out of her hands. It fell on the ground and burnt all the little
snakes' tails off. The snake-queen did her best to comfort them,
but the stumps of the little princes' tails ached so dreadfully that
it was ever so long before the snake-queen could put them off to
sleep. When the snake-king came home that evening, she told him what
had happened. And she was so cross with the little daughter-in-law,
that the snake-king had to promise that she should go back to her
father-in-law's house. A few days later, the snake-king assumed once
again the guise of a Brahman, and, loading the little daughter-in-law
with presents, took her back to her husband's home. In the course of
time the little snake-princes grew up, but their tails never grew
again. So their father, the snake-king, called one little prince,
No-tail; and the second little prince, Cut-tail; and the third little
prince, Dock-tail. And one day they asked the snake-queen how it was
that their tails had been broken off. She told them how the little
daughter-in-law had burnt them off by dropping the lamp on them.

The snake-princes, when they heard their mother's answer, were
terribly cross with the little daughter-in-law, and they vowed that
they would be revenged on her. So they found out where she lived,
and they sent a message to her house, saying that they were coming to
pay her a visit. But they really meant to bite her to death directly
they saw her. The little daughter-in-law was overjoyed when she heard
that the snake-princes were coming to visit her. For ever since the
snake-king had pretended to be her uncle, she always thought of little
No-tail and little Cut-tail and little Dock-tail as if they had been
her own cousins. Now it so happened that the very day on which they
were expected at the little daughter-in-law's house was Nagpanchmi
Day. The little daughter-in-law was sitting in the house all alone
waiting for little Prince No-tail, little Prince Cut-tail, and little