Part 14

In The Indian Antiquary, vol. xvii, p. 50, in a Salsette story by Mr. G. Fr. D'Penha, a Prince to avoid marrying his sister went away with a hunter and a carpenter. At a deserted city at which they stayed a Rakshasa came daily when one was left to cook, and ate the rice. On the third day the Prince was the cook, and he killed the Rakshasa. The Prince's life was in his sword; if it rusted he fell sick, if it broke he would die. He made the carpenter King of the city and the hunter King of another, giving them life-index plants. The Prince then went away, killed another Rakshasa, and got from his waist a diamond which showed a passage through the water of a tank to a palace where he married a Princess and became King. He then forgot his sword, and it rusted. His friends learnt by the fading plants that he was ill, and found him just alive. He recovered when they cleaned and repolished the sword, after which they became his Chief Officers of State.

In Folk-Tales of Hindustan (Shaik Chilli), p. 45, a Prince, accompanied by the sons of a goldsmith, a pandit, and a carpenter, went to kill a giant. While they halted, a giant took the food that each in turn cooked. When the Prince cooked he vanquished the giant, who offered him his daughter in marriage, and joined his party. The Prince married her to the goldsmith's son, and went to another city where the Prince's giant killed a giant who ate the people. The King's daughter was married to the pandit's son. At a third city the giant killed a lion, and a Princess was married to the carpenter's son. When they arrived at the city of the giant they had come to kill, the Prince and giant found he was the one already killed at the second city. These giants could take any shape, and thus evidently were Rakshasas. The Prince married a Princess at the fourth city and lived there with his giant. One day his wife lost her shoe while bathing in a stream, and a Raja's son found it floating down. A witch undertook to find the owner, dived into the water, came to the fort, became the Princess's servant, and learnt that the Prince's life lay in the brightness of his sword; if it became rusty he would die. One night the witch burnt the sword in a furnace, the Prince died, and she took his wife through the water to her admirer's palace, where she demanded a year's delay before marrying him. The Prince's giant found and repolished the sword, and the Prince revived. They summoned the other friends, went in search of the Princess, killed the Raja, his son, and the witch, and returned home.

In Tales of the Punjab (Mrs. Steele), p. 42, when a Prince was travelling accompanied by a knife-grinder, a blacksmith, and a carpenter, a demon in the form of a mannikin ate the food which the last three cooked in turn, but was killed by the Prince when he cooked. The Prince married the knife-grinder to the King's daughter, the blacksmith to the daughter of a King at another city at which the Prince killed a ghost (Churel), and the carpenter to a Princess at a third city. To each of the friends the Prince gave a barley plant as his life index; if it drooped he would be in trouble and needing their help. He went on, killed a Jinn who had carried off a Princess with golden hair, married her, and lived at the Jinn's palace. When bathing she set one or two hairs afloat in a Bo-leaf cup, which was secured by a King lower down the river. A wise woman sent to find their owner, discovered her, ascertained that the Prince's life was in his sword, at night put it in a fire, and when the hilt rolled off the Prince died. She then carried off the Princess to the King. As the barley plants snapped in two, the three friends came with armies, found the body of the Prince and his sword, repaired and repolished the latter, and thus restored the Prince's life. The carpenter discovered the Princess, made a flying palankin, into which she, together with the King's sister and the wise woman, mounted with him, and he sailed back to the Prince, throwing down the other two women on the way.

In Sagas from the Far East, p. 39, four companions took possession of a house on a hill. They cooked in turn, the other three going to hunt. On each day a demoness in the form of a woman a span high begged a taste of the food, and she and the food and cooking-pot then disappeared. The fourth man killed her.

In the Katha Sarit Sagara (Tawney), vol. i, p. 386, the sword incident varies. A Prince's wife, wishing to deprive him of the magic power conferred by the sword, put the weapon in a fire while he slept. He became unconscious when the sword was dimmed, but recovered when the Goddess Durga restored its brightness.

In the same work, vol. ii, p. 487, an Asura's vital point was his left hand; he died when a King shot him through it.

In the Maha Bharata (Vana Parva, cccxi) four of the Pandava Princes were killed in turn by a Yaksha as soon as they drank at a pool. When the eldest brother answered his questions satisfactorily he revived them.

NO. 112

THE STORY ABOUT A GIANT

In a certain country two men spoke together: "Let us two persons go to seek the kingdom gored [by] the Sky Buffalo," [122] they said, it is said.

After that the two went, it is said. Procuring provisions, they began to go. At the time when they are going thus for not much time, one man was struck by inability [to proceed]. The man said, it is said, "Don't you go here alone," he said.

"Without going alone what shall I do?" he said. After that, that man died.

This man having gone, contracted (lit., tied) a marriage. Putting [out of consideration] the displeasure of the woman's two parents, he contracted the marriage. The mother-in-law and father-in-law, both of them, having said, "Don't you two remain in my house," told them to go. After that, the son-in-law having caused thieves to be brought, took the goods in the house that he had not brought; the best (honda honda) goods the man took, a few things those men got.

The man, taking the woman, went to another city. At the time when they were at the city no long time, a child was born to the woman. The child, at the time when he was seven years of age, catching the remaining Hares and Mouse-deer dashes them to the ground. A long time after twelve years were fulfilled, having run after Sambhar deer and caught them he dashes them to the ground; [123] having caught Boars also he dashes them to the ground.

That he is doing thus was known to everybody. Having perceived it they told the matter to the King of that city. The King, causing the young man to be brought, and having given him many offices, made him remain near the King; he is stopping there.

Then a hostile army having come to the city and laid [siege] to the city, [124] after the Ministers told the King, causing the giant to be brought he asked, "A hostile army having come is surrounding my city. On account of it, art thou able to drive off and send away the army?"

The giant said, "I am not unable to do it."

After that, the King said, "What are the things thou wantest for it?" he asked.

When he asked, he said, "Should I receive a tusk elephant and the sword, it will do." Afterwards he gave the tusk elephant and sword.

Having waited until the time when he gives them, he went for the battle. Having gone, and having cut down that army, he came to the royal palace. Having come, he made obeisance [125] to the King [and related an account of his victory]. After that, the King having given half the kingdom to the giant, he remained [there].

Well then, beginning from that day, he remained exercising the sovereignty [over the half of the kingdom] until the time when he dies.

North-western Province.

I was informed that in the allusion to the Sky Buffalo which gored the earth, reference is made to the country in which the sky pierces (that is, touches) the earth (see vol. i, p. 284). The Sky Buffalo is not mentioned elsewhere in these stories.

In the Katha Sarit Sagara (Tawney), vol. i, p. 6, the God Siva is represented as saying, "Moreover, this world resembling a skull, rests in my hand; for the two skull-shaped halves of the [Mundane] egg before mentioned are called heaven and earth." It is evident that here also the two halves of the egg, that is, the sky and the earth, are supposed to be in contact, the sky resting on the earth. In the Rigveda they are termed two bowls; the sun travelled in the hollow space between them (i, clx, 2), and the upper one was supported by pillars.

The feats of the youthful giant in chasing and seizing wild animals are borrowed from the Mahavansa, chapter xxiii (p. 161 of Professor Geiger's translation), where it is stated of Khañjadeva, one of the ten leading chiefs under King Duttha-Gamani in the second century B.C., that "when he went a-hunting with the village folk he chased at these times great buffaloes, as many as rose up, and grasped them by the leg with his hand, and when he had whirled them round his head the young man dashed them to the ground, breaking their bones."

NO. 113

HITIHAMI THE GIANT

In the Wanni country, in the north-western quarter of the Island of Lanka (Ceylon), there is a village called Andara-waewa. In that village a giant was born. His parents, cherishing him, reared the child.

While the child is at the age for playing seated, he eats about two quarts of cooked rice [daily]. At the walking age he eats about three quarts of cooked rice. While seven years of age he eats about four quarts of cooked rice.

Having gone with children who walked about for amusement, having caught hares and mouse-deer, and struck them on the ground, killing them, he brings them [home]. After he has brought them, his two parents ask, "Whence, son, are these?" Then the child says, "Mother, having gone running I seized them."

Thus, having been living in that manner, at the age of about twelve years he said to his mother, "Mother, give me food [to enable me] to go to cut a chena." So his mother gave him food.

The child having eaten the food, and gone to the jungle taking two bill-hooks, cut the chena that very day. Having cut it, and come home, he said to his mother, "Mother, I cut a chena. I don't know the time for setting fire to it. Because of it, tell father to set fire to the chena."

After that, his mother said, "Our son cut a chena. Set fire to it; son does not know the time for setting fire [to it]." After that, the man went and set fire to the chena.

This giant-child having gone, cut the fence [sticks] for the chena in one day; on the next day he went, and sowed it till he finished it. The sowing account was a paela (a quarter of an amuna of 5.7 bushels) of millet. [126]

On the next day he said to his mother, "Mother, I cut a chena indeed; for the purpose of going and doing the work at a tawalla [127] also, give me food." Afterwards his mother gave him food. Having eaten the food, the child went to the tawalla, and put up earthen ridges over the ground for [making a field large enough for sowing in it] one and a half amunas (8.55 bushels) of paddy. [128] Having put them up he came home.

Having gone on the following day, he made [the soil into] mud [129] [by causing cattle to trample it]. Having made [it into] mud he came home.

Having come, he said to his mother, "Mother, place one and a half amunas of paddy in water [to cause it to sprout] for sowing in the tawalla." Afterwards his mother made the paddy sprout. This child took the one and a half amunas of paddy, and sowed it that very day. In the evening he came home.

On the following day he said to his mother, "Mother, give me food. I indeed sowed the tawalla; there is still to build the watch-hut in it." Afterwards his mother gave him food. The child ate the food, and went to the tawalla. Having gone there, and that very day having made the fence, and that very day having built the watch-hut, he came home. Having eaten food, he went back to the watch-hut, and with his own foot he sprinkles water over the amuna and a half of paddy. [130]

At that time the King caused a Mallawa [131] giant to be brought to Kandy. Many men wrestled with the Mallawa giant and fell. After that, the King said to the Ministers, "Go and find a thoroughly strong giant, and come back." Afterwards the Ministers spread the news: "Is there a giant able to wrestle with the Mallawa giant?"

Then certain men said, "At the village called Andara-waewa there is a man called Hitihami, who eats the cooked rice from seven [quarts] of rice. That man is good for wrestling with the Mallawa giant."

After they said it, the Ministers went to Andara-waewa to seek the giant Hitihami. When they went there, the boy Hitihami was not at home; only the giant's mother was there. They asked at the hand of his mother, "Where is now Hitihami?" Then his mother said, "My son went to the watch-hut at the tawalla."

After that, the Ministers went to the tawalla to seek him. As they were going there they saw Hitihami sprinkling water for the tawalla with his foot. Thereupon the Ministers went to the place where Hitihami was sprinkling water. Having gone, the Ministers asked, "Is it you they call Hitihami of Andara-waewa?"

Then Hitihami said, "Yes, it is I myself. What matter have you come about?" he asked.

Then the Ministers said, "It has been arranged by the King [that you are] to go for the Mallawa wrestling. Because of it, get ready [132] for you to go."

After that, Hitihami having come home with the Ministers, asked at the hand of his mother, "Mother, haven't you cooked yet?"

His mother said, "Son, I have not yet cooked. I have only boiled five quarts of meneri."

Then Hitihami having [drunk] the milk taken from seven buffalo cows in the large cooking-pot, and having eaten those five quarts of boiled meneri, [after] washing his [right] hand and taking his betel bag also, said to the Ministers, "Let us go;" and Hitihami and the Ministers went.

At the time when they are going, there are a great many pumpkins at a chena on the path. Having seen them, Hitihami, plucking four pumpkins also and continuing to eat them, went to Kandy.

The Ministers who went with him said to the King, "Hitihami of Andara-waewa has come."

The King told Hitihami to come near, and said, "Can you wrestle with the Mallawa one?"

Then Hitihami replied, "Putting one Mallawa person [out of consideration], should seven come I am not afraid." After that, the King told him to go for the wrestling with the Mallawa one.

As soon as Hitihami went, he seized the Mallawa one. Then the bones of the Mallawa one were broken. The King said, "A! Kill not my Mallawa one!" So Hitihami let go. The Mallawa one having died, fell on the ground.

After that, the King was displeased with Hitihami. Having become displeased he said to the Ministers, "You must put Hitihami on the other bank of the river (Mahawaeli-ganga)." The Ministers put Hitihami on the other bank.

As Hitihami was coming away to his village, sixty persons having come together for a paddy kayiya, [133] were at the foot of a tree. Hitihami having gone there, asked, "What are you come together there for?"

Then the men said, "We have come together to cut a paddy kayiya."

Hitihami said, "Are you willing for me also to cut the paddy plants for a breath (husmak)?"

The men said, "It is very good; let us cut."

Afterwards, asking for the sickles from each one of the men, and having broken them, and thrown them down, and drawn out the betel-cutter that was in Hitihami's betel wallet (bulat-payiya), taking it he began to cut the paddy plants. Only the paddy plants of two amunas of paddy (about four and a half acres) were ripe; there were no more.

He finished the two amunas of paddy plants, and because there were no [more] ripe paddy plants, cutting the fence of the upper field and having gone [there], he began to cut the green paddy plants.

Then the men who owned the field said and said, "Don't cut [those]." He does not stop. Afterwards the men tied a ball. [134]

Afterwards, the giant having come to the high ground [outside the field], when he came to the place where the men were near the tree, the men said, "Let us go to eat the kayiya."

Then Hitihami said, "You go and eat the kayiya; I am going to my village."

As he was coming on and on, having met with a wild buffalo it began to gore him. So Hitihami seized the two horns of the buffalo, and loosening the two horns, went to his village [with them].

Having gone [there], and given into his mother's hand the two horns, he said, "Mother, having conquered in the Mallawa wrestling, at the time when I was coming back about sixty men had come together to cut the paddy plants in a rice field. At the hand of the men I asked, 'What are you many men joined together there for?' Then the men said, 'We are [here] to cut a paddy kayiya.'

"Afterwards, asking for the men's sickles, I broke them and threw them down, and taking the betel-cutter [135] that was in my betel wallet, descended to the field, and having cut the paddy plants, there also I got the victory.

"As I was coming away, a wild buffalo came to gore me. Afterwards, loosening the buffalo's two horns [I brought them away]. These indeed are the two horns." He told her all the matters.

Then his mother said, "Son, except that you have said that word to me, do not say it for anyone else to hear;" and having cooked several kinds of cakes, and milk-rice, gave them to Hitihami the Giant to eat.

North-western Province.

This story differs from nearly all the others in being almost certainly based on a considerable statum of fact. Apparently, it is the exaggerated tradition about a very strong man who defeated a celebrated Indian wrestler at Kandy. The story also gives more details concerning the village cultivations than any others I have met with.

Perhaps it is not the only record of this Hitihami. Among the names of the deified chiefs of ancient times, termed Bandara, there is one called Hiti Bandara, who is said to have lived at a village called Gokaraella, twelve miles north-east of Kurunaegala. It is possible that he is the hero of this story; but as the names of the villages are different there is considerable doubt regarding it. There was a village called Andara-waewa (in the Wanni Hat-pattu district of the North-western Province) which was abandoned some centuries ago, the field and village tank having become overgrown with jungle and forest.

As Kandy was founded early in the fourteenth century, according to the manuscript Pradhana nuwarawal, the story may record events of the fourteenth, fifteenth, or possibly the sixteenth century, A.D.

NO. 114

THE NEW SPEECH [136]

A certain Gamarala had a daughter, it is said. Many persons having come, ask to marry the daughter. After they have asked it, this [137] Gamarala asks those people who come, "Do you know the New Speech?" At that time those people say, "Ane! There is not a New Speech that we know." "If so, go you away," the [138] Gamarala says to those parties. Well then, those people go.

Then still a party come. He asks that party, also, in that very manner, "Do you know the New Speech?" Thereupon that party say, "Ane! There is not a New Speech that we know." Then the man says, "If so, I will not give my girl. I will give her [only] to the man who knows the New Speech."

In this manner, many persons having asked and asked, went away. Because even one person is not learning the New Speech, even one person does not obtain her.

A young man at yet [another] village said thus: "Ane! Father, I know [139] a New Speech. Because of it, marry and give that Gamarala's daughter to me," he said.

Thereupon, he having gone asks the Gamarala, "My son knows a New Speech. Because of it, can you marry your daughter to my son?" he asked.

Then the Gamarala, having become pleased, said, "It is very good."

On the following day after that the marriage took place. When not much time had gone, one day when the father-in-law and the son-in-law were getting ready to go and plough the rice field, they said at the hand of the girl's mother, "Bring cooked rice to the rice field," and went to plough.

While ploughing, the father-in-law's goad having broken he went to the jungle below the rice field to cut a goad. Then that girl's mother, bringing the cooked rice and coming to the field, asked the son-in-law, "Where, son-in-law, is your father-in-law now?"

Then the son-in-law said, "Ando! Mother-in-law, is there any stopping in the field for him! There, On! A woman was beckoning with her hands; he will have gone on that account;" and leaving aside the quarter to which that man went, he stretched out his hand in another direction. "He went there, On! You go, too," he said. Afterwards the mother-in-law went there.

Then that father-in-law having come to the rice field [after] cutting a goad, asked at the hand of that son-in-law, "Son-in-law, where is your mother-in-law?"

Then the son-in-law said, "Ando! Father-in-law, is there any staying here for her! Having brought and placed here the [mat] box of cooked rice, there, On! A man was beckoning with his hand. She will have gone on that account;" and leaving the quarter to which she went, he stretched out his hand in another direction. "She went there, On! You go too," he said.

The Gamarala, taking the goad, went there to seek the woman. That woman is seeking the man; the man is seeking the woman. While seeking him in that manner that woman came to the rice field, and asked, "Son-in-law, hasn't he come yet, your father-in-law?"

Then the son-in-law said, "Not he, mother-in-law; he hasn't come yet."

While she was there, the father-in-law came up and beat the woman until the goad was broken to pieces. Afterwards the woman came home.

While the two men, having eaten the cooked rice, were ploughing, the son-in-law asked at the hand of the father-in-law, "Father-in-law, she is a slut whom you have called [in marriage], isn't she?"

The father-in-law asked, "What is [the meaning of] that, son-in-law?"

The son-in-law replied, "Ando! You have been married such a long time, too! Don't you know about it? When you are sleeping, having come every day she licks your body. Sleep to-day, also; while you are sleeping she will lick your body, On!"

Afterwards, having ploughed, when it became night the son-in-law, going in front, came home, and says at the hand of the mother-in-law, "Ando! Mother-in-law, he is a salt leaf-cutter whom you have married, isn't he?"

Then the mother-in-law asked, "What is [the meaning of] that, son-in-law?"

The son-in-law said, "Ando! You have been such a long time married, too! Don't you know about it? To-day, after father-in-law has gone to sleep lick his body. There is salt taste, On!"

Afterwards, in the night when the father-in-law had gone to sleep, the mother-in-law went and licked his body. Then the father-in-law, having awoke, said, "Ci! Ci [140]! Slut!"

The mother-in-law said, "Ci! Ci! Salt Leaf-cutter!" and the two quarrelled.

When not much time had gone by, the [141] Gamarala said a speech to the son-in-law in this manner. His elder daughter had been given [in marriage] to a person at a distant village. "Son-in-law, as I have got news that my daughter's illness is severe, I am going because of it, and having gone there am returning."

Saying, "Sow one and a half amunas of paddy (eight and a half bushels), and block up [the gaps in] the fence, and tie the fence of the garden, and heat water, and place it [ready] for me to bathe when I come," he went.

Thereupon the man, getting the whole of these into his mind, said, "It is good."