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her, and thus committed a grievous offence against the venerable Canna, who is of thy divine lineage; afterwards, on seeing this fatal ring, I remembered my love and my nuptials; but the whole transaction yet fills me with wonder. My soul was confounded with strange ignorance that obscured my senses; as if a man were to see an elephant marching before him, yet to doubt what animal it could be, till he discovered by the traces of his large feet that it was an elephant.

Cas. Cease, my son, to charge thyself with an offence committed ignorantly, and, therefore, innocently.—Now hear me

Dushm. I am devoutly attentive.

Cas. When the nymph Ménacà led Sacontalá from the place where thy desertion of her had afflicted her soul, she brought her to the palace of Aditi; and I knew, by the power of meditation on the Supreme Being, that thy forgetfulness of thy pious and lawful consort had proceeded from the imprecation of Durvásas, and that the charm would terminate on the sight of thy ring.

Dushm. [Aside.] My name then is cleared from infamy.

Sac. Happy am I that the son of my lord, who now recognises me, denied me through ignorance, and not with real aversion.—The terrible imprecation was heard, I suppose, when my mind was intent on a different object, by my two beloved friends, who, with extreme affection, concealed it from me to spare my feelings, but