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But he danced for joy, because he thought that he was about to enter a new body, and that by means of that he would acquire greater magic
power; for to whom is not youth pleasing."
When the Vetála, who was inside that corpse, heard this speech of the king's, he left his shoulder and went back to that aśoka-tree; but that exceedingly undaunted monarch again ran after him, to recover him; for the resolution of determined men surpasses in firmness the mighty mountains, and remains unshaken even at the end of a kalpa.
CHAPTER XCVIII.
(Vetála 24.)
Then the brave king Trivikramasena, disregarding the awful night, which in that terrible cemetery assumed the appearance of a Rákshasí, being black with darkness, and having the flames of the funeral pyres for fiery eyes, again went to the aśoka-tree, and took from it the Vetála, and put him on his shoulder.
And while he was going along with him, as before, the Vetála again said to that king, " king, I am tired out with going backwards and forwards, though you are not: so I will put to you one difficult question, and mind you listen to me."
Story of the father that married the daughter and the son that married the mother.:— There was in the Dekkan a king of small province, who was named Dharma; he was the chief of virtuous men, but he had many relations who aspired to supplant him. He had a wife named Chandravatí, who came from the land of Málava; she was of high lineage, and the most virtuous of women. And that king had born to him by that wife one daughter, who was not without cause named Lávanyavatí,*[1]
And when that daughter had attained a marriageable age, king Dharma was ejected from his throne by his relations, who banded together and divided his realm. Then he fled from his kingdom at night with his wife and that daughter, taking with him a large number of valuable jewels, and he deliberately set out for Málava the dwelling-place of his father-in-law. And in the course of that same night he reached the Vindhya forest with his wife and daughter. And when he entered it, the night, that had escorted him thus far, took leave of him with drops of dew by way of tears. And the sun ascended the eastern mountain, stretching forth its
- ↑ * i. e., possessed of beauty.
