Page:Ancient India as described by Megasthenês and Arrian.djvu/180

161 gia in the fact that the bird wags its tail in the same way as the water-ousels {oi KtyKkoi)* (4) I learn further that in India there is a bird called the Kelas, which is thrice the size of the bustard, and has a bill of prodigious size and long legs. It is furnished also with an immense crop resembling a leather pouch. The cry which it utters is peculiarly discordant. The plumage is ash- coloured, except that the feathers at their tips are tinted with a pale yellow. (5) I hear also that the Indian hoopoe ("(woTra) is double the size of ours, and more beautiful in appearance, and Homer says that while the bridle and trappings of a horse are the delight of a Hel- lenic king, this hoopoe is the fayourite plaything of the king of the Indians, who carries it on his hand, and toys with it, and never tires gazing in ecstasy on its splendour, and the beauty with which Nature has adorned it. The Brachmanes, there- fore, even make this particular bird the subject of a mythic story, and the tale told of it runs thus : — To the king of the Indians there was born a son. The child had elder brothers, who when they came to man's estate turned out to be very un- just and the greatest of reprobates. They despised their brother because he was the youngest ; and they scoffed also at their father and their mother, whom they despised because they were very old and grey-haired. The boy, accordingly, and his aged parents could at last no longer live with these wicked men, and away they fled from home, all Digitized by Google