Thus compounded of truth and falsehood, human life glides on in its own way,—a part of it shaped by Providence, a part by ourselves, and a part by our neighbours. It is a patchwork of odds and ends, truth and falsehood, the fictitious and the real.
Only the songs that the poet sang were true and whole. Their theme was the old old one of Radha and Krishna,—the Eternal Male and the Eternal Feminine, the primeval sorrow and the unending bliss! In those songs he told his true inner history; and the truth of the songs was tested in every heart from the king's to the poorest peasant's, at Amarápur. His songs were in every mouth. When the moon appeared or a breath of the south-wind blew, at once all over the country his songs overflooded the woods, the roads, the boats, the balconies, and the courtyards. And his fame knew no bounds.
Years passed on in this way. The poet wrote his odes, the king listened to them, the courtiers cried applause, Manjari visited the ghat, and from the lattice-window of the royal harem now a shadow was cast, now a tinkle of anklets was heard.
II.
Then came a champion-poet from the Southern Land. Chanting a Pythean ode in praise of the king, he stood in the royal Court. After leaving home he had defeated in metrical contest the laureate of every king on the way, and had at last reached Amarápur.
The king reverently said, "Welcome! Welcome!" The poet, Pundarik, haughtily cried out, "Come on! I challenge your Court."
The king's honour demanded that the challenge should be accepted. But Shekhar had no clear idea of how a poetical combat can be fought out. He grew extremely nervous and alarmed. His night wore on without sleep. On all sides he only saw images of the renowned Pundarik's tall stalwart frame, sharp hawk nose, and proud elevated crest.
In the morning the poet entered the arena with a trembling heart. From the earliest dawn the Court had been filled with spectators; the din was ceaseless; all work had been stopped in the city.
With great effort Shekhar forced a smile of cheerfulness on to his face, and bowed to his rival poet;—Pundarik with profound indifference returned the salute by a slight nod, and looked at his admiring followers with a smile.
Shekhar cast one glance at the lattice of the harem. He knew that from there hundreds of curious dark eyes were gazing eagerly and ceaselessly on the crowd. Once he threw up his heart in abstraction at that high plane and bowed to his guardian deity saying only, "If I win today, then O goddess, O Invicta, it will only prove thy name true!"
Trumpet and clarion pealed forth. The assembled throng stood up with a cry of "Hail". King Uday-náráyan, clad in white, entered the hall slowly like the fleecy clouds sailing in the sky of autumn mornings, and mounted his throne.
Pundarik advanced and stood in front of the throne. The vast assembly was hushed.
With chest thrown out and head slightly tilted aside, the large-limbed Pundarik began to chant deeply an ode in glory of Uday-náráyan. His voice filled the vast hall to overflowing; its deep resonance beat and was beaten back from the walls around, the pillars and the roof, like waves of the sea. The impact of the sound made the hearts of the vast audience quiver like so many doors. What skill he showed, what literary craft, what various interpretations of the name Udaynarayan, howi many different anagrams formed out of the letters of the king's name, how many metres, and how many puns!
When Pundarik made pause, for a time the hushed hall only simmered with the echo of his voice and the speechless amazement of a thousand hearts. The scholars come from far and near raised their right arms and with uplifted voice cried 'Bravo' on him.
The king from his throne cast one glance at Shekhar. The poet sent back to the king a look of mingled respect, friendship, pride and some amount of pathos and shrinking, too, and then slowly rose from his seat. Surely, when Rama, to humour his subjects, asked Sita to go through the ordeal of fire again, she must have looked thus as she stood up before her husband's throne.
The silent look of the poet seemed to tell
