The jumping rat

quot;Oh please forgive me! It8217;s just that dreadful mouse. Every day he eats away whatever food I manage to save.quot;

His friend looked in the direction of the peg and said, quot;But how can a mouse jump so high? There must be a reason for his achieving such a feat.quot; The holy man8217;s friend thought it over for some time and said, quot;There can be only one reason. The mouse must have put aside a lot of food and having so much food, gives him extraordinary energy to jump so high.quot;

They began to look for the hoard of food that the mouse had accumulated. When they found it, they dug it up and took it away.When the mouse returned and found that his hoard of food was missing, he was disheartened. He lost all his enthusiasm so much so that he could not even move about.

And so the holy man was free from the trouble of keeping watch over the food he saved in the begging bowl.

Thus it is wiser to strike at the source of an enemy8217;s strength to destroy him. Translated by G L Chandiramani