The Farmer's Wife, the Rogue and the Jackal

In a certain place lived a farmer and his wife. The farmer was old; his wife was full of youth, forever looking about for other men, and never stayed at home.

A rogue found her alone and said: "Fair one! I am a widower, and the sight of you has set me on fire; give me the pleasure of your love."

She said: "Handsome one, if that is so — my husband has a great deal of money, and he is so old he cannot even walk. So let me take that money and come away with you, and I shall enjoy love with you." He said: "That suits me too. Come early tomorrow to a certain place, and we shall go to some fine city and make your life worth living."

She agreed. And at dawn, taking all her husband's money, she came to the appointed place. The rogue took her and set off southward.

After some eight miles they came to a great river. The rogue thought: "What am I to do with this woman at the end of her youth? And if anyone comes after her it will go badly for me. Better I take only the money and go."

He said: "My dear, this great river is hard to cross. Let me first carry the money over, and then come back and take you across comfortably on my shoulders." She said: "Do that, my handsome one." And she handed over everything.

Then he said: "Give me too the cloth you are wearing, so that you can move freely in the water." And she gave him that as well.

With the whole of it he went off wherever he pleased — and she sat waiting on the sand at the river's edge.

Just then a she-jackal came by with a piece of meat in her mouth. At that same moment a large fish came out of the river onto the bank. Seeing it, the jackal dropped the meat and ran for the fish — and at once a vulture dropped out of the sky, snatched up the meat and flew off; and the fish slipped back into the water.

Robbed of both, the jackal stood looking up. Then the naked woman, seeing her cheated of meat and fish alike, laughed and said: "Jackal! The vulture has your meat and the fish has gone back in the water — what are you staring at?"

And the jackal, seeing her cheated of husband and lover alike, said mockingly: "My cleverness is one thing; yours is twice as great. No lover left and no husband either — what are you staring at, naked one?"

यादृशं मम पाण्डित्यं तादृशं द्विगुणं तव । माभूज्जारो न भर्ता च किं निरीक्षसि नग्निके ॥

Moral: My cleverness is one thing; yours is twice as great. No lover left and no husband either — what are you staring at, naked one?

From the Panchatantra, Book IV — Loss of Gains.