Epics of India

The Foolish, Timid Rabbit   by Ellen C. Babbitt rabbit sitting under palm tree, sleeping wakes up and wonders what would happen if earth suddenly broke apart suddenly, a coconut falls from the tree, and timid rabbit thinks the earth is breaking all up he runs and yells, attracting the attention of another rabbit the other rabbit asks him why he's running, and he tells him the earth is breaking all up and needs to run, too! second rabbit runs, and tells another rabbit, who tells another rabbit, until there's a lot of rabbits running they tell deer, who tells fox, who tells elephant, and suddenly there's a big heard of animals running and panicking because they think the earth is breaking all up Lion, King of the Beasts, roars three times and tells the herd to stop. He asks them why they're running and scared they tell him the earth is breaking all up Lion asks who saw it Elephant says Fox told him, and Fox says Deer told him, and Deer says a rabbit told him,

The Empty Lake by Noon Inayat lake covered with waterlilies lived fish, one of them told them all a story: once a great golden king fish of theirs that they admired and followed queen rain forgot to send showers to earth before the time of heat Mother Earth and thirsty sun rays drank the water of their lake and king wind destroyed all the water with his fires queen rain heard them calling and got the cloud fairies who make the water and thunder king thunder king made his army to fire, which made thunder, and lightning and water rain fell it was soft and sweet King feared the water would be taken away King fish spoke again and said King of Thunder and Queen of Rain please let it rain sky fell like a mountain of water sunrays covered and crows chased away King thunder and queen rain came down from sky they tell them they love him and just call when he needs water Lake

Once there was a farm that had lots of animals. On this farm lived a chicken, cow and spider. They were all great friends and looked out for one another. Cow lived in a field, next to the chicken coop, where Chicken lived, and in the corner of that coop lived Spider, in his finely spun web. They loved it on the farm, until one day, Spider overheard the farmer talking about getting ready to slaughter Cow so he could sell beef to the market. Immediately, Spider told Chicken, who told Cow. They had to come up with a plan soon. The night before the farmer planned on butchering Cow, Spider came up with a plan to help his friend. He ventured out to the field where Cow lived, and told Cow to lay down and pretend to be dead. Then, he spun a web all around Cow, so that it looked like Cow had been dead for quite some time. When the farmer came out the next morning, he saw Cow, and said, “Oh no, Cow has died! I can’t butcher him now, his meat has spoiled and will no longer be good to eat. I’ll

The Woodpecker, Turtle, and Deer by Ellen C. Babbitt deer lived in the forest, turtle lived in lake, woodpecker lived in treetops, all friends hunter comes and sees deer tracks, he sets traps near the lake deer springs the traps and calls out for help, turtle and woodpecker come to his aide turtle begins chewing off the leather straps on the trap, while woodpecker goes to the hunter's house hunter wakes up and starts to come outside with his knife, but woodpecker flies at his face, and he goes back inside to rest longer hunter wakes up and tries again, but woodpecker does it again. Lastly, hunter comes out and woodpecker flies back to his friends, yelling turtle has bloody mouth from chewing so much and deer breaks the last strap deer and woodpecker get away, but turtle is captured and put in a bag on a tree by the hunter deer comes back to save turtle. He leads the hunter far into the forest, and then runs back to free turtle deer lifts the bag from the tree and turtl

The Girl Monkey and the String of Pearls by Ellen C. Babbitt king and his family go to the lake for a swim, queen gives her pearls to her servant who watches over them in a box within the garden garden has lots of monkeys  Girl Monkey sees the pearls and wants them. She waits for the servant to fall asleep, and then she swoops down, grabs them, and runs back up her tree. servant wakes up and sees the pearls gone, the king orders the guards to find the person responsible  chief guard discovers no one could hav taken the pearls, so it must be a monkey he comes up with a plan to trick the Girl Monkey guards set out strings of beads, then the monkeys all come down and grab them, except girl monkey because she already has a string of pearls hidden all the monkeys gloat about their beads to Girl Monkey, who finally pulls hers out to show them off, revealing herself to the chief guard they catch her and send her to the king, who thanks the chief guard for being so wise Monkeys

Wise Merchant vs. The Fool You're a fool, you will die. Being First Means You're Last "I'm going to travel the countryside first and sell my goods to all the people, so I can reap all the benefits and become rich," said the merchant who is later eaten by a demon. "Knock yourself out," said the wise merchant. Bibliography These two microfictions are based on one of the Jataka tales, called The Wise and The Foolish Merchant by Ellen C. Babbitt. Basically, two merchants are buying goods in a city with plans to travel across a desert and sell those goods to others that they pass by. They want to make a profit from doing this. The foolish merchant says he wants to go first, so he can sell all of his goods first, set his own prices, have fresh grass for his oxen, and drink from clean water. The wise merchant allows him to do so, because the wise merchant knows that his oxen will eat the fresh grown grass, prevent himself from digging wells, and be able