24. Madaniká replied:—So it is! Oh highly favoured one of Heaven, who knowest that women by their nature are ten times more passionate than men, and should not therefore be chid on account of their gratification of their natural passions.
25. I am but a frail woman, and find you absorbed in deep meditation, I could not choose other wise than take me a partner as you saw, in the depth of the forest and in the night: (Solitude and the darkness of night, being so very favourable to love affairs).
26. The weak sex in general, and the maidens in particular, are ever fond of paramour by their very nature for the gratification of their lust, which they can never have the power to check.
27. A woman becomes graceful in the company of man, and no anathema or prohibition, nor the menaces of men, nor regard of chastity, is of any avail to retard them from it.
28. I am a damsel and a weaker vessel and an ignorant and independent lass, therefore sir, it becomes you to forgive my fickleness, because forgiveness is the most prominent feature of holiness.
29. Sikhidhwaja replied:—Know my belle, that anger has no seat in my heart, as there grows no plant in the sky; and it is only for fear of incurring the ignominy of good people, that I must decline to take thee as my spouse.
30. But I can associate with thee as before in mutual friendship for ever more, without bearing any yearning or grudge in our hearts, either for or against one another (but remain in disinterested amity for life).
31. Vasishtha replied:—After Sikhidhwaja had consented to continue in his indifference and disinterested friendship, with his only companion in the forest; Chúdálá was highly pleased to wit the nobleness of his mind, and thus said to herself.
32. O the transcendent tranquillity, which this lord of mine has gained, and whose dispassionateness has set him above anger, and his living liberation hath attained.