“Because in water one cannot see where one plants one’s feet. I would not cut mine!”
“And in the wood, dear girl, you kept your sunshade open. Why? For then there was shade from the trees?”
“But also, uncle, the droppings of birds, the malice of the monkeys letting fall unpleasant fragments, the falling of leaves and twigs. In the open this seldom happens; in a wood often.”
So full of delight at her good sense, the Brahman went to her parents, and asked her in marriage for the son of Migara. And he said:
“This girl will make a noble wife and a great lady, for she is full of thought for others and wise with the very wisdom of the Law. Give her to the son of Migara.”
And it was granted and they sent her to her husband in the city of Savatthi. Now Visakha was one who followed the Enlightened One with all her wise heart, but it was not so with Migara, her husband’s father, nor yet with his household. But she gratified their eyes for they demanded the Five Beauties in a daughter of the House, and these five she richly possessed namely, beauty of hair, beauty of flesh, beauty of bone, beauty of skin, and beauty of youth.
And beauty of hair is when the hair resembles a peacock’s tail, falling to the end of the tunic where it curls upward. Beauty of flesh, when the lips resemble a bright red gourd. Beauty of bone, when the teeth gleam between the rosy lips like cut mother-of-pearl, with even division. Beauty of skin, when without the application of any cosmetic it is smooth as a lotus-wreath and white as Kanikara flowers. Beauty of youth is the endurance of the gaiety and freshness of youth after many child-births. All these had Visakha, and yet another, for her voice was sweeter than music, like the silver sounding of a little gong. And on parting her father presented her with a magnificent jewel adornment known as the Great Creeper Parure, and a part of it consisted of a peacock with five hundred feathers of red gold in each wing, the beak of coral, the eyes of jewels and likewise the neck and tail-feathers. And on Visakha’s head it resembled a peacock perched on a height, and it gave forth music and appeared to be real.
But when she was established in her new home she found that Migara, her father-in-law, was a follower of the naked ascetics, and they and he cast scorn on the Perfect One, and this disturbed her much, and the ascetics said to Migara:
“O householder, you have introduced into your family an arrant misfortune breeder, a disciple of the monk Gotama. Expel her instantly.”
“And that is not easy!” thought Migara, “for she comes of a great family,—But I will take measures.”