prepared. The dog at once realised that, if the Brahmans who had been
invited to the memorial feast ate the poisoned grain, they would die,
and that the sin of Brahman murder would be incurred by the host,
her son. So she suddenly rushed up and put her foot right into the
middle of the milk-pudding. The son's wife was very angry. She threw
a red-hot coal at the dog with such skill that it dropped on to the
middle of her back and burnt a big hole in it. Then the son's wife
cooked a fresh milk-pudding and fed the Brahmans. But she was so
cross with the dog that she would not give her the smallest possible
scrap. So the poor dog remained hungry all day. When night fell she
went to the bullock who had been her husband and began to howl as
loudly as she could. The bullock asked her what the matter was. She
told him how she had seen that a snake had poisoned the grain, and
how, to prevent the Brahmans dying and her son incurring the sin of
their death, she had put her paw into the middle of the milk-pudding;
how her daughter-in-law had been angry and had burnt a hole in her
back with a live coal, and how her back hurt so that she did not know
what to do. The bullock answered, "You are suffering for the pollution
with which you darkened our house in a former life, and, because I
let you remain in the house and touched you, I too am suffering, and
I have become a bullock. Only to-day my son fastened me to his plough,
tied up my mouth, and beat me, I too have, like you, had nothing to eat
all day. Thus all my son's memorial services are useless." Now the son
happened to be passing by the stable and heard this conversation. He
at once fetched the bullock some grass and the dog some food, and he
brought them both water to drink; and then he went to bed very sad at
heart. Next morning he got up early and went into a dark forest until
at last he came to the hermitage of a rishi. He prostrated himself
before the rishi, who asked him why he was so sad. The Brahman's son
said, "I am sad because my father has been born again as a bullock