Folktales Of Karnataka - #2

The Goat and The Bee 

Once upon a time, a herd of goats was traveling through a thick forest. Suddenly, they heard the sound of a roaring tiger. The herd ran in panic. Between all this chaos, a goat with her two little lambs got left behind. She wandered the forest, looking for a shelter. After wandering with fear hither and thither she suddenly saw a dark cave. She entered into it and made the cave her house.

 

Her lamb’s names were Chey and Mey. For their safety, she put a strong sliding door in front of the cave to keep out any predators. She told them a code--

Chey, Mey, Chey, Mey 

Slide the door

Mom is here

So don’t you fear

And warned that until they heard this code from her, they shouldn’t slide the door. 

In that area there lived a Tiger. He came to know about the two lambs in the cave. He lived in their ambush. Many times, when goat was out for her lambs’ food, he tried to enter the cave but the lambs did not open the door to him because he didn’t know the code.

 

One day the goat left the cave as usual. She went to a waterfall and saw a bee struggling to swim and come out of the water, but failing. The goat wanted to help the bee. She took a stick and put it down on the surface of the water, next to the bee. The bee climbed on to the stick. The goat then pulled the stick out of the water. The bee thanked her for saving her life. They talked and soon became good friends. The bee told the goat that if she ever needed her help, she could just call out ‘Bee’, and she would come.

 

One day as the goat came back to her cave, both lambs told her about the tiger. They told her that he had asked them to open the door and they hadn’t. The goat was worried and thought that she might have to leave this cave and move to another place far away.

 

Immediately, she called her friend, the bee. The bee came. She told the bee about this problem. The bee told her not to worry and that she would take care of the children’s safety. Whenever she saw the tiger close to the goat’s cave, she looked to see if he would attack.

 

Once, when the tiger was wandering about the cave, the bee saw him. He was in the mood for attacking. The bee then called her entire hive. On her call, all the bees stung the tiger until he ran away far from the cave. 

 

When the goat was back, bee told her about this. The goat thanked the bee and her companions. After that she, with her lambs--Chey and Mey-- continued living in the same cave happily.