Indian Antiquary Vol 34

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 93

APRIL, 1903.)
FOLKLORE OF THE TELUGUS.
87
his own eyes the final conquest of the ancient Sāhi kingdom, tells in words of manifest emotion of the grandeur and chivalry of the extinguished dynasty.
We can scarcely err if we recognize in this great memory an after-glow as it were, of that splendour with which popular tradition invested the long-enduring Kushăn dominion.
FOLKLORE OF THE TELUGUS. BY G. R. SUBRAMIAH PANTULU.
No. 1. - Friendship.1 “Even to foes that visit us as guests Due hospitality should be displayed, The tree screens with its leaves the man Who fells it." - Mahabharata, Sir Monier-Williams'
Indian Wisdom. THERE was a certain Brahmana, named Jabala, belonging to the Middle Country, who was destitute of Vedic loro. Beholding a prosperous village before him, he entered it with the object of obtaining alms. In that village lived a robbez-chief of great wealth, conversant witŁ the distinctive features of all orders of men, devoted to the Brahmaņas, firm in truth, and always engageá in making gifts. Repairing to the abode of the chief, the Erahmana begged for alms. Indeed, he solicited a house to live in, and such necessaries of life as would last for a year. Thus solicited, the chief gave him a piece of new cloth, with its ends complete, and a young widow. Obtaining all these, the Brahmana's joy knew no bounds, and he began to live happily in the commodious building given him by the robber-chief. He then began to help the kinsmen of his female slave. Thus he lived for many years in the prosperous village of the brigands and began to practise the art of archery with great devotion. Every day, like rest of the robber-clan, Jabala went into the woods and slaughtered wild cranes in abondance, and became a perfect master of the art of slaughter, being ever engaged in it, and consequently bade farewell to compassion.
“Who friendship with a kneve hath made,
Is thought to be a partner in the trade." One day, another Brahmana came to the village, dressed in rags and deer-skins, and with matted locks. Of highly correct bebaviour, he was devoted to the study of the Vedas. Of a humble disposition, frugal in fare, devoted to the Brâhmaņas, thoroughly conversant with the Vedas, and observant of Brahmacharya vows, he had once been a desr friend of Jabala, and belonged to that part of the country from which the latter had emigrated. He never accepted any food offered by a Sadra, and therefore began to search for the house of a Brahmana and at last he came to Jabala's house, just as he was returning from the woods. The two friends met. Armed with bow and sword, Jabala bore on his shoulders a load of slaughtered cranes, from which the blood that trickled down smeared his whole body. Recognising him, his friend, to whom he appeared as a cannibal, said :
"What is this thou art doing here through folly? Thou art a Brânimaņa, and the perpetrator of a Brahmaņa family. Born in a respectable family, belonging to the Middle Country, how is it thou hast become a robber? Recollect, regenerate one, thy famous kinsmen of former times, all of whom were well versed in the Vedas! Born of their race, alas, thou hast become a disgrace to it! Awake thyself by thy own exertions ! Recollecting the energy, the bebaviour, the learning, the self-restraint, the compassion (that are thine by right of birth), leave this thy present abode, O regenerate one."
Thus addressed, Jabala answered him in great affliction, saying :- "O foremost of regenerate ones, I am poor. I am destitute also of a knowledge of the Vedas! Know, 0 best of Brahmanas, that I have taken up my abode here for the sake of wealth alone. In thy sight, however, I am a brute-beast. We will leave this place together to-morrow. Do thou pass the night here with me."
A curious example of a folktale adapted to Brahmanic teaching. -Ed.]