Page:Bengal Fairy Tales.djvu/100

80 The parees then roused them from sleep, and standing aside in the shadow watched to see what would happen. Great was the amazement of the prince and the princess to be thus miraculously brought together, and shyly at first they began to converse, Madan giving an account of himself, and Madhumala informing him who she was. The conversation soon became of an intimate nature and with both it was a case of love at first sight. Both made promises of everlasting fidelity and exchanged rings as tokens of their plighted troth. But their enjoyment was of short duration: the parees cast an irresistible spell on them, and they fell fast asleep, leaving the match-makers free to dispose of them as they willed. During the small hours of the morning they removed the prince to his camp, not on his own couch, but on that of the princess. This expedient was resorted to in order to leave a tangible token of the happy meeting.

When the prince awoke in the morning the first words he uttered were, "O Madhumala, where art thou?" His companions were naturally astounded, and the prime minister's son, hearing from the prince of his adventures during the night, at once declared that it must have been nothing but a dream. The prince, however, replied, "Friend, you call my experience of the past night a dream, but could a man exchange his ring with another's in a dream? See also this couch. Is it the one on which I fell asleep last evening?" The argument, though convincing enough, had no force with the minister's son, who at once made arrangements for the breaking up of the encampment and the instant return of the party to the palace. The prince reluctantly consented, but the state of his mind was unchanged. After his return home he could speak of nothing but this adventure until at last his distracted parents feared that his mind was affected and that he was under a spell. In vain they tried to divert his mind from the subject. The young man persisted in his assertions, and ultimately implored them to allow him to set out in search of Madhumala, to whom he had plighted his troth in the dream.