“Why, prithee?” asked the Baital.
“Because, dull demon,” said the king, “Birbal was bound to offer up his life for a master who treated him so generously; the son could not disobey his father, and the women naturally and instinctively killed themselves, because the example was set to them. But Rupsen the king gave up his throne for the sake of his retainer, and valued not a straw his life and his high inducements to live. For this reason I think him the most meritorious.”
“Surely, mighty Vikram,” laughed the Vampire, “you will be tired of ever clambering up yon tall tree, even had you the legs and arms of Hanuman[86] himself.”
And so saying he disappeared from the cloth, although it had been placed upon the ground.
But the poor Baital had little reason to congratulate himself on the success of his escape. In a short time he was again bundled into the cloth with the usual want of ceremony, and he revenged himself by telling another true story.
THE VAMPIRE’S FOURTH STORY — Of A Woman Who Told The Truth.
“Listen, great king!” again began the Baital.
An unimportant Baniya[87] (trader), Hiranyadatt, had a daughter, whose name was Madansena Sundari, the beautiful army of Cupid. Her face was like the moon; her hair like the clouds; her eyes like those of a muskrat; her eyebrows like a bent bow; her nose like a parrot’s bill; her neck like that of a dove; her teeth like pomegranate grains; the red colour of her lips like that of a gourd; her waist lithe and bending like the pards: her hands and feet like softest blossoms; her complexion like the jasmine-in fact, day by day the splendour of her youth increased.
When she had arrived at maturity, her father and mother began often to resolve in their minds the subject of her marriage. And the people of all that country side ruled by Birbar king of Madanpur bruited it abroad that in the house of Hiranyadatt had been born a daughter by whose beauty gods, men, and munis (sages) were fascinated.