"Then," said the woman, "since you have
come from the other world, you must have seen my daughter Kaluhami
there, who died but a few days ago. Pray tell me how she is." The
beggar, seeing how simple she was, replied, "She is my wife, and lives
with me at present, and she has sent me to you for her dowry." The woman
at once gave him all the money and jewels that were in the house, and
sent him away delighted with his unexpected good luck. Soon after, the
woman's husband returned, and learning how silly she had been, mounted
his horse and rode after the beggar. The rest of the story corresponds
to the Tamil version, as above, with the exception that when the husband
saw the beggar slide down the tree, get on his horse, and ride off, he
cried out to him, "Hey, son-in-law, you may tell Kaluhami that the money
and jewels are from her mother, and that the horse is from me;" which is
altogether inconsistent, since he is represented as the reverse of a
simpleton in pursuing the beggar, on hearing what his wife had done. It
is curious, also, to observe that in the Tamil version the man goes to
the house with the deliberate purpose of deceiving the simple woman,
while in the Sinhalese the beggar is evidently tempted by her mistaking
the meaning of his words. But both present very close points of
resemblance to the Norwegian story of the pretended pilgrim from
paradise.
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