whose husband died while she was
pregnant, and she was very unhappy and used to pray daily to Singh
Chando to give her a man child in place of her husband; she was left
well off and among her property were three gold coins, and as she was
afraid of these being stolen she decided to place them in the care
of the village headman. So she took them to him and asked him to keep
them till her child was born; and no one was present at the time but
the headman's wife. In due time her child was born and by the mercy
of Singh Chando it was a son; and when the boy had grown a bit and
could run alone his mother decided to take back the gold coins, so she
went to the headman and asked him for them; but he and his wife said:
"We do not understand what you are talking about? We know of no gold
coins: where are your witnesses? You must have had witnesses in such
a business." And they drove her out. She went away crying and called
the villagers together and asked them to decide the matter. So they
questioned her and the headman but as it was word against word they
could come to no decision; so they settled to put the parties on
oath, but the headman and the woman both swore that they had spoken
the truth, saying, "May we die if we have spoken falsely." Then
the villagers made them swear by their children and the woman and
the headman laid their hands on the heads of their sons and swore;
and when the woman swore her son fell down dead and she took up the
dead body in her arms and ran away with it.
The villagers were very sorry for what had happened but the headman
and his wife abused them for not having believed their word. The
woman had not gone very far before she met a stranger who asked why
she was crying and when she told him, he said: "Do not cry: you told
one falsehood and so your son has died. Take your child back to the
villagers and tell them that it was five gold coins and not three
that you gave to the headman and if you do this the child will come
to life again."
So the woman hastened back and found the villagers still assembled
and she told them as the stranger had directed; and she agreed to be
sworn again on the body of the child, and the headman promised to pay
five gold pieces if the child were restored to life. So the woman
laid her hands on the dead child and swore, and it was restored to
life. Then the headman was dumbfounded and reluctantly brought out
five gold pieces and gave them to the woman. She gave five
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