some sheaves of corn that were waiting to be threshed. When the Rakshas came into the house he looked round and said to his wife, 'Somebody has been arranging the house, everything in it is so clean and tidy. Wife, did you do this?'—'No,' she said; 'I don't know who can have done all this.'—'Some one also has been sweeping the courtyard,' continued the Rakshas. 'Wife, did you sweep the courtyard?'—'No,' she answered, 'I did not do it. I don't know who did.' Then the Rakshas walked round and round several times with his nose up in the air, saying, 'Some one is here now. I smell flesh and blood! Where can they be?'—'Stuff and nonsense!' cried his wife. 'You smell flesh and blood, indeed! Why, you have just been killing and eating a hundred thousand people. I should wonder if you didn't still smell flesh and blood!' They went on disputing the subject, until at last the Rakshas said, 'Well, never mind, I don't know how it is, but I'm very thirsty; let's come and drink some water.' So both the Rakshas and his wife went to a well which was close to the house, and began letting down jars into it, and drawing up the water, and drinking it. And the Princesses, who were on the top of the house, saw them. Now the youngest of the two Princesses was a very wise girl, and when she saw the Rakshas and his wife by the well, she said to her sister, 'I will do something now that will be good for us both;' and, running down quickly from the top of the house, she crept close behind the Rakshas and his wife, as they stood on tiptoe more than half over the side of the well, and, catching hold of one of the Rakshas' heels and one of his wife's, gave each a little push, and down they both tumbled into the well and were drowned, the Rakshas and the Rakshas' wife! The Princess then returned to her sister and said, 'I have killed the Rakshas.'—'What! both?' cried her sister. 'Yes, both,' she said. 'Won't they come back?; said her sister. 'No, never,' answered she.
The Rakshas being thus killed, the two Princesses took possession of the house, and lived there very happily for a long time. In it they found heaps and heaps of rich clothes, and jewels, and gold and silver, which the Rakshas had taken from people he had murdered; and all round the house were folds for the flocks, and sheds for the herds of cattle, which the Rakshas had owned. Every morning the youngest Princess used to drive out the flocks and herds to pasturage, and return home with them every night, while the eldest stayed at home, cooked the dinner, and kept the
