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From Fables & Folk-Tales from an Eastern Forest, Collected and Translated by Walter Skeat, M.A., Illustrated by F. H. Townsend; Cambridge: At the University Press; 1901; pp. 38-40, 80-81.


38

THE ELEPHANT PRINCESS AND THE PRINCE.a

THE Prophet Adam quarrelled with the Lady Eve and they declared they would live apart from each other.b Then Adam having taken up his abode by the sea-coast produced the Great Demon (who is known by many different names)., But the Lady Eve crossed the sea, making a bridge of a Soap-vine stemc (which had grown across the Straits) and became Queen of the People on the Other Side. There she gave birth to a daughter who was called the Youngest Princess. When this Princess grew up, the Queen warned her that if she ever crossed the water she must on no account harry the fields of cane or maize or bananas belonging to the People on the Other Side. One day however the Princess crossed over by means of the Soap-vine stem, and forgetting her mother’s warning she harried the fields of the Other People, and was immediately transformed into an Elephant. In this guise she was encountered by a young 39 Prince who was studying at a Monastery near by, and the latter, seeing the great beast in his path, struck her in the centre of the forehead with his iron-shod pike so that the point broke off short in the skin. On reaching home he reported the affair to the Head of his Monastery, saying that he had met a powerful beast of great size which had a tail at each end. The Head however, being a wise man, knew from his account that it was a Princess in disguise, and allowed the young man to set out to find her again. Presently the Prince came to the sea-shore, and in order to cross over the Straits he scooped out the contents of a giant gourd,d and seating himself inside it, and, guiding himself by the Soap-vine stem, he reached the other side in safety. On his arrival he made enquiry and was told that the Queen’s daughter was sick. Offering his services as a physician he obtained entry into the Palace, where he was shown the Princess, with his iron pike-heade still buried in her forehead. He then asked the Queen to erect on the sea-shore a Chamber like a Royal Audience-Hall, and at the same time to build him a big sailing-vessel whose beak should protrude into the Chamber. When this was done the Princess was 40 carried into the Chamber; and the Prince having entered in secret plucked out the iron point from her forehead so that she fell into a swoon. The iron pike-head he concealed in a bamboo tube, and exhibiting the Princess to her family as she lay in a dead faint, he brought her back to life by whistling and patting her; and when she came to, he caused her to be carried home in procession. For this service he received the Princess’s hand. After living for some years in happiness with her he wished to revisit his own country; and the Princess accompanied him, taking with her a train of thirty-nine attendants. Before the Princess departed the Queen repeated her former warning, but the Princess again disregarding it was turned back into an elephant, both she, and all her attendants with her.





Tail-piece: Black and white woodcut of an elephant.





[80] Notes.

a  The Elephant Princess.

This tale, which I picked up in Patāni, is obscure in parts, but shows distinct traces of Siamese influence (e.g. in the mention of the Siamese (Buddhist) Monastery). There are many of these monasteries in the State of Patāni, inhabited by the yellow-robed priests of Buddha.

b  The ‘Prophet’ Adam and the ‘Lady Eve’ (Baba Hawa) are the usual titles assigned by the Malays to the traditional ancestors of mankind. For a parallel story, see Malay Magic, p. 151 seqq.

c   making a bridge of a soap-vine stem.  This refers to the Malay soap-vine called Bĕluru; [the only one given in 81 Ridley’s List being Entada scandens L. (Leguminosæ)], short pieces of whose stem are broken up and mixed with water, which is then worked up into a lather and used for washing purposes by Jungle-dwelling Malays, in place of soap. It is a fairly big and strong creeper.

d   scooped out the contents of a giant gourd.  This recalls the state carriage (in our own story of Cinderella) which was improvised out of a pumpkin.

e   his iron pike-head; this is a pike called “sā” (sau), such as is carried by elephant-drivers.





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