Story 74 - The Three Suitors

IN a certain country dwelt a man and a woman, it is said. These two had a son and a daughter.

When a man came one day and asked for the daughter [in marriage] at the hand of the father, the father said,

“It is good. Come on Wednesday.”

The man having said “Ha,” went away.

Afterwards another man came and asked for the girl at the hand of the mother.

The mother said,

“It is good. Come on Wednesday.”

The man having said “Ha,” went away.

After that, yet a man came and asked for her at the hand of the girl’s younger brother.

The younger brother said,

“It is good. Come on Wednesday.”

The man having said “Ha,” went away.

Well then, the company of three persons having come on Wednesday and eaten rice and betel, caused the girl to come out [of the house], inviting her to go. Then the three persons endeavoured to call her to go in three [different] directions. Because the girl was unable to settle the dispute she ate a kind of poison, and lying down died there and then. Afterwards they buried her.

After that, the man who came first went to a soothsayer. The man who came next watched alone at the place where they buried her. The man who came last having said,

“It doesn’t matter to me,”

went to his village.

The man who went to ask for sooth having inquired about it, came to the place where they buried the girl. Having come and made incantations in the manner prescribed by the sooth-sayer, he made her arise, and got her [back to life]. After she had recovered she went to the village. The man also went there.

Now then, after the three men had come together there, the man who brought her back to life asked,

“To whom do you belong ?”

The girl said,

“The man who watched alone at the grave is my mother. The man who went to inquire of the soothsayer is my father. The man who went to his village is my man.”

Having said this, the girl went with the man to his village.

Kinnari. North-western Province.

 

Note:

This is a story of Vikrama and the Vampire, one of the puzzling questions set to the King being a decision as to whom the girl belonged.

In Indian Nights’ Entertainment (Swynnerton), p. 237, the girl threw herself down from the house-top. One of the suitors sprang on the funeral pile, and was burnt with her. The second watched over the grave. The third became a Fakir, and learnt how to revive the dead. He revived both the girl and the burnt suitor. The merchant whose opinion was required decided that the two who were burnt together were brother and sister, the Fakir who gave them renewed life was tbeir father, and the man who merely sat by the grave must become her husband.

In the Jataka story No. 150 (vol. i, p. 321), there is an account of a person who had learnt the spell for reviving the dead. In this case it was a tiger, who killed him.

In Tota Kahani (Small), p. 139, out of three suitors for the hand of a girl who was carried off by a fairy, one learnt the manner of her disappearance and the place where she was, the second made a magical flying wooden horse, on which the third rode to rescue her, killed the fairy, and brought her back. The Parrot’s decision was that the last one had the best right to her, as he had risked his life for her.    '