and other tales of magical birds abused by their beneficiaries
edited by
D. L. Ashliman
© 1998-2001
Aesop's "Goose That Laid the Golden Eggs"
and other tales of magical birds abused by their beneficiaries
edited by
D. L. Ashliman
© 1998-2001
A man and his wife had the good fortune to possess a goose which laid a golden egg every day. Lucky though they were, they soon began to think they were not getting rich fast enough, and, imagining the bird must be made of gold inside, they decided to kill it in order to secure the whole store of precious metal at once. But when they cut it open they found it was just like any other goose. Thus, they neither got rich all at once, as they had hoped, nor enjoyed any longer the daily addition to their wealth.
Much wants more and loses all.
One day a countryman going to the nest of his goose found there an egg all yellow and glittering. When he took it up it was as heavy as lead, and he was going to throw it away, because he thought a trick had been played upon him. But he took it home on second thoughts, and soon found to his delight that it was an egg of pure gold. Every morning the same thing occurred, and he soon became rich by selling his eggs. As he grew rich he grew greedy; and thinking to get at once all the gold the goose could give, he killed it and opened it only to find -- nothing.
Greed oft o'erreaches itself.
Once upon a time when Brahmadatta was reigning in Benares, the Bodhisatta was born a Brahmin, and growing up was married to a bride of his own rank, who bore him three daughters named Nanda, Nanda-vati, and Sundari-nanda. The Bodhisatta dying, they were taken in by neighbors and friends, whilst he was born again into the world as a golden mallard endowed with consciousness of its former existences.
Growing up, the bird viewed its own magnificent size and golden plumage, and remembered that previously it had been a human being. Discovering that his wife and daughters were living on the charity of others, the mallard bethought him of his plumage like hammered and beaten gold and how by giving them a golden feather at a time he could enable his wife and daughters to live in comfort. So away he flew to where they dwelt and alighted on the top of the central beam of the roof. Seeing the Bodhisatta, the wife and girls asked where he had come from; and he told them that he was their father who had died and been born a golden mallard, and that he had come to visit them and put an end to their miserable necessity of working for hire.
"You shall have my feathers," said he, "one by one, and they will sell for enough to keep you all in ease and comfort."
So saying, he gave them one of his feathers and departed. And from time to time he returned to give them another feather, and with the proceeds of their sale these Brahmin women grew prosperous and quite well to do.
But one day the mother said to her daughters, "There's no trusting animals, my children. Who's to say your father might not go away one of these days and never come back again? Let us use our time and pluck him clean next time he comes, so as to make sure of all his feathers."
Thinking this would pain him, the daughters refused.
The mother in her greed called the golden mallard to her one day when he came, and then took him with both hands and plucked him.
Now the Bodhisatta's feathers had this property that if they were plucked out against his wish, they ceased to be golden and became like a crane's feathers. And now the poor bird, though he stretched his wings, could not fly, and the woman flung him into a barrel and gave him food there. As time went on his feathers grew again (though they were plain white ones now), and he flew away to his own abode and never came back again.
There was once a poor man, who used to earn a few pánsas [copper coins] by cutting and selling wood. It was a hard struggle to support himself and wife and seven daughters. Never a bit of meat touched his lips, never a shoe covered his feet, and only a rag covered his back.
One day, when not feeling very well, he lay down under a tree to rest. The Lucky-Bird Humá happened to be flying about the place at the time, and, noticing the man's poverty and sickness, pitied him. So it flew down beside him and deposited a golden egg by his bundle of wood. In a little while the woodcutter awoke, and seeing the egg, picked it up and wrapped it in his cummerbund. He then took up his load and went to the woni [shopkeeper] who generally bought it. He sold him the egg for a trifle. He did not know what a wonderful egg it was, but the woni knew, and asked him to go and get the bird that laid it, and he would give him a rupee as a gift.
The man promised, and on the following day went to the jungle as usual to prepare his load of wood. On the way back he sat down to rest under the tree where he had found the egg, and pretended to sleep. The bird Humá came again, and noticing that he was still as poor and as ill-looking as before, thought that he had not seen the egg, and therefore went and laid another close by him, in such a spot that he could not possibly miss seeing it; whereupon the woodcutter caught the bird, and rose up to carry it to the woni.
"Oh! What are you going to do with me? Do not kill me. Do not imprison me, but set me free," cried the bird. "You shall not fail of a reward. Pluck one of my feathers and show it to the fire, and you shall at once arrive at my country, Koh-i-Qáf, where my parents will reward you. They will give you a necklace of pearls, the price of which no king on earth could give."
But the poor ignorant woodcutter would not listen to the bird's pleadings. His mind was too much occupied with the thought of the rupee that he felt certain of getting, and therefore he fastened the bird in his wrap, and ran off to the woni as fast as his load would permit. Alas, however, the bird died on the way from suffocation.
"What shall I do now?" thought the woodcutter. "The woni will not give me a rupee for a dead bird. Ha! Ha! I will show one its feathers to the fire. Perhaps the bird being dead will not make any difference."
Accordingly he did so, and immediately found himself on the Koh-i-Qáf, where he sought out the parents of the bird and told them all that had happened. Oh, how the parents and other birds wept when they saw the dead body of their beloved relative!
Attracted by the noise, a strange bird that happened to be passing at the time came in and inquired what was the matter. This bird carried a piece of grass in its beak, with which it could raise the dead.
"Why do you weep?" it said to the sorrowful company.
"Because our relative is dead. We shall never speak to it again," they replied.
"Weep not," said the strange bird. "Your relative shall live again." Whereupon it placed the piece of grass in the mouth of the corpse, and it revived.
When the bird Humá revived and saw the woodcutter, it severely upbraided him for his faithlessness and carelessness. "I could have made you great and happy," it said, "but now get you back to your burden of wood and humble home."
On this the poor man found himself back again in the jungle, and standing by the load of wood that he had prepared before he was transported to Koh-i-Qáf. He sold his wood, and then went home in a very sad frame of mind to his wife and daughters.
He never saw the bird Humá again.
Return to D. L. Ashliman's folktexts, a library of folktales, folklore, fairy tales, and mythology.
Revised September 14, 2001.