Story 149 - The Prince And The Minister

AT a certain city there were a King and a Queen; the Queen had a Prince and a Princess. While they were thus, the King and Queen reached a very great age.

Afterwards the King says to the Minister,

“When the Prince has become big give him the kingship;”

having said it, he gave the [temporary] kingship to the Minister. After that, the King and Queen died.

After that, while the Minister and Prince and Princess, these three persons, are living thus, the Minister becomes changed towards the Prince. The men of that country perceived it.

After that, men say to the Prince,

“Should you, Sir, stay, the Minister will behead you; you go to another country,”

they said.

After that, the Prince, taking the painting (portrait) of the Princess, said,

“Don’t you descend from the floor of the upper story until the time when I come back.”

Saying it, the Prince went to another city. The Prince went near a widow woman of that city.

The widow woman asks,

“Of what village are you ?”

she asked.

The Prince says,

“I don’t know either my village or country,”

he said.

After that, the widow woman says,

“You stay near me.”

When she said it, the Prince having said,

“It is good, mother,”

remained no long time.

Afterwards, when the King of the city, having been at the palace, is going near the widow woman’s house, the King having seen that the Prince is in the open space in front of the house, the King came back to the palace laughing with pleasure, and called the Minister.

After the Minister came running, the King says,

“To-day a pleasure has gone to me,”

he said.

The Minister says,

“Who is the man whom you, Sir, saw to-day in the morning ? If you, Sir, see that man every day in the morning it will be good,”

he said.

After that, the King says to the Minister,

“Calling the widow woman and the boy, come back,”

he said. Afterwards the Minister, summoning them, came.

The King says to the widow woman,

“Give me the boy; I will give him food, drink, and clothing,”

he said. The widow woman gave him the boy.

After that, the King having built a house for the boy, and given him food, drink, and clothing, said,

“Show yourself to me in the morning at six,”

he said. The Prince on the following day went at six, and stayed [there]. After that, the Prince on the following day came at seven.

Then the King says,

“Why are you such a time?”

he asked. The Prince says,

“I went to sleep,”

he said. After that, the Prince on the following day at eight went near the King.

Afterwards the King says to the Prince,

“Should you not come at six to-morrow I shall behead you,”

and scolded him. On the day after that the Prince did not go at all.

After that, the King, having called the servants, says,

“Look ye for what [reason] that Prince did not come.”

The servants having gone, when they are peeping through the door, the Prince lying down and taking a painting, kisses it, weeps, places it on the ground, takes it again. These servants having seen it, told the King. “If so, seizing the Prince come [with him],” he said. The Minister, seizing him, came.

The King asks,

“Why did you not come ?”

Then the Prince said,

“I went to sleep.”

Then the King said,

“Give me your painting.”

Afterwards the Prince brought and gave it. As soon as the King looked at the painting he asked,

“What [relative] of yours^[1] is this Princess ?”

The Prince said,

“My younger sister.”

Then the King says,

“Bring the Princess for me to marry her.”

Then the Minister says,

“Having been keeping that woman three months, because she is a courtesan I sent her away,”

he says.

The Prince said,

“This Minister neither saw my younger sister, and nor was keeping her. If you were keeping her, mention the Princess’s marks.”

The Minister says to the King,

“Please put this Prince in prison until the time when I come,”

he said to the King. He put the Prince in prison.

Afterwards, the Minister, asking the King for the Princess’s portrait, and taking a good entertainment, having embarked, went to the city in which is the Princess. Having gone [there] he exhibits the entertainment.

The old woman who is with (lit., near) the Princess having seen it, [said] to the Princess,

“There is an entertainment which was never at our city. Let us go to look at it,”

she said.

After that, the Princess says,

“Elder brother said, ‘ Until the time when I come don’t descend from the floor of the upper story.’ Because of it I will not. You look and come back,”

she said.

Afterwards, having seen the old woman the Minister asks,

“Is there a Princess [here] like this picture?”

Then the old woman said,

“There is,”

she said. The Minister said to the old woman,

“[After] calling her come back,”

he said.

After that, the old woman says,

“The Princess’s elder brother said, ‘Until the time when I come back don’t descend from the floor of the upper story,’ he said; because of it she will not descend,”

she said.

Then the Minister says,

“Tell me a mark of the Princess’s.”

Then the old woman said,

“ There is not another mark of the Princess’s to tell you; on the right thigh there is the birth-mark (upan-lakuna) she said to the Minister.

After the Minister went back to the palace he said to the King, “Please tell that Prince to come,”

he said. The King caused the Prince to be brought. Afterwards the Minister said to the Prince,

“On the right thigh of your younger sister there is the birth-mark only; no other mark,”

he said. The Prince said,

“Yes, [it is so].”

After that, the King commanded them to hang this Prince. The Prince says to the King,

“I must [first] look at younger sister, and come.”

After that, the King sent the Prince with two men. The Prince having gone to the floor of the upper story, and beaten the Princess [and told her what the Minister said], the Prince came again to the city in which is the King. The Princess having been weeping and weeping went to sleep.

Afterwards the King, [in order] to hang the Prince, took him upon the scaffold. That Princess learnt that he is hanging the Prince. After that, the Princess having mounted on a horse, the King saw her come driving it along. The King [said],

“Don’t hang the Prince just now.”

Afterwards, the Princess having come, and descended from the back of the horse, and tied the horse at a tree, the Princess sat on a chair near the King. The Princess asks at the hand of the King,

“Why are these people [here] in this manner ?”

The King says,

“To-day I am hanging a Prince; because of it the people have come.”

After that, the Princess says to the King,

“The Minister having been keeping me three months, taking my slipper came away. Be good enough to ask for it, and give me it.”

The King said,

“Minister, if you brought it give her it.”

The Minister says,

“That Princess I neither kept nor know,”

the Minister said.

Afterwards, having caused the Prince to descend from the scaffold, the King [said],

“Who is this of yours ?”

The Prince said,

“My younger sister.”

Afterwards the King having caused the Minister to be brought, [told him who she was, and asked],

“Why did you tell lies ?”

After that the Minister says,

“ You, Sir, will marry the Princess; you will give the Minister's work to the Prince. Because of that.”

After that, the King ordered them to hang the Minister.

The King married that Princess. [The Prince] having gone to the Prince’s [own] palace, took the kingship fro m the Minister [who had been ruling temporarily]. To the Minister he gave the Minister’s work [again].

Finished.

North-western Province.

 

Note:

With regard to the order to hang the Prince, and the subsequent hanging of the Minister, there is a reference to this punishment in the next story, in which a Minister recommends that a turtle which had frightened some Princesses should be hanged. In vol. i, p. 368, a jackal remarked that a leopard which had been caught in a noose had been “hanged,”

as though this were a well-known punishment. I think there is no other clear instance in these stories; but in vol. i, p. 189, a Prince found a Yaksani trying to eat a dead body which was hanging in a tree; if this had been a case of suicide the relatives might have removed the body. Hanging the body at the four gates of the city after quartering it is mentioned in two of these tales (vol. i, pp. 86 and 89, and in No. 80, p. 20 of the present volume). Hanging is not referred to in the stories of the Low-Country Sinhalese, where one might expect to meet with it.

In the Wevaelkaetiya Inscription (Epigraphia Zeylanica, vol. i, p. 250), King Mahinda IV. (a.d. 1026-1042) ordered that persons convicted of robbery with violence should be hanged. Mr. Wickre-masinghe in giving a translation of this inscription added a note to the eflect that he had not found this punishment mentioned elsewhere in Sinhalese literature; but in the Mahavansa, ii, lxxv, vv. 166 and 196, and in the Rajavaliya (translation), p. 66, there are accounts of the hanging of people. In Marshall’s Ceylon, p. 39, it is stated that

“the punishment of death was usually carried into effect by hanging, or being killed by elephants.”

In Davy’s work also, p. 182, it is said that

“the sentence of death, in cases of murder, was carried into effect by hanging.”

In the Katha Sarit Sagara (Tawney), vol. ii, p. 185, a young man who was in love with a Princess received her portrait from a painter, and " spent his time in gazing on, coaxing and touching, and adorning her picture; ... he seemed to see her, though she was only a painted figure, talking to him and kissing him, . . and he was contented, because the whole world was for him contained in that piece of painted canvas.”

In the Arabian Nights (Lady Burton’s ed., vol. i, p. 183), when a Wazir showed his young son to a Sultan, the latter was so much pleased with him that he said,

“O Wazir, thou must needs bring him daily to my presence.”

Footnotes and references:

[1]:

Umbe kawuda, your who ? a common form of expression.