The Kathá Sarit Ságara; or, Ocean of the Streams of Story
have the goodness every day, in the hall of assembly, to take me aside
for a moment in the sight of all, and speak to me in private? And as
an acknowledgment of that favour I will give your Majesty every day
five hundred dínárs, and I do not ask for any gift in return." When
the king heard that, he thought to himself, "What harm can it do? What
does he take away from me? On the contrary he is to give me dínárs
every day. What disgrace is there in carrying on a conversation with
a great merchant?" So the king consented, and did as he requested,
and the rogue gave the king the dínárs as he had promised, and the
people thought that he had obtained the position of a Cabinet Minister.
Now one day the rogue, while he was talking with the king, kept
looking again and again at the face of one official with a significant
expression. And after he came out, that official asked him why he
had looked at his face so, and the rogue was ready with this fiction;
"The king is angry because he supposes that you have been plundering
his realm. This is why I looked at your face, but I will appease
his anger." When the sham minister said this, the official went home
in a state of anxiety, and sent him a thousand gold pieces. And the
next day the rogue talked in the same way with the king, and then he
came out and said to the official, who came towards him; "I appeased
the king's anger against you with some judicious words. Cheer up;
I will now stand by you in all emergencies." Thus he artfully made
him his friend, and then dismissed him, and then the official waited
upon him with all kinds of presents.
Thus gradually this dexterous rogue, by means of his continual
conversations with the king, and by many artifices, extracted from the
officials, the subordinate monarchs, the Rájpúts, and the servants,
so much wealth, that he amassed altogether fifty millions of gold
pieces. Then the scoundrelly sham minister said in secret to the king,
"Though I have given you every day five hundred dínárs, nevertheless,
by the favour of your Highness, I have amassed fifty millions of
gold pieces. So have the goodness to accept of this gold. What have
I to do with it?" Then he told the king his whole stratagem. But it
was with difficulty that the king could be induced to take half the
money. Then he gave him the post of a Cabinet Minister, and the rogue,
having obtained riches and position, kept complimenting the people
with entertainments.
"Thus a wise man obtains great wealth without committing a very great
crime, and when he has gained the advantage, he atones for his fault
in the same way as a man who digs a well." Then Gomukha went on to
say to the prince; "Listen now to this one story, though you are
excited about your approaching marriage."
Story of Ratnarekhá and Lakshmísena.
There lived in a city, named Ratnákara, a king, named Buddhiprabha,
who was a very lion to the infuriated elephant-herd of his enemies, and
there was born to him by his queen, named Ratnarekhá, a daughter, named
Hemaprabhá, the most beautiful woman in the whole world. And since she
was a Vidyádharí, that had fallen to earth by a curse, she was fond
of amusing herself by swinging, on account of the pleasure that she
felt in recalling the impressions of her roaming through the air in
her former existence. Her father forbade her, being afraid that she
would fall, but she did not desist, so her father was angry and gave
her a slap. The princess was angry at receiving so great an indignity,
and wishing to retire to the forest, she went to a garden outside
the city, on the pretence of amusing herself. She made her servants
drunk with wine, and roaming on, she entered a dense tree-jungle,
and got out of their sight. And she went alone to a distant forest,
and there she built herself a hut, and remained feeding on roots and
fruits, engaged in the adoration of Siva. As for her father, he found
out that she had fled to some place or other, and made search for
her, but did not find her. Then he fell into great grief. And after
some time the king's grief abated a little, so he went out hunting to
distract his mind. And, as it happened, that king Buddhiprabha went
to that distant forest, in which his daughter Hemaprabhá was engaged
in ascetic practices. There the king saw her hut, and he went into it,
and unexpectedly beheld there his own daughter emaciated with ascetic
practices. And she, when she saw him, rose up at once and embraced
his feet, and her father embraced her with tears and seated her on
his lap. And seeing one another again after so long a separation,
they wept so that even the eyes of the deer in the forest gushed with
tears. Then the king at last comforted his daughter, and said to her,
"Why did you abandon, my daughter, the happiness of a palace, and act
thus? So come back to your mother, and give up this forest." When
her father said this to her, Hemaprabhá answered him, "I have been
commanded by the god to act thus. What choice have I in the matter? So
I will not return to the palace to indulge in pleasure, and I will
not abandon the joys of asceticism." When the king discovered from
this speech of hers that she would not abandon her intention, he had
a palace made for her in that very forest. And when he returned to
his capital, he sent her every day cooked food and wealth, for the
entertainment of her guests. And Hemaprabhá remained in the forest,
honouring her guests with wealth and jewels, while she lived herself
on roots and fruits.
Now one day there came to the hermitage of that princess a female
mendicant, who was roaming about, having observed a vow of chastity
from her earliest youth. This lady, who had been a mendicant from
her childhood, was honoured by Hemaprabhá, and when asked by her the
reason why she took the vow, she answered, "Once, when I was a girl,
I was shampooing my father's feet, and my eyes closed in sleep,
and I let my hands drop. Then my father gave me a kick, and said,
'Why do you go to sleep?' And I was so angry at that that I left his
house and became a mendicant." Then Hemaprabhá was so delighted with
the female mendicant, on account of the resemblance of her character
to her own, that she made her share her forest life. And one morning
she said to that friend; "My friend, I remember that I crossed in my
dreams a broad river, then I mounted a white elephant, after that
I ascended a mountain, and there I saw in a hermitage the holy god
Siva. And having obtained a lyre, I sang and played on it before him,
and then I saw a man of celestial appearance approach. When I saw
him, I flew up into the sky with you, and when I had seen so much,
I awoke, and lo! the night was at an end." When the friend heard
this, she said to Hemaprabhá, "Undoubtedly, auspicious girl, you
must be some heavenly being born on earth in consequence of a curse;
and this dream means that your curse is nearly at an end." When the
princess heard this speech of her friend's, she received it with joy.
And when the sun, the lamp of the world, had mounted high in
the heaven, there came there a certain prince on horseback. When
he saw Hemaprabhá dressed as an ascetic, he dismounted from his
horse, and conceiving admiration for her, he went and saluted her
respectfully. She, for her part, entertained him, and made him take a
seat, and feeling love for him, said, "Who are you, noble sir?" Then
the prince said, "Noble lady, there is a king of auspicious name,
called Pratápasena. He was once going through a course of asceticism
to propitiate Siva, with the view of obtaining a son. And that merciful
god appeared to him, and said, 'Thou shalt obtain one son, who shall be
an incarnation of a Vidyádhara, and he, when his curse is at an end,
shall return to his own world. And thou shalt have a second son, who
shall continue thy race and uphold thy realm.' When Siva said this
to him, he rose up in high spirits, and took food. Then he had one
son born to him, named Lakshmísena, and in course of time a second,
named Súrasena. Know, lovely one, that I am that same Lakshmísena,
and that to-day when I went out to hunt, my horse, swift as the wind,
ran away with me and brought me here." Then he asked her history,
and she told it him, and thereupon she remembered her former birth,
and was very much elated, and said to him, "Now that I have seen you, I
have remembered my birth and the sciences which I knew as a Vidyádharí,
[150] for I and this friend of mine here are both Vidyádharís, that
have been sent down to earth by a curse. And you were my husband,
and your minister was the husband of this friend of mine. And now
that curse of me and of my friend has lost its power. We shall all
meet again in the world of Vidyádharas." Then she and her friend
assumed divine forms and flew up to heaven, and went to their own
world. But Lakshmísena stood for a moment lost in wonder, and then
his minister arrived tracking his course. While the prince was
telling the whole story to him, king Buddhiprabha arrived, anxious
to see his daughter. When he could not see his daughter, but found
Lakshmísena there, he asked for news of her, and Lakshmísena told him
what had happened. Then Buddhiprabha was cast down, but Lakshmísena
and his minister remembered their former existence, their curse
having spent its force, and they went to their own world through
the air. He recovered his wife Hemaprabhá and returned with her,
and then taking leave of Buddhiprabha, he went to his own town. And
he went with his minister, who had recovered his wife, and told their
adventures to his father Pratápasena, who bestowed on him his kingdom
as his successor by right of birth. But he gave it to his younger
brother Súrasena, and returned to his own city in the country of the
Vidyádharas. There Lakshmísena, united with his consort Hemaprabhá,
and assisted by his minister, long enjoyed the delights of sovereignty
over the Vidyádharas.
By hearing these stories told one after another by Gomukha,
Naraváhanadatta, though he was excited about his approaching marriage
with his new wife Saktiyasas, spent that night as if it were a
moment. In this way the prince whiled away the days, until the day of
his marriage arrived, when, as he was in the presence of his father
the king of Vatsa, he suddenly saw the army of the Vidyádharas descend
from heaven, gleaming like gold. And he saw, in the midst of them,
Sphatikayasas the king of the Vidyádharas, who had come out of love,
holding the hand of his dear daughter, whom he wished to bestow on
the prince, and he joyfully went towards him, and saluted him by
the title of father-in-law, after his father had first entertained
him with the arghya and other usual ceremonies. And the king of the
Vidyádharas stated the object of his coming, and immediately created
a display of heavenly magnificence becoming his high position, and
by the might of his supernatural power loaded the prince with jewels,
and then bestowed on him in due form his daughter previously promised
to him. And Naraváhanadatta, having obtained that Saktiyasas, the
daughter of the king of the Vidyádharas, was resplendent as the lotus
after collecting the rays of the sun. Then Sphatikayasas departed,
and the son of the king of Vatsa remained in the city of Kausámbí,
with his eyes fixed on the face of Saktiyasas, as the bee clings to
the lotus.
BOOK XI.
CHAPTER LXVII.
Honour to the elephant-headed god who averts all hindrances, who is the
cause of every success, who ferries us over the sea of difficulties.
Thus Naraváhanadatta obtained Saktiyasas, and besides he had those
wives he married before, Ratnaprabhá and others, and his consort
the head wife Madanamanchuká, and with them and his friends he led
a happy life at the court of his father in Kausámbí.