Prince Siddhartha was very kind to people, animals and other living things. As a very brave horseman he won many prizes in the country. Although he did not have to suffer any hardships and difficulties as he had everything, he always thought of the poor people and living things who were working hard to make him happy. He felt sorry for them and wanted to make them happy too as he always was.
One day he was walking in the woods with his cousin Devadatta who had his bow and arrows with him. Suddenly Devadatta saw a swan flying and shot at it. His arrow brought the swan down. Both the boys ran to get the swan. As Siddhartha could run faster than Devadatta, he reached the bird first and found, to his surprise, that the swan was still alive. So he gently pulled out the arrow from the wing. He then got a little juice from cool leaves, put it on the wound of the bird to stop the bleeding and with his soft hand, stroked the swan which was very frightened. When Devadatta came to claim the swan, naturally Prince Siddhartha refused to give it to him. Devadatta was very angry to see his cousin keeping the swan away from him.
“Give me my bird, I shot it down.”
Said Devadatta.
“No, I am not going to give it to you. If you had killed it, it would have been yours. But now since it is only wounded and alive it belongs to me because I saved its life.”
Said Siddhartha.
Devadatta still did not agree. Then Siddhartha suggested,
“Let us go to the court of wisemen and ask them who really owns the swan.”
Devadatta agreed and then both of them went to the court of wisemen to tell them about their quarrel. The wisemen said,
“A life certainly must belong to him who tries to save it, a life cannot belong to one who is only trying to destroy it. The wounded swan by right belongs to Siddharta.”
