From the collection of Panchatantra, comes an amazing story – The Brahmani and the Mongoose. A long time ago, there was a Brahmin named Dev Sharma who lived with his wife. His wife delivered a son and they became extremely elated.

Somewhere near his house, a female mongoose delivered a baby mongoose and died after the birth of her baby. The Brahmin couple felt sad about the demise of the mongoose and adopted the little mongoose. Soon, they started taking care of the baby mongoose like their own son. Even though the Brahmani took care of the mongoose just like her own son, still she felt a bit apprehensive of the animal instincts of the mongoose and made sure to keep a watch on him always.

One day, she had to fetch water from the well. So, she asked her husband to take care of her son.  The Brahmin was a bit careless and went outside his place to beg for alms without informing his wife. As fate would have it, a dangerous snake entered the house and started crawling towards the Brahmin’s son.

Seeing this, the mongoose attacked the snack to protect his brother like little child. He fought with all his strength and killed the snake with his power. Because of the brawl, his entire mouth and claws got all smeared with the snake’s blood.

Upon the Brahmin’s wife return, the mongoose rushed towards her, thinking that she will be proud of his valour. But, the Brahmani got frightened on seeing the mongoose covered in blood and straightway jumped to the conclusion that the mongoose must have killed her son.

With antagonism and anger blocking her head, she threw the heavy pitcher full of water on the mongoose and killed him on the spot.

She ran inside to see her son, and got amazed to see her son safely sleeping on the bed. On a little distance was a snake lying dead, torn into shreds. At that very moment, she realized what had happened. She got distraught knowing that she killed the little mongoose which was just like her son, without thinking about anything.

Full of grief and repentance at her hasty action, she informed her husband about the incident after his return, and they became all wretched and morose.

Moral of The Story: Think before you act and never do anything in haste.