the princess went ahead to see how matters stood and to prepare a welcome for her husband.  He being left alone decided to bathe in the tank.  Now a dhoba was there washing the palace clothes, and seeing a stranger he concluded that it was a thief come to steal the clothes.  He accordingly killed him and then in fear threw the body into the water.  When the princess returned she was distressed to find no sign of her husband but his iron bow and arrows.  Search was made everywhere and the tank was netted but no trace could be discovered of her missing spouse.

Shortly afterwards a Ghasi girl came to catch chingris in the tank, and while doing so suddenly laid hold of a large fish.  In great delight she took it home.  When she came to cut it up she found inside the belly of the fish a living child.  Pleased with its appearance she decided to adopt it.  She put it in a basket, and tying the basket under her cloth pretended to be pregnant, and shortly afterwards announced that she had given birth to a child.  The boy grew with marvellous rapidity.

Meanwhile the father of the widowed princess insisted that she should marry again.  But she was faithful to the memory of her husband and declared that she would only marry the man who could draw the iron bow.  Many suitors came but they all failed to draw the bow.  At length the reputed son of the Ghasi woman came and pulling the bow with ease announced himself as the true husband of the princess with whom he lived happily ever after.

(17)—­The Wonderful Cowherd.

Once upon a time there was a Raja who had seven daughters.  The seven princesses used to bathe daily in a tank and when they bathed they used to put the scrapings from their bodies in a hole in the ground.  From this hole there grew a tree, and the eldest princess announced that she would marry the man who could tell her what had caused the tree to grow; many suitors came and made guesses but none divined the truth; heir father was anxious that she should be married, and insisted on every one in the kingdom being questioned.  At last a miserable, poverty stricken and sickly cowherd was asked; he had always grazed his cattle on the banks of the tank and had often seen the princesses bathing so he knew from what the tree had spring.  The princess being bound by her oath had to marry the miserable cowherd and go and live with him in his hut.

All day long the cowherd used to be groaning in sickness and misery; but at night he used to come out of his skin and appear as a beautiful and shining man; in this form he used to go and play and dance in the moonlight in the court yard of the Raja’s palace.  One night the princess’s maid-servant saw her master return and creep into his ugly skin; she told her mistress who resolved to keep watch the next night; when she saw her husband assume his shining form and go out of the house leaving his ugly skin lying on the ground, she took the skin and burnt it in the