So the men about the way, seeing him in grief, turned again to look, and consternation seized them and one cried aloud:
“Where is the Prince—beloved of the world? Have you taken him away by stealth? Where is he hidden?”
And Channa halting, said with sighs;
“I who followed him always with a loving heart, would I have left him? Little do you know me! He has dismissed me,—O men of Kapila! He has buried himself in the forests to live the life of an ascetic.”
And those who listened heard this with dark foreboding, for it appeared to them that things deep, strange, and mysterious had suddenly appeared in their way, and that the very world had changed in its course if such things could be. What had there been lacking to the Prince that he should go out thus to seek it? What had he beheld, invisible to them?
And the news spread from them to the city and men and women rushed out to the gates, and when they saw that Channa wept as he returned in loneliness, they, not understanding whether the Prince was dead or alive, cried out.
“What has befallen? Surely sorrow is added to sorrow.”
And like the flash of lightning news spread to the House of the Garden and the women of the palace, their hair dishevelled about them, their robes flung hastily on as for a night-alarm, came pouring down to the doors that they might hear the worst, and when they saw the charioteer alone, they raised a loud and bitter cry. So women mourn the beloved dead when hope itself is dead with him.
And the cry reached Prajapati, aunt and foster-mother of the Prince, sister of Maya his mother, and she wept, saying to herself.
“Alas—his beauty, his beauty! O my son, who was there to compare with him? I see his dark locks bound with gold, his eyes blue and deep as the Ox-King’s, his broad shoulders and strong arms, a Tiger-King among men. How can it be endured that you should suffer the chills and heats of the forest and we, bereft and miserable, see you no more!”