Once upon a time in the city of Rajagaha in the kingdom of Magadha there ruled a certain king of Magadha, in whose days the Bodhisatta came to life as a stag. Growing up, he dwelt in the forest as the leader of a herd of a thousand deer. He had two young ones named Leader and Blackie. When he grew old, he handed his charge over to his two sons, placing five hundred deer under the care of each of them. And so now these two young stags were in charge of the herd.

Towards harvest-time in Magadha, when the crops stand thick in the fields, it is dangerous for the deer in the forests round. Anxious to kill the creatures that devour their crops, the peasants dig pitfalls, fix stakes, set stone-traps, and plant snares and other gins. Many deer get caught in these traps.

Accordingly, when the Bodhisatta marked that it was crop-time, he sent for his two sons and said to them, “My children, it is now the time when crops stand thick in the fields, and many deer meet their death at this season. We who are old will make shift to stay in one spot; but you will retire each with your herd to the mountainous tracts in the forest and come back when the crops have been carried.” “Very good,” said his two sons, and departed with their herds, as their father bade.

Now the men who live along the route, know quite well the times at which deer take to the hills and return. They hide around the way and kill many deer. The dullard Blackie, ignorant of the times to travel and the times to halt, marched his deer early and late nearer to the villages. Villagers ambushed deers. These activities of the Balackie caused the destruction of all the herd. He reached the forest with a very few survivors.

Luckie on the other hand, being wise and astute and full of resource, never approached the confines of villages. He did not travel by day, or even in the dawn or gloaming. He moved only in the dead of night; He reached the forest without losing a single head of his deer.

Four months they stayed in the forest, not leaving the hills till the crops were carried. On the homeward way Blackie by repeating his former folly lost the rest of his herd and returned alone; whereas Luckie had not lost one of his herd, but had brought back the whole five hundred deer, when he appeared before his parents.

The Bodhisatta welcomed his sons; and after living to a good old age, he passed away to fare according to his deserts.