280
of the gods. In the same way I must keep putting off my master." Having thus reflected, the minister secretly made an arrangement with the astrologers that they were to fix a distant date.
Then the queen Vásavadattá found out what had taken place, and summoned the prime-minister to her palace. When he entered and bowed before her, the queen said to him, weeping " Noble sir, you said to me long ago, ' Queen, as long as I remain where I am, you shall have no other rival but Padmávatí,' and observe now, this Kalingasená, is about to be married here: and she is beautiful, and my husband is attached to her, so you have proved a prophet of falsehood and I am now a dead woman." When the minister Yaugandharáyana heard this, he said to her— " Be composed, for how could this happen, queen, while I am alive? However, you must not oppose the king in this matter, but must on the contrary take refuge in self-restraint, and shew him all complaisance. The sick man is not induced to place himself in the physician's hands by disagreeable speeches, but he is by agreeable speeches, if the physician does his work by a conciliatory method. If a man is dragged against the current, he will never escape from the stream of a river, or from a vicious tendency, but if he is carried with the current, he will escape from both. So when the king comes into your presence, receive him with all attentions, without anger, concealing your real feelings. Approve at present of his marrying Kalingasená, saying that his kingdom will be made more powerful by her father also becoming his ally. And if you do this, the king will perceive that you possess in a high degree the virtue of magnanimity, and his love and courtesy towards you will increase, and thinking that Kalingasená is within his reach, he will not be impatient, for the desire of a man for any object increases if he is restrained. And you must teach this lesson to Padmávatí also, blameless one, and so that king may submit to our putting him off in this matter. And after this, I ween, you will behold my skill in stratagem. For the wise are tested in difficulty, even as heroes are tested in fight. So, queen, do not be despondent." In these words Yaugandharáyana admonished the queen, and, as she received his counsels with respect, he departed thence.*[1] But the king of Vatsa, throughout that day, neither in light nor darkness entered the private apartments of either of the two queens, for his mind was eager for a new well-matched union with Kalingasená, who had approached him in such an ardour of spontaneous choice. And then the queen and the prime-minister and the king and Kalingasená spent the night in wakefulness like that of a great feast, apart in their respective houses, the second couple through impatience for a rare delight, and the first through very profound anxiety.
- ↑ * For san I should prefer sa which is read in a MS. lent me by the Principal of the Sanskrit College.
