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another likely to be beneficial ? So I depart, my friend, for I have opportunities against others." After saying this, Kali vanished from his sight, and Nala at once became well-disposed as before, and recovered his former splendour. And he returned and remounted the chariot; and in the course of the same day he drove king Rituparna into Vidarbha, so rapidly did he get over the ground, and there the king was ridiculed by the people, who asked the cause of his coining; and he put up near the palace.
And when he arrived, Damayantí knew of it, having heard the wonderful noise of the chariot, and she inly rejoiced, as she suspected that Nala had come too. And she sent her own maid to find out the truth, and she enquired into it, and came back and said to her mistress, who was longing for her beloved lord; " Queen, I have enquired into the matter; this king of Kosala heard a false report of your Svayamvara and has come here, and he has been driven here in one day by Hrasvabáhu his charioteer and cook, who is famous for his skill in managing chariots. And I went into the kitchen and saw that cook. And he is black and deformed, but possesses wonderful powers. It is miraculous that water gushed up in his pots and pans, without being put in, and wood burst into flames of its own accord, without having been lighted,*[1] and various cates were produced in a moment. After 1 had seen this great miracle, I came back here." When Damayantí heard this from the maid, she reflected— " This cook, whom the fire and the water obey, and who knows the secret of chariot-driving, can be no other than my husband, and I suspect lie has become changed and deformed on account of separation from me, but I will test him." When she had formed this resolve, she sent, by way of stratagem, her two children with that same maid, to shew them to him. And Nala, when he had seen his children and taken them on his knees after a long separation, wept silently with a flood of tears. And he said to the maid— " I have two children like these in the house of their maternal grandfather, I have been moved to sorrow by recollecting them." The maid returned with the children and told all to Damayantí, and then she conceived much hope.
And early the next day she gave her maid this order; " Go and tell that cook of Rituparna's from me; ' I hear that there is no cook like you in the world, so come and prepare curry for me to-day.' " When the maid
- ↑ * Cp. the 28th story in the 1st Part of Sicilianische Märchen by Laura Gonzenbach, " Von der Tochter der Sonne." Here Lattughina says " Fire, be lighted," and immediately a clear fire burned upon the hearth. Then she said " Come along, pan," and a golden pan came and placed itself upon the fire. " Come along oil," and the oil came and poured itself into the pan. In " The story of Shams ul dín and his son," Hasan Badr ul dín is discovered by his skill in cooking (Lane's Arabian Nights, Vol. I, p. 266.) Do Gubernatis (Zoological Mythology, Vol. I, p. 158,) remarks that service in the kitchen is especially dear to the young hero.
