The Brahmarâkshas and the Hair

“My dear friend,” said he, “my wife says she has a little job to give you; do it please now. I think that that is the last thing I can give you to do, and after it in obedience to the conditions under which you took service with me, I must become your prey!”

At this moment his wife came to them, holding in her left hand a long hair, which she had just pulled out from her head, and said:—

“Well, Brahmarâkshas, I have only a very light job for you. Take this hair, and when you have made it straight, bring it back to me.”

The Brahmarâkshas calmly took it, and sat in a pîpal tree to make it straight. He rolled it several times on his thigh and lifted it up to see if it became straight; but no, it would still bend! Just then it occurred to him that goldsmiths, when they want to make their metal wires straight, have them heated in fire; so he went to a fire and placed the hair over it, and of course it frizzled up with a nasty smell! He was horrified!

“What will my master’s wife say if I do not produce the hair she gave me?”

So he became mightily afraid, and ran away.

This story is told to explain the modern custom of nailing a handful of hair to a tree in which devils are supposed to dwell, to drive them away.