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The Two Chinamen
by
After a little time the king came to a tree that was taller than any other in the jungle, and upon it was a palace. Stairs led from the door of the palace to the ground, and as he looked more closely he saw a man up there. In great joy he called out to him, asking to be directed. “I am the king of a far country,” he said, “and I am on a journey to search for my brother, whom I have not seen for many, many years. Last night I lost my way. Will you take pity on me and show me the way and I will give you a great reward?”
“Who was your brother?” asked the man in the tree.
“He was a Chinese student,” returned the king, “and he had a wonderful magic sword. One day as we were traveling he cut a great fish in two, but such was the virtue residing in the magic sword that he not only cut the fish in halves but the bridge as well, so I left him standing on the end of the bridge.”
You may imagine how pleased the king was when he discovered that the man standing at the top of the tree was the long-lost brother for whom he was searching, and he made ready to ascend to his house in the treetop.
At that moment a little monkey ran down the tree toward him, and he kicked it aside, saying, “Out of my way, little monkey.”
The small monkey in great anger said: “I am not a monkey, but your nephew.”
“My nephew!” exclaimed the king in great astonishment. “What do you mean by that?”
His brother, the monkey king, then explained to him that he had married the queen of all the monkeys and that this was their child, that he ruled over all the monkeys, who had built this palace for him and every seventh day brought him tribute of food.
“I am sorry to say, then,” said the elder brother, “that I have killed one of your subjects,” and at the same moment the wife and son of the dead monkey approached their king.
“Our lord,” said they, “the man yonder has been guilty of a great crime. He entered the domains of our lord and although we did nothing to him, yet he raised his bow and killed one of the servants of our lord. Therefore our lord’s servants demand that he shall be killed too.”
“I am very sorry,” said the king of the monkeys, “that you have killed that special monkey. He was very clever and brave. He was also one of my chief amats, and his friends will assuredly kill you.”
The monkeys were now assembling by hundreds and calling to each other everywhere. Every treetop appeared alive with angry figures all calling for vengeance on the man who had killed their friend.
The king, however, who had taken sides with his brother, was not afraid, and said he could kill all the monkeys in the country; and he drew his sword and cut in halves the monkey nearest to him. To his great surprise, however, the two halves of the monkey he had killed each became a whole monkey and attacked him again, so that he now had two to fight instead of one. If he cut off the hand or leg of a monkey with his long sword, it immediately turned into two, and he soon saw that unless he devised some other way of fighting them they would soon kill them both.
He therefore rushed off to the jungle and got a great hollow bamboo. He then went to a bees’ nest and swept all the bees into it, and caught a great many scorpions and centipedes, snakes and spiders. When the monkeys came toward him to renew the fight, he opened one end of the bamboo and the insects and reptiles, swarming out, very angry at being kept prisoners in the hollow bamboo, soon drove the monkeys off so that the two brothers were able to escape. Shortly afterward they found the escort of the king and together returned to the city where the good elder brother made the younger his chief amat.