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crushing stroke.”

      The pious king, with grief distressed,

      The noble hundred thus addressed:

      “With patience, daughters, bear your fate,

      Yours was a deed supremely great

      When with one mind you kept from shame

      The honour of your father’s name.

      Patience, when men their anger vent,

      Is woman’s praise and ornament;

      Yet when the Gods inflict the blow

      Hard is it to support the woe.

      Patience, my girls, exceeds all price:

      ’Tis alms, and truth, and sacrifice.

      Patience is virtue, patience fame:

      Patience upholds this earthly frame.

      And now, I think, is come the time

      To wed you in your maiden prime.

      Now, daughters, go where’er you will:

      Thoughts for your good my mind shall fill.”

      The maidens went, consoled, away:

      The best of kings, that very day,

      Summoned his ministers of state

      About their marriage to debate.

      Since then, because the Wind-God bent

      The damsels’ forms for punishment,

      That royal town is known to fame

By Kanyákubja’s3 borrowed name.

      There lived a sage called Chúli then,

      Devoutest of the sons of men;

      His days in penance rites he spent,

      A glorious saint, most continent.

      To him absorbed in tasks austere

      The child of Urmilá drew near,

      Sweet Somadá, the heavenly maid

      And lent the saint her pious aid.

      Long time near him the maiden spent,

      And served him meek and reverent,

      Till the great hermit, pleased with her,

      Thus spoke unto his minister:

      “Grateful am I for all thy care:

      Blest maiden, speak, thy wish declare.”

      The sweet-voiced nymph rejoiced to see

      The favour of the devotee,

      And to that eloquent old man,

      Most eloquent she thus began:

      “Thou hast, by heavenly grace sustained,

      Close union with the Godhead gained.

      I long, O Saint, to see a son

      By force of holy penance won.

      Unwed, a maiden life I live:

      A son to me, thy suppliant, give.”

      The saint with favour heard her prayer,

      And gave a son exceeding fair.

      Him, Chúli’s spiritual child,

His mother Brahmadatta4 styled.

      King Brahmadatta, rich and great,

      In Kámpilí maintained his state,

      Ruling, like Indra in his bliss,

      His fortunate metropolis.

      King Kuśanábha planned that he

      His hundred daughters’ lord should be.

      To him, obedient to his call,

      The happy monarch gave them all.

      Like Indra then he took the hand

      Of every maiden of the band.

      Soon as the hand of each young maid

      In Brahmadatta’s palm was laid,

      Deformity and cares away,

      She shone in beauty bright and gay.

      Their freedom from the Wind-God’s might

      Saw Kuśanábha with delight.

      Each glance that on their forms he threw

      Filled him with raptures ever new.

      Then when the rites were all complete,

      With highest marks of honour meet

      The bridegroom with his brides he sent

      To his great seat of government.

      The nymph received with pleasant speech

      Her daughters; and, embracing each,

      Upon their forms she fondly gazed,

      And royal Kuśanábha praised.

1 The modern Berar.

2 According to the Bengal recension the first (Kuśámba) is called Kuśáśva, and his city Kauśáśví. This name does not occur elsewhere. The reading of the northern recension is confirmed by Foê Kouê Ki; p. 385, where the city Kiaoshangmi is mentioned. It lay 500 lis to the south-west of Prayága, on the south bank of the Jumna. Mahodaya is another name of Kanyakubja: Dharmáraṇya, the wood to which the God of Justice is said to have fled through fear of Soma the Moon-God was in Magadh. Girivraja was in the same neighbourhood. See Lasson’s I, A. Vol. I. p. 604.

3 That is, the City of the Bent Virgins, the modern Kanauj or Canouge.

4 Literally, Given by Brahma or devout contemplation.

      Canto 35. Visvámitra’s Lineage.

      “The rites were o’er, the maids were wed,

      The bridegroom to his home was sped.

      The sonless monarch bade prepare

      A sacrifice to gain an heir.

      Then Kuśa, Brahmá‘s son, appeared,

      And thus King Kuśanábha cheered:

      “Thou shalt, my child, obtain a son

      Like thine own self, O holy one.

      Through him for ever, Gádhi named,

      Shalt thou in all the worlds be famed.”

      He spoke, and vanished from the sight

      To Brahmá‘s world of endless light.

      Time fled, and, as the saint foretold,

      Gádhi was born, the holy-souled.

      My sire was he; through him I trace

      My line from royal Kuśa’s race.

      My sister — elder-born was she —

The pure and good Satyavatí,1

      Was

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