Page:History of Bengali Language and Literature.djvu/310

 The meeting. Champak Nagar. Behula disguised asa sweeper: girl, 274. BENGALI LANGUAGE & LITERATURE. [ Chap. and the knotted hair distinctive of Yoginis. Laks- mindara took a kamandalu in his hand, and covered his beautiful body with ashes like a Yogi. The seeming ascetics passed through Baruipara and other places, and came to the home of Saha, the merchant of Nichhaninagar. They entered the house by the back-door, and came directly to the inner apartments. At that moment, Amala, the mother of Behula, was coming out of the kitchen with a golden plate full of rice, for the dinner of Hari Sadhu, her eldest son, when the sight of the Yogi and Yogini made her tremble with grief, the golden plate fel] from her hand, and she wailed aloud, ‘‘This Yogini is just like my Behula!’’ she could say only thisand no more. She ran up to the supposed Yogini throwing her arms about her and swooned away. Behula held her mother’s head in her arms and tenderly caressed her, weeping pro- fusely. When Amala came to her senses, Behula softly said, ‘‘We are come back, mother, once more to your arms. Yonder Yogi is your son-in-law restor- ed to life.” The people of the whole village came to see them, but Behula would not stop there even for a day. She was eager to go back to Champak Nagar, and in spite of their affectionate remonstrances, embarked once more on board the ship “ Madhukar” and started for Champak Nagar that very day. When they reached that city, however, she played another trick. She disguised herself as a sweeper- girl. While on her way back from heaven she had employed an artist to prepare a fan bedecked with precious stones in which the pictures of all the j