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JUNE, 1887.]
THE OGRESS QUEEN.
THE OGRESS QUEEN. A KASMIRI STORY.
BY THE REV. J. HINTON KNOWLES, F.R.G.S., M.R.A.S., &c.
People tell of a king who had seven wives that were all childless. When he married the first he thought that she would certainly bare him a son. He hoped the same of the second, the third and the others; out no son was born to gladden his days, and to sit on the throne after him. This was a terrible, overwhelming grief to him.
One day he was walking in a neighbouring wood and bemoaning his lot, when he saw a most beautiful fairy.
"Where are you going?" she asked. "I am very miserable," he replied. "Although I have seven wives, I have no son to call my own, and to make my heir. I came to this wood to-day hoping to meet some holy man, who would intercede for me."
"And do you expect to find such a person in this lonely place?" she asked laughing. "Only I live here. But I can help you. What will you give me, if I grant you the desires of your heart?"
"Give me a son, and you shall have half of my country."
"I will take none of your gold or your country. Marry me, and you shall have a son and heir."
The king agreed, took the fairy to his palace, and very quickly made her his eighth wife. A short while afterwards all the other wives of the king became pregnant. However, the king's joy was not for long. The beautiful fairy whom he had married was none other than a rakshasi (ogress), who had appeared to his Majesty as a fairy, in order to deceive him and work mischief in the palace. Every night when the rest of the royal household were fast asleep she arose and going to the stables and outhouses ate an elephant, or two or three horses, or some sheep, or a camel; and then having satisfied her blood-thirsty appetite returned to her room, and came forth in the morning, as if nothing bad happened. At first the king's servants feared to inform him of these things; but when they found that animals were being taken every night, they were obliged to go to him. Strict orders were at once given for the protection of the palace-buildings
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and guards were appointed to every room, but it was all in vain. Day by day the animals disappeared and nobody could tell how.
One night while the king was pacing his room, puzzled to know what to do, the supposed fairy, his wife, said:
"What will you give me if I discover the thief ?"
"Anything-everything," the king replied. "Very well; rest, and by the morning I will show you the cause of these things."
His Majesty was soon sound asleep, and the wicked queen left the room. She went to the sheep-pens, and taking one of the sheep killed it, and filled an earthen vessel with its blood. Then she returned to the palace, and went to the several rooms of the other wives of the king and stained their mouths and clothes with the blood that she had brought. Afterwards she went and lay down in the room, while the king was still sleeping. As soon as the day dawned she woke him and said to him :
"I find that your other wives have taken and eaten the animals. They are not human beings. They are rakshasis. If you wish to preserve your life, you will beware of them. Go and see if I am not speaking the truth."
The king did so, and when he saw the bloodstained mouths and garments of his other wives, he was terribly enraged. He ordered that their eyes should be put out, and that they should be thrown into a big, dry well, which was outside the city; and this was done,
The very next/day one of them gave birth to a son, who was eaten by them for food. The day after that another had a son, and he was likewise eaten, On the third day another wife was confined on the fourth day another; on the fifth day another; and on the sixth day another: each of a son, who was eaten up in his turn. The seventh wife, whose time had not arrived, did not eat her portions of the other wives' children, but kept them till her own son was born, when she begged them not to kill him, and to take the portions which they had given her instead. Thus the child was spared, and through him in the future the lives of the seven queens were miraculously preserved.
