The Bodhisatta was once a king who ruled righteously. He had a heron who carried messages for him. Once when she was away, two boys who lived in the palace squeezed the heron’s two children to death. A tiger was kept chained up in the palace, and later when the two boys went to see it, the heron got revenge by grabbing them and throwing them to the tiger, who ate them both. The heron told the king what she had done and said she could no longer live there. The king said he understood she had good reason to kill the boys and asked her to stay. But she said she could not and flew off to the Himalayas.
In the Lifetime of the Buddha
The heron of the past was an earlier birth of a king’s messenger heron in the Buddha’s time. Once when she was away, two boys who lived in the palace squeezed the heron’s two children to death. A tiger was kept chained up in the palace, and later when the two boys went to see it, the heron got revenge by grabbing them and throwing them to the tiger, who ate them both. Feeling satisfied, the heron flew straight off to the Himalayas.
When the Buddha heard some of his disciples discussing the heron’s vengeance, he told them this story so they knew that she had also killed the killers of her young ones in the past.
