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Nandi Sootra
Just then the pitcher on her head fell down and shattered. The water spilled out and vanished in the sand.
Seeing all this the immodest said at once - "Old lady, as this pitcher has broken so is your son dead."
The old lady was engulfed in a wave of distress. Now the modest said - "Don't say that friend. Her son has already reached home." He turned to the old lady and said - "Mother, please rush back, your son awaits you there."
Reassured, the old lady left for her home. When she reached home, she saw that her son, with dust covered feet, was sitting at the gate and waiting for her. She embraced him with joy and at once traced back her steps to the young augur, taking along her son. She rewarded the modest and showered blessings on him.
When the immodest realised that all his predictions proved wrong and those of his friend proved to be right, he became very sad.
However, instead of finding his own shortcomings he was filled with a deep anger for his teacher - "This is the result of my teacher's favouritism. He did not teach me properly." When the two students returned to their teacher the modest bowed before the teacher with gratitude. But the immodest just stood there without even greeting the teacher.
When the teacher raised a questioning eye, he complained - "You have not taught me properly, therefore my knowledge is incomplete. Whereas you have taught this fellow with all sincerity so that his knowledge is complete. Such favouritism is not proper for a good teacher."
The teacher asked the modest with surprise - "Son, what is the matter? Why your colleague feels like that? Tell me everything in detail."
The modest told the whole story exactly as it had happened.
The teacher asked again - "Now tell me about the grounds of your predictions."
The modest - "Sir, by your grace I observed carefully that the foot prints belonged to an elephant. However, the distance between the spot where it urinated and the foot prints made me deduces that it was a female, not male. When I looked at the trees on both sides of the path I found signs of leaves and fruits snatched only from the trees on the right hand side. The trees on the left were intact. This told me that the she-elephant was blind in the left eye. With the foot prints of the elephant there were numerous other foot prints of men and women and foot prints of horses. This indicated that the person riding the elephant belonged to the royal family.
A little further there were clear signs of the elephant squatting down and a lady getting down and going to a nearby clump of bushes to relieve herself. Some strands of silk and a few long hairs indicated that the lady was married and extremely rich. Therefore I thought that she must be thequeen. After urinating she got up leaving an imprint of her right palm on sand. This difficulty in getting up indicated that she was pregnant. Observing her foot prints carefully I gathered that she was favouring the left leg. Thus I knew that the delivery time was very near. Other signs indicated that she will give birth to a male child."
The teacher looked at him with pride and contentment. The student continued - "When the pitcher slipped and broke immediately after the old lady asked her question, I deduced that like the sand made pitcher returned to its origin, the son has also returned to his mother."
Aagam- 44 -NandiSootra
75
Compiled by- Deepratnasagar
