KING.—His behavior and whole bearing would have led me to doubt it, had not the place of his abode encouraged the idea.
[Follows the child, and takes him by the hand, according to the request of the attendant. Speaking aside.
I marvel that the touch of this strange child
Should thrill me with delight; if so it be,
How must the fond caresses of a son
Transport the father's soul who gave him being!
ATTENDANT [looking at them both].—Wonderful! Prodigious!
KING.—What excites your surprise, my good woman?
ATTENDANT.—I am astonished at the striking resemblance between the child and yourself; and, what is still more extraordinary, he seems to have taken to you kindly and submissively, though you are a stranger to him.
KING [fondling the child].—If he be not the son of the great sage, of what family does he come, may I ask?
ATTENDANT.—Of the race of Puru.
KING [aside].—What! are we, then, descended from the same ancestry? This, no doubt, accounts for the resemblance she traces between the child and me. Certainly it has always been an established usage among the princes of Puru's race,
To dedicate the morning of their days
To the world's weal, in palaces and halls,
'Mid luxury and regal pomp abiding;
Then, in the wane of life, to seek release
From kingly cares, and make the hallowed shade
Of sacred trees their last asylum, where
As hermits they may practise self-abasement,
And bind themselves by rigid vows of penance.