the hawker came; and seeing the ass fallen into so bad a plight,
pronounced the second verse:

"Long might the ass,
Clad in a lion's skin,
Have fed on the barley green;
But he brayed
And that moment he came to ruin."

And even while he was yet speaking the ass died on the spot.

238

THE TALKATIVE TORTOISE

The future Buddha was once born in a minister's family, when
Brahma-datta was reigning in Benares; and when he grew up he became the
king's adviser in things temporal and spiritual.

Now this king was very talkative; while he was speaking others had no
opportunity for a word. And the future Buddha, wanting to cure this
talkativeness of his, was constantly seeking for some means of doing so.

At that time there was living, in a pond in the Himalaya mountains, a
tortoise. Two young hamsas, or wild ducks, who came to feed there, made
friends with him, and one day, when they had become very intimate with
him, they said to the tortoise:

"Friend tortoise! the place where we live, at the Golden Cave on Mount
Beautiful in the Himalaya country, is a delightful spot. Will you come
there with us?"

"But how can I get there?"

"We can take you if you can only hold your tongue, and will say nothing
to anybody."

"Oh! that I can do. Take me with you."

"That's right," said they. And making the tortoise bite hold of a stick,
they themselves took the two ends in their teeth, and flew up into the
air.

Seeing him thus carried by the hamsas, some villagers called out, "Two
wild ducks are carrying a tortoise along on a stick!" Whereupon the
tortoise wanted to say, "If my friends choose to carry me, what is that
to you, you wretched slaves!" So just as the swift flight of the wild
ducks had brought him over the king's palace in the city of Benares, he
let go of the stick he was biting, and falling in the open courtyard,
split in two! And there arose a universal cry, "A tortoise has fallen in
the open courtyard, and has split in two!"

The king, taking the future Buddha, went to the place, surrounded by his
courtiers; and looking at the tortoise, he asked the Bodisat, "Teacher!
how comes he to be fallen here?"

The future Buddha thought to himself, "Long expecting, wishing to
admonish the king, have I sought for some means of doing so. This
tortoise must have made friends with the wild ducks; and they must have
made him bite hold of the stick, and have flown up into t