Peering
through the branches, he perceives her reclining on a stone seat strewn
with flowers. Her two companions are with her, and she is sick unto
death. The king notices that her cheeks are wasted, her breasts less
swelling, her slender waist more slender, her roseate hue has grown
pale, and she seems like some poor _madhave_ creeper touched by winds
that have scorched its leaves. Her companions anxiously inquire the
cause of her sickness, and, after much hesitation, she reveals her love
by inscribing a poem, with her fingernail, on a lotus leaf smooth as a
parrot's breast. The king hears the avowal of her love, rushes in to
her, and declares his passion: adding that daughters of a royal saint
have often been wedded by _Gandharva_ rites, without ceremonies or
parental consent, yet have not forfeited the father's blessing. He thus
overcomes her scruples. Gautami, the matron of the hermitage, afterwards
enters, and asks, "My child, is your fever allayed?" "Venerable mother,"
is the reply, "I feel a grateful change." As the king sits in solitude
that evening in the deserted arbor, he hears a voice outside, uttering
the verses--"The evening rites have begun; but, dark as the clouds of
night, the demons are swarming round the altar fires.
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