Upon this, Madrî, avoiding what might impair the firmness of mind of her husband, suppressed the deep sorrow that put her heart to anguish, and said with feigned calmness:
31, 32. 'It is not right, Your Majesty, that you should go to the forest alone. I too will go with you where you must go, my lord. When attending on you, even death will be a festival to me; but living without you I deem worse than death.
'Nor do I think the forest-life to be unpleasant at all. Do but consider it well.
33. 'Removed from wicked people, haunted by deer, resounding with the warbling of manifold birds, the penance-groves with their rivulets and trees, both intact, with their grass-plots which have the loveliness of inlaid lapis lazuli floors, are by far more pleasing than our artificial gardens.
'Indeed, my prince,
34. 'When beholding these children neatly dressed and adorned with garlands, playing in the wild shrubs, you will not think of your royalty.
35. 'The water-carrying brooks, overhung by natural bowers of perpetually renewed beauty, varying according to the succession of the seasons, will delight you in the forest.
36, 37. 'The melodious music of the songs of birds longing for the pleasure of love, the dances of the peacocks whom Lasciviousness has taught that art, the sweet and praised buzzing of the honey-seeking bees: they make together a forest-concert that will rejoice your mind.
38. 39. 'Further, the rocks overspread at night with the silk garment of moonlight; the soft-stroking forest wind impregnated with the scent of flowering trees; the murmuring noise of the rivulets, pushing their waters over moving gravel so as to imitate the sound of a number of rattling female ornaments—all this will gladden your mind in the forest.'