Page:Sacontala (Jones 1870).djvu/50

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48
SACONTALA;

at me, wishing to be unperceivcd; then she smiled, and started a new subject of conversation. Love is by nature averse to a sudden communication, and hitherto neither fully displays, nor wholly conceals, himself in her demeanor towards me.

Mádh. [Laughing.] Has she thus taken possession of your heart on so transient a view?

Dushm. When she walked about with her female friends, I saw her yet more distinctly, and my passion was greatly augmented. She said sweetly, but untruly, "My foot is hurt by the points of the Cusa grass:" then she stopped; but soon, advancing a few paces, turned back her face, pretending a wish to disentangle her vest of woven bark from the branches in which it had not really been caught.

Mádh. You began with chasing an antelope, and have now started new game: thence it is, I presume, that you are grown so found of a consecrated forest.

Dushm. Now the business for you, which I mentioned, is this; you, who are a Bráhmen, must find some expedient for my second entrance into that asylum of virtue.

Mádh. And the advice which I give is this: remember that you are a king.

Dushm. What then?

Mádh. "Hola! bid the hermits bring my sixth part of their grain." Say this, and enter the grove without scruple.