The Old Tiger and the Traveller: A Hitopadesha Story with Moral
Quick answer: The Old Tiger and the Traveller retold in full: a tiger with a gold bracelet preaches charity across a swamp until a greedy man wades in. The Hitopadesha moral about greed.
An old tiger stands at the edge of a pond with a gold bracelet in his paw, calling to passers-by that he wants to give it away. The Old Tiger and the Traveller comes from the first book of the Hitopadesha, Mitralabha, the Gaining of Friends.
The story
A tiger grew too old to hunt. His teeth were worn, his legs were stiff, and the deer walked past him at a distance and did not hurry. So he changed his method. He found a golden bracelet on the body of a traveller long dead, went to a pond beside the high road, bathed as the pious bathe, plucked a blade of sacred grass to hold in his paw, and stood in the shallows calling out, 'Travellers, travellers, here is a bracelet of gold. Who will take it as a gift?'
A man walking to the next town heard him and stopped at a careful distance. 'Why would a tiger give away gold?' The tiger lowered his head. 'Brother, I was a killer in my youth, and I have lost my wife and my sons for it, and a holy man taught me to spend my old age in charity. Look at me. My claws are gone, my teeth are gone. I have bathed, I hold the sacred grass, I have read the books of law. Why should you fear me? Come, wash yourself in this pond and take the bracelet with my blessing.'
The man looked at the bracelet, and the sun caught it, and he stopped looking at the tiger. He stepped into the pond, and the pond was not a pond but a swamp under a skin of water, and he sank to his knees, then to his waist. 'I am stuck.' 'Do not fear,' said the tiger. 'I am coming to help you.' He came. Crossing the mud that held a man was nothing to a tiger.
The traveller had time for one thought before the end, and the Hitopadesha records it: that he had known what a tiger was, and had let a piece of gold persuade him otherwise. The tiger ate, washed, took the bracelet back to the shallows, and began again to call.
The moral, and what it actually means
The verse says that greed makes a man forget what he knows, and that nobody who trusts a tiger because of its rosary deserves to be surprised. The story is careful to show that the traveller is not a fool. He asks the right question first. What defeats him is that the answer is good, full of pious detail, and the gold does the rest. Greed here is the wish to believe a story you would otherwise see through.
Where the tale sits and why it has lasted
It belongs to Mitralabha, the first book of the Hitopadesha, told by a wary bird to warn a friend against a stranger's offer. The Hitopadesha, compiled in Bengal from the Panchatantra and other sources, is younger than its parent and sharper in its verses. The tale has lasted because the trap is built entirely of virtue: grass, bathing, scripture, remorse. The signs of holiness are true, and the tiger is still a tiger.
For young readers and classrooms
From about eight upward.
Write your own
The engine is the bait that looks like goodness. Give a predator every outward mark of reform and let each mark be genuine on its face, then place a reward where reaching it means stepping onto untested ground. The victim must be intelligent; the story is only frightening if a careful person falls.
What writers can take from this
- For readers: the tiger returns to the shallows at the end and calls again; the loop is the real horror.
- For teachers: children can list the tiger's proofs of holiness and grade each one for what it actually proves.
- For teachers: compare with The Cat's Judgement from the Panchatantra, another predator dressed as a saint.
- For writers: give your villain a true confession. The tiger's story of loss is probably real, and that is what makes it work.
- For writers: the swamp under the water is the structural key; the danger is hidden in the path, not the person.
Try it yourself
Write a story in which a dangerous figure offers a real reward for nothing, backs the offer with confessions that are all true, and the person who accepts is careful and clever and falls anyway. End with the offer being made again to someone new.
Questions
What is the moral of The Old Tiger and the Traveller?
Greed makes people forget what they know. The traveller understands that tigers kill, but a gold bracelet and a pious speech persuade him to step into the swamp.
Which Hitopadesha book is The Old Tiger and the Traveller from?
The first book, Mitralabha, the Gaining of Friends, where it is told as a warning against accepting a stranger's generous offer.
Is The Old Tiger and the Traveller suitable for children?
Yes, from about eight. The death is not described, and the tale makes a strong lesson about offers that seem too good.
By the Writory editorial team, reviewed by working writers. Updated September 2026.
Enter a Writory story contest
Enter the Writory Short Story Contest and have your own story read and scored out of 100. Entries close 25 November. That first entry makes you a Writorian.