Excerpt from Deccan Nursery Tales or Fairy Tales From the South These stories first appeared in the Times of India newspaper, and my acknowledgments are due to the editor for his courtesy in per mitting their publication. I have translated all of them as literally as possible from the original Marathi. But, owing to the difference between Marathi and English canons of taste, I have had in a very few places slightly to Change the sense. In some places, owing -to the obscurity of the original text, I have had to amplify the trans lation. In other places I have had to cut short the descriptions of Hindu rites and ceremonies so as to avoid wearying the English reader. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.