Chapter CI.
Then Mṛigánkadatta, refreshed by breaking his fast, sat down with those ministers of his on the bank of that lake. Then he courteously asked those four ministers, whom he had recovered that day, for an account of their adventures during the time that he was separated from them. Thereupon that one of them, who was called Vyághrasena, said to him, “Listen, prince, I now proceed to relate our adventures. When I was carried to a distance from you by the curse of the Nága Párávatáksha, I lost my senses, and in that state I wandered through the forest by night. At last I recovered consciousness, but the darkness, which enveloped me, prevented me from seeing where the cardinal points lay, and what path I ought to take. At last the night, that grief made long,[1] came to an end; and in course of time the sun arose, that mighty god, and revealed all the quarters of the heaven. Then I said to myself ‘Alas! Where can that master of mine be gone? And how will he manage to exist here alone separated from us? And how am I to recover him? Where shall I look for him? What course shall I adopt? I had better go to Ujjayiní; for I may perhaps find him there; for he must go there, to find Śaśánkavatí.’ With such hopes I set out slowly for Ujjayiní, threading that difficult forest that resembled calamity, scorched by the rays of the sun, that resembled showers of fiery powder.
“And at last, somehow or other, I reached a lake, with full-blown lotuses for expanded eyes, that seemed to hold converse with me by means of the sweet cries of its swans and other water-birds; it stretched forth its ripples like hands; its surface was calm and broad;[2] the very sight of it took away all grief; and so in all points it resembled a good man. I bathed in it, and ate lotus-fibres, and drank water; and while I was lingering on its bank, I saw these three arrive there, Dṛiḍhamushṭi, and Sthúlabáhu, and Meghabala. And when we met, we asked one another for tidings of you. And as none of us knew anything about you, and we suspected the worst, we made up our minds to abandon the body, being unable to endure separation from you.
“And at that moment a hermit-boy came to bathe in that lake; his name was Mahátapas, and he was the son of Dírghatapas. He had matted hair, he diffused a brightness of his own, and he seemed like the god of Fire, blazing with mighty flame, having become incarnate in the body of a Bráhman, in order to consume once more the Kháṇḍava forest;[3] he was clothed in the skin of a black antelope, he had an ascetic’s water-vessel in his left hand, and on his right wrist he bore a rosary of Aksha-seeds by way of a bracelet; the perfumed earth that he used in bathing was stuck on the horns of the deer that came with him, and he was accompanied by some other hermit-boys like himself. The moment he saw us about to throw ourselves into the lake, he came towards us; for the good are easily melted with compassion, and shew causeless friendship to all. And he said to us, ‘You ought not to commit a crime characteristic of cowards, for poltroons, with their minds blinded with grief, fall into the gulfs of calamity, but resolute men, having eyes enlightened by discernment, behold the right path, and do not fall into the pit, but assuredly attain their goal. And you, being men of auspicious appearance, will no doubt attain prosperity; so tell me, what is your grief? For it grieves my heart to see you thus.’
“When the hermit-boy had said this, I at once told him the whole of our adventure from the beginning; then that boy, who could read the future,[4] and his companions, exhorted us with various speeches, and diverted our minds from suicide. Then the hermit-boy, after he had bathed, took us to his father’s hermitage, which was at no great distance, to entertain us.
“There that hermit’s son bestowed on us the arghya, and made us sit down in a place, in which even the trees seemed to have entered on a course of penance, for they stood aloft on platforms of earth, and lifted on high their branches like arms, and drank in the rays of the sun. And then he went and asked all the trees in the hermitage, one after another, for alms. And in a moment his alms-vessel was filled with fruits, that of themselves dropped from the trees; and he came back with it to us. And he gave us those fruits of heavenly flavour, and when we had eaten them, we became, as it were, satisfied with nectar.
“And when the day came to an end, and the sun descended into the sea, and the sky was filled with stars, as if with spray flung up by his fall, and the moon, having put on a white bark-robe of moonlight, had gone to the ascetic grove on the top of the eastern mountain,[5] as if desiring to withdraw from the world on account of the fall of the sun, we went to see the hermits, who had finished all their duties, and were sitting together in a certain part of the hermitage. We bowed before them, and sat down, and those great sages welcomed us, and with kindly words at once asked us whence we came. Then that hermit-boy told them our history until the time of our entering the hermitage. Then a wise hermit there, of the name of Kanva, said to us, ‘Come, why have you allowed yourselves to become so dispirited, being, as you are, men of valour? For it is the part of a brave man to display unbroken firmness in calamity, and freedom from arrogance in success, and never to abandon fortitude. And great men attain the title of great by struggling through great difficulties by the aid of resolution, and accomplishing great things. In illustration of this, listen to this story of Sundarasena, and hear how he endured hardship for the sake of Mandáravatí?’ When the hermit Kanva had said this, he began, in the hearing of us and of all the hermits, to tell the following tale.”