‘After beholding that, I renounced from that time all anger, but you, though you are a hermit, have not even now renounced anger. The man who is free from anger has gained heaven, behold now a proof of this.’ After saying this, the husbandman left his body and ascended to heaven. “This is one wonder which I have seen, hear a second, O king;”
After saying this to king Śrutasena, the Bráhman continued, “Then, as I was roaming about on the shore of the sea to visit sacred places, I reached the realm of king Vasantasena. There, as I was about to enter an almshouse where cooked food is distributed by the king, the Bráhmans said to me,—‘Bráhman, advance not in that direction, for there the king’s daughter is present, she is called Vidyuddyotá, and if even a hermit beholds her, he is pierced by the arrow of love, and becoming distracted ceases to live.’ Then I answered them—‘This is not wonderful to me, for I continually behold king Śrutasena, who is a second god of love. When he leaves his palace on an expedition, or for some other purpose, women of good family are removed by guards from any place whence they may possibly see him, for fear they should infringe chastity.’ When I said this, they knew I was a subject of your Majesty’s, and the superintendent of the house of entertainment and the king’s chaplain took me into the presence of the king, that I might share the feast. There I saw that princess Vidyuddyotá, looking like the incarnation of the magic art with which the god of love bewilders the world. After a long time I mastered my confusion at beholding her, and reflected—‘If this lady were to become the wife of our sovereign, he would forget his kingdom. Nevertheless I must tell this tale to my master, otherwise there might take place the incident of Devasena and Unmádiní.’
The story of Devasena and Unmádiní.
Once on a time, in the realm of king Devasena, there was a merchant’s daughter, a maiden that bewildered the world with her beauty. Her father told the king about her, but the king did not take her in marriage, for the Bráhmans, who wished to prevent his neglecting his duties, told him she had inauspicious marks. So she was married to his prime minister.[1] And once on a time she showed herself to the king at a window. And the king, struck by her with a poisonous look from a distance, as if she had been a female snake,[2] fainted again and again, enjoyed no pleasure, and took no food. And the righteous king, though entreated over and over again to marry her by the ministers, with her husband at their head, refused to do so, and devoted to her, yielded up his breath.
“Accordingly I have come to-day and told you this wonderful tale, thinking that if a similar distraction were to come upon you, I should be guilty of conspiring against your life.”
When king Śrutasena heard from that Bráhman this speech, which was like the command of the god of love, he became ardently attached to Vidyuddyotá, so he immediately sent off the Bráhman and took steps to have her brought quickly and married her. Then the princess Vidyuddyotá became inseparable from the person of that king, as the daylight from the orb of the sun.
Then a maiden of the name of Mátṛidattá, the daughter of a very rich merchant, intoxicated with the pride of her beauty, came to select that king for her husband. Through fear of committing unrighteousness, the king married that merchant’s daughter; then Vidyuddyotá, coming to hear of it, died of a broken heart. And the king came and beheld that dearly loved wife lying dead, and took her up in his arms, and lamenting, died on the spot. Thereupon Mátṛidattá, the merchant’s daughter, entered the fire. And so the whole kingdom perished with the king.
“So you see, king, that the breaking off of long love is difficult to bear, especially would it be so to the proud queen Vásavadattá. Accordingly, if you were to marry this Kalingasená, the queen Vásavadattá would indubitably quit her life, and queen Padmávatí would do the same, for their life is one. And then how would your son Naraváhanadatta live? And, I know, the king’s heart would not be able to bear any misfortune happening to him. And so all this happiness would perish in a moment, O king. But as for the dignified reserve, which the queens displayed in their speeches, that sufficiently shews that their hearts are indifferent to all things, being firmly resolved on suicide. So you must guard your own interests, for even animals understand self-protection, much more wise men like yourself, O king.” The king of Vatsa, when he heard this at length from the excellent minister Yaugandharáyaṇa, having now become quite capable of wise discrimination, said—“It is so; there can be no doubt about it; all this fabric of my happiness would be overthrown. So what is the use of my marrying Kalingasená? Accordingly the astrologers did well in mentioning a distant hour as auspicious for the marriage: and there cannot after all be much sin in abandoning one who had come to select me as her husband.” When Yaugandharáyaṇa heard this, he reflected with joy, “Our business has almost turned out according to our wishes. Will not that same great plant of policy, watered with the streams of expedient, and nourished with due time and place, truly bring forth fruit?” Thus reflecting, and meditating upon fitting time and place, the minister Yaugandharáyaṇa went to his house, after taking a ceremonious farewell of the king.
The king too went to the queen Vásavadattá, who had assumed to welcome him a manner which concealed her real feelings, and thus spoke to her to console her: “Why do I speak? you know well, O gazelle-eyed one, that your love is my life, even as the water is of the lotus. Could I bear even to mention the name of another woman? But Kalingasená came to my house of her own impetuous motion. And this is well known, that Rambhá, who came to visit Arjuna of her own impetuous will, having been rejected by him, as he was engaged in austerities, inflicted on him a curse which made him a eunuch. That curse was endured by him to the end, living in the house of the king of Viráṭa in the garb of a eunuch, though he displayed miraculous valour. So I did not reject this Kalingasená when she came, but I cannot bring myself to do anything without your wish.” Having comforted her in these words, and having perceived by the flush of wine which rose to her cheek, as if it were her glowing passionate heart, that her cruel design was a reality, the king of Vatsa spent that night with the queen Vásavadattá, delighted at the transcendent ability of his prime minister.