Story 10 - Matalange Loku-appu

ONCE upon a time there lived a man and a woman, whose son was a youth named Matalange Loku-Appu.

One day the mother went to the river to fetch water, telling her son to allow nothing whatever to enter the house in her absence. While she was away a small lizard (hikanala) ran into the house. As it approached, the boy called out to it to stop, but it took no notice of him, and climbed up into the roof, whereupon Loku-Appu set fire to the roof and burnt the house down. When his mother returned, and asked him how the house came to be burnt, he informed her that he had done it in driving the lizard out of the roof.

Afterwards the father came home, and on learning what had occurred set off into the forest with his son to cut sticks, in order to build a new house. While he cut the sticks he ordered Loku-Appu to collect them.

A river flowed through the forest, and Loku-Appu asked him where it ran.

“To your house,”

he replied. The son, taking this literally, threw all the sticks into the river, so that it might transport them home. When the father discovered that all the sticks were lost in this way, he flew into a passion, tied the boy on a log, and set him afloat in the river, saying

“Go thou also.”

At a short distance down the river there was a sweet-potato garden. The gardener saw the log and boy floating past, and rescued Loku-Appu. He inquired the boy’s name, and was told it was

“Uprooter-of-Creepers, Sweet-Potato-Eater.”

Nevertheless, he placed the boy in charge of his garden, ,

After two or three days, the gardener returned to inspect his garden, and found all the sweet potatoes pulled up and eaten. So he tied the boy on the log again, and set him afloat once more.

Further down the river there was a plantain garden, the owner of which saw Loku-Appu on the log, and drew him ashore. When asked his name, Loku-Appu replied,

“Eater-of-the-first-Comb-of-Plantains, Crusher-of-young-Plantain-Shootsh.”

The man gave him charge of the garden.

In a few days, the man came to see how his garden progressed, and found everything broken down and eaten. On this, he at once dismisssed Loku-Appu.

Having nothing to live upon, Loku-Appu now began to borrow from some tom-tom beaters. After a few months, these men, finding that he did not repay them, called on him to make him come to a settlement. Loku-Appu saw them at a distance, and guessing their errand, put a young girl into the corn store-room, and began to trim a club with his knife.

When the creditors arrived he requested them to be seated. Soon afterwards he fetched up an old woman who lived in the house, gave her a smart blow with the club, and put her also into the corn-store.

After a few minutes, he called for betel to be brought, and the little girl came out with it. At this, the tom-tom beaters were greatly astonished, and made inquiries regarding the miracle, for such they thought it. Loku-Appu told them that the virtue lay in the club, with which all old women could be converted into young girls.

When they heard this, they became exceedingly anxious to possess the wonderful club, but Loku-Appu refused to part with it on any terms. At last, finding persuasion useless, the tom-tom beaters took it from him by force, and went straight home with it.

There they called up part of the old women of their village, and after beating them well with the club, put them into the com store-rooms. To give the charm time to work they waited three days. Then they went to examine the old women, expecting to find them become young again; but all were dead.

Full of anger, they went to Loku-Appu to tell him that he had deceived them, and that the women were all dead. While they were still at a distance, Loku-Appu cried out,

“Alas, alas ! They have taken hold of the wrong end of the stick !”

When they came near he explained to them the blunder they had made. As they took the stick from him by force he was not responsible for it.

This time he cut a mark on the right end of the stick to be used, telling the tom-tom beaters that if the wrong end were used the women would certainly die, while the proper end would as certainly change them into young girls.

When the tom-tom beaters returned to their village they fetched up all the rest of the old women, and after belabouring them well with the proper end of the club, put them also into the com-stores. Yet after three days they found that the result was just the same as at first; all the women were dead.

Determined to revenge themselves on Loku-Appu, they came to his house, tied him up in a sack, and set off to the river with him, intending to drown him. On the way, they heard the beating of tom-toms, whereupon they set the sack down on the road, and went to see what it was about.

During their absence, a Muhammadan trader in cloth who was coming along the road, found the sack, and heard a voice proceeding from it:

“Alas! What a trouble this is that has come upon me ! How can I govern a kingdom when I cannot either read or write ?”

The trader immediately untied the sack, and questioned Loku-Appu as to how he came there. Loku-Appu explained to the trader that he was about to be made a king, but not possessing the requisite amount of knowledge for such a high position he had refused the dignity; and now he was oeing carried off in this way to be put on the throne.

“By force they are going to make me king,” he said.

The trader remarked'to him,

“It will be a great favour if you will let them do it to me instead”;

and eventually they changed places, Loku-Appu tying the trader in the sack, and he himself taking the man’s clothes and bundle of cloth. loku-Appu then hid himself.

In a short time the tom-tom beaters came back, carried away the sack with the would-be king, and threw it into the river.

As they were returning past a part of the river, they saw, to their intense surprise, Loku-Appu washing clothes in it. They came to him and said,

“What is this, Loku-Appu ? Where have you come from ? Where did you get all this cloth ?”

He replied,

“These are the things which I found in the river bottom when you threw me in with the sack. As they are rather muddy I am cleaning them.”

The tom-tom beaters said that they would be greatly obliged if he would put them in the way of getting such treasures, so he requested them to bring sacks like that in which he had been tied.

They soon came back with the sacks, were tied up in them, and were thrown into the river by Loku-Appu.

Then Loku-Appu went to the tom-tom beaters’ village, and took possession of their lands and houses.

Some of the incidents of this story are found in No. 58 also.

In The Indian Antiquary, vol. iii, p. xi, in a Bengal story, by Mr. G. H. Damant, some men who had been cheated by a fanner, called at his house regarding the matter. He offered them food, and when they sat down to the meal struck his wife with his bullock goad, and said,

“Be changed into a girl, and bring in the curry.”

She went out, and sent back their little daughter with the food. He then sold the men the magic stick for one hundred and fifty rupees, telling them that if they beat their wives well with it they would all recover their youth. They acted accordingly, and beat them so thoroughly that the wives were all killed. Then they returned and burnt the farmer’s house down, as noted at the end of the last story, where the later incidents are given.

In The Indian Antiquary, vol. xviii, p. 120, there is a South Indian story by Pandita Natesha Sastri, in which, when three persons who had been cheated by a man came to interview him regarding the frauds, they were welcomed by him. According to arrangement, he beat his wife, who was dressed as an old woman, with a pestle and put her inside the house, explaining to his guests that he had only done it to make her young again. Soon afterwards she reappeared aa a young woman. He lent them the magic pestle for a week, but by its use they only killed their relatives. Then they returned in order to square up accounts with him, tied him in a bag, and carried him up a mountain, intending to burn him alive.

When they went for the firewood, a cow-herd came up, learnt from him that he was about to be forcibly married to a girl, took his place, and was burnt, the impostor himself driving off the 1,001 cows which the man was watching. When the three cheated persons returned and learnt that he had been sent back from Kailasa with the cattle, as his time on earth had not expired, two of them got him to burn them in a similar way.