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1883.] C. Swynnerton —Folktales from the Upper Panjdb. 
of Baner and had never seen the Indus determined to perform a journey. 
Descending to the Yusafzai plains he made his way to Atak, and when 
he saw one of the large eight-oared ferry boats crossing with the flood to 
the opposite bank of the river, he cried to the bystanders—“ What long 
legs that creature must have!” 
XXIII. The Baner! and his drowned wife. 
There was once a sudden flood in the Indus which washed away num¬ 
bers of people, and among others, the wife of a certain Baneri. The dis¬ 
tracted husband was wandering along the banks of the river looking for the 
dead body, when a countryman accosted him thus, “ O friend, if, as I am 
informed, your wife has been carried away in the flood, she must have floated 
down the stream with the rest of the poor creatures. Yet you are going up 
the stream.” “ Ah sir,” answered the wretched Baneri, “ you did not 
know that wife of mine. She always took an opposite course to every one 
else. And even now that she is drowned, I know full well that, if other 
bodies have floated down the river, hers must have floated up !” 
XXIY. The man and the Bear. 
One day when the river was in flood, a certain dark object was seen 
floating down the stream. Thereupon a poor man, mistaking it for a log 
of wood, plunged into the water and swimming with vigorous strokes, 
seized it with both his hands. When too late he discovered that he was 
clasped in the shaggy embrace of a bear. “ Ah,” cried his friends from the 
shore, “ let him go, let him go !” “ Just what I am trying to do,” answered 
the unhappy man, “ but he won’t let me go !”* 
XXY. The Crow and its young. 
An old mother crow was once engaged in giving sound advice to her 
newly fledged young ones. “ Remember” said she, “your principal enemy will 
be man. Whenever you detect a man in the act of even stooping towards the 
ground as if for a stone, at once take wing and fly.” “ Very good,” answered 
one of her precocious youngsters, “ but what if the man happens to have a 
stone already in his hand ? Can you advise us how we shall proceed then?” 
XXVI. The Jackal and the Fleas. f 
There was once a jackal so infested with fleas that life was a burden 
to bim. Determined to be rid of them, he sought for a pool of water, and 
* Logs of deodar are frequently floated down the Indus from the Himalayas. 
During floods many of these logs are washed away from the “ timber yards’’ far up in 
the mountains. For every log recovered the villagers along the hanks receive a 
reward of four annas from the owners. Each log bears its owner’s mark. 
f The English fable of the Fox and the Fleas is almost exactly similar. 
