Page:Sacred Books of the Buddhists Vol 1.djvu/115

 property, taking what you have got from my part as well as from your father's side .'

Madrî answered: 'Where shall I lay the deposit, my prince?' Visvantara spoke:

29, 30. 'You must always give in charity to people of good conduct, embellishing your bounty by kind observance. Goods deposited in this manner are imperishable and follow us after death. Be a loving daughter to your parents-in-law, a careful mother to our children. Continue in pious conduct, beware of inadvertence; but do not mourn for my absence, will you?'

Upon this, Madrî, avoiding what might impair the firmness of mind of her husband, suppressed the deep sorrow that put her heart to anguish, and said with feigned calmness:

31, 32. 'It is not right, Your Majesty, that you should go to the forest alone. I too will go with you where you must go, my lord. When attending on you, even death will be a festival to me; but living without you I deem worse than death.

'Nor do I think the forest-life to be unpleasant at all. Do but consider it well.

33. 'Removed from wicked people, haunted by deer, resounding with the warbling of manifold birds, the penance-groves with their rivulets and trees, both intact, with their grass-plots which have the loveliness of inlaid lapis lazuli floors, are by far more pleasing than our artificial gardens.

'Indeed, my prince,

34. 'When beholding these children neatly dressed and adorned with garlands, playing in the wild shrubs, you will not think of your royalty.

35. 'The water-carrying brooks, overhung by natural bowers of perpetually renewed beauty, varying according to the succession of the seasons, will delight you in the forest.