The stirrup-holder was overcome with horror, and came down from the
mountain bewildered, and represented the state of the case, and gave
the King a cup of cold water from his ewer. The latter raised the cup
to his lips, and his eyes overflowed with tears. The attendant asked
the reason of his weeping. The King drew a sigh from his anguished
heart and relating in full the story of the Hawk and the spilling of
the water in the cup, said: "I grieve for the death of the Hawk, and
bemoan my own deed in that without inquiry I have deprived a creature,
so dear to me, of life." The attendant replied: "This Hawk protected
thee from a great peril, and has established a claim to the gratitude
of all the people of this country. It would have been better if the
King had not been precipitate in slaying it, and had quenched the fire
of wrath with the water of mildness."

The King replied; "I repent of this unseemly action; but my repentance
is now unavailing, and the wound of this sorrow cannot be healed by any
salve"; and this story is related in order that it may be known that
many such incidents have occurred where, through the disastrous results
of precipitation, men have fallen into the whirlpool of repentance.



The Mouse and the Frog

It is related that a Mouse had taken up its abode on the brink of a
fountain and had fixed its residence at the foot of a tree.

A Frog, too, passed his time in the water there, and sometimes came to
the margin of the pool to take the air. One day, coming to the edge of
the water, he continued uttering his voice in a heart-rending cadence