Suan's Good Luck

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Title:     Suan's Good Luck
Author: Dean S. Fansler [More Titles by Fansler]

(a) Suan's Good Luck
Narrated by Macaria Garcia. The story is popular among the Pampangans.

There was once an old woman who had an only son named Suan. [2] Suan was a clever, sharp-witted boy. His mother sent him to school. Instead of going to school, however, Suan climbed up the tree that stood by the roadside. As soon as his mother had passed by from the market, Suan hurried home ahead of her. When she reached home, he cried, "Mother, I know what you bought in the market to-day." He then told her, article by article. This same thing happened so repeatedly, that his mother began to believe in his skill as a diviner.

One day the ring of the datu's [3] daughter disappeared. All the people in the locality searched for it, but in vain. The datu called for volunteers to find the lost ring, and he offered his daughter's hand as a prize to the one who should succeed. Suan's mother heard of the proclamation. So she went to the palace and presented Suan to the datu.

"Well, Suan, to-morrow tell me where the ring is," said the datu.

"Yes, my lord, I will tell you, if you will give your soldiers over to me for to-night," Suan replied.

"You shall have everything you need," said the datu.

That evening Suan ordered the soldiers to stand around him in a semicircle. When all were ready, Suan pointed at each one of them, and said, "The ring is here, and nowhere else." It so happened that Suan fixed his eyes on the guilty soldier, who trembled and became pale. "I know who has it," said Suan. Then he ordered them to retire.

Late in the night this soldier came to Suan, and said, "I will get the ring you are in search of, and will give it to you if you will promise me my safety."

"Give it to me, and you shall be safe," said Suan.

Very early the next morning Suan came to the palace with a turkey in his arms. "Where is the ring?" the datu demanded. "Why, sir, it is in this turkey's intestines," Suan replied. The turkey was then killed, and the ring was found inside it.

"You have done very well, Suan. Now you shall have my daughter's hand," said the datu. So Suan became the princess's husband.

One day the datu proposed a bet with any one who wished to prove Suan's skill. Accordingly another datu came. He offered to bet seven cascos [4] of treasure that Suan could not tell the number of seeds that were in his orange. Suan did not know what to do. At midnight he went secretly to the cascos. Here he heard their conversation, and from it he learned the number of seeds in the orange.

In the morning Suan said boastfully, "I tell you, your orange has nine seeds." Thus Suan won the whole treasure.

Hoping to recover his loss, the datu came again. This time he had with him fourteen cascos full of gold. He asked Suan to tell him what was inside his golden ball. Suan did not know what to say. So in the dead of night he went out to the cascos, but he could learn nothing there. The next morning Suan was summoned into the presence of the two datus. He had no idea whatever as to what was in the ball; so he said scornfully, "Nonsense!"

"That is right, that is right!" shouted a man. "The ball contains nine cents." Consequently Suan won the fourteen cascos full of gold. From now on, nobody doubted Suan's merit.

 

(b) Suan Eket.

Narrated by Manuel Reyes, a Tagalog from Rizal province. He heard the story from his grandfather.

Many years ago there lived in the country of Campao a boy named Suan. While this boy was studying in a private school, it was said that he could not pronounce the letter x very well--he called it "eket." So his schoolmates nick-named him "Suan Eket."

Finally Suan left school, because, whenever he went there, the other pupils always shouted at him, "Eket, eket, eket!" He went home, and told his mother to buy him a pencil and a pad of paper. "I am the wisest boy in our town now," said he.

One night Suan stole his father's plough, and hid it in a creek near their house. The next morning his father could not find his plough.

"What are you looking for?" said Suan.

"My plough," answered his father.

"Come here, father! I will guess where it is." Suan took his pencil and a piece of paper. On the paper he wrote figures of various shapes. He then looked up, and said,--

"Ararokes, ararokes,
Na na nakawes
Ay na s'imburnales,"--

which meant that the plough had been stolen by a neighbor and hidden in a creek. Suan's father looked for it in the creek near their house, and found it. In great wonder he said, "My son is truly the wisest boy in the town." News spread that Suan was a good guesser.

One day as Suan was up in a guava-tree, he saw his uncle Pedro ploughing. At noon Pedro went home to eat his dinner, leaving the plough and the carabao [5] in the field. Suan got down from the tree and climbed up on the carabao's back. He guided it to a very secret place in the mountains and hid it there. When Pedro came back, he could not find his carabao. A man who was passing by said, "Pedro, what are you looking for?"

"I am looking for my carabao. Somebody must have stolen it." "Go to Suan, your nephew," said the man. "He can tell you who stole your carabao." So Pedro went to Suan's house, and told him to guess who had taken his carabao.

Suan took his pencil and a piece of paper. On the paper he wrote some round figures. He then looked up, and said,

"Carabaues, carabaues,
Na nanakawes
Ay na sa bundokes,"--

which meant that the carabao was stolen by a neighbor and was hidden in the mountain. For many days Pedro looked for it in the mountain. At last he found it in a very secret place. He then went to Suan's house, and told him that the carabao was truly in the mountain. In great wonder he said, "My nephew is surely a good guesser."

One Sunday a proclamation of the king was read. It was as follows: "The princess's ring is lost. Whoever can tell who stole it shall have my daughter for his wife; but he who tries and fails, loses his head."

When Suan's mother heard it, she immediately went to the palace, and said, "King, my son can tell you who stole your daughter's ring."

"Very well," said the king, "I will send my carriage for your son to ride to the palace in."

In great joy the woman went home. She was only ascending the ladder [6] when she shouted, "Suan Suan, my fortunate son!"

"What is it, mother?" said Suan.

"I told the king that you could tell him who stole the princess's ring."

"Foolish mother, do you want me to die?" said Suan, trembling.

Suan had scarcely spoken these words when the king's carriage came. The coachman was a courtier. This man was really the one who had stolen the princess's ring. When Suan was in the carriage, he exclaimed in great sorrow, "Death is at hand!" Then he blasphemed, and said aloud to himself, "You will lose your life now."

The coachman thought that Suan was addressing him. He said to himself, "I once heard that this man is a good guesser. He must know that it was I who stole the ring, because he said that my death is at hand." So he knelt before Suan, and said, "Pity me! Don't tell the king that it was I who stole the ring!"

Suan was surprised at what the coachman said. After thinking for a moment, he asked, "Where is the ring?"

"Here it is."

"All right! Listen, and I will tell you what you must do in order that you may not be punished by the king. You must catch one of the king's geese to-night, and make it swallow the ring."

The coachman did what Suan had told him to do. He caught a goose and opened its mouth. He then dropped the ring into it, and pressed the bird's throat until it swallowed the ring.

The next morning the king called Suan, and said, "Tell me now who stole my daughter's ring."

"May I have a candle? I cannot guess right if I have no candle," said Suan.

The king gave him one. He lighted it and put it on a round table. He then looked up and down. He went around the table several times, uttering Latin words. Lastly he said in a loud voice, "Mi domine!"

"Where is the ring?" said the king.

Suan replied,--

"Singsing na nawala
Ninakao ang akala
Ay nas' 'big ng gansa,"--

which meant that the ring was not stolen, but had been swallowed by a goose. The king ordered all the geese to be killed. In the crop of one of them they found the ring. In great joy the king patted Suan on the back, and said, "You are truly the wisest boy in the world."

The next day there was a great entertainment, and Suan and the princess were married.

In a country on the other side of the sea was living a rich man named Mayabong. This man heard that the King of Campao had a son-in-law who was a good guesser. So he filled one of his cascos with gold and silver, and sailed to Campao. He went to the palace, and said, "King, is it true that your son-in-law is a good guesser?"

"Yes," said the king.

"Should you like to have a contest with me? If your son-in-law can tell how many seeds these melons I have brought here contain, I will give you that casco filled with gold and silver on the sea; but if he fails, you are to give me the same amount of money as I have brought."

The king agreed. Mayabong told him that they would meet at the public square the next day.

When Mayabong had gone away, the king called Suan, and said, "Mayabong has challenged me to a contest. You are to guess how many seeds the melons he has contain. Can you do it?" Suan was ashamed to refuse; so, even though he knew that he could not tell how many seeds a melon contained, he answered, "Yes."

When night came, Suan could not sleep. He was wondering what to do. At last he decided to drown himself in the sea. So he went to the shore and got into a tub. "I must drown myself far out, so that no one may find my body. If they see it, they will say that I was not truly a good guesser," he said to himself. He rowed and rowed until he was very tired. It so happened that he reached the place where Mayabong's casco was anchored. There he heard somebody talking. "How many seeds has the green melon?" said one. "Five," answered another. "How many seeds has the yellow one?"--"Six."

When Suan heard how many seeds each melon contained, he immediately rowed back to shore and went home.

The next morning Suan met Mayabong at the public square, as agreed. Mayabong held up a green melon, and said, "How many seeds does this melon contain?"

"Five seeds," answered Suan, after uttering some Latin words.

The melon was cut, and was found to contain five seeds. The king shouted, "We are right!"

Mayabong then held up another melon, and said, "How many does this one contain?"

Seeing that it was the yellow melon, Suan said, "It contains six."

When the melon was cut, it was found that Suan was right again. So he won the contest.

Now, Mayabong wanted to win his money back again. So he took a bottle and filled it with dung, and covered it tightly. He challenged the king again to a contest. But when Suan refused this time, because he had no idea as to what was in the bottle, the king said, "I let you marry my daughter, because I thought that you were a good guesser. Now you must prove that you are. If you refuse, you will lose your life."

When Mayabong asked what the bottle contained, Suan, filled with rage, picked it up and hurled it down on the floor, saying, "I consider that you are all waste to me." [7] When the bottle was broken, it was found to contain waste, or dung. In great joy the king crowned Suan to succeed him. Thus Suan lived happily the rest of his life with his wife the princess.

 

Notes.

Two other printed variants are--

(c) "Juan the Guesser" (in H. E. Fansler's Types of Prose Narratives [Chicago, 1911], pp. 73-77).

(d) "Juan Pusong" (JAFL 19 : 107-108).

This story seems to be fairly widespread among the Filipinos: there is no doubt of its popularity. The distinguishing incidents of the type are as follows:--

A1 Lazy son decides that he will go to school no longer, and (A2) with his ABC book or a pencil and pad of paper, he has no trouble in making his parents think him wise. (A3) He tells his mother that he has learned to be a prophet and can discover hidden things. (A4) He spies on his mother, and then "guesses" what she has prepared for supper.

B He hides his father's plough (cattle), and then finds it for him. (B1) Plays similar trick on his uncle, thereby establishing his reputation as a diviner.

C King's daughter loses ring, and the king sends for Juan to find it under penalty of death if he fails, or (C1) his mother volunteers her son's services. (C2) He accidentally discovers the thief by an ejaculation of sorrow, or (C3) shrewdly picks out the guilty one from among the soldiers.

In either case he causes the ring to be hid in a secret place or swallowed by a goose (turkey), in whose body it is found the next day.

D Juan marries the princess.

E By overhearing a conversation, Juan is able to tell the number of seeds in an orange (melon), and to win a large sum of money from a neighboring king who has come to bet with hero's father-in-law.

F Hero required to accept another bet, as to the contents of three jars. (Method as in E,--swimming out to neighboring king's casco and overhearing conversation.)

G Ejaculation guess as to contents of golden ball (bottle).

H Afraid of being called on for further demonstration of his skill, hero burns his "magic" book.

These incidents are distributed among the four forms of the story as follows:--

 
    Version a       A1A4C1C3DEG
    Version b       A1A2BB1C1C2DEG
    Version c       A1A2BCC2DE(accidentally hears answer)FH
    Version d       A1A3A4EB

A concluding adventure is sometimes added to version c, "Juan the Guesser." King and queen of another country visit palace of Juan's father-in-law and want their newly-born child baptized. Juan is selected to be godfather. When called upon to sign the baptism certificate, he instantly dies of shame, pen in hand: he cannot write even his own name.

A connection between our story and Europe at once suggests itself. "Dr. Knowall" (Grimm, No. 98) is perhaps the best-known, though by no means the fullest, Western version. Bolte and Polívka (2 [1915] : 402) give the skeleton of the cycle as follows:--

A1 A peasant with the name of Crab (Cricket, Rat), who buys a physician's costume and calls himself Dr. Knowall, or (A2) who would like to satiate himself once with three days' eating, (B) discovers the thieves who have stolen from a distinguished gentleman a ring (treasure), by calling out upon the entrance of the servants (or at the end of the three days), "That is the first (second, third)!" (C) He also guesses what is in the covered dish (or closed hand) while commiserating himself, "Poor Crab (Cricket, Rat)!" (D1) Through a purgative he by chance helps to find a stolen horse, or (D2) he discovers the horse that has previously been concealed by him. (E) He gets a living among the peasants, upon whom he has made an impression with a short or unintelligible sermon or through the crashing-down of the pulpit, which has previously been sawed through by him.

Bolte lists over a hundred and fifty stories containing one or more incidents of this cycle. The discovery of the ring inside a domestic fowl (sometimes animal) is found in most of the European versions, as is likewise the "ejaculation guess" (our C3 and G).

These two details, however, are also found in Oriental forms of the story, which, as a whole, have some peculiarly distinctive traits. These (see Bolte-Polívka, 2 : 407) are (1) the rôle of the wife, (2) the collapsing of the room, (3) the burning of the magic book. The appearance in the Philippine versions of two of these motifs (one in modified form), together with a third (the betting-contest between the two kings, which is undoubtedly Eastern in origin), leads us to believe that our story of "Juan the Guesser" is in large measure descended directly from Oriental tradition, though it may owe something to Occidental influence.

In two of our variants it is the mother who in her fond pride places her son in jeopardy of losing his head. As the hero is a young bachelor when the story opens, the exploitation of his prowess would naturally devolve upon his mother. The burning of the magic book is found in version c, though the incident of the collapsing of the room or house is lacking in all our variants. The most characteristic episode, however, in the Philippine members of this cycle, is the betting-contest between the two kings. It is introduced five times into the four tales. Its only other occurrence that I know of in this cycle is in an Arabian story cited by Cosquin (2 : 192), which follows.

One day, when the king was boasting of his conjurer before some other kings, they said to him, "We too have some diviners. Let us compare their wits with the wisdom of your man." The kings then buried three pots,--one filled with milk, another with honey, and the third with pitch. The conjurers of the other kings could not say what was in the pots. Then Asfour (the hero) was called. He turned to his wife, and said, "All this (trouble) comes of you. We could have left the country. The first (time) it was milk; the second, honey; the third, pitch." The kings were dumfounded. "He has named the milk, the honey, and the pitch without hesitation," they said, and they gave him a pension.

The close resemblance between this detail and the corresponding one (F) in "Juan the Guesser" is immediately evident. The fact that the difficulty in Juan's career is overcome, not by an "ejaculation guess," but by a providential accident (much the same thing, however), does not decrease the significance of the two passages.

That the betting-contest between the two kings is an Oriental conception (very likely based on actual early custom) is further borne out by its appearance in a remarkable group of Eastern stories of the "Clever Lass" type (see Child, English and Scottish Ballads, 1 : 11). "The gist of these narratives," writes Professor Child, "is that one king propounds tasks to another; in the earlier ones, with the intent to discover whether his brother-monarch enjoys the aid of such counsellors as will make an attack on him dangerous; in the later, with the demand that he shall acquit himself satisfactorily, or suffer a forfeit: and the king is delivered from a serious strait by the sagacity either of a minister . . . or of the daughter of his minister, who came to her father's assistance .... These tasks are always such as require ingenuity of one kind or another, whether in devising practical experiments, in contriving subterfuges, in solving riddles, or even in constructing compliments."

One other Oriental variant of this story may be cited because of its similarity to two of our tales (cf. our episodes C and C2). This is an Anamese version, printed in the "Chrestomathie cochin-chinoise" (Paris, 1872), 1 : 30:--

There was once a man who, being qualified for nothing, and not knowing how to earn a living, made up his mind one day to become a diviner. As luck had many times served him, the public came to believe in his oracles.... He amassed a good round sum, and day by day his success made him more bold and boastful. Once a golden tortoise disappeared from the palace of the king. As all searches for it resulted in nothing, some one mentioned the diviner to the king, and begged permission to summon him. The king ordered his litter prepared, the escort and the umbrellas of honor, and sent to have the conjurer fetched. When the conjurer learned what was the matter, he was very much disturbed, but he could not resist the commands of the king. Accordingly he dressed himself, entered the litter, and set out. Along the road the poor diviner continually bemoaned his fate. Finally he cried out, "What is the use of groaning? The stomach (bung) has caused it all; the belly (da) will suffer for it" (an Anamese proverb). Now, it happened that the two litter-bearers were named Bung and Da, and it was they who had stolen the king's gold tortoise. When they heard the exclamation of the diviner, they believed that they had been discovered. They begged him to have pity on them; they confessed that they had stolen the tortoise and had hidden it in the gutter. "Very well," said the diviner, "I will spare you; I will say nothing; reassure yourselves." When he reached the palace, he went through some magical performances, found the tortoise, and was overwhelmed by the king with rewards and honors.--COSQUIN, 2 : 192.

It is entirely possible that this story and our two stories containing the same situation are connected. Trading between Manila and Indo-China has been going on for centuries.

The history of the Philippine story has probably been something like this: To an early narrative about a wager between two neighboring kings or datus, in which the winner was aided by the shrewdness of an advisor (originally having a considerable amount of real ability), were added other adventures showing how the advisor came to have his post of honor. The germ of this story doubtless came from India via the Malay migrations; the additional details possibly belong to a much later period.

It is, moreover, not impossible that this whole cycle of the lucky "anti-hero" grew up as a conscious antithesis to the earlier cycle of the genuinely "Clever Lass" (see No. 7 in this collection).

In conclusion I might call attention to Benfey's treatment of this droll in "Orient und Occident" (1 : 371 et seq.). Benfey traces the story from the Orient, but considers that its fullest form is that given in Schleicher's Lithuanian legends. The tale is also found in "Somadeva," Chapter XXX (Tawney, 1 : 272-274).

 

FOOTNOTES

[1] I am greatly indebted to Professor E. Arsenio Manuel, Department of Anthropology, University of the Philippines, for biographical and other data with regard to Dean S. Fansler. Mr. E. D. Hester kindly furnished additional details.

[2] A common nickname for "Juan," equivalent to the English "Jack."

[3] Datu, old native name for "village chieftain."

[4] Casco, a commodious wooden cargo-boat commonly used in rivers and propelled by poling.

[5] Carabao, a gray water-buffalo used throughout the Archipelago as a draught-animal.

[6] The usual means of getting into a native grass house is a bamboo ladder.

[7] This is a common Tagalog expression, and means, "I consider that you are all inferior to me in every respect."

[The end]
Dean S. Fansler's short story: Suan's Good Luck

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