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62
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
[MARCH, 1897.
coming he met his uncle. Then the uncle thought within himself :-"The lad is not idle ; he does as much as he can. In this manner, day by day, he will get wiser and wiser; what my sister said is true. Henceforth I must not say any thing to him."
Moreover he thought :-“I must look for a site for a stana. I do not know where it should be built. Therefore, I must call a magician and show him the place."
Thinking thas, he quickly took his meal and went to the magician's house. When he went there, he saw the magician sitting in his house and talking cheerfully with his relatives who had come to him. Then the Ballal said to him: "O magician, I come to you on account of some business."
Then the magician, seeing the Balla], showed him respect and gave him a mat and a low stool and water in a pot and milk in a bowl, and said " Drink, sir," and also placed before him betel-leaves and betel-nut in a brass plate; and after finishing their talk, and after the Balla! had told him everything, the magician accompanied the Ballal to the budu. After reaching the budu, he ordered a good dinner for him, as if it were the dinner for a feast. So he and the Ballk], having finished dinner, ate the betel-leaves, and then got up and walked round the whole house; and yet they did not find a good site for the stána. Then they went further and looked for a site; there they found a large milk-banyan tree. When they found it, they thought it to be a very suitable site for & stána.
Then the magician said to the Balla! :-" O Ballal, you cannot find such a fine site if you go in search for it in a thousand districts. Such a ba nyan tree ought to be in a place where a stuna is to be built; without it you ought not to build a stána. In this place everything is convenient; therefore, you must build here."
At this the Balla! said :-" It is not enough if you say you must build here. You must tell me how much space is needed, and bringing the measuring line and rod, you must measure the ground just now."
So saying he brought the line and the rod and all the measuring instraments, and having measured the required space drove stakes into the ground, and making everything ready returned home. The next day, being Friday, when the sun arose and came above the horizon to about a man's height, carpenters came to the Ballal with their axes, ready to fell trees, and stood before him with clasped hands. Then the Ballal said to them, “O carpenters, are you come? Sit down in the verandah; I will come shortly."
So saying he ordered a big pot to be filled with water, and taking the water and four sérs of jaggery and four sugar-canes and twenty tender cocoanuts with him, the Balla! called the carpenters to him, and went with them to the forest; and seeing good trees asked the carpenters and got them felled at their suggestion. After the trees were felled, the Balla! and the carpenters being exposed to the hot sun became thirsty, and felt as if saffron powder had been put into their eyes, and began to breathe hard. Then the Ballal, giving to each carpenter one tender cocoanut and one pot of water and a quarter sår of jaggery, drank as much as he liked, and suid to them :-"O you carpenters, what is this? Our mother's milk which we had sucked while young, even that is burnt up; is it not so? By one day's work only you are quite exhausted. We have yet to fell down many trees. How will you fell them? I am ansions about it. What is this? It seems as if you had never before felled trees. I am very much astonished at this. Now you must cut off all the branches of the trees which you have felled, and then you must strip the bark of the trees, and make them four-sided to be ready for sawing. The sun is going to set soon. Therefore, make baste and strip the bark soon.' To-morrow the sawyers will come. When they come we must make everything ready for them. We must make four posts to stand, and tie cross-pieces on them on which the trees must be laid to be ready for sawing."
