When his father did not return, the child began to cry, and Thakur
heard him and came down, and to frighten the boy and make him leave
the jungle he came in the guise of a leopard; but the child would not
move from where he was; then Thakur appeared as a bear, and as a snake
and an elephant and in many other forms but the child would not move;
so at last Thakur took the form of an old woman, who lifted him in
her arms and soothed him and carried him to the edge of the jungle
and left him on the outskirts of a village.

In the morning a rich Brahman found him and took him home, and as no
one claimed the child he brought him up and made him his goat-herd,
and they gave him the name of Lela. The Brahman's sons and daughters
used to go school, and before he took his goats out to graze Lela
used to carry their books to the school. And going to the school every
day Lela got to know one or two letters and used to draw them in the
sand while minding his goats; later he got the children to give him
an old book saying that he wanted to pretend to the other boys that
he could read and out of this book he taught himself to read: and as
he grew up he became quite a scholar. One day he picked up a letter
and found that it was from one of the village girls arranging to elope
that very evening with a young man. At the appointed time Lela went to
the rendez-vous and hid himself in a tree; soon he saw the Brahman's
daughter come to the place, but as her letter had not been delivered
her lover did not appear. The girl got tired of waiting and then she
began to call to her lover, thinking that perhaps he was hiding for
a joke. When she called, Lela answered from the tree and she thought
that it was her lover and said "Come down and let us be off." So
Lela came down and they started off together; when day dawned she saw
that it was Lela who was with her and she sat down and upbraided him
for deceiving her. Lela said that they had met by chance; he had not