MISCELLANEA.
Indian Folktales.
(Continued from Vol. VI., page 406.)
We must not trust Appearances.
The bearer of a certain rajah one day, when his master was out hunting, was making the rajah's bed, which he did very well. He began to wonder what the couch felt like to sleep on. "I must try," said he to himself. Pulling aside the covering, he got in, and it was so comfortable that, being somewhat drowsy, he immediately fell fast asleep. Now the rani, as evening fell, grew sleepy and went to her room. There, to her surprise, she saw her husband, as she thought, in bed. Surmising he must have come home quietly, and too tired out by the chase to salute her, she undressed and crept in the other side of the wide couch. When the rajah came home and found the couple in his bed he was furious, and, drawing his sword, would have killed them there and then. But the prudent vizier stayed his hand. "Wait till we prove guilt," said he; and he induced the rajah to hide himself in the room. Then the vizier crept under the couch armed with a long pin, which he ran into the lower resai (quilt) and pricked the bearer. The man woke, started up, and, horrified to see where he was, "Alas!" cried he, "what have I done? I must have fallen asleep," and he quickly smoothed his side of the bed and left the room. Then the vizier pricked the rani. She, too, awoke, and was much amazed not to find her husband by her. "I thought I saw him asleep," she said aloud to herself. And the rajah, well pleased at the vizier's ruse, saw he had been saved from killing two innocent persons.
