there nine hundred and ninety-eight talking wooden parrots, which I greatly prize. Let me first go and fetch them.'
They said, 'Very well; go quickly, and return.' So he mounted the two wooden parrots which had brought him from the Panch-Phul Ranee's country (and which had for eighteen years lived in the jungle close to the palace), and returned to the land where his first wife lived, and fetched her and the nine hundred and ninety-eight remaining wooden parrots to his father's kingdom. Then his father said to him, 'Don't have any quarrelling with your half-brother after I am dead' (for his half-brother was son of the old Rajah's favourite wife). 'I love you both dearly, and will give each of you half of my kingdom.' So he divided the kingdom into two halves, and gave the one half to the Panch-Phul Ranee's husband, who was the son of his first wife, and the other half to the eldest son of his second but favourite wife.
A short time after this arrangement was made, Panch-Phul Ranee said to her husband, 'I wish to see my father and mother again before I die; let me go and see them.' He answered, 'You shall go, and I and our son will also go.' So he called four of the wooden parrots—two to carry himself and the Ranee, and two to carry their son. Each pair of parrots crossed their wings; the young Prince sat upon the two wings of one pair, and on the wings of the other pair sat his father and mother. Then they all rose up in the air, and the parrots carried them (as they had before carried the Rajah alone)—up, up, up—on, on, on—over the Red Sea and across the seven seas, until they reached the Panch-Phul Ranee's country.
Panch-Phul Ranee's father saw them come flying through the air, as quickly as shooting stars; and much wondering who they were, he sent out many of his nobles and chief officers to inquire.
The nobles went out to meet them, and called out, 'What great Rajah is this who is dressed so royally, and comes flying through the air so fast? Tell us, that we may tell our Rajah.'
The Rajah answered, 'Go and tell your master that this is Panch-Phul Ranee's husband come to visit his father-in-law.' So they took that answer back to the palace; but when the Rajah heard it, he said, 'I cannot tell what this means—for the Panch-Phul Ranee's husband died long ago. It is twenty years since he fell upon the iron spears and died; let us, however, go and discover who this great Rajah really is.' And he and all his court went out to meet the new-comers—just as the parrots had alighted
