110 SRI RAMA. 



into play all the smews of his body eleven hundred and ninety- 

 nine in number, and all his joints, while his eyes grew as red. 

 as the saga bean* when fried, and his bristles stood up like 

 the thorns on the jack-fruit and his pores opened like the 

 stalk-end of a fig "). 



Sri Rama had sunk up to his knees in the earth under his 

 supernatural burden, when Raja Laksamana, seeing his dan- 

 ger, seized the monkey by the arms and legs and swinging 

 him round sent him flying through space till he fell at last 

 on an island in the midst of the sea.f There the latter called 

 upon his friend the Jin with seven heads for help. The wish 

 was hardly expressed when the latter stood before him, and 

 the circumstances having been explained, the Jin took the 

 monkey-prince on his shoulder and then superuaturally in- 

 creased his stature until he was within easy reach of Maharaja 

 Duwana's landing-place at Kachapuri. There the monkey 

 jumped off and hid himself in the bushes. After a while 

 forty-four J handmaidens carrying water jars made their appear- 

 ance. Through them Kra Kechil learnt the reason why they 

 came daily to fetch so much water. They told him that after 

 Maharaja Duwana had brought Princess Sakutum Bunga 

 to his- own country, he had looked up the genealogy of his 

 house and had discovered that the Princess stood to him in 

 the relation of daughter to father. He had thus been unable 

 to marry her, and had given her a separate palace and 

 establishment of her own. Here she remained secluded, shut- 

 ting herself out from the light of day and bathing constantly 



* Sar/a — Adenantliera pavonia ? 



f According to the Ramuyana, HiNUiiiN leapt across the straits 

 which separates India and Ceylon, lighting only once on a rock in 

 the middle. 



% The number " forty-four," which occurs so constantly in this 

 story, is the number of families which go to make up the congre- 

 gation of a Malay mosque. So, the period " three months and ten 

 days," which often recurs, is the period of the iddut of a divorced 

 woman or a widow, within which she may not lawfully marry 

 again. The adoption of these arbitrary figures in the 'details of a 

 romance is curious. 



