The Bel-Princess

In a country lived a King who had seven sons. Six of these sons
married, but the seventh and youngest son would not marry; and,
moreover, he disliked his six sisters-in-law, and could not bear to
take food from their hands. One day, they got very angry with him for
disliking them, and they said to him, taunting him, "We think that you
will marry a Bel-Princess."

"A Bel-Princess," said the young prince to himself. "What is a
Bel-Princess? and where is one to be found? I will go and look for
one." But the next day he thought, "How can I find a Bel-Princess? I
don't know where to seek for her."

At last one day he saddled and bridled one of his father's beautiful
horses. Then he put on his grand clothes, took his sword and gun, and
said good-bye to his father and mother, and set out on his search.
They cried very much at parting with him.

He rode from his father's country for a long, long way. At length,
when he had journeyed for six months, he found himself in a great
jungle, through which he went for many nights and days, until he at
last came to where a fakir lay sleeping. The young prince thought, "I
will watch by this fakir till he wakes. Perhaps he can help me." So he
stayed with the fakir for one whole month; and all that time he took
care of him and watched by him, and kept his hut clean.

This fakir used to sleep for six whole months at a time, and then he
would remain awake for six months.

When the prince had watched over him for one month the fakir woke, for
his six months' sleep had come to an end; and when he saw what care
the young prince had taken of him, and how clean his hut was, he was
very much pleased with the King's son, and said to him, "How have you
been able to reach this jungle, to which no man can come? and who are
you? and whence do you come?"

"I am a King's son," answered the prince. "My father's country is a
six months' journey away from this; and I am come to look for a
Bel-Princess. I hear there is a Bel-Princess, and I want to find her.
Can you tell me where she is?"

"It is true that there is one," answered the fakir, "and I know where
she is. She is in the fairies' country, whither no man can go."

This made the young prince very sad. "What shall I do?" he said. "I
have left my father and mother, and have travelled a long, long way to
find the Bel-Princess. And now you tell me I cannot go where she
lives."

"I will help you," said the fakir, "and if you do exactly what I tell
you, you will find her. But, first, stay here with me for a little
while."

So the King's son stayed for another month with the fakir, and took
care of him, and did everything for him, as he did for his own father.

At the end of the month, the fakir gave him his stick, and said to
him, "Now you must go to the fairies' country. It is one week's
journey distant from this jungle. When you get there, you will see a
number of demons and fairies who live in it." Then the fakir took a
little earth from the ground, and put it in the prince's hand. "When
you have come to the fairies' country, in order that they and the
demons may not see you, you must blow all this earth away from the
palm of your hand, and then you will be invisible. You must ride on
till you come to a great plain in the middle of their garden, and on
this plain you will see a large bel-tree and on it one big bel-fruit.
In this fruit is the Bel-Princess. You must throw my stick at it, and
it will fall; but you must take care to catch the fruit in your shawl,
and not let it fall to the ground. Then ride quickly back to me, for
as soon as the fruit falls you will cease to be invisible, and the
fairies and demons who guard the fruit will all come running after
you, and they will all call to you. But take care, take care not to
look behind you when they call you. Ride straight on to me with the
fruit, and do not look behind you. If you do, you will become stone,
and your horse too, and they will take the bel-fruit back to its
tree."

The prince promised to do all the fakir bade him. He rode for a week,
and then he came to the fairies' country. He blew the earth the fakir
had given him away from his palm all along his fingers, just as he had
been told, and then he became invisible. He rode through the great
garden to the plain. There he saw the bel-tree, and the one fruit
hanging all alone. He threw the fakir's stick at it, and caught it in
a corner of his shawl as it fell, but then he was no longer invisible.
All the fairies and demons could see him, and they came running after
him as he rode quickly away, and called to him. He looked behind at
them, and instantly he and his horse became stone; and the bel-fruit
went back to its tree and hung itself up.

For one week the fakir sat in his jungle, waiting for the King's son.
But the moment he was turned into stone, the fakir knew of it, and he
set off at once for the fairies' country. He walked all through it,
but neither the fairies nor demons could touch him. He went straight
to the great plain, and there he saw the King's son sitting on his
horse, and both he and the horse were stone.

This made the fakir very sad; and he said to God, "What will the
father and mother do, now that their son is changed into a stone?" And
he prayed to God and said, "If it be God's pleasure, may this King's
son be alive once more." Then he cut his little finger on the inside
from the tip to the palm, and smeared the prince's forehead with the
blood that came from it. He rubbed some blood on the horse too, all
the time praying to God to give the prince his life again. The King's
son and his horse were alive once more. The fakir took the prince back
to his jungle, and said to him, "Listen. I told you not to look behind
you, and you disobeyed me and so were turned to stone. Had I not come
to save you, you would always have remained stone."

The fakir kept the prince with him in the jungle for one whole week.
Then he gave him his stick and some earth he picked up from the ground
on which they were standing, and said, "Now you must go to the
fairies' country again, and throw my stick at the bel-fruit, and catch
it in a corner of your shawl as you did before. But mind, mind you do
not look behind you this time. If you do you will be turned to stone,
and you will for ever remain stone. Ride straight back to me with the
fruit, and take care never to look behind you once till you get to
me."

So the King's son went again to the fairies' country, and all happened
as before, till he had caught the fruit in his shawl. But then he rode
straight back to the fakir without looking behind him, although the
fairies and demons ran after him and called to him the whole way.

He rode so fast they could not catch him, and when he came to the
fakir, the fakir turned him into a fly and thus hid him. Up came all
the fairies and demons and said to the fakir, "There is a thief in
your hut." "A thief! Where is the thief?" said the fakir. "Look
everywhere for him, and take him away if you can find him." Then they
searched and searched everywhere, but could not find the prince; so at
last they went away.

When they had all gone, the fakir took the little fly and turned it
back into a King's son. A few days afterwards he said to the prince,
"Now you have found what you wanted; you have the Bel-Princess you
came to seek. So go back to your father and mother." "Very well," said
the prince. Then he got his horse all ready for the journey, took the
bel-fruit, and made many salaams to the fakir, who said to him, "Now,
listen. Take care not to open the fruit on the road. Wait till you are
in your father's house with your father and mother, and then open it.
If you do not do exactly as I tell you, evil will happen to you; so
mind you only open the fruit in your father's house. Out of it will
come the Bel-Princess."

The prince set out on his journey, and rode on and on for six months
till he came to his father's country, and then to his father's garden.
There he sat down to rest by a well under a clump of great trees. He
said to himself, "Now that I am in my father's country, and in my
father's garden, I will sit and rest in this cool shade; and when I am
rested I will go up to the palace." He bathed his face and his hands
in the well, and drank some of its water. Then he thought, "Surely,
now that I am in my father's country and in his garden, I need not
wait till I get to his palace to open my bel-fruit. What harm can
happen if I do open it here?"

So he broke it open, in spite of all the fakir had told him, and out
of it came such a beautiful girl. She was more beautiful than any
princess that ever was seen--so beautiful that the King's son fainted
when he saw her. The princess fanned him, and poured water on his
face, and presently he recovered, and said to her, "Princess, I should
like to sleep for a little while, for I have travelled for six months,
and am very tired. After I have slept we will go together to my
father's palace." So he went to sleep, and the princess sat by him.

Presently a woman came to the well for water, and she said to herself,
"See, here is the King's youngest son. What a lovely princess that is
sitting by him! What fine clothes and jewels she has on!" And the
wicked woman determined to kill the princess and to take her place.
Then she came up to the beautiful girl, and sat down beside her, and
talked to her. "Listen to me, princess," she said at last. "Let us
change clothes with each other. Give me yours, and I will give you
mine." The princess, thinking no harm, did as the woman suggested.
"And now," said the woman, "let me put on your beautiful jewels." The
princess gave them to her, and then the wicked, wicked woman, said to
her, "Let us walk about this pretty garden, and look at the flowers,
and amuse ourselves." By and by she said, "Princess, let us go and
look at ourselves in the well, and see what we look like, you in my
clothes, and I in yours." The young girl consented, and they went to
the well. As they bent over the side to look in, the wicked woman gave
the princess a push, and pushed her straight over the edge into the
water.

Then she went and sat down by the sleeping prince, just as the
princess had done. When he awoke and saw this ugly, wicked woman,
instead of his Bel-Princess, he was very much surprised, and said to
himself, "A little while ago I had a beautiful girl by me, and now
there is such an ugly woman. It is true she has on the clothes and
jewels my Bel-Princess wore; but she is so ugly, and there is
something wrong with one of her eyes. What has happened to her?" Then
he said to this wicked woman, whom he took for his Bel-Princess,
"What is the matter with you? Has anything happened to you? Why have
you become so ugly?" She answered, "Till now I have always lived in a
bel-fruit. It is the bad air of your country that has made me ugly,
and hurt one of my eyes."

The prince was ashamed of her, and very, very sorry. "How shall I take
her to my father's palace now?" he thought. "My mother and all my
brothers' wives will see her, and what will they say? However, never
mind; I must take her to my house, and marry her. I cannot think what
can have happened to her." Then he got a palanquin, and took her up to
the palace.

His father and mother were very glad that their youngest son had come
back to them; but when they saw the wicked woman, and heard she was
his Bel-Princess, they, and every one else in the palace, said, "Can
she be a Bel-Princess? She is not at all pretty, and she is not at all
pleasant." "She was lovely when she came out of the fruit," said the
prince. "No one ever saw such a beautiful girl before. I cannot think
what has happened to her. It must be the bad air of this country that
has made her so ugly." Then he told them all about his journey to the
jungle where he had met the fakir, and how, with the fakir's help, he
had found his Bel-Princess, and how he had opened the fruit in his
father's garden, and then fallen asleep.

The King made a great wedding-feast for his son, and he and the wicked
woman were married, and all the time the King's youngest son thought
he was marrying the Bel-Princess.

Meanwhile, the beautiful girl had not been drowned in the well, but
had changed into a most lovely pink lotus-flower. This flower was
first seen by a man from the village who came to the well for water.
"What a lovely lotus-flower!" said the man; "I must gather it." But
when he tried to reach it the flower floated away from him. Then he
went and told all the people in the village of the beautiful flower,
and then the palace servants heard of it. They all tried to gather it,
but could not, for the flower always went just out of their reach.
Then the King and his six elder sons heard of it, and they came to the
well; but the King tried in vain to gather it, and his six sons too.
The lotus-flower always floated away from them.

Last of all, the youngest prince heard of the lotus, and he grew very
curious to see it, and said, "I will try if I cannot gather this
wonderful flower that no one can touch." So he, too, came to the well,
and stooped, and stretched out his hand, and the minute he did so the
flower floated of itself into his hand.

Then he was very happy and proud, and he took the flower up to his
wife and showed it to her. "Just see," he said, "every one in the
village and the palace were talking of this lotus-flower; and every
one tried to gather it; and no one could, for the flower would not let
any one touch it. My father tried, and my brothers all tried, and
they, too, could not gather it; but as soon as I stretched out my hand
the flower floated into it of itself."

When his wicked wife saw the flower, she said nothing; but her heart
told her it was the beautiful girl she had pushed into the well. The
prince laid the flower on his pillow, and was very glad and happy. As
soon as he had gone out, his wife seized the lotus-flower, tore it to
bits, and threw them far away into the garden.

In a few days a bel-tree was growing on the spot where she had thrown
the pieces of the lotus-flower. On it grew one big bel-fruit, and it
was so fine and large that every one in the village and the palace
tried to gather it; but no one could touch it, for the fruit always
went just out of reach. The King and his six elder sons also tried,
but they could not touch it. The youngest prince heard of this fruit,
so he said to his wife, "I will go and see if I can gather this
bel-fruit that no one can even touch." The wicked woman's heart said
to her, "In the bel-fruit is the Bel-Princess;" but she said nothing.

The prince went to the bel-tree; the bel-fruit came into his hand, and
he broke it off the tree, and brought it home to his wife. "See," he
said, "here is the bel-fruit; it let me gather it at once." And he was
very proud and happy. Then he laid the fruit on a table in his room.

When he had gone out the wicked wife came, and took the fruit, and
flung it away in the garden. In the night the fruit burst in two, and
in it lay a lovely, tiny girl baby. The gardener, as he went round the
garden early in the morning, found the little baby; and he wondered
who had thrown away the beautiful fruit, and who the lovely baby girl
could be. She was so tiny and so pretty, and the gardener was
delighted when he saw her, for he had no children, and thought God had
sent him a little child at last.

He took her in his arms and carried her to his wife.

"See," he said, "we have never had any children, and now God has sent
us this beautiful little girl." His wife looked at the child, and she
was as delighted with her as her husband was. "Yes," she said, "God
has sent us this child, and she is certainly most beautiful. I am very
happy. But I have no milk for her; if only I had milk for her, I could
nurse her and she would live." And the gardener's wife was very sad to
think she had no milk in her breasts for the little child.

Then her husband said, "Let us ask God to send you milk for her." So
they prayed to God and worshipped him. And God was pleased with them
both, and sent the gardener's wife a great deal of milk.

The little girl now lived in the gardener's house, and he and his wife
took the greatest care of her, and were very happy to think they had
now a child. She grew very fast, and became lovelier every day. She
was more beautiful than any girl that had ever been seen, and all the
people in the King's country used to say, "How lovely the gardener's
daughter is! She is more beautiful than any princess."

The King's youngest son's wicked wife heard of the child, and her
heart told her, "She is the Bel-Princess." She said nothing, but she
often thought of how she could contrive to have her killed.

One day, when the gardener's daughter was seven years old, she was out
in her father's garden, making a little garden of her own near the
house-door. While she was busy over her flowers, the wicked woman's
cow strayed into the garden and began eating the plants in it. The
little girl would not let it make its dinner off her father's flowers
and grass, but pushed it out of the garden.

The wicked woman was told how the gardener's daughter had treated her
cow; so she cried all day long, and pretended to be ill. When her
husband asked her what was the matter, she answered, "I am sick
because the gardener's daughter has ill-treated my cow. She beat it,
and turned it out of her father's garden, and said many wicked things.
If you will have the girl killed, I shall live; but if you do not kill
her, I shall die." The prince at once ordered his servants to take the
gardener's daughter the next morning to the jungle, and there kill
her.

So the next morning early the servants went to the gardener's house to
take away his daughter. He and his wife cried bitterly, and begged the
servants to leave the girl with them. They offered them a great many
rupees, saying, "Take these rupees, and leave us our daughter." "How
can we leave you your daughter," said the servants, "when the King's
youngest son has ordered us to take her to the jungle and kill her,
that his wife may get well?"

So they led the girl away; and as they went to the jungle, they said
to each other, "How beautiful this girl is!" They found her so
beautiful that they grew very sorrowful at the thought of killing her.

They took the girl to a great plain, which was about ten miles distant
from the King's country; but when they got there they said they could
not kill her. She was so beautiful that they really could not kill
her. She said to them, "You were ordered to kill me, so kill me."
"No," they answered, "we cannot kill you, we cannot kill you."

Then the girl took the knife in her own hand and cut out her two eyes;
and one eye became a parrot, and the other a _maina_. Then she cut out
her heart and it became a great tank. Her body became a splendid
palace and garden--a far grander palace than was the King's palace;
her arms and legs became the pillars that supported the verandah roof;
and her head the dome on the top of the palace.

The prince's servants looked on all the time these changes were taking
place, and they were so frightened by them, that when they got home
they would not tell the prince or any one else what they had seen. No
one lived in this wonderful house. It stood empty in its garden by its
tank, and the parrot and _maina_ lived in the garden trees.

Some time afterwards the youngest prince went out hunting, and towards
evening he found himself on the great plain where stood the wonderful
palace. He rode up to it and said to himself, "I never saw any house
here before. I wonder who lives here?" He went through the great gate
into the garden, and then he saw the large tank, and how beautiful the
garden was. He went all through the garden and was delighted with it,
and he saw that it was beautifully kept, and was in perfect order.
Then he went into the palace, and went through all the rooms, and
wondered more and more to whom this beautiful house could belong. He
was very much surprised, too, at finding no one in the palace, though
the rooms were all splendidly furnished, and very clean and neat.

"My father is a great king," he said to himself, "and yet he has not
got a palace like this." It was now deep night, so the prince knew he
could not go home till the next day. "Never mind," he said, "I will
sleep in the verandah. I am not afraid, though I shall be quite
alone."

So he lay down to sleep in the verandah, and while he lay there, the
parrot and _maina_ flew in, and they perched near him, for they knew
he was there, and they wanted him to hear what they said to each
other. Then they began chattering together; and the parrot told the
_maina_ how the prince's father was king of the neighbouring country,
and how he had seven sons, and how six of the sons had married six
princesses, "but this prince, who was the youngest son, would not
marry; and what is more, he did not like his brother's wives at all."
Then the birds stopped talking and did not chatter any more that
night. The prince was very much surprised at the birds knowing who he
was, and all about his dislike to his brothers' wives.

The next morning he rode home; and there he stayed all day, and would
not talk. His wife asked him, "What is the matter with you? Why are
you so silent?" "My head aches," he answered: "I am ill." But towards
evening he felt he must go back to the empty palace on the great
plain, so he said to his wife, "I am going out to eat the air for a
little while." Then he got on his horse and rode off to the palace.

As soon as he had laid himself down in the verandah, the parrot and
the _maina_ perched near him; and the parrot told the _maina_ how the
prince had heard of the Bel-Princess; and all about his long journey
in search of her, and how he found the bel-fruit, and how he was
turned to stone. Then he stopped chattering, and the birds said
nothing more to each other that night.

In the morning the King's son rode home, and was as silent and grave
as he had been before. He told his wife his head ached when she asked
him whether he was ill.

That night he again slept in the verandah of the strange palace, and
heard a little more of his story from the birds.

The next day he was still silent and grave, and his wife was very
uneasy. "I am sure the Bel-Princess is alive," she said to herself,
"and that he goes every night to see her." Then she asked him, "Why do
you go out every evening? Why do you not stay at home?" "I am not
well," he answered, "so I go to my mother's house" (the prince had a
little house of his own in his father's compound). "I will not sleep
at home again till I am well."

That night he lay down to sleep again in the verandah of the great
empty palace, and heard the parrot tell the _maina_ all that happened
to the prince up to the time that he fell asleep in his father's
garden with the beautiful Bel-Princess sitting beside him.

On the fifth night the prince lay down to sleep again in the verandah
of the palace on the great plain, and watched eagerly for the little
birds to begin their talk. This night the parrot told how the wicked
woman had come and taken the Bel-Princess's clothes, and thrown her
down the well; how the princess became a lotus-flower which the wicked
wife broke to bits; how the bits of the lotus-flower turned into a
bel-fruit which she threw away; how out of the fruit came a tiny
girl-baby that the gardener adopted; how the wicked woman persuaded
the prince to have this girl killed when she was seven years old; how
he and the _maina_ had once been this girl's eyes; how the tank was
once her heart, and how her body had changed into this palace and
garden, while her head became the dome on the top of the palace.

Then the _maina_ asked the parrot where the Bel-Princess was. "Cannot
she be found?" said the _maina_. "Yes," said the parrot, "she can be
found; but the King's youngest son alone can find her, and he is so
foolish! He believes that his ugly, wicked wife is the beautiful
Bel-Princess!" "And where is the princess?" asked the _maina_. "She is
here," said the parrot. "If the prince would come one day and go
through all the rooms of this palace till he came to the centre room,
he would see a trap-door in the middle of that room. If he lifted the
trap-door he would see a staircase which leads to an underground
palace, and in this palace is the Bel-princess." "And can no one but
the prince lift the trap-door?" asked the _maina_. "No one," answered
the parrot. "It is God's order that only the King's youngest son can
lift the trap-door and find the Bel-Princess."

The next day the young prince went through all the rooms of the
palace, instead of going home. When he came to the centre room, he
looked for the trap-door, and when he had lifted it he saw the
staircase. He went down it, and found himself in the under-ground
palace, which was far more beautiful than the one above-ground. It was
full of servants; and in one room a grand dinner was standing ready.
In another room he saw a gold bed, all covered with pearls and
diamonds, and on the bed lay the Bel-Princess.

Day and night she prayed to God and read a holy book. She did nothing
else.

When the prince went into her room and she saw him, she was very sad,
not happy, for she thought, "He is so foolish; he knows nothing of
what has happened to me." Then she said to him, "Why did you come
here? Go home again to your father's palace."

The prince burst out crying. "See, princess," he said, "I knew nothing
of your palace. I only found it by chance five nights ago. I have
slept here in the verandah for the last five nights, and only last
night did I learn what had happened to you, and how to find you." "I
know it is true," she said, "that you knew nothing of what happened to
me. But now that you have found me, what will you do?"

"I will go home to my father's palace," he answered, "and make
everything ready for you, and then I will come and marry you and take
you home."

So it was all settled, and he ate some food, and returned to his
father. He told his father and mother all that had happened to the
Bel-Princess, and how her body had turned into the beautiful garden
and palace that stood on the big plain; and of the little birds; and
of the underground palace in which she now lived. So his father said
that he and the prince's mother, and his six brothers and their wives,
would all take him in great state to the palace and marry him to the
beautiful Bel-Princess; and that then they would all return to their
own palace, and all live together. "But first the wicked woman must be
killed," said the King.

So he ordered his servants to take her to the jungle and kill her, and
throw her body away. So they took her away at four o'clock in the
afternoon and killed her.

One morning two or three days later, the prince and his father and
mother, and brothers and sisters-in-law, went to the great palace on
the wide plain; and there, in the evening, the king's youngest son was
married to the Bel-Princess. And when his father and mother and
brothers, and his brothers' wives, saw her, they all said, "It is
quite true. She is indeed a Bel-Princess!"

After the wedding they all returned to the King's palace, and there
they lived together. But the King and his sons used often to go to the
palace on the great plain to eat the air; and they used to lend it
sometimes to other rajas and kings.