Page:The Sanskrit Drama.djvu/108

Rh The Svapnavāsavadattā, or the Svapnanāṭaka, in six Acts forms in substance the continuation of the Pratijñāyaugandharāyaṇa. The minister is anxious to secure for Udayana an extension of his power by wedding him to Padmāvati, daughter of the king of Magadha. But Udayana will not leave his beloved Vāsavadattā, so that strategy is needed. The minister induces Vāsavadattā to aid in his scheme, and, taking advantage of a temporary separation, he spreads the rumour that the queen and he have perished in a conflagration. The king is thus induced to consider marriage with Padmāvatī, in whose care the minister has entrusted the queen, giving out that she is his sister. Padmāvatī is willing to accept the love of the king, but, learning that he has never ceased to cherish the memory of his beloved, she is seized by a severe headache, and the king comes to comfort her. He does not find her, and lies down, sleep overcoming him; Vāsavadattā who had come to aid Padmāvatī sits down beside the sleeping form which she mistakes for that of her new mistress, but, as he begins to speak in his sleep she rises and leaves him, but not before he has caught a glimpse of her, in a dream as he thinks. He is summoned to the palace, and finds the good news that his foes have been defeated, and a messenger has come from Mahāsena and his wife to console him, bearing the picture of the nuptials of himself and Vāsavadattā. Padmāvatī recognizes in the lady the features of the sister left in her care by Yaugandharāyaṇa, who arrives to explain to the satisfaction of all the plan he has devised to secure Udayana's ends.

The fame of the work in Rājaçekhara's time is attested, and already before him the imaginary conflagration of the queen had excited the imitation of Harṣa in the Ratnāvalī; Vāmana cites from it, and Abhinavagupta knew it. Nor is there any doubt that it is the poet's masterpiece and the most mature of his dramas. Great promise, however, in a different vein is shown in the Cārudatta, of which we have only a fragment in four