So, under my roof, peace was no longer to be found.
rt way
king the air with
eir
r‐
If you, brother, chanced to delay your steps at the
farmhouse of the rich brahmin who lives but a sho
off, and heard how his two wives railed at one another —
disputing in high, shrill tones and sha
th
coarse language — then you have, so to speak,
passed my house on the way.
And it also became, I am sorry to confess, a prove
bial saying in Ujjenī at that time: “The two agree: like
Kāmanīta’s wives!”
115
~ 15 ~
T
HE SHAVEN‐HEADED MONK
S
UCH WAS THE STATE of affairs in my home
when, one morning, I sat in a large room which
lay on the shady side of the house and which was set apar
for the transaction of all business matters. For that reason it
t
d
e
h
best
r it
e all, on account of the sparing diet to be put up
over‐looked the courtyard, an arrangement which enabled
me to keep under my own eye everything relating to the
administration of my affairs.
Before me stood a trusted servant who had, for a
number of years, accompanied me on all my journeys an
to whom I was giving exact instructions with regard to th
taking of a caravan to a somewhat distant spot. Along wit
these directions I was, of course, describing to him the
m
of disposing of his wares when he got there, the
ode
produce he had to bring back with him, the business
connections he was to form and other similar matters, fo
was my intention to give him full charge of the expedition.
*
*
*
To be sure, my house was less home‐like than
e
and one might suppose that I myself would ha
ver,
ve
been glad to embrace every opportunity of roaming about
in distant lands. But I was beginning to be somewhat self‐
indulgent and dainty, and I shunned very distant journeys
— not only because of the fatigues to be faced on the way
but, abov
117
w
hen actually on the road. Yet even supposing the
ith w
as well as I did at
t my caravans
under trusty leaders while I remained behind in Ujjenī.
Well, as I was saying, I was in the midst of giving
my caravan leader very minute and well‐considered
instructions, when from the courtyard we heard the voices
of my two wives, both much louder than usual and with a
flow of language which sounded as though it would never
end. Irritated by this tiresome interruption, I finally sprang
up and, after having vainly looked out of the window,
I stepped into the courtyard.
There I saw both of my wives standing at the outer
gate. But far from finding them wrangling with one an‐
other as I had expected, I came upon them for the first
time of one mind: they had discovered and pounced upon
a common enemy and on him they now poured out the
vials of their united wrath. This luckless victim was a
wandering ascetic, who stood there next to one of the
pillars of the gate quietly letting this stream of abuse flow
over him.
The actual reason for their attack upon him I have
never discovered; I imagine, however, that the mother
instinct, which was very highly developed in both of them,
scented in this self‐denier a traitor to the sacred cause of
human propagation and a foe to their sex, and that they
had just as instinctively fallen upon him as two mongooses
upon a cobra.
“Out with you, you bald‐pated priest, you shame‐
less ruffian! Just look how you stand there, with your bent
shoulders and hang‐dog look, breathing piety and con‐
templation — you oily hypocrite! You smooth‐faced
journey’s end reached, with the possibility of making up
for lost time and of having the best of everything, there
were numerous disappointments to be reckoned with and
I, at least, was never able to dine abroad
home. As a result, I had begun to send ou
118
windbag! It is the kitchen pot that you peer and gaze for,
that you sniff and snuffle at — just like any old donkey
who, unyoked from his cart, runs
the rubbish‐heap in
the courtyard and peers and gaze and sniffs and
snuffles... Out with you, you lazy brazen‐faced thief, you
shameless beggar, shaveling monk!”
The object of these and similar expressions of
maternal contempt, a wanderer belonging to some ascetic
school and a man of strikingly lofty stature, stood still
beside the gate‐post in an attitude of easy repose. His
robe, of the amber colour of the Kanikāra flower and not
unlike your own, fell in picturesque folds over his left
shoulder to his feet, and gave the impression of covering a
powerfully built body. The right arm, which hung limply
down, was uncovered and I could not help admiring the
huge coil of muscles, which rather seemed to be the well‐
earned possession of a warrior than the idle inheritance of
an ascetic; and even the clay alms‐bowl appeared to be as
strange and incongruous in his hand as an iron bludgeon
in that same hand would have seemed to be in its proper
place. His head was bent, his gaze fixed on the ground,
his mouth absolutely without expression, and he stood
motionless there as though some masterly artist had hewn
the statue of a wandering monk in stone, had painted and
clothed it, and that I had thereupon caused it to be set up
at my gate — as if it were a symbol of my liberality.
This tranquillity of his, which I held to be meekness
but which my two wives regarded as contempt,
naturally goaded the latter to ever greater efforts; and they
would probably have graduated to actual violence, had I
not come between, rebuked them for their disrespect‐
fulness and driven them into the house. Then I went up to
the wanderer, bowed respectfully before him and said:
“I trust, Most Venerable One, that you will not take
to heart what these two women may have said: I know it
to
s
,
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