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16. JAINA RELIGIOUS AND MORAL STORIES
423
XIV, The following story illustrates the consequences of theft or rather breach of trust. Simhasena was the king of Simhapura in the land of Prayaga, and Rāmadatta was his chief queen. The learned Sribhūti who had a great reputation for speaking the truth was his priest, and Sridattā was the latter's devoted wife. A young merchant named Bhadramitra, on the eve of a voyage to Suvarnadvipa with other merchants, had left seven priceless jewels in the custody of Sribhūti. Unfortunately, on the return voyage, Bhadramitra suffered shipwreck, but succeeded in reaching the shore by clinging to a floating plank. Having lost his friends and wealth, he was reduced to sore straits, and, arriving destitute at Simhapura, went to Srībhūti and asked for the jewels entrusted to him. But the latter pretended not to recognise him and denied having received any jewels at all. When Bhadramitra persisted in demanding the jewels, Srībhūti had him dragged to the king's presence, and, accusing him of calumny and defamation, had him repudiated by the king.
Not discouraged in the least, Bhadramitra climbed every night a tamarind tree which stood near the queen's palace, and regularly at dusk and dawn he kept shouting from the top of the tree that Śribhūti refused to return his jewels, and if the accusation turned out to be false, he (Bhadramitra) might be tortured to death. One evening the queen Rāmadattā, while she was watching the celebration of the Kaumudi festival by the women of the city, heard the plaint of Bhadramitra and devised a plan to test the truth of the charge against Śrībhūti. She invited the latter to a game of dice with her; and, under her instructions, a maidservant went to his wife, and won her confdence by producing certain articles belonging to her husband, which he had lost in the game, and obtained from her the jewels on the pretext that he had sent for them. The ruge succeeded perfectly well and the jewels were immediately taken to the king.
The king mixed up the jewels with those in his treasury and sent for Bhadramitra, and when the latter arrived, he was asked to single out th belonging to him. Bhadramitra had no difficulty in finding them, and the king was at once convinced of the guilt of Sribhuti, and lavishly praised and rewarded the young man for speaking the truth. The king then sent for Śrībhūti, and, after severely reprimanding him for his treachery, ordered that, by way of punishment, he must either swallow a certain quantity of cow-dung or submit to be roughly handled by a number of stalwart wrestlers; otherwise he would have all his property confiscated. Sribhūti calmly accepted the latter alternative, and was turned out of the city, mounted on an old donkey and wearing a garland of potsherds. As a result of his sins, he was attacked
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