Reading Notes Week 12 Part A

Monkey Bridge

A Giant monkey ruled eighty thousand monkeys and they all lived together in the Himalaya Mountains. There was a stream through where they lived that fell onto this wonderful tree. The tree would produce the most wonderful fruits. The monkeys were really happy and lived most of their days eating and relaxing. They would eat the fruit which tasted like honey. The Giant monkey advised them that they should destroy all the fruit as it was produced so it would not fall in the stream and lead to the villages of man. For man would come in search of it and would take all the fruit. They obeyed this order for a very long time till one fell through the cracks. The fruit was carried away on an ant’s nose and picked up in the large city of Benares. The fruit was then found by King Brahmadatta as he was bathing. They were amazed by the dazzling fruit and wondered where it had come from. Another that was with him told him that it was a mango and that it grew it the Himalayas. The men tasted it and they all agreed the fruit was divine. And the king himself went in search of this fruit.

Bibliography: Twenty Jataka tales retold by Noor Inayat

Coaita or Spider Monkey by George Shaw