The Kathá Sarit Ságara; or, Ocean of the Streams of Story
said to his servants, "Come now, shew me this heroic human victim,
who killed so many of my warriors when he was being captured." As soon
as his servants heard this, they brought Sundarasena, smeared with
clotted blood, and defiled with wounds, into the presence of that
king. When the king of the Bhillas saw him, he half recognised him,
and being terrified, said to him, "Tell me, who are you, and whence
do you come?" Sundarasena answered the king of the Bhillas, "What does
it matter who I am, or whence I come? Do what you are about to do."
Then Vindhyaketu recognised him completely by his voice, and exclaiming
excitedly, "Alas! Alas!" fell on the ground. Then he embraced the
prince, and said, "Alas, great king Mahásena, see what a fitting
return I, villain that I am, have now made for your numerous benefits,
in that I have here reduced to such a state your son, whom you value
as your life, prince Sundarasena, who has come here from somewhere
or other!" This and many other such laments he uttered in such a way
that all there began to shed tears. But the delighted companions
of Sundarasena comforted the Bhilla king, saying to him, "Is not
this much that you recognised the prince before any misfortune had
happened? What could you have done after the event had taken place? So
why do you despond in the midst of this joy?"
Then the king fell at the feet of Sundarasena, and lovingly honoured
him, and Sundarasena got him to set all the human victims free. And
after he had shown him all due respect, he took him to his village
and his friends with him, and proceeded to bandage his wounds and
administer medicines to him; and he said to him, "Tell me, prince, what
brought you to this place, for I have a great desire to know." Then
Sundarasena related to him all his adventures. And that prince of the
Savaras, being astonished, said to him, "What a wonderful chain of
events! That you should have set out to marry Mandaravatí, and that
you should then have been wrecked [453] in the sea, and that this
should have led to your reaching the hermitage of Matanga, and to
your meeting your beloved there, and that this merchant, in whom you
confided, should have carried her off from you, and that you should
have entered the wilderness, and have been imprisoned for sacrifice,
and recognised by me and delivered from that death--how strangely does
all this hang together! Therefore honour by all means to mysteriously
working Destiny! And you must not feel anxious about your beloved,
for, as Destiny has done all this, she will also do you that other
service soon."
While the king of the Pulindas was saying this, his commander-in-chief
came quickly in a state of high delight, and entering said to him,
"King, a certain merchant entered this wilderness with his followers,
and he had with him much wealth and a very beautiful lady, a very gem
of women; and when I heard of this, I went with an army, and seized
him and his followers, with the wealth and the lady, and I have them
here outside." When Sundarasena and Vindhyaketu heard this, they said
to themselves "Can these be that merchant and Mandáravatí?" And they
said, "Let the merchant and the lady be brought in here at once," and
thereupon the commander-in-chief brought in that merchant and that
lady. When Dridhabuddhi saw them, he exclaimed, "Here is that very
princess Mandáravatí, and here is that villain of a merchant. Alas,
princess! How came you to be reduced to this state, like a creeper
scorched by the heat, with your bud-like lip dried up, and with your
flower-ornaments stripped off?" While Dridhabuddhi was uttering this
exclamation, Sundarasena rushed forward, and eagerly threw his arms
round the neck of his beloved. Then the two lovers wept for a long
time, as if to wash off from one another, by the water of a shower
of tears, the defilement of separation.
Then Vindhyaketu, having consoled them both, said to that merchant,
"How came you to carry off the wife of one who confided in
you?" Then the merchant said, with a voice trembling with fear,
"I have fruitlessly done this to my own destruction, but this holy
saint was preserved by her own unapproachable splendour; I was no
more able to touch her, than if she had been a flame of fire; and I
did intend, villain that I was, to take her to my own country, and
after her anger had been allayed, and she had been reconciled to me,
to marry her." When the merchant had said this, the king ordered him to
be put to death on the spot; but Sundarasena saved him from execution;
however he had his abundant wealth confiscated, a heavier loss than
that of life; for those that have lost their wealth die daily, not
so those that have lost their breath.
So Sundarasena had that merchant set at liberty, and the wretched
creature went where he would, pleased at having escaped with life; and
king Vindhyaketu took Mandáravatí, and went with her and Sundarasena to
the palace of his own queen. There he gave orders to his queen, and had
Mandáravatí honoured with a bath, with clothes and with unguents, and
after Sundarasena had been in the same way bathed and adorned, he made
him sit down on a splendid throne, and honoured him with gifts, pearls,
musk, and so on. And on account of the reunion of that couple, the king
made a great feast, at which all the Savara women danced delighted.
Then, the next day, Sundarasena said to the king, "My wounds are
healed, and my object is attained, so I will now go hence to my own
city; and, please, send off at once to my father a messenger with a
letter, to tell the whole story, and announce my arrival." [454] When
the Savara chief heard this, he sent off a messenger with a letter,
and gave him the message which the prince suggested.
And just as the letter-carrier was reaching the city of Alaká, it
happened that king Mahásena and his queen, afflicted because they
heard no tidings of Sundarasena, were preparing to enter the fire in
front of a temple of Siva, surrounded by all the citizens, who were
lamenting their approaching loss. Then the Savara, who was bearing the
letter, beholding king Mahásena, came running up proclaiming who he
was, stained with dust, bow in hand, with his hair tied up in a knot
behind with a creeper, black himself, and wearing a loin-cincture
of vilva-leaves. That letter-carrier of the king of the Bhillas
said, "King, you are blessed with good fortune to-day, as your son
Sundarasena has come with Mandáravatí, having escaped from the sea; for
he has arrived at the court of my master Vindhyaketu, and is on his way
to this place with him, and has sent me on before." Having said this,
and thus discharged his confidential commission, the letter-carrier
of the Bhilla king laid the letter at the monarch's feet. Then all
the people there, being delighted, raised a shout of joy; and the
letter was read out, and the whole of the wonderful circumstances
became known; and king Mahásena recompensed the letter-carrier, and
abandoned his grief, and made great rejoicings, and entered his palace
with all his retainers. And the next day, being impatient, he set out
to meet his son, whose arrival he expected, accompanied by the king
of Hansadvípa. And his force of four arms marched along with him,
innumerable, so that the earth trembled, dreading insupportable weight.
In the meanwhile Sundarasena set out from that village of the Bhillas
for his own home, with Mandáravatí. And he was accompanied by his
friends Vikramasakti and Bhímabhuja, whom he found in the prison,
and Dridhabuddhi too was with him. He himself rode on a horse swift
as the wind, by the side of Vindhyaketu, and seemed by the hosts of
Pulindas that followed him, to be exhibiting the earth as belonging
to that race. And as he was marching along, in a few days he beheld
on the road his father coming to meet him, with his retinue and his
connections. Then he got down from his horse, and the people beheld him
with joy, and he and his friends went up and fell at the feet of his
father. His father, when he beheld his son looking like the full moon,
felt like the sea which surges up with throbbings of joy, and overflows
its bounds, and could not contain himself for happiness. [455] And
when he saw Mandáravatí, his daughter-in-law, bowing at his feet,
he considered himself and his family prosperous, and rejoiced. And
the king welcomed Dridhabuddhi and the other two ministers of his
son, who bowed at his feet, and he received Vindhyaketu with still
warmer welcome.
Then Sundarasena bowed before his father-in-law Mandáradeva, whom his
father introduced to him, and rejoiced exceedingly; and beholding
his ministers Chandaprabha and Vyághraparákrama, who had arrived
before, clinging to his feet, he considered that all his wishes were
accomplished. And immediately king Mahendráditya, who was delighted
at hearing what had happened, came there from Sasánkapura out of
affection. Then prince Sundarasena, mounted on a splendid horse,
escorting his beloved, as Nadakúvara did Rambhá, went with all those to
his own home, the city of Alaká, the dwelling-place of all felicities,
abounding in virtuous men. And accompanied by his beloved he entered
the palace of his father, being sprinkled, as he passed through the
city, by the wives of the citizens, who were all crowding to the
windows, with the blue lotuses of their eyes. And in the palace he
bowed at the feet of his mother, whose eyes were full of tears of joy,
and then spent that day in rejoicings, in which all his relations
and servants took part.
And the next day, in the long desired hour fixed by the astrologers,
the prince received the hand of Mandáravatí, who was bestowed on him by
her father. And his father-in-law, king Mandáradeva, as he had no son,
bestowed on him many priceless jewels, in his joy, and the reversion
of his kingdom after his own death. And his father, king Mahásena,
without exhausting the earth, made a great feast, in a style suitable
to his desires and means, in which all prisoners were released, and a
rain of gold was seen. [456] And having beheld Sundarasena prosperous
by his union with Mandáravatí, and having taken part in his wedding
festivities, in which all the women danced to song, and having been
honoured by king Mahásena, king Mandáradeva returned to his own
territory, and the king of Sasánkapura returned to that city, and
Vindhyaketu, the lord of the great wilderness, returned to his domain.
And after some days had elapsed, king Mahásena, perceiving that his son
Sundarasena was virtuous and beloved by the subjects, established him
in his throne, and went himself to the forest. And prince Sundarasena,
having thus obtained the kingdom, and having conquered all his enemies
by the might of his arm, ruled with those ministers the whole earth,
and found his joy in the possession of Mandáravatí ever increasing.
When the minister Vyághrasena had told this story on the bank of the
lake to Mrigánkadatta, he went on to say to him, "This wonderful tale,
prince, did the hermit Kanva relate to us in the hermitage, and at
the end of the tale the compassionate man said to us, to comfort
us, 'So, my sons, those who endure with resolute hearts terrible
misfortunes hard to struggle through, attain in this way the objects
they most desire; but those others, whose energies are paralysed by
loss of courage, fail. Therefore abandon this despondency, and go
on your way. Your master also, prince Mrigánkadatta, shall recover
all his ministers, and shall long rule the earth, after having been
united with Sasánkavatí.' When that great hermit had said this to
us, we plucked up courage, and spent the night there, and then set
out from that hermitage, and in course of time reached this wood,
travel-worn. And while here, being tortured with excessive thirst