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THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
(NOVEMBER, 1885.
thing more than the usual allowance. The queen, hearing an altercation, came up, and demanded of the poor woman what she wanted.
"I was asking for a little more rice than usual, your Majesty," said she," that we might feed a stranger we have taken in for the night."
The queen, who was as uncharitable as her husband, fell into a rage at this, and ordered her servants not only to give the poor woman nothing more than her daily allowance, but to cortail even that by a handful or two by way of punishing her for her impudence.
The cowherd's wife meekly took what was given her and went home, and when the rice was cooked she divided it and the gu! between the stranger, her husband and herself. After serving the stranger with his share of the food, the poor couple retired into an inner room and sat down to theirs.
While they were at their meal the husband said: “Why did you not ask for a little more rice, wife, when you were given our daily pittance at the palace this evening, as I had told you, so that both we and our guest might have fared better to night "
"I did ask," said the woman," but the queen came up, and instead of adding a little more to our usual supply, ordered her servants to curtail it by a handful or two, and so I was obliged to be content with what was given me, and to do the best I could with it."
Their royal guest overheard this conversa- tion, and thus found confirmation of the report he had heard about the miserly habits of the king and queen of the country he found himself in,
After finishing what was placed before him the king lay down on the floor to sleep, and his host and hostess did the same in the next room. Before the king had composed himself to sleep, the cowherd arose, and coming up to him said :
"Awake! I have something for your ears only, and listen attentively, for I have a prophecy to tell you."
The king stared at him in astonishment, bot the cowherd proceeded :
"Before daybreak to-morrow the palace yonder will be in flames. Do not be concerned or frightened at this, for the decrees of fate are immutable, but take a knife and hasten
to the stalls where the cattle are kept, cut the strings with which they are tied and let them loose. You must then return to this cottage, where you will find my wife and myself dead in our beds. Do not be overcome with grief, but open the box in that corner there and you will find in it some money that I have saved up. Take some of it, run to the bázár and buy such articles as may be required for our obsequies. This done, lose no time in having our bodies burnt with due ceremony, defraying the cost of that also out of the contents of the box, and you will find two gold coins still left in it. I shall tell you, presently, what use you are to make of them. When returning from the outskirts of the city after burning our bodies you will hear a dhed (scavenger) quarrelling with his wife, and presently you will see him coming down a hill with two new-born babes placed in a winnowing fan. He will be abusing his wife for having given birth to twins this year, when he could not find bread enough for those she had already borne him, and saying that he will not bear it any longer, but will consign the unwelcome little ones to the sea. You must walk up to him, beg him to have mercy on the poor little things, give him the two gold coins, and tell him to have patience, for Iswar will provide for his babes. When he hears this he will return home again with the infants, who will be no other than the wicked king and queen of this country, burnt in the fire by which their palace is to be destroyed, because their sonls will have transmigrated into the bodies of the scavengers' twins.
"You must proceed towards the city after this and you will hear great rejoicings going on in a certain part of it, and on inquiry will learn that the two great ministers of the State are celebrating the birth, one of a boy and the other of a girl, just born to them. You will be told further that the two ministers, not being blessed with any progeny, had constantly been praying to Iswar to bless them with children, and that as they were very righteous and pious, he had heard their prayers, so that both their wives had borne them children at the same time, upon which, as they were great friends, they had vowed that if one had a boy and the other a girl they would marry them to each other; and that this is why both the families
