"You are the son-in-law for me! The wedding shall take place
to-morrow!"

13. Can you understand how it was that the magician did not notice
the trick Rupa-Sikha had played upon him?

14. What fault blinds people to the truth more than any other?


CHAPTER VIII


When Sringa-Bhuja heard what Agni-Sikha said, he was full of joy;
but Rupa-Sikha knew well that her father did not mean a word of
it. She waited quietly beside her lover, till the magician bade all
the sisters but herself leave the hall. Then the magician, with a
very wicked look on his face, said:

"Before the ceremony there is just one little thing you must do for me,
dear son-in-law that is to be. Go outside the town, and near the most
westerly tower you will find a team of oxen and a plough awaiting
you. Close to them is a pile of three hundred bushels of sesame
seed. This you must sow this very day, or instead of a bridegroom
you will be a dead man to-morrow."

Great was the dismay of Sringa-Bhuja when he heard this. But Rupa-Sikha
whispered to him, "Fear not, for I will help you." Sadly the prince
left the palace alone, to seek the field outside the city; the guards,
who knew he was the accepted lover of their favourite mistress,
letting him pass unhindered. There, sure enough, near the western