The Columbia herald. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 1850-1873, 1873-04-18
A Buddhist Legend.

In the village of Sarvathi there lived
q young wife named Keesah. who. al
the age of IA, gave birth to son: and
she loved him with all the love and ioy
| of the possessor of a newly-found treas.
ure, for his face was like golden cloud.
! his eyes fair and tender as a blue Iotus.
and his smile bright and beaming like
| the morning light upon the dewy fiow-
ers. But when the boy was able ia
walk, and could run about the house.
there came day when he suddenly fell
| sick and died. And Keesah, not un-
derstanding what had happened TO her
fair, lotus-eyed boy, clasped him to her
bosom, and went about. the village from
house to house, praying and Weeping.
and beseeching the good people to give
her some medicine to cure her baby.
But the villagers and neighbors, on
seeing her, said -
els the girl mad, that she still bears
about on her breast the dead BODY of
her child?"
At length holy man, pitying the
girls sorrow, said to himself "AIas I
this Keesah does not understand the
law of death; 1 will try to comfort her. -
And he answered her, and said, "My
good girl, cannot myself give. you any
medicine to cure your boy, but know a
holy and wise physician who can"
"Oh p said the young mother, edo
tell me who it is, that may go at once
to himp ~"
And the holy man replied, 'He is
called the Buddha; he. alone can cure
thy child"
Then Keesah, on hearing this, was
comforted, and set out to find the
Buddha, still clasping to her heart the
hfeless body of her child. And when
she found him, she bowed down before
him, and said =
/" O my lord and master do you know
of any medicine that will cure my baby p
And the Buddha replied and said /:
Yes, know of one, but. you must get
it for me-"
And she asked: "What medicine do
you want 7? Tell me that may hasten
in search of it."
And the Buddha said: "I want only
few grains of mustard-seed. Leave
here the boy, and go You and bring
them to me-"
The girl refused to part with her baby,
but promised to get the seed for him.
As she was about to set out, the pitiful
Buddha, recalling her, said =
My sister, the mustard-seed that /
require must be taken from a house
where no child, parent. husband, wife,
relative, or slave has ever died."
The young mother replied, every
good, my lord" and went her way, TAX
ing her boy with her, and setting him
astride on her him, with his lifeless head
resting on her bosom. Thus she went
from house to house, from palace to
hut, begging for some grains of mustard
seed. The people said to her: "Here
are the seeds; take them, and go thy
way" But she first asked -
In this, my friends house, has there
ever died child, q husband, parent,
or slave ?"
And they one and all replied "Lady,
what is this that thou hast said? Know
est thou not that the living are few, but
that the dead are many There is no
such house as thou seekest.
Then she went to other houses and
begged the grains of mustard-seed,
which they gladly gave her, but to her
questionings one said, "I have lost
SON." another, f'I have lost parent ;"
and yet another, '' / have lost slave :"
and every one and all of them made
some such reply. At last, not being
the dead, whence she could obtain the
mustard-seed, and feeling utterly faint
and weary, she sat herself down upon
stone with, her baby in her lap, an d
thinking sadly, said to herself, "Alas
this is heavy task have undertaken
I am not the only one who has lost her
baby. Everywhere children are dying,
parents are dying, loved ones are dying,
and everywhere they tell me the dead
are more numerous than the living.
Shall then think only of my own
sorrow ?"
Thinking thus she suddenly summond
courage to put away her sorrow for her
dead baby, and she carried him to the
forest and laid him down to rest under
tree; and having covered him over
with tender leaves, and taken her last |
look of his loved face, she betook her
self once more to the Buddha, and bow |
ed before him.
And he said to her: "Sister, hast |
thou found the mustard-seedY Y
81 have not, my lord" she replied I; |
" for the people In the village tell me
there is no house In which some one |
has not died; for the living are few, but |
the dead are many"
"A And where is your baby ?"
81 have laid him under tree in the |
forest, my lord, said Keesah gently.
Then said the Buddha to her: You |
have found the grains of mustard-seed
you thought that you alone had lost a |
son, but now you have learned that the |
law of death and of suffering is among |
all living creatures, and that here there
is no permanence.
On hearing this, Keesah was comfort |
ed, and established in the path of virtue,
and was thenceforth called Keesah God |
ami the disciple of the Buddha.