The heroine may occupy eight different relations to her lover.[52] She may be his absolute mistress (svādhīnapatikā) and he her obedient slave; she may be awaiting him in full dress (vāsakasajjā); she may be distressed by his involuntary absence (virahotkaṇṭhitā), enraged (khaṇḍitā) at discovering him disfigured by the marks of her rival’s teeth and nails, or be severed from her beloved by a quarrel (kalahāntaritā) and suffer remorse, or be deceived (vipralabdhā) by a lover who fails to meet her at the rendezvous which she has named. Her lover may be absent abroad (proṣitapriyā), or she may have to seek him out or press him to come to her (abhisārikā), giving as meeting-place a ruined temple, a garden, the house of a go-between, a cemetery, the bank of a stream, or in general any dark place. The first two classes of heroine are bright and gay, the others are wearied, tearful, changing colour, sighing, and wear no ornaments as token of their dejection. A woman, who is subject to another, cannot stand in all these relations to a lover; she may be distressed at his absence, deceived, or driven to seek him out, but she cannot be enraged, for she is not the mistress of her lover, and thus the king’s courtesy to Mālavikā in Kālidāsa’s play is not to be treated as an effort to appease an enraged heroine.
The heroine is accorded even a more generous allowance of excellencies than the hero.[53] The first three are physical, the first display of emotion in a nature previously exempt (bhāva), the movement of eyes and brows betokening the awakening of love (hāva), and the still more open manifestation of affection. The next seven are inherent characteristics of the heroine; the brilliance of youth and passion; the added touch of loveliness [[310]]given by love, sweetness, radiance, courage, dignity, and self-control. Then come ten graces; the sportive imitation of the movements or words of the beloved one, the swift change of aspect at his arrival, tasteful arrangement of one’s ornaments to increase radiance of appearance, studied confusion of ornaments, hysteria (kilakiñcita), in which anger, fear, joy, and tears mingle, manifestations of affection (moṭṭāyita) on hearing the beloved mentioned or seeing his portrait, pretended anger (kuṭṭamita) on the lover touching hair or lip, affected indifference (bibboka), born of excess of pride, a graceful pose (lalita), and the bashfulness which forbids speech even when an opportunity presents itself. To these twenty Viçvanātha adds eight more graces; the pride which is vain of youth and beauty, the ennui which besets the maiden in her lover’s absence, the naïveté which displays itself in pretended ignorance and innocence, the distraction evinced by ornaments in disorder, wandering glances, and truant words, curiosity, the meaningless laugh of youth and high spirits, the tremors of fear causeless but common in the presence of the lover, and the sportive play of young affection. The same source gives us in great detail the modes in which the different types of heroine display their affection, in maidenly modesty or in shameless boldness, an analysis showing keen and deep insight into all the outward manifestations of love at an Indian court. Less praiseworthy is the perverse ingenuity which enumerates the different types of heroine, and educes first 128 from the combination of the eight forms of relationship to the lover with the sixteen kinds based on the division of wife, another’s, and hetaera. These are then multiplied by three on the basis of the division of all characters as high class, middle class, and low class.
The same division of classes is applied to all the other characters (pātra) which can appear in a play, but a much more fundamental classification is that by sex, masculine, feminine, and neuter. Most of the rôles are such as are incidental to the life of a palace, for the normal drama deals with the amours of a king, and his entourage and that of the queen account for practically all the normal characters of the drama.
The king’s confidant and devoted friend is the Vidūṣaka,[54] a Brahmin, ludicrous alike in dress, speech, and behaviour. He is a [[311]]misshapen dwarf, baldheaded, with projecting teeth and red eyes, who makes himself ridiculous by his silly chatter in Prākrit, and his greed for food and presents of every kind. It is a regular part of the play for the other characters to make fun of him, but he is always by the king’s side, and the latter makes him his confidant in all his affairs of the heart, while the Vidūṣaka repays him by willing, if frequently incompetent or unlucky, attempts at service. The theorists offer no explanation of the anomaly of a Brahmin in such a curious position, but Açvaghoṣa already has the figure, as has Bhāsa, though not in his epic dramas, and later he is established as almost an essential feature in all dramas not derived from the epic; the chief exception is the Mālatīmādhava, where, however, his place is taken by the hero’s friend in sport (narmasuhṛd).
A much less common, but an interesting character is that of the Viṭa,[55] who resembles, though distantly, the parasite of the Greek drama; he is a poet skilled in the arts, especially music, acquainted au fond with the ways of hetaerae, in short a perfect man of the world with literary and artistic culture to boot. He is an essential figure in the Bhāṇa, or monologue, in which he relates his own shady adventures, but in other forms of drama he plays but a small part; Kālidāsa and Bhavabhūti ignore him, and, while Harṣa depicts him in the Nāgānanda, his position there is episodic; in the Mṛcchakaṭikā alone does he attain full development in his relation to the boastful Çakāra. Both these figures appear also in the Cārudatta, Çūdraka’s model. The Çakāra,[56] brother of a royal concubine, is of low caste, easily angered and appeased, fond of fine raiment, and proud of his office, in which, however, he shows himself corrupt and incompetent. He is found also in an episode of the Çakuntalā, but then fades from the drama leaving, however, a clear suggestion of its early history.
The king requires in his amours the aid of a messenger (dūta)[57] as well as for more serious affairs. The holder of this rôle must be possessed of loyalty, energy, courage, a good memory, and adroitness; he may be given full powers to act as seems best in each emergency, or have limited authority, or be a mere bearer [[312]]of a message. Others intimately associated with the royal household are the servants (ceṭa),[58] the mercenaries, Kirātas or Mlecchas, the chaplain, priest, and other theologians. There are also those employed in the government of the realm, which the king is only too pleased to neglect.[59] The minister (mantrin, amātya) is of good family, of high intelligence, skilled in affairs human and divine, and devoted to the interests of the country. The general (senāpati) is also of high birth, incapable of weakness, skilled in both the theory and the practice of war, and kind of speech; ready to note the weakness of the enemy and to direct at the suitable moment a campaign against him. The judge (prāḍvivāka) must be master of the laws and of judicial procedure, absolutely impartial, devoted to his duty, free from anger or pride, master of himself. The other officers are required to possess high qualities of intelligence, activity, and devotion to duty, while for less important work the king commands the services of foresters, military officers, and soldiers. The prince royal (kumāra) and the friend are also mentioned in the Nāṭyaçāstra, but without detail.
Of women’s rôles[60] the most important in dignity is that of the chief queen (mahādevī), the equal in age and rank of her husband, whose lapses in affection wound her, without robbing her of her sense of self-respect or dignity. In good fortune or evil she is devoted to him and seeks ever his welfare. The queen (devī) is also a daughter of a king, but she is more proud than dignified, and, intoxicated by her youth and beauty, her mind is set on the pleasures of love. The favourite (svāminī) is the daughter of a general or a minister, seductive by her beauty and intelligence, honoured by the king and others. There are other types of concubine (sthāyinī and bhoginī) with characteristics but little distinctive. The harem includes also the chief attendants (āyukta), who are charged with the supreme oversight of some department of the court, the king’s personal attendant who is always with him (anucārikā), the maid who performs his toilet and holds over him the umbrella of state, the women—called sometimes Yavanīs, once Greek maidens—who act as his body-guard, and those aged women who are skilled in political traditions [[313]]and are respected on that score. There are also the princess, ingénue and modest, and the duenna (mahattarā), who among other things sees to the punctual performance of auspicious rites, and the more humble adepts in the dance, in song, in handicrafts, in acting, and in the favourite amusement of swinging the ladies of the harem. The hetaera is painted in attractive colours; she is thoroughly well educated, exempt from the normal defects of women, kind of heart, adroit, active, a born coquette, and seductive in every way. Special importance among these feminine rôles attaches to that of the heroine’s messenger, the counterpart of the hero’s agent. She may be a friend, a slave, a foster-sister, a neighbour, a workwoman, or an artiste, or strangely enough, a nun, usually of Buddhist connexions, a curious and interesting sidelight on Indian views of the devotees of that faith. The doorkeeper (pratīhārī) has the function of announcing to the king such political events as the declaration of war and the conclusion of peace.
The neuter rôles[61] are filled by men who have either taken vows of chastity, or have been deprived of virility in order to permit of their employment in the harem. The Snātaka is a Brahmin, who has completed his course of religious study, is familiar with religious and social affairs; he resides within the palace. The chamberlain (kañcukin) is an old Brahmin, worn out in the service of the king, but still mentally alert and skilled in his business of conveying the royal orders in the palace. The eunuchs (varṣadhara, nirmuṇḍa, upasthāyika) are effeminate and cowardly but not lacking in savoir faire; they find employment in the king’s amours.
The nomenclature[62] of the characters is in some measure regulated by rule; the name of a hetaera should end in dattā, senā, or siddhā, as does that of Vasantasenā in the Cārudatta; that of a merchant in datta as in Cārudatta; that of the Vidūṣaka from spring or a flower, but in the Avimāraka he is styled Saṁtuṣṭa; that of a servant, male or female, should be derived from some object, which occurs in descriptions of the seasons, &c., as in the names Kalahaṅsa and Mandārikā in the Mālatīmādhava; those of Kāpālikas, a species of ascetics, should end in ghaṇṭa as in Aghoraghaṇṭa in the same play. [[314]]
There is also an elaborate etiquette[63] as to the mode of addressing the diverse personages. A king is styled thus by ascetics, but Deva or Svāmin by his courtiers; his charioteer and Brahmins generally hail him as Āyuṣmant, ‘long-lived’, while inferiors style him Bhaṭṭa, ‘master’. The crown prince is styled Svāmin, like his father; the other princes of the blood (bhartṛdāraka), but also common people, Bhadramukha or Saumya, preceded by he in the latter case, terms designed to conciliate by attributing to those addressed the qualities they are desired to show.[64] The style Bhagavant, ‘blessed’, is appropriate to the gods, to great sages and saints; Ārya, ‘noble’, is appropriate to Brahmins, ministers, and elder brothers, while a wife should address her husband as Āryaputra. Sages address an ascetic as Sādhu; ministers are styled Amātya or Saciva; the king calls his Vidūṣaka, and is called by him, Vayasya, ‘friend’. Sugṛhītābhidha, ‘well named one’, is the address[65] of a pupil to his master, a son to a father, or a younger to an elder brother, while the latter in return uses Tāta or Vatsa, both affectionate and condescending terms, suitable also for use to a son, or any person who owes one respect. Heretics should be given the styles they affect, thus a Buddhist should be hailed as Bhadanta; Çakas should be styled by such terms as Bhadradatta. The interjection Haṅho may be used between men of middle rank, Haṇḍe between common people. The Vidūṣaka addresses the queen and her ladies as Bhavatī; otherwise the queen is styled Bhaṭṭinī or Svāminī, a wife as Āryā, a princess Bhartṛdārikā, a hetaera Ajjukā, a go-between or aged dame Ambā; Halā is used between friends of equal rank, Hañjā is addressed to a servant.