Having torn [them open] and allowed the paddy to fall, he began to plough. While he was turning two or three times there and here along the rice field, all the paddy fell down.

After it fell he unfastened the bulls, and taking the digging hoe, put two or three sods on the earthen ridges (niyara); and having come, and brought away the plough and the yoke pole, and set the yoke pole as a stake in the gap [in the fence], and fixed the plough across it and tied it, and gone away to the house driving the above-mentioned bulls, and cut up the six bulls, and given [their] twelve haunches to the twelve dogs, and drawn out two or three betel-creeper plants, and given them to the twelve calves, and come after cutting the Milla stump, he began to warm the water.

When it was becoming hot, he took water and poured it on the betel creepers. Having left the remaining water to thoroughly boil, he called to his father-in-law, "[Be pleased] to bathe with the water," and having cooled a little water, he poured it first on his body.

Secondly, taking [some] of that boiling water he sprinkled it on his body. Thereupon his body was burnt. The Gamarala, crying out, began to run about; having checked and checked him he began to sprinkle [him again]. Thereafter, both of them came home and stayed there.

While they are there the Gamarala, talking to his wife, says, "This son-in-law is not a good sort of son-in-law. I must kill this one." Having sought [in vain] for a contrivance to kill him, he says, "We cannot kill this one. Let us send him near our elder daughter."

Having cooked a kuruniya (one-fortieth of an amuna) of cakes, and written a letter, and put it in the middle of the cakes, and given it into the hand of his boy (son), he says to the son-in-law, "Child, go near my elder (lit., big) daughter [and give her this box of cakes], and come back." Having said [this] he sent him near the above-mentioned elder daughter.

These two persons (the little son and the son-in-law) having set off, while they were going away, when the boy went into the jungle the son-in-law went [with the box of cakes] to the travellers' shed that was there; and having unfastened the cake box he began to eat.

While he was going on eating he met with the above-mentioned letter. Taking it, and when he looked in it having seen that there was said in it that [the daughter] is to kill him, he tore it up. Then having thought of the name of the boy who goes with him and written that she is to kill the boy, he put it in the box, and as soon as he put it in tied up [the box] and placed [it aside].

The boy having come and taken the box, and said, "Let us go," they set off.

Having gone to the house, while he is [there] the above-mentioned elder daughter having cooked and given him to eat, and unfastened the box, while going on eating the cakes met with this letter. Taking it, and when she looked having seen that there was said [that she was] to kill her brother, quite without inquiry she quickly killed him outright.

There was a Bali (evil planetary influence) sending away [63] at the house in which she was. When the woman was wishing and wishing long life (that is, responding loudly, Ayibo! Ayibo!) the boy (her son) said that he wanted to go out. Thereupon, speaking to her sister’s husband, she says, "Conduct this boy to the door."

When she said it, the man, calling the boy, went to the door. There the man with his knife pricks him. Thereupon the boy in fear comes running near his mother. After a little time, when he again said he wanted to go out, his mother says, "Ane! Bolan, split this one’s belly." [64]

When she said it, having gone taking the boy he split his belly. Having come back he asked for a little water to wash the knife. The boy’s mother having come crying, when she looked the boy was killed.

This one bounded off, and came running to the very house of the above-mentioned Gamarala.

The Gamarala having sent a letter to the elder daughter and told her to come, after she came says, "Daughter, when you have gone off to sleep we will put a rope into the house. Put that rope on that one’s neck and fasten it tightly," he said.

Having put the Gamarala’s younger son-in-law, and younger daughter and elder daughter, these very three persons, in one house, and shut the door, and left them to sleep, he extended a rope from the cat-window (the space between the top of the outer wall and the roof).

The elder daughter who had been taught the above-mentioned method [of killing the son-in-law], went to sleep, and stayed so. While this man was looking about, he saw that the rope is coming [over the wall into the room].

Taking the rope, he put it on the elder daughter’s neck and made it tight. The Gamarala, who stayed outside, having tied the [other end of the] rope to the necks of a yoke of buffalo bulls, made them agitated.

When the yoke of cattle had drawn the rope [tight], the Gamarala, springing and springing upward while clapping his hands, says, "On other days, indeed, he escaped. To-day, indeed, he is caught," he said.

Thereupon the son-in-law, having stayed in the house, came outside and said, "It is not [done] to me; it is your elder daughter herself," he said.

Thereupon the Gamarala in a perplexity says, "Aniccan dukkhan! It is the thing which this one has done!" Just as he was saying it the son-in-law cut off his nose. Having cut it off he went to his own country.

Because the word which cannot be said was said [by the Gamarala] he cut off his nose.

Tom-tom Beater. North-western Province.

In The Orientalist, vol. i, p. 131, Mr. W. Goonetilleke gave a story about a Gamarala who cut off the nose of any servant who used the words Aniccan dukkhan. A young man took service under him in order to avenge his brother who had been thus mutilated; but the incidents differ from those related in the story given by me. The Gamarala was surprised into saying the forbidden words when the man poured scalding water over him. The servant immediately cut off his nose, ran home with it, and kicked his brother, who was squatting at the hearth, so that he fell with his face against the hearth stone. This reopened the wound; and when the Gamarala’s nose was fitted on and bandaged there after application of the juice of a plant which heals cuts, it became firmly attached, and as serviceable as the original nose.

In Indian Nights' Entertainment (Swynnerton), p. 106, there is a story of a Moghul who engaged servants on the condition that if he or the servant became angry the other should pull out his eye. A man who had accepted these terms was ordered to plough six acres daily, fence it, bring game for the table, grass for the mare, and firewood, and cook the master’s food. He lost his temper when scolded, and his eye was plucked out. His clever brother determined to avenge him, was engaged by the Moghul, and given the same tasks. He ploughed once round the six acres and twelve furrows across the middle, set up a bundle of brushwood at each corner, tied the bullocks to a tree, and went to sleep. He played various other tricks on his master, including the cooking of his favourite dog for his food. When the master was going for a new wife, the servant, who was sent to notify his coming, said his master was ill and by his doctor’s orders took only common soap made into a porridge with asafoetida and spices. He was sick in the night after taking it, and next morning the man refused to remove the vessel he had used. As the Moghul was carrying it out covered up with a sheet, the friends being told by the man that he was leaving through anger at the food they gave him, ran out and seized his arms to draw him back, and caused him to drop and break the vessel. On their way home they had a quarrel and a scuffle, the Moghul admitted he was angry at last, and the man got him down and plucked out his eye. Some of the incidents are found in the stories numbered 241 and 242 in this volume.