The King’s Diet

King Krishnadeva Raya had become very fat. He simply sat around and ate all kinds of food and did no exercise at all. The courtiers and the ministers were worried about him.
“He used to be so active,” they whispered to one another. “He rode and practised sword play and walked through the kingdom, and led the soldiers. He would be angry if he found the soldiers unfit physically. And now he lives a life where he hardly ever moves about! What can we do?”


One minster suggested that the physicians and the doctors should be called in to advise the King. So, the physicians came and told the King that he must take enough exercise and cut down on the food that he was eating. This only annoyed the King. Each time, a doctor gave him his advice, he got steadily more angry.
He announced that he wanted someone to find an easy remedy. And he laid down one condition: anyone whose advice failed would be beheaded. Everyone feared the King and now they were even more terrified!


They ran to Tenali Raman and requested him to find a way to help them and the King. A few days later, an astrologer came to the court. He told the court that the King had one month left to live. The King was horrified and furious with the astrologer.
Immediately, he got the fellow locked up in a dungeon. “And he will stay there for a month,” added the King. I want to see if his prediction is true or not. How dare he say this?” And so the poor shivering astrologer sat in his cell and wondered what would happen to him at the end of the month.
One month passed, and the King was still alive. He had lost his appetite and was so worried that he walked up and down, restless and anxious. But when he saw that the astrologer’s prediction had failed, he summoned him to the court.


“So, my fine astrologer, here I am. Alive and well! Time to behead you now, isn’t it?” asked the King.
“Your Majesty, please see yourself in a mirror once before you decide,” pleaded the astrologer.
The King was surprised at the reflection he saw. He was not fat any more! “I am not an astrologer, Your Majesty,” he confessed, “I am a physician. It was Tenali Raman who asked to frighten you so that you might stop overeating and start walking.”
The King rewarded both the physician and Tenali Raman.

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