HARISARMAN


There was in a certain village, a certain Brahman named Harisarman.
He was poor and foolish and unhappy for want of employment, and he had
very many children. He wandered about begging with his family, and
at last he reached a certain city, and entered the service of a
rich householder called Sthuladatta. His sons became keepers of
Sthuladatta's cows and other property, and his wife a servant to
him, and he himself lived near his house, performing the duty of an
attendant. One day there was a feast on account of the marriage of
the daughter of Sthuladatta, largely attended by many friends of the
bridegroom and merry-makers. Harisarman hoped that he would be able to
fill himself up to the throat with oil and flesh and other dainties,
and get the same for his family, in the house of his patron. While he
was anxiously expecting to be fed, no one thought of him.

Then he was distressed at getting nothing to eat, and he said to his
wife at night: "It is owing to my poverty and stupidity that I am
treated with such disrespect here; so I will pretend by means of an
artifice to possess a knowledge of magic, so that I may become
an object of respect to this Sthuladatta; so, when you get an
opportunity, tell him that I possess magical knowledge." He said this
to her, and after turning the matter over in his mind, while people
were asleep he took away from the house of Sthuladatta a horse on
which his master's son-in-law rode. He placed it in concealment at
some distance, and in the morning the friends of the bridegroom could
not find the horse, though they searched in every direction. Then,
while Sthuladatta was distressed at the evil omen, and searching for