Stories - HERMIT AND THE MOUSE
Once upon a time there was a Shiva temple in a city called Mahilaropya. A hermit named Tamrachood lived in a nearby room. He begged for alms and people filled his alms bowl with delicacies, eatables flavored with sugar. Everyday after eating to his fill, he hid the remaining food in the alms bowl. He hung it on a peg keeping it for the servant’s breakfast.
In that room, there lived a mouse named Hiranyaka. Hiranyaka, along with his friends ate the hermit’s left over food. The mouse nibbled the hermit’s food, however carefully he hid it. The hermit in fear of the mouse moved it from place to place, always hanging it higher. Even then the mouse got at it easily enough and ate it.
One day a holy man named Vrihatspik arrived at Tamrachood’s place. Tamrachood welcomed him, gave him due respects. At night the holy man started narrating pious tales. But Tamrachood’s thoughts were so pre-occupied with mice that he kept striking the alms bowl with a bamboo stick and returned an absent minded answer to the holy man.
The holy man grew extremely angry on seeing this, and said:
Holy Man: “Tamrachood! I think you are not worthy of being called a friend. You do not talk to me whole-heartedly. You forgot our friendship for you are proud of owning this room. I shall leave your place and go else where.”
Holy Man: “Friends and guests will be glad only when they are greeted and spoken with kind words. One should not visit any home which fails in gentle greetings and do bad gossip.”
Tamrachood was terrified and said, “Holy sir, please forgive me. There is no friend nearer my heart than you. Please listen to the reason for being inattentive. ”
Tamrachood: “There is a mouse that jumps and climbs to my alms bowl. However high I hang it, he eats my left over. The servants get nothing and refuse to clean up my house. So I strike the alms bowl to frighten the mouse. The mouse is so clever in jumping that it beats cats, monkeys and other creatures.”
Holy Man: “Have you found the mouse hole anywhere?”
Tamrachood: “Holy sir, I have not”
Holy Man: “Surely, his hole is over his treasure. The fragrance from his treasure makes him spry. He surely gets his vigor from the smell of his treasure. Do you know how he comes?”
Tamrachood: “Yes sir, I do. He does not come alone. He comes with a school of mice”
The holy man got a digging tool, a spade and said
Holy Man: “We must wake early and follow the tracks while the footprints are still on the floor”
When the mouse heard their conversation, he was terrified that they will not only find his treasure but his fort also. So he took another track with his followers.
A cat pounced on them, killing half the mice. The mice who survived blamed Hiranyak, the mouse, for taking another trail and returned to their old fortress drenching the floor with blood.
The holy man saw the floor with drops of blood, followed the trail to the fortress. As he dug, he came upon the treasure over which the mouse lived and the smell which used to guide him back to the fortress.
The holy man smiled and said:
Holy Man: “O’ Tamrachood, now you can sleep in peace. It was this treasure that enabled the mouse to jump so high. ”
They took the treasure and returned to the room.
Later, the mouse returned to his hole with his companions. He felt powerless and troubled. When Tamrachood heard the patter of the mice, he feared and again started to strike the alms bowl with his bamboo stick.
Holy Man: “Tamrachood, why don’t you sleep peacefully? Do not fear, my friend. His jumping energy is gone with his property.”
The mouse angrily tried a desperate jump for the alms bowl but missed and fell to the floor.
The mouse companions made remarks on him that he has no power to fill their bellies. They never accompanied him again.
The mouse saw his treasure converted in to a pillow and used by the men. He pondered deeply and decided to get his treasure bag.
At night, he made a hole in the bag. But the holy man woke up and struck the mouse with the bamboo stick. The mouse escaped the blow and said to himself:
Mouse: “No one can take what is rightfully ours. A man receives only what’s duly his.”
The mouse felt bad for his money madness. He thought “Health and peace of mind are more important than money. There is a saying that the lord of seven continents who is greedy is but a beggar and one who lives content is rich indeed.”
“There is no treasure that equals charity and no gem compares with character. Content is perfect wealth.”
Having learnt the lesson, the mouse left the place and went to a forest. He made friends with a crow, a turtle and a deer and led a contented life.
MORAL: Be happy with what you have.
(Story by Padmaja Gudipati adapted from Mitra Bedham of Panchatantra)