Panchatantra: Mother Shandilee's Bargain

From The Panchatantra of Vishnu Sharma, translated by Arthur W. Ryder (1925).

Mother Shandilee's Bargain

[This story is inserted into Gold's Gloom.]

At one time I asked a certain Brahman in a certain town for shelter during the rainy season, and this he gave me. So there I lived, occupied with pious duties.

One day I woke betimes, and listening to a conversation between my host and his wife, I heard the Brahman say: "My dear, tomorrow will be the winter solstice, an extremely profitable season. So I will go to another village in search of donations. And you, in honour of the sun, should give some Brahman food to the extent of your ability."

But his wife snapped at him harshly, saying: "Who would give food to a poor Brahman like you? Are you not ashamed to talk like that? And besides:

Since first I put my hand in yours,
I haven't had a thing:
I've never tasted stylish food;
Don't mention gem or ring."

At this the Brahman was terrified and he stammered:

"My dear, my dear, you should not say such things. You have heard the saying:

You have a mouthful only? Give
A half to feed the needy:
Will any ever own the wealth
For which his soul is greedy?

And again:

The poor man can but give a mite;
Yet his reward is such -
The Scriptures tell us as is his,
From riches giving much.

The cloud gives only water, yet
The whole world treats him as a pet:
But none can bear the sun, who stands
With rays that look like outstretched hands.

"Bearing this in mind, even the poor should give to the right person at the right time - though the gift seems beneath contempt. For

Great faith, a gift appropriate,
Fit time, a fit recipient,
An understanding heart - and gifts
Are blest beyond all measurement.

And some quote this:

Indulge in no excessive greed
(A little helps in time of need)
But one, by greed excessive led,
Perceived a topknot on his head."

"How was that?" asked the wife. And the Brahman told the story of Self-Defeating Forethought.*

"And that is why I say:

Indulge in no excessive greed
(A little helps in time of need)
But one, by greed excessive led,
Perceived a topknot on his head."

Then the Brahman continued: "My dear, did you never hear this?

These five are fixed for every man
Before he leaves the womb:
His length of days, his fate, his wealth,
His learning, and his tomb."

After this preachment, the wife said: "Well, I believe I have a bit of sesame grain in the house. I will grind it into flour and feed a Brahman." And her husband, having received her promise, went off to another village.

Then the wife softened the sesame grains in hot water, hulled them, placed them in the hot sun, and returned to her chores in the house. In this state of affairs a dog made water in the dish of grain, and she thought when she saw it: "Dear me! See how shrewd fate is, when it has turned against you. Even these poor sesame grains it has made unfit to eat. Well, I will take them to some neighbour's house, and make an exchange, unhulled for hulled. For anybody will bargain on those terms."

So she put her grain in a basket and went from house to house, saying: "Who cares to exchange sesame unhulled for sesame hulled?"

Now she happened to enter with her grain a house which I had entered to beg alms, and she made her offer there. The housewife was delighted and took the hulled grain in exchange for unhulled.

Later, her husband came home and asked: "My dear, what does this mean?"

And she told him: "I made a bargain, hulled sesame for unhulled."

Over this he pondered, then said: "To whom did this grain belong?"

And his son Kamandaki told him: "To Mother Shandilee."

Then he said: "My dear wife, she is mighty shrewd at a bargain. You had better throw this sesame away.

'It's certain Mother Shandilee,
If bargaining in sesame -
Her hulled grains for the unhulled kind -
Has some good reason in her mind."