The Magic Bed

On a scorching day long ago, a young prince of India spent the whole morning hunting in the jungle. By midday his servants were nowhere to be seen, so he settled in the shade of a tree to rest and to eat the little cakes his mother had packed for him.

He broke the first cake in half and found one ant inside. The second held two ants, the third held three, and so it went on, until in the sixth cake he found six ants along with the Ant-King himself.

“It seems these cakes are more yours than mine,” the prince told the Ant-King. “Keep every one. I am going to have a nap.”

While he slept and dreamed, the Ant-King climbed up to his ear. “We are very grateful for the cakes,” it whispered. “Every crumb is gone. How can we repay you?”

Still asleep, the prince answered, “There is nothing I lack. My money is more than I could ever spend, my jewels are more than I could ever wear, my servants are too many to count, and I am weary of all of it.”

“Princess Lalun would never weary you,” said the Ant-King. “Go and look for her. She is as lovely as the dawn.”

When the prince opened his eyes, not one ant was left, and he was sorry, because the Ant-King’s words about Princess Lalun stayed in his mind. “I must discover what land she lives in,” he decided.

He rode through the jungle until the sun went down, and beside a pool he came upon a tiger roaring loudly.

“What is wrong?” asked the prince. “Are you hungry?”

“Not hungry,” said the tiger, “but a thorn has stuck in my paw, and the pain is terrible.”

The prince sprang down from his horse and examined the paw. He drew the thorn out, pressed some healing leaves over the sore place and bound them on with a strip he tore from his own turban.

He was about to mount again when a tigress burst out of the bushes. “Wonderful!” she cried. “A man for supper!”

“Certainly not,” said the tiger. “This man was good to me. He took the thorn from my paw, and I owe him thanks. Whenever he needs us, we must come to his aid.”

“Eating him would suit us far better,” the tigress muttered, but the tiger gave such a growl that she leapt away into the thick of the jungle.

The prince asked the tiger the shortest road to the country of Princess Lalun. The tiger told him that he would have to cross three ranges of hills and pass through seven jungles.

“However,” the tiger went on, “a fakir, a holy beggar, lives in the very next jungle. He owns a magic bed that flies wherever its rider wishes, a bag that hands out anything you ask for, and a stone bowl that brims with water whenever you tell it to. With those three things you will surely reach the princess.”

Full of joy, the prince went in search of the fakir. He found him seated beneath a tree on the jungle’s edge, with the bed beside him on one side and the bag and the bowl on the other.

The fakir listened to the prince’s request and then sat without moving for a long while. At last he asked, “For what reason do you seek Princess Lalun?”

“So that I may marry her,” the prince said, and he meant it with all his heart.

“Hold my hands and gaze into my eyes,” said the fakir. The prince did so, and the fakir could tell that this young man was honest. So he promised to lend him the bed, the bag and the bowl, and to keep his horse safe until he came back.

“Lie on the bed, then,” said the fakir, “and wish to be in the land of Princess Lalun.”

Holding the bag and the bowl, the prince lay down. “Carry me to Princess Lalun’s country,” he said, and in a flash the bed was flying over the seven jungles and the three ranges of hills. Before a minute had passed, it set him down inside the princess’s kingdom.

Her father, Rajah Afzal, ruled that land. So many princes had come to ask for his daughter that he was sick of refusing them. He had set them tasks that could not be done, but still more suitors arrived, until in the end he decided to keep all foreigners out. He ordered that no one in the kingdom should give a stranger shelter for the night.

So when the prince knocked at an old woman’s cottage and asked to stay, she said the rajah had forbidden it.

“Then may I put my bed in your garden and sleep out there?” he asked. “And may I share your supper?”

The old woman shook her head. “All I have to eat is rice.” But the prince pleaded until she gave in, and he set his bag down on her table.

“Bag, give us supper!” he commanded. The bag sprang open, and out came a splendid meal for two on plates of gold, with golden spoons to eat it with. The old woman sat down with the prince, and they both enjoyed the delicious food.

Afterwards, the old woman picked up a pot to fetch water from the well.

“Don’t trouble yourself,” said the prince. He gave the bowl a tap. “Bowl, water, please!” In an instant it was full, and the old woman used the water to wash the golden dishes.

“Let me stay here a little while,” said the prince, “and the plates and spoons are yours to keep.” He had the bowl fill once more and rinsed his hands. “This bowl gives me as much water as I like,” he explained, “and this bag gives me anything else I want. Both of them belong to a holy fakir, and I don’t think he would like his things being thrown out into the night.”

The old woman was silent for a long time. “It is bad to anger a rajah,” she said at last, “but angering a fakir could be worse still.”

“Have you counted the dishes?” asked the prince. “That is twelve golden plates and twelve golden spoons.”

She nodded and tucked them beneath her bed. “Very well, you can stay,” she said. “Only take care that none of the rajah’s soldiers find you.”

Night had fallen, and the two of them sat in darkness, because the cottage had no lamp.

“Lamps are forbidden by the rajah,” the old woman told him. “Every night his daughter, Princess Lalun, sits up on her palace roof, and her shining lights up the entire kingdom.”

At that moment a lovely silver glow flooded the room. The prince went outside, and there on the palace roof sat the princess. She wore a sari of silver gauze, and her dark hair reached nearly to the ground. Across her brow lay a band of pearls and diamonds, and the light she gave off was as beautiful as sun, moon and stars shining all at once.

“The Ant-King spoke the truth,” the prince murmured. “She makes the dark bright and turns night into day. I could never tire of Princess Lalun.”

At midnight the princess left the roof and went to bed. The prince sat down on his bed, holding his bag. “Bed, take me into the princess’s palace!” he said, and the bed flew him to the room where she lay sleeping. He gave the bag a shake. “Bag, I want a beautiful shawl, stitched with red and blue and gold!” The bag produced it, and he laid it softly over the princess. Then the bed took him back to the cottage.

All the next day the bag fed the prince and the old woman, and when darkness came, the princess appeared on the roof once more. Tonight her sari was white silk sprinkled with butterflies made of diamonds, and she glowed more brightly than ever.

When she went down to her room at midnight, the prince flew to the palace on his bed a second time. “Bag,” he said, “I want the loveliest of rings!” Out came a ring with rubies set in it, and he slid it onto her finger while she slept. When she awoke, he told her his name and his story.

The princess looked at him and saw how noble and handsome he was. She learned that he was a great rajah’s son, and that the splendid shawl had been his gift, and she loved him at once. She promised to tell her parents that he was the husband she wanted. Then the prince flew home to the old woman’s cottage.

The following day Rajah Afzal summoned the prince and said he could marry the princess, since that was her wish. “First, though,” said the rajah, “there is a job for you. Take these eighty pounds of mustard seed and press every drop of oil out of them within a day.”

On his way out of the palace the prince groaned, “It cannot be done!”

The old woman agreed. “Nobody could do it,” she said, “except a whole army of ants.”

At that the prince remembered the Ant-King, and no sooner had the thought come into his head than the Ant-King and his ants came marching in beneath the door.

The prince showed them the sack of seed. “Unless all the oil is out of this by morning,” he said, “Princess Lalun cannot be my wife.”

“Leave it to us,” said the Ant-King. “You go to sleep.”

By morning the ants had pressed the seed completely dry, and the prince carried it cheerfully to the king.

“Excellent,” said Rajah Afzal. “But now there is another task. Once, out in the hills, I trapped two demons, and they are locked in a cage here. I want them dead before they escape and hurt my people. Kill them, and the princess is yours.”

Back at the cottage the prince asked the old woman, “How can I possibly fight two demons?”

“That would take a couple of tigers,” she replied, and the instant the prince thought of his tigers, they walked in through the door.

“Lead us to the king,” said the tiger.

The prince asked the rajah whether his tigers might fight the demons, and the rajah gladly agreed, since he longed to see the demons gone. The whole court gathered to watch, and the tigers killed both demons.

“Now,” said the prince, “give me your daughter.” But Rajah Afzal replied, “Only one more thing. Beat my kettledrum, and you shall marry Princess Lalun.”

“And where is this drum?” asked the prince.

The rajah pointed upwards. “In the sky.”

“How am I to get up there?” the prince sighed. “This task is the worst of all.”

He trudged back to the cottage. “The ants pressed the oil and the tigers killed the demons,” he told the old woman, “but who can climb into the sky to beat a drum?”

“You are not very quick, are you?” said the old woman. “Your bed flew you over seven jungles and three ranges of hills. Surely it can fly you up into the sky as well?”

“Why didn’t I think of that?” exclaimed the prince. He sat on his little bed, and it carried him high into the sky, where he banged the kettledrum with the handle of his hunting knife so hard that the king heard it from the ground.

When the prince came down, the rajah said, “The wedding may be held whenever you choose,” and the prince returned the bed, the bowl and the bag to their owner, the fakir.

Invitations went out to every king and queen of the nearby lands, and after the wedding the prince took Princess Lalun home to his own country.

About this telling

This is the title story of The Magic Bed: A Book of East Indian Fairy-Tales, a collection edited by Hartwell James for the Henry Altemus Company of Philadelphia, with pictures by John R. Neill. The book gives no date for the tale and does not say who collected it.

In the original the prince calls the Ant-King the “Ant-Rajah” at times, since rajah means king. A fakir is described in the book as a “holy beggar”, and a sari, which the book spells “saree”, is the long draped dress worn by many Indian women.

Read the original: Hartwell James, The Magic Bed (Project Gutenberg #37708, The Magic Bed)

Reading guidance: ages 9–12. The story includes threatened predation, two demons killed in a fight, and secret visits to a sleeping princess that invite discussion of permission.

A closer reading

The prince has extraordinary possessions, but he repeatedly needs someone to explain how to use the help available. The old woman identifies the ants and tigers as possible helpers and reminds him that a flying bed can reach a drum in the sky. Her practical reasoning is as important to the ending as the magical objects themselves.

Kindness begins some of the relationships, but it does not explain every action. The prince pressures the old woman by invoking a fakir’s anger, and enters Lalun’s room while she sleeps. Her later choice to marry him matters; it does not make an uninvited visit a respectful model. The final return of the borrowed objects provides a clearer example of care for someone else’s rights.

Try this with the story

Match each task to both the helper who completes it and the person who recognizes the solution. Then list what belongs to the prince and what is borrowed. Explain why returning the bed, bag and bowl is a separate good choice from completing the rajah’s tests.

Think about it

• How did the prince help the ants and the tiger?
• What three magic things did the fakir lend him?
• How did each of the prince’s friends help with the rajah’s tasks?
• Why do you think the rajah kept setting the prince more and more tasks?

You may also like

• The Fish Prince — another tale from The Magic Bed
• Prince Wicked And The Grateful Animals — another Indian tale of grateful animals who help a hero
• The Wise Jackal — another tale from Hartwell James’s collection