The Blind Man, the Hunchback and the Princess

In the northern country there was a city called Madhupura, ruled by a king named Madhusena. From some pleasure of his a daughter was born to him with three breasts.

Hearing that she was three-breasted, the king said to his chamberlain: "Take this inauspicious three-breasted girl away to some distant country where nobody knows of her."

The chamberlain said: "Great king! It is indeed said that a three-breasted girl brings misfortune. Even so, call the brahmins and ask, so that neither this world nor the next is spoiled. The understanding of a man who keeps asking and listening grows like the rays of the sun."

The king called the brahmins and asked: "A three-breasted daughter has been born to me; is there any prescribed course for her or not?"

They said: "Master, listen — a girl with any limb too few or too many is ill-natured and destroys her own character. And a three-breasted girl who comes within her father's sight destroys her father; of that there is no doubt. So, master, avoid the sight of her. And if you give her to anyone in marriage, send the bridegroom abroad — then no fault will attach in either world."

Hearing this, the king had it proclaimed by drum through the city: "Whoever marries this three-breasted princess shall receive a hundred thousand gold pieces — and must go abroad."

The proclamation went on for a long time, and nobody accepted. Meanwhile the princess came of age and was kept in a hidden place.

In that same city there lived a blind man whose stick was held by a hunchback named Manthara. Hearing the proclamation, the two of them talked it over: "If this is being proclaimed, let us take it. If by good fortune we get the girl and the money, our days will pass comfortably; and if we die of her ill luck, this poverty will be over."

So they told the king's men, who informed the king: "Master! Someone has accepted." The king said: "Give them the girl and the money and send them abroad."

So the blind man was married to the three-breasted princess, given the money, and put on a boat with the hunchback and sent to another country.

There they bought a house in some city and settled. The blind man lay on his cot and the hunchback ran the household. And the princess fell into an improper connection with the hunchback.

One day she said to him: "Handsome one! If this blind man were dead we could live happily. Find some poison and kill him."

Some days later she found a dead black snake and said to the hunchback: "Brother! You are clever; take this snake, cook it with plenty of spice, and give it to the blind man as fish. He is greedy; he will eat it and die."

The hunchback put the snake in a pot to cook and, going off to fetch other things, said: "Sister! Stir this fish carefully with the spoon while I am gone."

So she stood stirring the pot. And the poisonous steam that rose out of it went into the eyes of the blind man sitting above — and his sight opened; he could see.

And seeing, he understood the whole business between his wife and the hunchback at once. Filled with rage he seized the hunchback by the legs, swung him round, and struck his wife with him.

With that blow the hunchback's hump was straightened, and the princess's third breast went back into her chest.

So the blind man, the hunchback and the three-breasted princess — all three of them were put right the moment the deed stood in front of them.

अन्धकः कुब्जकश्चैव त्रिस्तनी राजकन्यका । त्रयोऽप्यध्यायतं सिद्धाः सम्मुखे कर्मणि स्थिते ॥

Moral: The blind man, the hunchback and the three-breasted princess — all three of them were put right the moment the deed stood in front of them.

From the Panchatantra, Book V — Ill-Considered Action.