Filipino Popular Tales | Page 8

green melon?" said one. "Five," answered another. "How many seeds has the yellow one?"--"Six."
When Suan heard how many seeds each melon contained, he immediately rowed back to shore and went home.
The next morning Suan met Mayabong at the public square, as agreed. Mayabong held up a green melon, and said, "How many seeds does this melon contain?"
"Five seeds," answered Suan, after uttering some Latin words.
The melon was cut, and was found to contain five seeds. The king shouted, "We are right!"
Mayabong then held up another melon, and said, "How many does this one contain?"
Seeing that it was the yellow melon, Suan said, "It contains six."
When the melon was cut, it was found that Suan was right again. So he won the contest.
Now, Mayabong wanted to win his money back again. So he took a bottle and filled it with dung, and covered it tightly. He challenged the king again to a contest. But when Suan refused this time, because he had no idea as to what was in the bottle, the king said, "I let you marry my daughter, because I thought that you were a good guesser. Now you must prove that you are. If you refuse, you will lose your life."
When Mayabong asked what the bottle contained, Suan, filled with rage, picked it up and hurled it down on the floor, saying, "I consider that you are all waste to me." [7] When the bottle was broken, it was found to contain waste, or dung. In great joy the king crowned Suan to succeed him. Thus Suan lived happily the rest of his life with his wife the princess.

Notes.
Two other printed variants are--
(c) "Juan the Guesser" (in H. E. Fansler's Types of Prose Narratives [Chicago, 1911], pp. 73-77).
(d) "Juan Pusong" (JAFL 19 : 107-108).
This story seems to be fairly widespread among the Filipinos: there is no doubt of its popularity. The distinguishing incidents of the type are as follows:--
A1 Lazy son decides that he will go to school no longer, and (A2) with his ABC book or a pencil and pad of paper, he has no trouble in making his parents think him wise. (A3) He tells his mother that he has learned to be a prophet and can discover hidden things. (A4) He spies on his mother, and then "guesses" what she has prepared for supper.
B He hides his father's plough (cattle), and then finds it for him. (B1) Plays similar trick on his uncle, thereby establishing his reputation as a diviner.
C King's daughter loses ring, and the king sends for Juan to find it under penalty of death if he fails, or (C1) his mother volunteers her son's services. (C2) He accidentally discovers the thief by an ejaculation of sorrow, or (C3) shrewdly picks out the guilty one from among the soldiers.
In either case he causes the ring to be hid in a secret place or swallowed by a goose (turkey), in whose body it is found the next day.
D Juan marries the princess.
E By overhearing a conversation, Juan is able to tell the number of seeds in an orange (melon), and to win a large sum of money from a neighboring king who has come to bet with hero's father-in-law.
F Hero required to accept another bet, as to the contents of three jars. (Method as in E,--swimming out to neighboring king's casco and overhearing conversation.)
G Ejaculation guess as to contents of golden ball (bottle).
H Afraid of being called on for further demonstration of his skill, hero burns his "magic" book.
These incidents are distributed among the four forms of the story as follows:--
Version a A1A4C1C3DEG Version b A1A2BB1C1C2DEG Version c A1A2BCC2DE(accidentally hears answer)FH Version d A1A3A4EB
A concluding adventure is sometimes added to version c, "Juan the Guesser." King and queen of another country visit palace of Juan's father-in-law and want their newly-born child baptized. Juan is selected to be godfather. When called upon to sign the baptism certificate, he instantly dies of shame, pen in hand: he cannot write even his own name.

A connection between our story and Europe at once suggests itself. "Dr. Knowall" (Grimm, No. 98) is perhaps the best-known, though by no means the fullest, Western version. Bolte and Pol��vka (2 [1915] : 402) give the skeleton of the cycle as follows:--
A1 A peasant with the name of Crab (Cricket, Rat), who buys a physician's costume and calls himself Dr. Knowall, or (A2) who would like to satiate himself once with three days' eating, (B) discovers the thieves who have stolen from a distinguished gentleman a ring (treasure), by calling out upon the entrance of the servants (or at the end of the three days), "That is the first (second, third)!" (C) He also guesses what is in the covered dish (or closed hand) while commiserating himself, "Poor Crab (Cricket, Rat)!" (D1) Through