Page:The Tamils Eighteen Hundred Years Ago.djvu/110

Rh thy bards are soft as they have no other work but to eat of boiled rice, roasted flesh and spiced mixtures.

On another occasion the same poet composed in honor of the king an ode which is remarkable for boldness of conception and felicity of expression. The ode is addressed to the sun, and the poet draws a series of comparisons between the king and the sun, in all of which he shows that his patron is superior to the luminary. I cannot reproduce in a translation the elegance of expression of the original, but the meaning s as follows :—


 * Bright orb that marchest proudly in the sky!
 * Behind the hills thou hidest from our sight,
 * And thou art seen by day and ne’er by night:
 * Though soaring in the sky so wide and high,
 * Alone thou darest not to show thy face,
 * But comest guarded by a thousand rays!
 * How canst thou vie with Cheral Athan bold,
 * Who countless chiefs in fealty doth hold,
 * Who knows no fear on the battle field
 * And counts no cost the weak and poor to shield,
 * Who scorns divided empire for his sway,
 * And leads the legions that smite and slay?”

Though this was in fact a pure conceit in words, the parallel drawn was so startling, that the king was doubtless highly flattered by this gem of poetry, and he rewarded the poet with a free gift of several villages.

Athan II had two sons, the elder of whom was called Chenkkudduvan and the younger was known as Ilankko-Adikal or the “royal monk.” The latter prince composed the poem Chilapp-athikaram. He relates in this poem that on a certain occasion when he and his brother were seated in the audience hall at the foot of the throne occupied by their father, a seer appeared before the king. He surveyed the features of the king and his two sons and foretold that the king would soon depart his life and that the younger son had every sign of becoming a sovereign. This remark of the seer annoyed Ilanko-adikal, who loved his elder brother dearly, so much that he resolved to renounce the world at once and embrace the life of a monk of the Nigrantha sect, so that all hopes of his succession to the throne may be cut off