Chapter 6.9 - Hamsa-kaka-upakhyana

This story is seen in the 41st chapter of KarnaParva. A Vaishya lived in a country on the seashore. He was very generous and took pleasure in almsgiving. His young son used to feed the crows everyday with the leftover food in the home. By eating this food the crow became quite strong and fat. The crow then became very proud and it started insulting other birds in its category. Once it had the audacity to challenge a swan that came to the seashore in flying.^[1]

There were many swans in the group. They simply smiled at the foolishness of the crow in challenging one of them to fly with the crow. The crow was ready to bet. The swans told the crow that it should not challenge a swan in flying and they were sure it would lose the bet. But the crow insulted them and told them that it knew 101 ways of flying.^[2] The swan said it knew only one way of flying. They started flying. After some time the crow felt tired, but it had no place to rest. It fell into the sea. Then it begged the swan to save it. The swan saved it from drowning. The crow then eulogized the heroism of the swan and flew away to a distant place saying that it will not insult others any more.

In this story, the poet has used many different names for the flight of the birds.^[3] From this it is quite obvious that the poet was well-versed in ornithology.