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Life and Stories of Pārçvanātha
queer actions. The Rākşasa acclaims him a noble man, but prepares to eat him. Rūpavati says, 'Eat me, for if my husband is eaten, what will become of me?' The Rākşasa says, ' You can live on alms, if any one refuses to give you alms, his head shall split into a hundred pieces.' Then she says, 'Give me my husband by way of alms.' The Rākşasa will not give him: his head splits into a hundred pieces.-N. B. This story introduces two additional familiar motifs: Head bursting' (e. g., Bșhaddevatā 4. 120; Pārçvanātha 2. 812; Jātakas 210, 358, 422); and 'Devil Tricked' (Dummer Täufel '); e. g. Kathās. 28. 156 ff.; ZDMG. Ixi. 20, with note on p. 69.
Vetālapancavinçati: Çivadāsa, 9; Kathāsaritsāgara 84; Baitāl Pachisi 9, Madanasenā is engaged to Samudradatta. Dharmadatta sees her, falls in love with her, and exacts from her a promise that she will come to him, untouched, on her bridal night. Her husband generously permits her to go to her ardent lover. On the way she is seized by a thief, who is also ravished by her beauty. She tells him of her tryst with Dharmadatta, and begs him to wait for her return, because she must keep her promise. When she comes to Dharmadatta, she tells what has happened. Rejoiced at her truthfulness, he lets her return to tủe thief, who in turn is moved by her faith, and allows her to return to her husband, with whom she lives happily ever after. For parallels outside India see Tawney in his Translation of Kathāsaritsāgara, vol. ii, p. 281; Oesterley, Baitāl Pachīsī, p. 197 ff.
Hitopadeça in Braj Bhākhā (Hertel, Das Pañcatantra, p. 56, who cites a variant from Hemavijaya’s Kathāratnākara): A cow strays from the herd, is attacked by a hungry lion, but begs him to spare her, until she has given suck to her calf. The lion allows her to go, but when she approaches her calf, the latter notices her grief, and refuses to suck. The cow tells of her promise; the calf &ccompanies the cow back to the lion, because its grief for its mother would, in any case, have killed it. The lion is rejoiced, and declares that the cow henceforth is his sister; the calf his nephew.
Jātaka 513, a king is seized by an ogre, while hunting. The ogre allows the king to go home on a promise to return next day to be eaten. His heroic son returns in his place, but is spared by the
ogre.
