Collectanea. 495
but Wind said : " Mountain is stronger than I, because, blow as hard as I can, I cannot stir it." So he went to Mountain, who said: "Yes, I am stronger than most things, but even a rat can pierce my side when he pleases. Hence the rat is greater than I." The man knew no where else to go, so he came home, and lo ! he found the girl turned into a rat as she was before.
[Mr. E. Sidney Hartland remarks: "One of La Fontaine's fables concerns a man who married a cat transformed into a woman. The story of The Strongest Thing in the World is well known in various forms."]
XIX. The Travel/itig Compafiions and the Grateful Doe.
Once upon a time a man called all his fellow villagers and took them with him to hunt. He shot many animals, and never missed. Of the few animals which his companions shot they refused to give him a share. So one day when he saw a big doe barking-deer he refused to shoot at it. Some time after, as he was walking along a road, a snake came out which turned into a beggar-man and asked him where he was going. " I am going to travel," he replied. The snake answered : " I will go with you." So they went on together. As they were walking a frog came out, and, turning into a man, asked them where they were going. When they said that they were going on their travels, he said he would join them. Then the doe appeared in the shape of a very pretty girl, and began to comb her hair in the river. Like the other animals she too joined them. When they came to the end of their journey the man married the girl. They came to a Sahib, who said : " If you don't make an irrigated field and cause rice to grow in it in a single day I will give you only an hour's grace before I kill you." The hunter was dismayed at this order, and he went and told his wife. She said : " Never mind. I will do it." Then she said : " First cut off my head with your knife (ddo)." The man refused, but" she insisted, and he had to kill her. But she came to life after he left her, made the field, caused the rice to grow, and went back to the house, cooked the dinner, and waited for her husband. But he did not come. Then she sent the snake man and the frog man to fetch him, and they dragged him to his wife's house.
