well knew that no such demon had possessed her daughter, but that it was all the master’s idle report. But still, to wipe away any evil notion in the minds of the people she publicly proclaimed that her daughter would perform pûjâ in the cremation-ground at midnight at the next new moon.[1] Now, it is always the rule in such rites that the person who is possessed should go alone to the cremation-ground, and, accordingly, on the night of the next new moon, Chandralêkhâ went to the burning-ground with a basket containing all the necessary things for worship, and a light.
Near Kaivalyam, at a distance of five kôs from it, was a great forest called Khâṇḍavam. In it there dwelt eight robbers, who used to commit the greatest havoc in the country round. At the time that Chandralêkhâ proceeded to the cremation-ground, these eight robbers also happened to go there to conceal what they had stolen in the earlier
- ↑ In stories of a master falling in love with the girl he has been teaching, he is usually himself made a soothsayer. In that capacity he asks the guardian (father or mother) to put the girl in a light box and to float her down a river. The girl in the box is taken by a young man, sometimes a prince, and becomes his wife. A tiger or a lion is then put into the box, and when the teacher, a great way down the river, takes the box and wishes to run away with the girl inside, he is torn to pieces, as a fit reward for his evil intentions, by the beast. But here the story takes a different turn.
