is my Chandravali",[1] said Diggaja to himself. "And why shouldn't this be, considering what a d-d 'pail of clarified butter' I have discharged? 'Tis a mercy Bimala dosn't know it's a borrowed feather."
To-day great joy awaits Madhava's[2] luck—to-day Vrikabhanu's daughter is hieing herself to the grove-embosomed cottage.
CHAPTER XII.
ASHMANI'S RENDEZVOUS.[3]
Of what pattern of beauty was Diggaja's charmer, Ashmani, the reader is no doubt curious to know; and I will satisfy his curiosity. But it would be highly impudent for so contemptible a person as I am to depart from the beaten path followed by authors when engaged in describing female loveliness. I will therefore begin with the beginning i. e. the invocation.
O word-presiding Goddess![4] O thou of the lotus seat! O thou with a countenance fine as the autumnal moon! Thou whose feet excel a group of chaste lotuses, and whose bosom overflows with the 'milk of kindness' for thy devotee, vouchsafe unto me the protection of those lily-like feet of thine, for I am going to describe
- ↑ One of the sixteen thousand paramours of Krishna and a principal rival of Radhika.
- ↑ Another name of Krishna.
- ↑ In this Chapter, the illustrious author holds up to eternal ridicule those Sanskrit and Bengali writers—and their name is legion—who, departing from truth and sobriety, deal in astounding hyperboles and far-fetched conceits.
- ↑ This is a typical invocation of Saraswati, the goddess of learning.
