The Tales · Indic
The Blue Jackal
A dyed jackal rules the forest until his own howl gives him away.
A jackal named Fierce-Howl, driven by hunger into a city, is chased by dogs and falls into a dyer’s vat of indigo. He climbs out blue and slips back into the forest. The animals have never seen such a color and run from him.
He tells them that Indra has anointed him king. They bow. He makes the lion his prime minister, the tiger his lord of the bedchamber, and drives off his own kin, the other jackals, with a cuffing.
Later, he hears jackals howling and is overcome with joy. He howls with them. The lions and tigers recognize him, and a tiger tears him apart.
Ryder renders the framing verse: “Whoever leaves his friends, / Strange folk to cherish, / Like foolish Fierce-Howl, will / Untimely perish.”
Counsel
The counterfeit is held up by his costume and undone by his nature. For the buyer, the lesson is to wait for the howl: any pitch gives itself away when something familiar sounds nearby. For the seller, the lesson is that what you borrow, you also owe.
Verification
Tale read in Arthur W. Ryder's 1925 translation (Book I, tale 14, told by Victor to warn the lion against abandoning his own hereditary servants for strangers). Which book it sits in differs by recension: Wikipedia's list shows both I.11 and III.8, and we could not tell which recension each number belongs to. The jackal is Fierce-Howl (Ryder), not Damanaka.