Poor helpless orphan! It remembers well
How with a mother’s tenderness and love
Thou didst protect it, and with grains of rice
From thine own hand didst daily nourish it,
And ever and anon when some sharp thorn
Had pierced its mouth, how gently thou didst tend
The bleeding wound and pour in healing balm.
The grateful nursling clings to its protectress,
Mutely imploring leave to follow her.”
Sacontala replies, weeping, “My poor little fawn, dost thou ask to follow an unhappy wretch who hesitates not to desert her companions? When thy mother died, soon after thy birth, I supplied her place and reared thee with my own hands, and now that thy second mother is about to leave thee, who will care for thee? My father, be thou a mother to her. My child, go back and be a daughter to my father!”