Saturday 12 February 2022

28 MORAL FABLES FROM SANSKRIT LITERATURE-TALE 12

 


The story of Jealousy Monkeys and Birds

There is a large silk-cotton tree on the banks of the river Narmada, in the vicinity of a hill.  There, in the interiors of nests, built by themselves lived certain birds in happiness even in the monsoons.  Once in the rainy season, the sky being overcast with masses of clouds looking like so many dark veils, there fell a heavy shower of rain in large streams.  Then the birds seeing some monkeys at the foot of the tree, suffering, from cold and shivering, said, through mercy-Oh! Monkeys! Please listen-

“Asmaabhir nirmithaa needaas

  chanchu maathraahathais thrunaih  l

  Hastha paadhaadhi samyukthaa

  Yooyam kimithi seedhatha ll

We have built nests with straws bought by means of nothing else but our bills: why do you, who are endowed with hands and feet, experience suffering?

Hearing this, the monkeys being enraged said to themselves-Oh! The birds! comfortably lodged in the interior of their nests not exposed to the blast, are reproaching us.  Well, let the showers just cease.  Thereafter, when the downpour of rain had stopped, the monkeys climbed up the tree, and smashed all the nests, so that the eggs of the birds fell down.

The moral of the story:

“Vidvaan eva upadheshtavyo na avidhvaamsthu kadhaachana l

  Vaanaraan upadhisya atha sthaana-bhrashtaa yayuh khagaah ll

A learned man only should be advised and never an illiterate one; for having offered advice to monkey’s, the birds had to go away deprived of their place of abode. 


(This story is taken from the titled Vigraha the 3rd volume of the book Hitopadesa which has four volumes viz., Mitralaabhah, Suhrudbedhah, Vigrahah and Sandhi written by Narayana Pandita who lived in later part of the 14th Century A.D.)


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