With a roar the Tiger leapt upon Carpenter's Boar. At the very instant he sprang, [408] the Boar dodged and dropped straight into the round hole. The Tiger could not stop, but tumbled over and over and fell all of a heap in the jaws of the other pit, where it got very narrow. Up jumps the Boar out of his hole, and quick as lightning ran his tusk into the Tiger's thighs, tore him about the kidneys, buried his fangs in the creature's sweet flesh, and wounded his head. Then he tosses him out of the pit, crying aloud--"Here's your enemy for you!" They who came first had tiger to eat; but they who came after went about sniffing at the others' mouths, and asking what tiger's flesh tasted like!

But the Boars were still uneasy. "What's the matter now?" asked our Hog, who had noticed their movements.

"Master," said they, "it's all very well to kill one tiger, but the sham hermit can bring ten tigers more!"

"Who is he?"

"A wicked ascetic."

"The tiger I have killed; do you suppose a man can hurt me? Come along, and we'll get hold of him." So they all set forth.

Now the man had been wondering why the Tiger was so long in coming. Could the Boars have caught him? he thought. At last he started to meet him on the way; and as he went, there came the Boars! He snatched up his belongings, and off he ran. The Boars tore after him. He threw away his encumbrances, and with all speed climbed up a fig-tree.

"Now, Master, it's all up!" cried the herd. "The man has climbed a tree!"

"What tree?" their leader asked.

They replied, "A fig-tree."

"Oh, very well," said the leader. "The sows must bring water, the young ones dig about the tree, the tuskers tear at the roots, and the rest surround it and watch." They did their several tasks as he bade them; he meanwhile charged full at a great thick root, [409]--'twas like an axe-blow; and with this one blow he felled the tree to the ground. The Boars who were waiting for the man, knocked him down, tore him to pieces, gnawed the bones clean in a moment!

Now they perched Carpenter's Boar on the tree-trunk. They filled the dead man's shell with water, and sprinkled the Boar to consecrate him for their king; a young sow they consecrated to be his Consort.

This, the saying goes, is the origin of the custom still observed. When people make a king now-a-days, he is placed on a fine chair of fig-wood, and sprinkled out of three shells.

A sprite that dwelt in that forest beheld this marvel. Appearing

before the Boars in a cleft of his tree-trunk, he repeated the third stanza: