The following story is sometimes told to children to warn them against foolish pride and to inculcate obedience to fathers. [Illustration: THREE KINDS OF HOUSES—MUD, DRY-STONE, STONE-AND-MORTAR] A young tiger who had heard about the ability of men, though he had never seen one, felt so eager in his strength to have a combat that he expressed to his father a wish to go out and find a man and have a fight with him. The father tiger advised against such an undertaking, saying, “Even I who am older and stronger than you should not think of seeking a fight with a man, for I could not prevail against him.” But the proud young tiger, not heeding his father’s advice, went to seek a man. He journeyed until he came to a road much frequented by travelers and lay down under a tree to await a foe. While waiting there he noticed a camel running down the road, although loaded heavily. The camel was running away from his master. The young, inexperienced tiger got up and said to the camel, “Are you a man?” The camel answered hastily, “I am not a man, but I am running away from a man, because he loads such heavy burdens on me.” The young tiger thought to himself, “How strong must the man be if he causes so much distress and fear in this great creature.” Next a horse passed, and the tiger thought, “Maybe this is the man,” but received a negative reply to his question as he had from the camel. Then there came along a weak little donkey, loaded with wood and driven by a man. The tiger asked his question of the man, “Are you a man?” “Yes,” the man answered. Then the young tiger said, “I have come to have a fight with you.” “All right,” replied the man, “but I am not quite ready now. May I tie you with my rope to the tree until I can come back?” The tiger allowed the man to tie him, which the man did very securely, and then cut a strong, thick club from the tree, with which he beat the young tiger cruelly. The tiger cried out in pain, “Oh, please let me go; I’ll never try to fight with a man again.” Then the man let him go and the young tiger went to his father and told his experience. A bit of current fiction regarding Asiatics is that the children are chronically unhappy. Moslem children are the especial victims of this Christian species of prevarication. To such people “children playing in the streets of Jerusalem” belong to the good time coming and are the sign of fulfilled prophecy,[77] despite the probable fact that children have been playing in Jerusalem’s streets for some thousands of years, whether tourists have seen them or not. Doubtless, as the tourist appears in any street, playing ceases and small children flee or stand in mute amazement. The child will probably be happy again when the apparition vanishes. Along the tourists’ route the children are too often taught to cry out for gifts (_bakshîsh_) and to show themselves at a disadvantage in order to excite pity. Moslem children sometimes curse or even attempt to stone travelers. ----- -----