned Brahman, Vishnu Sharma by name, for the edification of his pupils, the sons of an Indian Raja. They have been adapted to or translated into a number of languages, notably into Pehlvi and Persian, Syriac and Turkish, Greek and Latin, Hebrew and Arabic. And as the _Fables of Pilpay_,[6] they are generally known, by name at least, to European littérateurs. Voltaire remarks,[7] ‘Quand on fait réflexion que presque toute la terre a été infatuée de pareils contes, et qu’ils ont fait l’éducation du genre humain, on trouve les fables de Pilpay, Lokman, d’Ésope bien raisonnables.’

[6] In Arabic, _Bidpai el Hakim_.

[7] _Dictionnaire philosophique_, sub v. ‘Apocryphes.’

These tales, detached, but strung together by artificial means—pearls with a thread drawn through them—are manifest precursors of the Decamerone, or Ten Days. A modern Italian critic describes the now classical fiction as a collection of one hundred of those novels which Boccaccio is believed to have read out at the court of Queen Joanna of Naples, and which later in life were by him assorted together by a most simple and ingenious contrivance. But the great Florentine invented neither his stories nor his ‘plot,’ if we may so call it. He wrote in the middle of the fourteenth century (1344-8) when the West had borrowed many things from the East, rhymes[8] and romance, lutes and drums, alchemy and knight-errantry. Many of the ‘Novelle’ are, as Orientalists well know, to this day sung and recited almost textually by the wandering tale-tellers, bards, and rhapsodists of Persia and Central Asia.

[8] I do not mean that rhymes were not known before the days of El Islam, but that the Arabs popularised assonance and consonance in Southern Europe.

The great kshatriya (soldier) king Vikramaditya,[9] or Vikramarka, meaning the ‘Sun of Heroism,’ plays in India the part of King Arthur, and of Harun El Rashid further West. He is a semi-historical personage. The son of Gandharba-Sena the donkey and the daughter of the King of Dhara, he was promised by his father the strength of a thousand male elephants. When his sire died, his grandfather, the deity Indra, resolved that the babe should not be born, upon which his mother stabbed herself. But the tragic event duly happening during the ninth month, Vikram came into the world by himself, and was carried to Indra, who pitied and adopted him, and gave him a good education.

[9] ‘Vikrama’ means ‘valour’ or ‘prowess.’

The circumstances of his accession to the throne, as will presently appear, are differently told. Once, however, made King of Malaya, the modern Malwa, a province of Western Upper India, he so distinguished himself that the Hindu fabulists, with their usual brave kind of speaking, have made him ‘bring the whole earth under the shadow of one umbrella.’

The last ruler of the race of Mayúra, which reigned 318 years, was Rája-pál. He reigned 25 years, but giving himself up to effeminacy, his country was invaded by Shakáditya, a king from the highlands of Kumaon. Vikramaditya, in the fourteenth year of his reign, pretended to espouse the cause of Rája-pál, attacked and destroyed Shakáditya, and ascended the throne of Delhi. His capital was Avanti, or Ujjayani, the modern Ujjain. It was 13 kos (26 miles) long by 18 miles wide, an area of 468 square miles, but a trifle in Indian history. He obtained the title of Shakári, ‘foe of the Shakas,’ the Sacæ or Scythians, by his victories over that redoubtable race. In the Kali Yug, or Iron Age, he stands highest amongst the Hindu kings as the patron of learning. Nine persons under his patronage, popularly known as the ‘Nine Gems of Science,’ hold in India the honourable position of the Seven Wise Men of Greece.

These learned persons wrote works in the eighteen original dialects from which, say the Hindus, all the languages of the earth have been derived.[10] Dhanwantari enlightened the world upon the subjects of medicine and incantations. Kshapanaka treated the primary elements. Amara-Singha compiled a Sanskrit dictionary and a philosophical treatise. Shankubetálabhatta composed comments and Ghatakarpara, a poetical work of no great merit. The books of Mihira are not mentioned. Varáha produced two works on astrology and one on arithmetic. And Bararúchí introduced certain improvements in grammar, commented upon the incantations, and wrote a poem in praise of King Mádhava.

[10] Mr. Ward of Serampore is unable to quote the names of more than nine out of the eighteen, namely: Sanskrit, Prakrit, Naga, Paisacha, Gandharba, Rakshasa, Ardhamágadi, Apa, and Guhyaka—most of them being the languages of different orders of fabulous beings. He tells us, however, that an account of these dialects may be found in the work called _Pingala_.

But the most celebrated of all the patronised ones was Kalidása. His two dramas, Sakuntala,[11] and Vikram and Urvasi,[12] have descended to our day; besides which he produced a poem on the seasons, a work on astronomy, a poetical history of the gods, and many other books.[13]

[11] Translated by Sir Wm. Jones, 1789; and by Professor Williams, 1856.

[12] Translated by Professor H. H. Wilson.

[13] The time was propitious to savans. Whilst Vikramaditya lived, Mágha, another king, caused to be written a poem called after his name. For each verse he is said to have paid to learned men a gold piece, which amounted to a total of 5,280_l._—a large sum in those days, which preceded those of _Paradise Lost_. About the same period, Karnáta, a third king, was famed for patronising the learned men who rose to honour at Vikram’s court. Dhavaka, a poet of nearly the same period, received from King Shriharsha the magnificent present of 10,000_l._ for a poem called the _Ratna-Malá_.

Vikramaditya established the Sambat era, dating from A.C. 56. After a long, happy, and glorious reign, he lost his life in a war with Shalivahana, King of Pratisthana. That monarch also left behind him an era called the ‘Shaka,’ beginning with A.D. 78. It is employed, even now, by the Hindus in recording their births, marriages, and similar occasions.

King Vikramaditya was succeeded by his infant son Vikrama-Sena, and father and son reigned over a period of 93 years. At last the latter was supplanted by a devotee named Samudra-pála, who entered into his body by miraculous means. The usurper reigned 24 years and 2 months, and the throne of Delhi continued in the hands of his sixteen successors, who reigned 641 years and three months. Vikrama-pála, the last, was slain in battle by Tilaka-chandra, King of Vaharannah.[14]

[14] Lieut. Wilford supports the theory that there were eight Vikramadityas, the last of whom established the era. For further particulars, the curious reader will consult Lassen’s _Anthologia_, and Professor H. H. Wilson’s _Essay on Vikram_, (New) As. Res. ix. 117.

It is not pretended that the words of these Hindu tales are preserved to the letter. The question about the metamorphosis of cats into tigers, for instance, proceeded from a Gem of Learning in a university much nearer home than Gaur. Similarly the learned and still living Mgr. Gaume (_Traité du Saint-Esprit_, p. 81) joins Camerarius in the belief that serpents bite women rather than men. And he quotes (p. 192) Cornelius à Lapide, who informs us that the leopard is the produce of a lioness with a hyæna or a pard.

The merit of the old stories lies in their suggestiveness and their general applicability. I have ventured to remedy the conciseness of their language, and to clothe the skeleton with flesh and blood.

CONTENTS.

PAGE INTRODUCTION. 1

_THE VAMPIRE’S FIRST STORY._ IN WHICH A MAN DECEIVES A WOMAN. 54

_THE VAMPIRE’S SECOND STORY._ OF THE RELATIVE VILLANY OF MEN AND WOMEN. 97

_THE VAMPIRE’S THIRD STORY._ OF A HIGH-MINDED FAMILY. 140

_THE VAMPIRE’S FOURTH STORY._ OF A WOMAN WHO TOLD THE TRUTH. 156

_THE VAMPIRE’S FIFTH STORY._ OF THE THIEF WHO LAUGHED AND WEPT. 167

_THE VAMPIRE’S SIXTH STORY._ IN WHICH THREE MEN DISPUTE ABOUT A WOMAN. 190

_THE VAMPIRE’S SEVENTH STORY._ SHOWING THE EXCEEDING FOLLY OF MANY WISE FOOLS. 209

_THE VAMPIRE’S EIGHTH STORY._ OF THE USE AND MISUSE OF MAGIC PILLS. 238

_THE VAMPIRE’S NINTH STORY._ SHOWING THAT A MAN’S WIFE BELONGS NOT TO HIS BODY BUT TO HIS HEAD. 267

_THE VAMPIRE’S TENTH STORY._ OF THE MARVELLOUS DELICACY OF THREE QUEENS. 285

_THE VAMPIRE’S ELEVENTH STORY._ WHICH PUZZLES RAJA VIKRAM. 290

CONCLUSION. 307

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

DURING THE THREE HOURS OF RETURN HARDLY A WORD PASSED BETWEEN THE PAIR. _Frontispiece_

HE WAS PLAYING UPON A HUMAN SKULL WITH TWO SHANK BONES._p._ 43

HE ONCE MORE SEIZED THE BAITAL’S HAIR. 48

WENT UP TO HER WITH POLITE SALUTATIONS. _To face_ 65

HAVING SAID THIS, HE THREW ONE OF THE SWEETMEATS TO THE DOG. _To face_ 85

MOUNTING THEIR HORSES, FOLLOWED THE PARTY. 93

HE DISMISSED THE PALANQUIN-BEARERS. 117

HE SET OUT ALONE WITH HIS ILL-GOTTEN WEALTH. _To face_ 118

THE KING, PUFFING WITH FURY, FOLLOWED HIM AT THE TOP OF HIS SPEED, AND CAUGHT HIM BY HIS TAIL. _To face_ 139

IN THE MEANTIME A TRAVELLER, A RAJPUT, BY NAME BIRBAL. 143

THE BAITAL DISAPPEARED THROUGH THE DARKNESS. _To face_ 165

AS, HOWEVER, HE PASSED THROUGH A BACK STREET. _To face_ 170

AFTER A FEW MINUTES THE SIGNAL WAS ANSWERED. 173

THE TWO THEN RAISED, BY THEIR UNITED EFFORTS, A HEAVY TRAP-DOOR. _To face_ 174

TREADING WITH THE FOOT OF A TIGER-CAT. 177

THE KING WAS CUNNING AT FENCE, AND SO WAS THE THIEF. _To face_ 179

PRESENTLY THE DEMON WAS TRUSSED UP AS USUAL. 188

BAMAN, THE SECOND SUITOR, TIED UP A BUNDLE AND FOLLOWED. 198

MEANWHILE MADHUSADAN, THE THIRD, BECAME A JOGI. 199

THE HOUSEHOLDER’S WIFE CAME TO SERVE UP THE FOOD, RICE AND SPLIT PEAS. _To face_ 203

MADHUSADAN PROCEEDED TO MAKE HIS INCANTATIONS, DESPITE TERRIBLE SIGHTS IN THE AIR. _To face_ 205

VIKRAM PLACED HIS BUNDLE UPON THE GROUND, AND SEATED HIMSELF CROSS-LEGGED BEFORE IT. _To face_ 207

THEY TRIED TO LIVE WITHOUT A MONTHLY ALLOWANCE, AND NOTABLY THEY FAILED. 223

AN EDIFYING SPECTACLE, INDEED, FOR THE WORLD TO SEE: A CROSS OLD MAN SITTING AMONGST HIS GALLIPOTS AND CRUCIBLES. _To face_ 228

THE BONE THEREUPON STOOD UPRIGHT, AND HOPPED ABOUT. 230

THEY PREPARED FOR THEIR TASK. 234

WITH A ROAR LIKE THUNDER. _To face_ 235

BUT THEIR EYES HAD MET. 241

AS THEY EMERGED UPON THE PLAIN, THEY WERE ATTACKED BY THE KIRATAS. _To face_ 277

THEN A HORRID THOUGHT FLASHED ACROSS HER MIND; SHE PERCEIVED HER FATAL MISTAKE. _To face_ 279

THERE HE FOUND THE JOGI. 310

AS HE BENT HIM DOWN TO SALUTE THE GODDESS. 317

TAILPIECE. 319

VIKRAM AND THE VAMPIRE.

INTRODUCTION.

The sage Bhavabhuti—Eastern teller of these tales—after making his initiatory and propitiatory congé to Ganesha, Lord of Incepts, informs the reader that this book is a string of fine pearls to be hung round the neck of human intelligence; a fragrant flower to be borne on the turban of mental wisdom; a jewel of pure gold, which becomes the brow of all supreme minds; and a handful of powdered rubies, whose tonic effects will appear palpably upon the mental digestion of every patient. Finally, that by aid of the lessons inculcated in the following pages, man will pass happily through this world into the state of absorption, where fables will be no longer required.

He then teaches us how Vikramaditya the Brave became King of Ujjayani.

Some nineteen centuries ago, the renowned city of Ujjayani witnessed the birth of a prince to whom was given the gigantic name Vikramaditya. Even the Sanskrit-speaking people, who are not usually pressed for time, shortened it to ‘Vikram,’ and a little further West it would infallibly have been docked down to ‘Vik.’

Vikram was the second son of an old king Gandharba-Sena, concerning whom little favourable has reached posterity, except that he became an ass, married four queens, and had by them six sons, each of whom was more learned and powerful than the other. It so happened that in course of time the father died. Thereupon his eldest heir, who was known as Shank, succeeded to the carpet of Rajaship, and was instantly murdered by Vikram, his ‘scorpion,’ the hero of the following pages.[15]