Campeyya-Jataka– The Serpent King – No 5O6

In a month's time the brahmin was come to Benares. There he got much money by making the snake perform in the villages beyond the Gates. The king also sent for him, and commanded a performance; the man promised this for the morrow, which was the last day of the half- month. Then the king sent a drum beating about the city, with proclamation, that on the morrow a royal snake would dance in the palace court; let the people then gather to see it in their multitudes. Next day the courtyard of the palace was adorned, and the brahmin summoned. He brought in the Great Being in a jewelled basket on a gay rug, which he set; down, and himself took a seat. The king came down from the upper storey and sat on his royal seat in the midst of a great concourse of people. The brahmin took out the Great Being, and made him dance. The people could not keep still: thousands of kerchiefs waved in the air; a shower of jewels in all seven kinds fell about the Bodhisatta.
It was now the full month since the Serpent was caught ; and for all that time he had taken no food. Now Sumana began to think-

"My dear husband tarries long. It is now a month since he has not returned: what can the matter be?'' So she went and looked at the pond: lo, the water was red as blood! Then she knew that he must have been caught by a snake-charmer. Forth from the palace she came, and to the antheap; she saw the place where he had been caught, and the place where he had been tormented, and she wept. Then she went to the frontier village, and enquired ; and learning all the facts, she went on to Benares and in the midst of the people, above the palace court in the air she stood now lamenting. The Great Being as he danced looked up in the air, and saw her, and being ashamed crept into his basket, and there he lay. When he crept into the basket, the king cried out, "What is the matter now?'' Looking this way and that way, he saw her poised in the air, and recited the first stanza:

Who is it like the lightning shines! or like a blazing star ?
Goddess or Titaness ? methinks no human thing you are.

Their conversation is given in the stanzas following:

No Goddess I nor Titaness, nor human, mighty king!
A female of the serpent kind, come for a certain thing.

Full of wrath and rage you show,
From your eyes the teardrops flow:
Say what wrong or what desire
Brings you, lady ? I would know.

Crawling serpent fierce as flame!
So they called him: one there came,
Seized him for his profit, sire:
Freedom for my lord I claim! '

How could such a starveling wight
Catch a, creature full of might?
Daughter of the serpents, say
How to discern a snake aright?

Such his might, that e'en this town
He could burn to cinders down.
But he loves the holy way,
And seeks austerity's renown.

Then the king asked how the man had caught him. She replied in the following stanza:

On holy days the royal snake
At the four-ways used to take
Holy vows: a juggler caught him.
Free my husband for my sake!

After these words she added yet these other two stanzas begging his release:Lo sixteen thousand women gay with jewel and with ring,
Beneath the waters counted him their refuge and their king.

Justly, gently set him free,
Buy the Serpent liberty,
With gold, a hundred kine, a village:
That will merit will for thee-

Then the king recited three stanzas;

Justly now and gently see
I buy the Serpent liberty
With gold, a hundred kine, a village,
That will merit win for me.

A jewelled earring give I thee, a hundred drachms of gold,
A lovely throne like flower of flax with cushions laid fourfold!

A bull, a hundred kine, two wives of equal birth with thee:
Release the holy Snake: the deed will meritorious be.

To this the hunter made reply:

I want no gifts, your majesty,
But let the Serpent now go free.
Thus I now release the Serpent:
The deed will meritorious be.