A Man Called Mouse, by Clay Lane

The ‘magical mouse’ in Klaipeda, Lithuania, is a modern myth, a sculpture in brass (not gold, understandably). It is said that if one whispers a wish into its ear, the wish will come true. See Klaipeda Tourism and Culture Information Centre. Gunadhya and his merchant friend would not have approved of such promises of easy fortune.

A Man Called Mouse

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‘THOSE two handfuls of gram flour I sold at the roadside with a pitcher of water to a team of woodcutters, in exchange for two logs. The two logs I sold for rather more gram flour, and bought rather more logs. After three days of this there was a tremendous rainstorm which forced the woodcutters to stop work, and in the dearth I made a fine profit from my logs, enough to start a little shop.

‘My shop has done very well, and now I am very wealthy, but I have never forgotten Vishakhila. In fact, I sent him a present: a mouse made of gold. Vishakhila was so pleased with it that he gave me his daughter in marriage. Now everyone knows my story, and they all call me Mouse.’*

based on a story in The Kathasaritsagara 11th century

Based on ‘The Kathá Sarit Ságara or Ocean of the Streams of Story’ (1912), by Somadeva Bhatta, translated by C.H. Tawney.

* But see the Aesop’s fable The Country Milkmaid, in which one young lady finds that an ambitious entrepreneur’s dreams don’t always work out.

Sevens

Suggest answers to this question. See if you can limit one answer to exactly seven words.

What enabled ‘Mouse’ to establish the store that made him a wealthy man?

Suggestion

Selling logs when loggers could not work.

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