Chapter
LXXXVII
(Vetála)
Then the
king went back to the aśoka-tree, and taking the Vetála from it, placed him on
his shoulder, and brought him along, and as he was going along with him, the
Vetála again said to the king, “Listen, king, I will tell you a short story.”
The
story of Harisvámin, who first lost his wife, and then his life
There is a
city of the name of Váráṇasí, the abode of Śiva. In it there lived a Bráhman,
named Devasvámin, honoured by the king. And that rich Bráhman had a son named
Harisvámin; and he had an exceedingly lovely wife, named Lávaṇyavatí. I think
the Disposer must have made her after he had acquired skill by making Tilottamá
and the other nymphs of heaven, for she was of priceless beauty and loveliness.
Now, one night
Harisvámin fell asleep, as he was reposing with her in a palace cool with the
rays of the moon. At that very moment a Vidyádhara prince, by name Madanavega,
roaming about at will, came that way through the air. He saw that Lávaṇyavatí
sleeping by the side of her husband, and her robe, that had slipped aside,
revealed her exquisitely moulded limbs. His heart was captivated by her beauty;
and blinded by love, he immediately swooped down, and taking her up in his arms
asleep, flew off with her through the air.
Immediately
her husband, the young man Harisvámin, woke up, and not seeing his beloved, he
rose up in a state of distraction. He said to himself, “What can this mean?
Where has she gone? I wonder if she is angry with me. Or has she hidden herself
to find out my real feelings, and is making fun of me?” Distracted by many
surmises of this kind, he wandered hither and thither that night, looking for
her on the roof, and in the turrets of the palace. He even searched in the
palace-garden, and when he could not find her anywhere, being scorched with the
fire of grief, he sobbed and lamented, “Alas! my beloved with face like the
moon’s orb, fair as the moonlight; did this night grudge your existence, hating
your charms that rival hers? That very moon, that, vanquished by your beauty,
seemed to be in fear, and comforted me with its rays cool as sandalwood, now
that I am bereaved of you, seems to have seen its opportunity, and smites me
with them, as if with burning coals, or arrows dipped in poison.” While Harisvámin
was uttering these laments, the night at last slowly passed away, not so his
grief at his bereavement.
The next
morning the sun dispelled with his rays the deep darkness that covered the
world, but could not dispel the dense darkness of despondency that had settled
on him. The sound of his bitter lamentations, that seemed to have been
reinforced by wailing power bestowed on him by the chakravákas, whose period of
separation was at an end with the night, was magnified a hundredfold. The young
Bráhman, though his relations tried to comfort him, could not recover his
self-command, now that he was bereaved of his beloved, but was all inflamed
with the fire of separation. And he went from place to place, exclaiming with
tears, “Here she stood, here she bathed, here she adorned herself, and here she
amused herself.”
But his
friends and relations said to him, “She is not dead, so why do you kill
yourself? If you remain alive, you will certainly recover her somewhere or
other. So adopt a resolute tone, and go in search of your beloved; there is
nothing in this world that a resolute man, who exerts himself, cannot obtain.”
When Harisvámin had been exhorted in these terms by his friends and relations,
he managed at last, after some days, to recover his spirits by the aid of hope.
And he said to himself, “I will give away all that I have to the Bráhmans, and
visit all the holy waters, and wash away all my sins. For if I wipe out my sin,
I may perhaps, in the course of my wanderings, find that beloved of mine.”
After going through these reflections suitable to the occasion, he got up and
bathed, and performed all his customary avocations, and the next day he
bestowed on the Bráhmans at a solemn sacrifice various meats and drinks, and
gave away to them all his wealth without stint.
Then he
left his country, with his Bráhman birth as his only fortune, and proceeded to
go round to all the holy bathing-places in order to recover his beloved. And as
he was roaming about, there came upon him the terrible lion of the hot season,
with the blazing sun for mouth, and with a mane composed of his fiery rays. And
the winds blew with excessive heat, as if warmed by the breath of sighs
furnaced forth by travellers grieved at being separated from their wives. And
the tanks, with their supply of water diminished by the heat, and their drying
white mud, appeared to be shewing their broken hearts. And the trees by the
roadside seemed to lament on account of the departure of the glory of spring,
making their wailing heard in the shrill moaning of their bark, with leaves, as
it were lips, parched with heat. At that season Harisvámin, wearied out with
the heat of the sun, with bereavement, hunger and thirst, and continual
travelling, disfigured, emaciated and dirty, and pining for food, reached in
the course of his wanderings, a certain village, and found in it the house of a
Bráhman called Padmanábha, who was engaged in a sacrifice. And seeing that many
Bráhmans were eating in his house, he stood leaning against the door-post,
silent and motionless. And the good wife of that Bráhman named Padmanábha,
seeing him in this position, felt pity for him, and reflected; “Alas! mighty is
hunger! Whom will it not bring down? For here stands a man at the door, who
appears to be a householder, desiring food, with downcast countenance;
evidently come from a long journey, and with all his senses impaired by hunger.
So is not he a man to whom food ought to be given?” Having gone through these
reflections, the kind woman took up in her hands a vessel full of rice boiled
in milk, with ghee and sugar, and brought it, and courteously presented it to
him, and said; “Go and eat this somewhere on the bank of the lake, for this
place is unfit to eat in, as it is filled with feasting Bráhmans.”
He said, “I
will do so,” and took the vessel of rice, and placed it at no great distance
under a banyan-tree on the edge of the lake; and he washed his hands and feet
in the lake, and rinsed his mouth, and then came back in high spirits to eat
the rice. But while he was thus engaged, a kite, holding a black cobra with its
beak and claws, came from some place or other, and sat on that tree. And it so
happened that poisonous saliva issued from the mouth of that dead snake, which
the bird had captured and was carrying along. The saliva fell into the dish of
rice which was placed underneath the tree, and Harisvámin, without observing
it, came and ate up that rice. As soon as in his hunger he had devoured all
that food, he began to suffer terrible agonies produced by the poison. He exclaimed,
“When fate has turned against a man, everything in this world turns also;
accordingly this rice dressed with milk, ghee and sugar, has become poison to
me.”
Thus
speaking, Harisvámin, tortured with the poison, tottered to the house of that
Bráhman, who was engaged in the sacrifice, and said to his wife; “The rice,
which you gave me, has poisoned me; so fetch me quickly a charmer who can
counteract the operation of poison; otherwise you will be guilty of the death
of a Bráhman.” When Harisvámin had said this to the good woman, who was beside
herself to think what it could all mean, his eyes closed, and he died.
Accordingly
the Bráhman, who was engaged in a sacrifice, drove out of his house his wife,
though she was innocent and hospitable, being enraged with her for the supposed
murder of her guest. The good woman, for her part, having incurred groundless
blame from her charitable deed, and so become branded with infamy, went to a
holy bathing-place to perform penance.
Then there
was a discussion before the superintendent of religion, as to which of the four
parties, the kite, the snake, and the couple who gave the rice, were guilty of
the murder of a Bráhman, but the question was not decided.
“Now you,
king Trivikramasena, must tell me, which was guilty of the murder of a Bráhman;
and if you do not, you will incur the before-mentioned curse.”
When the
king heard this from the Vetála, he was forced by the curse to break silence,
and he said, “No one of them could be guilty of the crime; certainly not the
serpent, for how could he be guilty of anything, when he was the helpless prey
of his enemy, who was devouring him? To come to the kite; what offence did he
commit in bringing his natural food which he had happened to find, and eating
it, when he was hungry? And how could either of the couple, that gave the food,
be in fault, since they were both people exclusively devoted to righteousness,
not likely to commit a crime? Therefore I think the guilt of slaying a Bráhman
would attach to any person, who should be so foolish as, for want of sufficient
reflection, to attribute it to either of them.”
When the
king had said this, the Vetála again left his shoulder, and went to his own
place, and the resolute king again followed him.
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