Gold's Gloom
[This story is inserted into The Winning of Friends.]
In the southern country is a city called Maidens' Delight, and in the neighbourhood a shrine to Shiva. In a cell nearby lived a hermit named Crop-Ear. During his begging hour he would fill his alms-bowl with dainties from the city, eatables jellified, melting in the mouth, toothsome, flavoured with sugar, treacle, and pomegranate. Then, returning to his cell, he satisfied himself according to the ordinance, hid what food was left in the alms-bowl, and hung it on a peg, keeping it for the servants' breakfast. On this food I subsisted with my companions. And so the time passed.
Since I nibbled his food, however carefully he hid it, the hermit was disgusted, and in fear of me he moved it from place to place, always hanging it higher. Even so I got at it easily enough and ate it.
Now one day a guest arrived, a holy man named Wide-Bottom. And Crop-Ear welcomed him, paid him due respect, and relieved his fatigue. At night they lay on the same couch and started to relate pious tales. But Crop-Ear's thoughts were so preoccupied with mice that he kept striking the alms-bowl with a frazzled bamboo and returned an absentminded answer to Wide-Bottom as he told a pious tale.
Then the guest grew extremely angry and said: "Come, Crop-Ear! I perceive that your friendship is dead. For you do not talk with me whole-heartedly. So, night though it be, I shall leave your cell and go elsewhere. For there is a saying:
'Come! Enter! News from town?
A chair! You look run down!
Welcome! Why have you slighted
Our home so long? Dee-lighted!'
Such kindly words as these
May set the mind at ease,
And friends be glad to go
Where they are greeted so.
And again:
Wherever hosts look vaguely round
Or fix their glances on the ground,
The guests who visit such a place
Are hornless, yet of bovine race.
You should not visit any home
From which no gentle greetings come,
Which fails in eager promptitude,
With gossip touching bad and good.
"But this you do not understand, having forgotten friendship through pride in the ownership of one mere cell. So that you seem to dwell here, but in reality you have earned a place in hell. For the proverb says:
A certain course for hell to steer,
Become a chaplain for a year;
Or try more expeditious ways -
Become an abbot for three days.
Poor fool! You take pride in what should cause contrition."
When he heard this, Crop-Ear was terrified and said: "Do not speak thus, holy sir. There is no friend nearer my heart than you. Pray hear the reason of my inattention. There is a villainous mouse that jumps and climbs to my alms-bowl, however high I hang it, and he eats my leavings. Thus the servants get no recompense, and refuse to tidy up. So to frighten the mouse, I strike the alms-bowl repeatedly with my bamboo. This is the whole story. But I should add that the villain has such cleverness in jumping as to put cats, monkeys, and other creatures to the blush."
Then Wide-Bottom said: "But have you found the mouse-hole anywhere?"
"Holy sir," said Crop-Ear, "I have not."
"Surely," said the other, "his hole is over his hoard. Beyond question, the fragrance from his hoard makes him spry. For
The smell of wealth is quite enough
To wake a creature's sterner stuff;
And wealth's enjoyment, even more,
With virtuous giving from his store.
And again:
It's certain Mother Shandilee
If bargaining in sesame -
Her hulled grains for the unhulled kind -
Has some good reason in her mind."
"How was that?" asked Crop-Ear. And Wide-Bottom told the story of Mother Shandilee's Bargain.**
"So," said Wide-Bottom, "he surely derives this vigour in jumping from the smell of his hoard." And he continued: "Do you know his manner of attack?"
"Yes, holy sir, I do," answered Crop-Ear. "He comes not alone, but with a school of mice."
"Well now," said Wide-bottom, "is there any digging tool about?"
"Indeed there is," said Crop-Ear. "Here is a handy pickaxe, solid iron."
"In that case," said the guest, "you and I must wake early, so as to follow their tracks together, while the footprints still dirty the floor."
Now when I heard the villain's speech fall like a thunderbolt, I thought: "Ah, this spells ruin for me. For his words imply something more. Just as he has marked my hoard, so he will surely discover my fortress, also. Of this his implied meaning convinces me. For the proverb says:
Shrewd characters at sight
Can estimate aright
Their man, as some are deft
To gauge an ounce by heft.
And again:
The budding fancy first betrays
The character that strives
For birth as recompense of good
Or ill in former lives:
No marking tail has grown, yet when
You see the beggar pick
His mincing steps about the pond,
You cry: 'A peacock chick!'"
So I was terrified, deserted the beaten track to my fortress, and with my followers started on another track.
Then a prodigious cat met us, and seeing the whole pack before him, pounced into our midst. And the mice who survived the slaughter scolded me for picking a bad trail, and sought shelter in the old fortress, drenching the floor with blood. Yes, there is wisdom in the old story:
A deer there was that burst his bonds;
He flung the trap aside;
He violently broke apart
The hobbling snare that tied;
From woods uncouth with tufted flames
Around him bristling, fled;
The hunters' arrows left behind;
To seeming safety sped;
Into a well at last he tumbles:
On hostile fate all effort stumbles.
Then I departed, alone. The others - poor dolts! plunged into the old fortress. Thereupon the holy man, perceiving that the floor was smeared with drops of blood, followed the trail to the fortress, and began to ply the pickaxe. As he dug, he came upon the hoard over which I had lived so long, and the smell of which used to guide me back to the fortress.
Then Wide-Bottom was filled with glee and said: "Now, Crop-ear, sleep in peace. It was the smell of this that enabled the mouse to wake you." So they took the hoard and turned to the cell.
Now when I returned to the spot, I could not bear to look at the sad, disturbing sight. And I reflected: "Ah, what shall I do? Where shall I go? How may I win peace of mind?" In such reflections the day dragged drearily away.
Still, when the sun had laid his thousand beams to rest, I went with my companions to the same cell, though I was troubled and lacking in vigour. And when Crop-Ear heard the patter of our pack, time and again he started to strike the alms-bowl with his frazzled bamboo.
Then his guest said: "My friend, why not go peacefully to sleep at last?"
"Holy sir," he replied, "I am sure that villainous mouse has come with his followers. I do this from fear of him."
But Wide-Bottom laughed and said: "Have no fear, my friend. His jumping energy is gone with his property. This rule applies to all creatures without exception. As the saying goes:
The man has constant vigour? Dares
On others' backs to mount?
Speaks in a self-sufficient tone?
He has a bank account."
This angered me so that I made a desperate jump for the alms-bowl, but missed and fell to the floor. And my enemy saw me and said to Crop-Ear: "Look, my friend! It is quite wonderful. You could put it into poetry:
The wealthy men are men of force;
And they are scholars all, of course:
The mouse who lost his wealthy store,
Is now a mouse and nothing more.
And there is point in this:
A fangless snake; an elephant
Without an ichor-store;
A man who lacks a cash account -
Are names and nothing more."
When I heard this, I reflected: "Alas! It is true, though it is my enemy who says it. For today I have not the power to jump a mere finger's breadth. A curse upon a fellow's life without money! As the saying goes:
After money has departed,
If the wit is frail,
Then, like rills in summer weather,
Undertakings fail.
Forest sesame, crow-barley,
Men who have no cash,
Owning names but lacking substance,
Are accounted trash.
Beggars have, no doubt, their virtues,
Yet they do not flash:
As the world has need of sunlight,
Virtues ask for cash.
Beggars-born less keenly suffer
Than the men who crash
From a life of comfort to a
Deficit of cash.
Like the flabby breasts of widows,
Hopes and wishes rash
Helpless fall upon the bosom,
When there is no cash.
The sun that stuns the eyes that shun,
In vain he strains to see:
The light so bright is wrapped in night
By veils of poverty."
With this broken-spirited lamentation I saw my own hoard of wealth converted into a pillow for my enemy, and at dawn I crept into my fortress - a failure.
Then my attendants retired and gossiped together.
"Look here!" said they, "the fellow has no power to fill our bellies. Those who ride his back get nothing but buffets - from cats, for example. Why pay him reverence? For the proverb says:
A king from whom no bounties come,
But only buffets fall,
Had better be avoided, and
By soldiers first of all."
Such remarks I heard on the trail. And since, when I returned to the fortress, not one of my followers accompanied me (for I was penniless) I began to ponder deeply. "A curse, a curse on a life of poverty! There is sound sense in the verse:
Even relatives are sure
Scornfully to treat the poor;
Pride is docked, and virtue's moon
Loses lustre, waning soon;
Friends that were, disgusted fly;
Sorrows breed and multiply;
Comes the imputation then
Of the sins of other men.
When man is crushed by poverty
And stricken down by fate,
His best of friends become his foes,
And tried affection, hate.
And again:
Empty is the childless home;
Hearts that lack a friendship sure;
Wide horizons, to the fool;
All is empty to the poor.
And once again:
His passions are entire; his name,
Keen wit, and speech are just the same;
The man's the same. No! See him change!
Cash fails. The life is out! Ah, strange!
"Yet what have folk like me to do with money? Folk whose final fate is such as this? Positively my best course, now that property is gone, is to withdraw to the forest. As the proverb says:
Pride builds a proper house;
Never be humble:
Spurn cars of heaven, where
Pride takes a tumble.
Failure may dog the step;
Pride stands erect,
Stoops not to widest wealth
Tainted, abject."
And I continued my reflections: "Yes, the curse of beggary is dreadful as death. For
Gutted by the forest fire,
Stands in sterile soil a tree,
Gnarled, and riddled by the worms -
Better that than beggar be.
And as for beggary:
It is the shrine of wretchedness,
The dwelling-place of tears,
The thief of mind, the soil of doubts,
The treasury of fears,
Concreted meanness, home of woe,
And haughty honour's knell,
A form of death - to self-esteem
No different from hell.
And again:
A beggar is a man of shame,
Who bids farewell to honour's name;
From this, humiliations grow,
Then melancholy's gloomy woe;
But gloom with sadness dims the sense,
And sad men lack intelligence;
Now death is folly's certain fruit -
Thus, money's lack is evil's root.
And once again:
Thrust your hands between the jaws
Of an angry snake;
Slumber in the house of Death;
Poisoned liquor take;
Dash yourself to pieces down
Himalaya's side:
Do not feast on riches wrung
From a villain's pride.
To sum it up:
Feed your body to the flames,
Friend, if you are needy;
Do not cringe to beg a dole
From the selfish-greedy.
Better roam in forest wilds
With the beasts of prey
Than, by whimpering for gifts,
Baseness to betray.
"This being the case, what possible course shall I adopt to keep alive? How about robbery? That too is damnable, for it means appropriating what belongs to others. As the verse puts it:
Better let your tongue be tied
Than to know that you have lied;
Better to be impotent
Than adulterously bent;
Better die than take delight
In the petty pricks of spite;
Better beg as monk than feel
That you live by what you steal.
Well, then, shall I live on charity? That, too, is damnable, my friends, damnable. That too is a second gate of death. As the saying goes:
Parasite, or exiled scamp,
Invalid, or homeless tramp -
Life is death for these. The best
Would be death. For death is rest.
"Then I must at any cost recover the very treasure that Wide-bottom has stolen. For I saw my moneybag converted into a pillow for those two villains. I must regain my property, and if I die in the attempt, it will be better than this. For
If cowards who see themselves despoiled
Too tamely feel the sting,
Their fathers in the world beyond
Will spurn their offering."
After reaching this conclusion, I went there at night and gnawed a hole in the bag after he had gone to sleep. Thereupon that dreadful holy man awoke and struck me on the head with the frazzled bamboo. Yet somehow I escaped death - predestination, you see. As the old rhyme puts it:
What's duly his, a man receives;
This law not even God can break;
My heart is not surprised, nor grieves;
For what is mine, no strangers take.
"How was that?" asked the crow and the turtle. And Gold told the story of Mister Duly.*
"And that is why I say:
What's duly his, a man receives;
This law not even God can break;
My heart is not surprised, nor grieves;
For what is mine, no strangers take."
And Gold continued: "After these reflections, I recovered from my money-madness. For there is much wisdom in this:
Not rank, but character, is birth;
It is not eyes, but wits, that see;
True learning it's, to cease from wrong;
Contentment is prosperity.
And again:
Yes, all prosperities are his,
Whose heart is filled with mirth:
The feet in leather sandals shod,
Travel a leather earth.
A hundred leagues is nothing to him
Whose vehicle is greed:
To clasp the wealth that fingers touch
Contentment has no need.
Since Vishnu, universal lord,
Through thee a dwarf was made,
manhood's solvent, Greed divine,
To thee be homage paid.
No feat is hard for thee, O Greed,
Dishonour's wedded dame,
Who, for the men of kindest heart,
Prepares draughts of shame.
What man should never bear, I bore;
I spoke and, speaking, lied;
I waited at the stranger's door:
O Greed, be satisfied!
And again:
I've drunk foul water; slept forlorn
On gathered bits of broken thorn;
I've lost my love, I've begged for alms,
Enduring heart- and belly-qualms;
I've crossed the sea; I've walked afar;
I've treasured half a shattered jar:
Of further labours is there need?
Quick, damn you! Give your orders, Greed!
No poor man's evidence is heard,
Though logic link it word to word:
While wealthy babble passes muster
Though crammed with harshness, vice, and bluster.
The wealthy, though of meanest birth,
Are much respected on the earth:
The poor whose lineage is prized
Like clearest moonlight, are despised.
The wealthy are, however old,
Rejuvenated by their gold:
If money has departed, then
The youngest lads are aged men.
Since brother, son, and wife, and friend
Desert when cash is at an end,
Returning when the cash rolls in,
cash that is our next of kin.
"At the moment when, with such thoughts in my mind, I went to my quarters, our friend Swift came to me and suggested a journey hither. So here I am. I have come with him to visit you. Thus I have related to you the cause of my gloom.
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