Night had fallen, and it was quite dark by the time I reached the sinsapa wood. As I carefully guided my horse between the tree-trunks, I was welcomed by the splendid odour of the blossoms of the night-lotus, which rose to greet me from the ancient Krishna pond. Very soon the crumbling roof of the temple, with its swarming images of the gods, and its jagged and tangled outlines, began to show against the starlit heavens. I was at the appointed place. Scarcely had I swung myself out of the saddle when my friends were at my side. With a cry of rapture, Vasitthi and I rushed into one another’s arms, half beside ourselves with the joy of meeting again, and all my recollections now are of caresses, stammered words of endearment, and assurances of love and fidelity, which absorbed us utterly, till I was rudely startled by the unexpected feeling of a wing that softly fanned my check as it brushed lightly past. This, with the hoot of an owl, and the hateful clang of a cracked bronze bell which immediately followed, had the effect of completely rousing me from my love-trance. Medini had pulled the old prayer-bell, and so scared the owl from the recess in which she dwelt. The good-hearted girl had done it, not so much to summon the saintly woman, as because she saw that formidable person already coming out of the sanctuary, plainly indignant that she should hear voices within the sacred precincts, although no one had either rung or knocked.
Medini informed the ancient dame that her great reputation for holiness, and the report of her marvellous knowledge, had brought herself and this young man—pointing to Somadatta—to seek her, in order to receive information about what was yet concealed in the lap of time. The holy woman raised her glance searchingly towards heaven, and gave it as her opinion that, as the Pleiades occupied a particularly favourable position with regard to the Polar Star, she had good reason to hope that the spirits would not refuse their help; upon which she invited Somadatta and Medini to enter the House of Krishna, the Sixteen-thousand-one-hundredfold Bridegroom,6 who delighted in granting to a pair of lovers the inmost wishes of their hearts. Vasitthi and I, however, as the supposed attendants, remained outside.
How we now assured one another, with the most solemn oaths, that only the All-destroyer, Death, should be able to part us, how we spoke of my speedy return so soon as the rainy season should be over, and discussed ways and means by which her extremely rich parents should be brought to consent to our union, and how all this was intermingled with innumerable kisses, tears, and embraces, I could not now tell thee with even an attempt at truth, for it abides with me only as the remembrance of a vague dream. Still less, however, can I, if thou thyself hast not lived through a similar experience, give thee any idea of the way in which, in every embrace, sweetest rapture and heartrending despair clasped each other round; for each embrace reminded us that the last for this time would soon come, and who could give us the assurance that it would not then be the very last for all time?
All too soon, Somadatta and Medini came forth from the temple. The saintly woman wished to reveal the future to us also now, but Vasitthi shrank from the thought.
“How should I bear it,” she exclaimed, “if a future menacing disaster were to be unveiled?”
“But why then just menacing disaster?” said the well-meaning old woman, whose life experiences, presumably as the result of her sanctity, had probably been happy ones. “For the servant also, happiness waits,” she added, with a look fraught with promise.
But Vasitthi was not to be allured; sobbing, she clung around my neck.
“Ah! my only love!” she cried, “I feel as though the future with inexorable face were looking down upon us. Oh! I feel it—I shall never see thee more.”
Although these words caused an icy chill to creep over me, I tried to reason her out of this groundless fear; but, just because it was groundless, my most eloquent words availed little or nothing. The tears rolled in an unbroken stream over her cheeks; with a look of divine love, she caught my hand and pressed it to her breast.
“Yet if we should nevermore see each other in this world, we shall still remain faithful; and when this short and painful life on earth is ended, we shall find one another in Paradise, and, united there, forever enjoy the raptures of heaven … O Kamanita, promise me that. How much more will that upraise and strengthen me than any words of comfort! For these are as powerless against the inevitable stream of Fate, already surging towards us, as the reeds against the floods of waters. But all-powerful, bringing forth new life, is sacred, deep-seated resolution.”
“If it depends only upon that, beloved Vasitthi, how should I fail to find thee anywhere?” I said. “But let us hope that it will be in this world.”
“Here everything is uncertain, and even the moment in which we now speak is not ours, but it will be otherwise in Paradise.”
“Ah! Vasitthi,” I sighed, “is there a Paradise—and where does it lie?”
“Where the sun sets,” she replied, with complete conviction, “lies the Paradise of Infinite Light; and for all who have the courage to despise the earthly, and to fix their thoughts upon that place of bliss, there waits a pure birth from the bosom of a lotus flower. The first craving for that Paradise causes a bud to appear in the
