BoomerSooner359: Reading Notes: Free Reading Jataka Tales Part A

Once again during my reading, I was surprised about the outcome. I read about How the Monkey Saved His Troop. The monkeys had lived near a tree that stood next to a river. They had feasted on the tree’s mangoes daily and were living a satisfied life gathering the fruit on the ground while also gathering the fruit that were in the branches. One day, a king and his men stumbled upon the fruit and asked where it came from. After they found out where it came from, the kind and his men decided to camp out and have more mangoes in the morning. The monkeys waited until the soldiers were asleep and then, finding that all the fruit had been taken from the ground, the monkeys gathered what they could from the branches. While gathering fruit from the branches, the king was awakened from the noise. The king ordered his men to grab their bows and arrows and wait until the monkeys come down from the tree. The men were ordered to kill the monkeys as they came down! The monkeys were so frightened that they begged their chief to find a way out of the mess they were in! The chief swung to a branch that was over the river but it did not reach completely to the trees on the other side of the river. He was sure that some of the monkeys would fall and drown in the river! So he grabbed the other branch and used his back as a bridge for the other monkeys to cross. He called them to cross and after all of the monkeys crossed, the king noticed what the chief had done for his monkey troops. The king said it was a noble thing to do and that he would promise that the monkey chief would be taken care of for the rest of his life! I didn’t expect the king to care much for the monkeys but once the king noticed what the monkey chief was willing to do for his monkey troops, it makes sense that he would honor that because he knew what it meant to lead troops through life and death!