Jataka Vol. II: Book II. Dukanipāta: No. 218. Kūṭa-Vāṇija-Jātaka
p. 127
No. 218.
KŪṬA-VĀṆIJA-JĀTAKA.
"Well planned indeed!" etc.--[181] This story the Master told while staying in
Jetavana, about a dishonest trader.
There were two traders of Sāvatthi, one pious and the other a cheat. These two
joined partnership, and loaded five hundred waggons full of wares, journeying
from east to west for trade; and returned to Sāvatthi with large profits.
The pious trader suggested to his partner that they should divide their stock.
The rogue thought to himself, "This fellow has been roughing it for ever so long
with bad food and lodging. Now he's at home again, he'll eat all sorts of
dainties and die of a surfeit. Then I shall have all the stock for myself." What
he said was, "Neither the stars nor the day are favourable; to-morrow or the
next day we'll see about it;" so he kept putting it oft: However, the pious
trader pressed him, and the division was made. Then he went with scents and
garlands to visit the Master; and after a respectful obeisance, he sat on one
side. The Master asked when he had returned. "Just a fortnight ago, Sir," said
he. "Then why have you delayed to visit the Buddha?" The trader explained. Then
the Master said, "It is not only now that your partner is a rogue; he was just
the same before;" and at his request told him an old-world tale.
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Once upon a time, while Brahmadatta was king of Benares, the Bodhisatta came
into this world as the son of one in the king's court. When he grew up he was
made a Lord Justice.
At that time, two traders, one from a village and one of the town, were friends
together. The villager deposited with the townsman five hundred ploughshares.
The other sold these, and kept the price, and in the place where they were he
scattered mouse clung. By and by came the villager, and asked for his
ploughshare 1. "The mice have eaten them up 2!" said the cheat, and pointed out
the mouse clung to him.
p. 128
"Well, well, so be it," replied the other: "what can be done with things which
the mice have eaten?
Now at the time of bathing he took the other trader's son, and set him in a
friend's house, in an inner chamber, bidding them not suffer him to go out any
whither. [182] And having washed himself he went to his friend's house.
"Where is my son?" asked the cheat.
"Dear friend," he replied, "I took him with me and left him on the river side;
and when I was gone down into the water, there came a hawk, and seized your son
in his extended claws, and flew up into the air. I beat the water, shouted,
struggled--but could not make him let go."
"Lies!" cried the rogue. "No hawk could carry off a boy"
"Let be, dear friend: if things happen that should not, how can I help it? Your
son has been carried off by a hawk, as I say."
The other reviled him. "Ah, you scoundrel! you murderer! Now I will go to the
judge, and have you dragged before him!" And he departed. The villager said, "As
you please," and went to the court of justice. The rogue addressed the
Bodhisatta thus
"My lord, this fellow took my son with him to bathe, and when I asked where he
was, he answered, that a hawk had carried him off. Judge my cause!"
"Tell the truth," said the Bodhisatta, asking the other.
"Indeed, my lord," he answered, "I took him with me, and a falcon has carried
him off."
"But where in the world are there hawks which carry off boys?"
"My lord," he answered, "I have a question to ask you. If hawks cannot carry off
boys into the air, can mice eat iron ploughshares?"
"What do you mean by that?"
"My lord, I deposited in this man's house five hundred ploughshares. The man
told me that the mice had devoured them, and showed me the droppings of the mice
that had done it. My lord, if mice eat ploughshares, then hawks carry off boys:
but if mice cannot do this, neither will hawks carry the boy off. This man says
the mice ate my ploughshares. Give sentence whether they are eaten or no. [183]
Judge my cause!"
"He must have meant," thought the Bodhisatta, "to fight the trickster with his
own weapons.--Well devised!" said he, and then he uttered these two verses:--
"Well planned indeed! The biter bit,
The trickster tricked--a pretty hit!
If mice eat ploughshares, hawks can fly
With boys away into the sky! p. 129
"A rogue out-rogued with tit for tat!
Give back the plough, and after that
Perhaps the man who lost the plough
May give your son back to you now!" 1
[184] Thus he that had lost his son received him again, and he received his
ploughshare that had lost it; and afterwards both passed away to fare according
to their deeds.
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When this discourse was ended, the Master identified the Birth:--"The cheat in
both cases was the same, and so was the clever man; I myself was the Lord Chief
Justice."
Footnotes
127:1 Here, in the last sentence but one, and in the verses the singular phālaṁ
is used. It is possible this may be a collective, but more likely that it harks
back to a simpler and older version, where only one is spoken of. Readers cannot
fail to have marked the fondness of the Jātaka editor for round numbers,
especially five hundred.
127:2 Things gnawed by mice or rats were unlucky; cp. vol. 1. p. 372 (Pāli),
Tevijja-Sutta Mahāsīlaṁ i (trans. in S. B. E., Buddhist Suttas, p. 196). The man
here goes further than he need; if the mice had but nibbled the ploughshares
perhaps he might throw them away.--We may also have a reference to an old
proverb, found both in Greek and Latin: "where mice eat iron" meant "nowhere."
Herondas 3. 76 οὑδ᾽ ὅκου χώρης οἱ μῦς ὁμοίως τὸν σίδηρον τρώγουσιν. Seneca,
Apocolocyntosis chap. 7 (to Claudius in heaven) venisti huc ubi mures ferrum
rodunt.
129:1 A like repartee is found in North Ind. N. and O. iii. 214 (The Judgement
of the Jackal); Swynnerton, Ind. Nights Entertainments, p. 142 (The Traveller
and the Oilman); and a story of an oilman in Stumme's Tunische Märchen, vol. ii.
Next: No. 219. Garahita-Jātaka
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