e so much for him,
and they lived happily together.

Told by Muniya.

[Decoration]

[Decoration]

XXVI.

THE BED.

In a country there was a grain merchant's son, whose father and mother
loved him so dearly that they did not let him do anything but play and
amuse himself while they worked for him. They never taught him any
trade, or anything at all; for they never reflected that they might
die, and that then he would have to work for himself. When he was old
enough to be married, they found a wife for him, and married him to
her. Then they all lived happily together for some years till the
father and mother both died.

Their son and his wife lived for a while on the pice his father and
mother had left him. But the wife grew sadder and sadder every day,
for the pice grew fewer and fewer. She thought, "What shall we do when
they are all gone? My husband knows no trade, and can do no work." One
day when she was looking very sorrowful, her husband asked her, "What
is the matter? Why are you so unhappy?" "We have hardly any pice
left," she answered, "and what shall we do when we have eaten the few
we have? You know no trade, and can do no work." "Never mind," said
her husband, "I can do some work."

So one day when there were hardly any pice left, he took an axe, and
said to his wife, "I am going out to-day to work. Give me my dinner to
take with me, and I will eat it out of doors." She gave him some
food, wondering what work he had; but she did not ask him.

He went to a jungle, where he stayed all day, and where he ate his
dinner. All day long he wandered from tree to tree, saying to each,
"May I cut you down?" But not a tree in the jungle gave him any
answer: so he cut none down, and went home in the evening. His wife
did not ask where he had been, or what he had done, and he said
nothing to her.

The next day he again asked her for food to take with him to eat out
of doors, "for," he said, "I am going to work all day." She did not
like to ask him any questions, but gave him the food. And he took his
axe, and went out to a jungle which was on a different side to the one
he had been to yesterday. In this jungle also he went to every tree,
and said to it, "May I cut you down?" No tree answered him; so he ate
his dinner and came home.

The next day he went to a third jungle on the third side. There, too,
he asked each tree, "May I cut you down?" But none gave him any
answer. He came home therefore