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before pleased with his other excellent qualities, was now more exceedingly delighted; and he took that anklet in his joy and gave it with his own hand to the queen, and described to her the way in which he had obtained it. And she, hearing the story and beholding that heavenly jewelled anklet, rejoiced in her heart and was continually engaged in extolling Aśokadatta. Then the king said to her: " Queen, in birth, in learning, in truthfulness and beauty Aśokadatta is great among the great; and I think it would be a good thing if he were to become the husband of our lovely daughter Madanalekhá; in a bridegroom, these qualities are to be looked for, not fortune that vanishes in a moment, so I will give my daughter to this excellent hero." When she heard that speech of her husband's, that queen approving the proposal said, " It is quite fitting, for the youth will be an appropriate match for her, and her heart has been captivated by him, for she saw him in a spring-garden, and for some days her mind has been in a state of vacancy and she neither hears nor sees; I heard of it from her confidante, and, after spending an anxious night, towards morning I fell asleep, and I remember I was thus addressed by some heavenly woman in a dream, ' My child, thou must not give this thy daughter Madanalekhá to any one but Aśokadatta, for she is his wife acquired by him in a former birth.' And when I heard it, I woke up, and in the morning I want myself on the strength of the dream and consoled my daughter. And now, my husband has of his own accord proposed the marriage to me. Let her therefore be united to him, as a spring-creeper to its stalk." When the king's beloved wife said this to him, he was pleased, and he made festal rejoicings, and summoning Aśokadatta gave that daughter to him. And the union of those two, the daughter of the king, and the son of the great Bráhman, was such that each enhanced the other's glory, like the union of prosperity and modesty. And once upon a time the queen said to the king, with reference to the anklet brought by Aśokadatta: " My husband, this anklet by itself does not look well, so let another be made like it." When the king heard that, he gave an order to the goldsmiths and other craftsmen of the kind, to make a second anklet like that. But they, after examining it said;— " It is impossible, O king, to make another like it, for the work is heavenly, not human. There are not many jewels of this kind upon the earth, so let another be sought for where this was obtained." When the king and the queen heard this, they were despondent, and Aśokadatta who was there, on seeing that, immediately said, " I myself will bring you a fellow to that anklet." And having made this promise he could not give up tho project on which he was resolved, although the king, terrified at his tern endeavoured to dissuade him out of affection. And taking tho anklet he went again on the fourteenth night of the black fortnight to the cemetery where he had first obtained it; and after he had entered that cemetery which
