Page:Katha sarit sagara, vol2.djvu/626

 And he went with him to his own city Pátáliputra, and he remained there some time welcomed by his father. And there he told his parents all his adventures, beginning with his marrying Rúpavatí, and ending with the story of Kandarpa.

In the meanwhile Sumanas fled, terrified at the elephants, and entered a thicket, and while she was there, the sun set for her. And when night came on, she cried out in her woe, " Alas, my husband ! Alas, my father! Alas, my mother !" and resolved to fling herself into a forest fire. And in the meanwhile that company of witches, that were so full of pity for Kandarpa, having conquered the other witches, reached their own temple. There they remembered Kandarpa, and finding out by their supernatural knowledge that his wife had lost her way in a wood, they deliberated as follows, " Kandarpa, being a resolute man, will unaided obtain his desire; but his wife, being a young girl, and having lost her way in the forest, will assuredly die. So let us take her and put her down in Ratnapura, in order that she may live there in the house of Kandarpa's father with his other wife." When the witches had come to this conclusion, they went to that forest and comforted Sumanas there, and took her and left her in Ratnapura.

When the night had passed, Sumanas, wandering about in that city, heard the following cry in the mouths of the people who were running hither and thither, " Lo ! the virtuous Anangavatí, the wife of the Bráhman Kandarpa, who, after her husband had gone somewhere or other, lived a long time in hope of reunion with him, not having recovered him, has now gone out in despair to enter the fire, followed by her weeping father- in-law and mother-in-law." When Sumanas heard that, she went quickly to the place where the pyre had been made, and going up to Anangavatí, said to her, in order to dissuade her, " Noble lady, do not act rashly for that husband of yours is alive." Having said this, she told the whole story from the beginning. And she shewed the jewelled ring that Kandarpa gave her. Then all welcomed her, perceiving that her account was true. Then Kandarpa's father honoured that bride Sumanas and gladly lodged her in his house with the delighted Anangavatí. Then Kandarpa left Páțaliputra* without telling Keśața, as he knew he would not like it, in order to roam about in search of Sumanas. And after he had gone, Keśața, feeling unhappy without Rúpavatí, left his house without his parents' knowledge, and went to roam about hither and thither. And Kandarpa, in the course of his wanderings, happened to visit that very city, where Keśața married Rúpavatí. And hearing a great noise of people, he asked what it meant, and a certain man said to him, " Here is Rúpavatí preparing to die, as she cannot find her husband Keśața; the