Reading Notes: More Jataka Tales, Part A

The Cunning Wolf

• Some people had no more food left for dinner, so a man volunteered to go get more meat for dinner with his club.
• He lays next to a watering hole and pretending to be dead, so when an animals comes he can surprise attack him.
• A bunch of animals noticed him and watched him for a while. The king of the wolves decides to go check out if the man is really dead, so he tells the others to wait. 
• The king wolf slightly tugs on the man's club, and instantly the man kind of pulls the club back.
• The wolf realizing the man is not dead and tried to fool the animals that he was dead. Luckily, the man misses when he threw the club at the wolf and noticed that they were no animals near by.
• Man goes back with no food because the animals outsmarted his move to kill them. 

The Woodpecker and the Lion

• A woodpecker saw that this lion was in pain and found it it was because he had a bone stuck in his throat. 
• Lion asked for his help, but at first the woodpecker was unsure because he thought the lion might eat him. 
• The woodpecker decided to help and placed a stick to hold the lion's mouth open, thus he couldn't shut it. He stuck his head in the lion's mouth and got the stick, but hit the stick when coming out of lion's mouth.
• The lion did not eat the woodpecker or say thanks.
• One day woodpecker asked for the lion's help, but lion said he did not owe it anything because he let the woodpecker go instead of eating it. 
• The two animals avoid each other from then on. 
• A way I could rewrite this story is use different characters or change the setting.

Lion roaring in pain
(Source: Wikimedia Commons)

Bibliography: More Jataka Tales by Ellen C. Babbitt-Part A.