Page 10 - Ebook-Jataka-E

From one side of the tree the branches extended over the water. When the
flowers opened, the monkeys ate or destroyed them on those branches, so that no
fruit could grow on them. And if there still grew one, they plucked it, even when it
was not greater than the heart of a flower, because her chief, who was aware of
the danger, had warned them. He said: ‘Beware, that no fruit falls into the water, the
river will carry them to the city, where the humans will, once they have eaten the
fruit, will search for the tree. They will come along the river up to the mountains
and find the tree. Then they will pluck all fruits and we will have to flee from here.’

So the monkeys obeyed and for a long time no fruit fell into the water. But
the day came that a ripe fruit, covered by an ant’s nest among the leaves, fell into
the water and was carried away by the current of the river, down the rocky hills,
until the valley in which the great city Benares lay, on the shores of the Ganges.

That day, when the fruit swam before the city of Benares, driven by the little
waves of the river, bathed King Brahmadatta in the waters of the Ganges, between
two nets, held by a few fishermen. He dived and swam and played with the little
sunrays caught in the water. The fruit was carried along into one of the nets.

Wonderful!’ exclaimed the fisherman who saw it first. ‘Where on earth grows
a fruit like this one?’ And he took it and showed it with sparkling eyes to the king.

Brahmadatta wondered and admired the beauty of that fruit. ‘Where might
that tree stand, which carries such fruits?’ he asked himself. He called some foresters
at the near riverbank and asked them, if they knew about this fruit and where one
could find it.

‘Sir,’ they said, it is a mango, a wonderful mango. A fruit as this does not grow
in a valley like ours, but high up in the mountains of the Himalaja, where the air is
pure and the sunrays clear. Without doubt this mango-tree stands at the riverbank,
a fruit fell into the water and was carried until here.’

The king ordered his servants to taste the fruit, and after they had done so,
he also ate and gave some to his ministers and courtiers. ‘Indeed’, they said, such a
fruit is divine, non other is like this one’.

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