THE SARANGA BIRDS About in the Forest with Another Female Bird Neglect Ing Wife and Children
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, CHAPTER XVIII A saranga bird was living there with its four fledgelings. The male bird was pleasantly roaming THE SARANGA BIRDS about in the forest with another female bird neglect ing wife and children. The mother bird looked IN TilE STORIES narrate(l in the Puranas, birds and after its young ones. As the forest was set on nre beasts speak like men, and sometimes they give as commullCled hy Krishna alia Arjuna and the nre sound advice and even teach spiritual wisdom. But spread in all directions, doing its destruelive work, the natural qualities of those creatures are adroitly the worried mother bird began to lament: 'The nre made to peep through this human veil. is coming lIearer and nearer buming everything, and soon it will be here and destroy us. All· forest One of the characteristic beauties of the Puranic creatures are in despair and the air is full of the literature is this happy fusion of nature and imagi agonising crash of falling trees. Poor wingless nation. In a delightful passage in the Ramayana, babies! You will become a prey to the nre. What Hanuman, who is described as very wise and learned, shall I do? Your father has deserted us, and I am is made to frolic with apish joy, when he imagined not strong enough to flyaway carrying yOll with me." that the beautiful damsel he saw at Ravana's inner courtyard was Sita. To the mother who was wailing thus, the child ren said: "Mother, do not torment yourself on our It is IIsual to entertain children with stories in account; leave us to our fate. If we die here, we which birds and beasts are made to speak. But the ,shall attain a good birth in some future life. If you stories of the Puranas are meant for elderly people, give, up your life for our sake, our family will and in them usually some background is given in become extinct. Fly to a place of safety, take explanation of animals having the gift of human another mate and he happy. You will soon have speech. The usual expedient employed is a previous other children and he able to forget us. Mother, birth when those creatures were human beings. For reflect and do what is best for our race." instance, a deer was a rishi in a previous birth, or a fox: a king the subsequent degradation being due Despite this earnest entreaty, the mother had to a curse. In such cases the deer will act as a deer no mind to leave her children. She said: "I shall and yet speak as a rishi, and in the fox the vulpine remain here and perish in the flames with YOll." nature is shot through with the characteristics of a wise and experienced king. The stories are thereby This is the background of the story of the made interesting vehicles of the great truths they birds: A rishi named Mandapala long lived faithful sometimes convey. to his vow of perfect brahmacharya; but when he sOI1~ht entry to the higher regions, the ~ate-keeper Khandavaprastha, that forest full of lIneven said: "There is no place here for a childless man" places and thorns and prickles and cumbered with and turned him Lack. He was then born as a the crumbling vestiges of a long dead city, was saranga bird and lived with a female companion indeed a frightful place when it came into the named Jarita. She laid four· eggs. Then he left possession of the Pandavas. Birds and beasts had Jarita ai1CI wandered in the woods with another made it their abode, and it was infested with thieves female companion, Lapita. and wicked men. Krishna and Arjuna resolved to,.+-· set nre to the forest and construct a new city in its ,~: The four eggs of Jarita hatched in time and place. • they were the four birds mentioned above. As they • -<'- \ ~c,"~· . ~{, , '[ • . h';j,~, , " r -. , .. I I . ,, . " . .; I ; :. -- ,- , . I. : ,1 ..-.." , , , I ! 1:;..., , / / .