youth took the melon and handed over the money. "But tell me," says he,
"will its young one be as green as it is?" "Doubtless," answered the
man, "it will be green." As the booby was going home, he allowed the
melon to roll down a slope before him. It burst on its way, when up
started a frightened hare. "Go to my house, young one," he shouted.
"Surely a green animal has come out of it." And when he got home, he
inquired of his mother if the young one had arrived.

In the _Gooroo Paramartan_ there is a parallel incident to this
last. The noodles are desirous of providing their Gooroo with a horse,
and a man sells them a pumpkin, telling them it is a mare's egg, which
only requires to be sat upon for a certain time to produce a fine young
horse. The Gooroo himself undertakes to hatch the mare's egg, since his
disciples have all other matters to attend to; but as they are carrying
it through a jungle, it falls down and splits into pieces; just then a
frightened hare runs before them; and they inform the Gooroo that, a
fine young colt came out of the mare's egg, with very long ears, and ran
off with the speed of the wind. It would have proved a fine horse for
their revered Gooroo, they add; but he consoles himself for the loss by
reflecting that such an animal would probably have run away with him.

A number of the Gothamite tales in the printed collection are not only
inferior to those which are preserved orally, but can be considered in
no sense examples of preeminent folly. Three consist of tricks played by
women upon their husbands, such as are found in the ordinary jest-books
of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In one a man, who had taken
a buzzard, invites some friends to dine with him. His wife, with two of
her gossips, having secretly eaten the buzzard, kills and cooks an old
goose, and sets it before him and his guests; the latter call him a
knave to mock them thus with an old goose, and go off in great anger.