CHILDREN’S CORNER

Once in Baghdad, there lived a miser called Hassan. His wife Zahra was equally miser. Although, Hassan worked in the court of the caliph Harun Rashid and received a fat salary, he pretended as if he was extremely poor. They lived in a miserable hut, and wore shabby clothes. They purc-hased meagre amount of food, just enough to keep them alive. One day, Hassan told his wife, they were spending too much on food. He asked her to go to the merchants and tell them that the caliph has put her husband in prison. They will feel sorry and will give her free food.  His wife thought it was an excellent idea. The merchants of the bazaars felt sorry for her and gave her free food. But soon they were tired and asked her to approach their relatives. She did accordingly. Her rich relatives helped her out of a sense of pity. But, they too got tired and told her to work as a maid to earn her living. One day Hassan returned in the dead of night with a precious ruby. He told his wife that he had stolen from the caliph’s treasury. The caliph has so many, he would never miss this one. This continued for some time, until the theft was discovered.  The Chief of Police summoned the diamond merchants and told them to report to them all persons who wanted to sell diamond and gold. Hassan and Zahra were arr-ested in no time. They were able to recover all the caliph’s missing jewels and sacks of gold.  The two were dra-gged before the caliph.

The caliph heard their side of the story. The miser couple told him they had done all this to save for their old age.  The caliph pronounced his verdict. He said: For misleading the vendors in the bazaar, both be heavily fined and imprisoned; for telling falsehoods to relatives, they should be beaten soundly; for stealing from the caliph’s palace, they should be sentenced to death. The sentence seized their hearts. They fell down on their knees and begged that they be forgiven. The caliph said: I spare you this punishment on one condition: You should return home with the illgotten wealth tied to your necks. When they found that the caliph had spared their lives and gold, both of them could hardly believe their ears. But they trembled when the caliph uttered his next decree. The first person who barters a crumb of bread to these misers for all their gold shall be hanged on the city walls!  Hassan and Zahra returned home accompanied by a heavy palace guard and their duty was to see that the orders of the caliph were obeyed at all costs.

The misers did not step out of their hut for a few days, living on the food they had in their house. As the food ran out, they stepped out of their hut to buy food with their gold. But the merchants would shy away from the couple who had become the talk of the entire city.  They drank from public fountains to keep themselves alive. Finally, good sense returned to them and they begged for an audience with the caliph. The caliph accepted their appeal and they were brought before him in the judgment hall.  ‘Take all the gold from us’, cried Hassan, we do not wish to see it once again. But, I beg from your mercy to give me work, food, clothes, warmth and liberty so that I can lead my life as an honest man. The caliph was glad that they had now witnessed for themselves the error of their ways. He commanded his guard to go and meet every person from where the couple had taken charity on some pretext or the other, and pay them back in gold. Turning to Hassan and Zahra he said: It is good for you that you have learned that hoarded gold is one of the chains of death. Then he added: Give them food, clothes, and work so that they may begin a new life together.

The ‘loggerhead turtles’ are open sea reptiles, which are spread all across the Atlantic Ocean. They are carnivorous and have no commercial value. Two or three stray specimens were captured by scientists on the coastline of Britain. The adults hatch their young ones on the shore and bury their eggs deep and cover it lightly with sand and are left to fend for themselves. In the month of August, the young turtles, which are now fully formed break open their shells and try to escape into the nearby sea. However, it is by no means an easy task. They are attacked by predators, which make a delicious meal of them. However, several of them reach the sea and there lurks no danger to them in the sea. When they grow into massive adults, it is the turn of the other sea animals to safeguard them from these turtles.

A distinguished American naturalist, Professor H.G Parker of Harvard University started taking interest in the habits of these turtles from the time they were born. He noticed that they are drawn to the sea by a natural impulse. Any effort to put them in any di-rection other than the sea’s, fails to stop them from turning to the sea ag-ain. He st-ates: To the observer they app-ear to be dr-awn toward the sea by an influence as spiritual, as it is impelling. This is the problem that the biologists love to analyze but the answers always elude them.

After capturing the specimens, Professor Harker, placed them carefully in open cages and traveled in his jeep some miles along the coastline, and took out one of the turtles after he had made sure it had lost all its moorings, and set it on the ground facing north, but it turned around and went west – literally – towards the sea. He took another turtle and pointed its head south, but it turned around west in the direction of the sea. The experiment went on and each time their route was towards the sea.

This inherent stimulus to head for the sea is indeed a divine gift and nothing else could explain the call of the sea. It is for us to unravel the mystery of this inborn trait of the baby turtles and find out why they behave like this.