Akhoonji was a mean and miserly landowner who not only oppressed his workers but enjoyed watching them suffer.

Mean though he was. Akhoonji was reputed never to break his word. The injustice and cruelty he delighted in was from the diabolical cleverness of his mind.

“Hark now lad, for I will not say it again.” Akhoonji told Shahryar. “Work and eat exactly as instructed. Lest you give up the job there’s no money for you; on the other hand if I sack you from work, a whole year’s pay is yours—and that’s a hundred pieces of silver!

“To work now, ye miserable brat, or be off with you!”

Tired and panting for breath, Shahryar finished gathering hay and feeding the cattle. But Akhoonji had forbidden him to use the oxen to till the land; so poor Shahryar pulled the plough with his own shoulders.

At the end of the day, wincing with blisters and bruises, the new farm hand sat down to eat.

“Beware lad, for you must eat your loaf without breaking the edge; and, what’s more—eat this honey without opening the lid!” So saying, Akhoonji personally offered him large, disc-shaped loaves of bread, and a big pot of honey.

“Eat as much as you like,” guffawed Akhoonji, “for there’s a lot more of it in my larder!”

Poor Shahryar went to sleep without food, for how could he eat bread without breaking the edge or honey without opening the lid?

“What do you think of that, woman!” Akhoonji sniggered at his wife, as both of them waddled to their bedroom.

“Generous Aqa!” she simpered. “Several loaves of bread and a whole pot of honey—all for a miserable wretch . . . why, even our hounds don’t feast half as well; and to think people call you cruel!”

Shahryar worked for another day and yet another; but simply couldn’t go on with an empty stomach. Before long, tired and forlorn, bruised and fatigued, hungry as he’d never been, Shahryar limped back home.

Grieved to hear of his brother’s suffering and outraged by Akhoonji’s cruelty, Hoshyar resolved to meet injustice with ingenuity, and compel Akhoonji to fair-play. The next day he marched to the farm much against Shahryar’s protests and cautioning.

Agreeing to the same terms, Hoshyar set about his tasks with effortless ease—but with a great deal of difference.

Akhoonji and his wife were too complacent by now to watch the doings of yet another gullible farm hand. But when things seemed too quiet for Akhoonji’s liking, the ponderous landowner decided to investigate. Seeing his cattle grazing in the fields and beyond, he rounded on his new servant with much abuse.

“Why, you infernal lout! You’re supposed to gather hay and feed them in the byre. Round them up this instant!”

Calm and yet firm, Hoshyar said—

“Nay, good sire, you only asked to feed the cattle, and that’s but what I’m doing. As for rounding them up, do it all yourself, for that is not my chore.”

And when Akhoonji had himself tethered his cows and oxen, he found his horses gone! No prodding did the horses need as they furrowed that land in endless rows. Hoshyar, to Akhoonji’s dismay, lay on the grass, chewing a strand of hay.

Akhoonji sputtered with rage when Hoshyar explained, “I was not to use the oxen; you didn’t say, ‘don’t use the horses either’…”

At mealtime Akhoonji was fit to be tied. Hoshyar ate with gusto, plucking at the centre of the disc-shaped loaf, leaving the edge in tact! Large rings of loaves began to pile up as Hoshyar asked for more and more.

Piercing a hole in the bottom of the earthen pot he sucked of all the honey. Pots of honey began to gather around Hoshyar, and it seemed he’d eat forever.

Looking back for a signal or perhaps a restraining hand, the landlord’s wife could find none. She went on serving the bold and plucky youth while Akhoonji stood as if petrified. Aghast, drained of all his wits, the man of his word could now have bitten his tongue!

“Go away, lad,” gasped Akhoonji, mopping his brow, “for you’ve all but emptied my larder. Here’s a hundred pieces of silver—it’s a whole year’s pay.

“Keep away from my livestock and horses, and cross not again this threshold; I don’t know what you are, for you’re more than match for me.”

It was still early afternoon when Hoshyar returned home. “Allah be praised!” he shouted.

Giving his brother a friendly cuff and the bag of jingling silver, he fell upon his creaking bed and belched for all his worth.

“It’s all yours, brother of mine, for not an ounce of work did I. Keep it all for justice—what use I have of money?”

“Allah be praised!” exclaimed Shahyar when he had heard his brother’s exploits. “Truly, an ounce of wisdom is better than a ton of effort!”

So ends the tale of loving brothers, living hand in hand. With food aplenty, the house repaired, and clothes and shoes in grand array, it’ll be a long time, by Allah’s will, that they’ll be free from want or worry.

[Taken down from the lips of my wife’s grandma verbatim, and retold by Yusuf Bin Aiyoub Bangalorewala, alias Yusuf Lien, 1998]

[A Real Grandma’s Folktale]

Last update : 29-06-2005 18:09

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