No. 240:  “Through being out of sight, my child, in course of time the love dwindles away even of those who were firmly joined in tender union, as water runs from the hollow of the hand.”

No. 106:  “O heart that, like a long piece of wood which is being carried down the rapids of a small stream is caught at every place, your fate is nevertheless to be burnt by some one!”

No. 80:  “By being out of sight love goes away; by seeing too often it goes away; also by the gossip of malicious persons it goes away; yes, it also goes away by itself.”

“If the bee, eager to sip, always seeks the juices of new growths, this is the fault of the sapless flowers, not of the bee.”

Where love is merely sensual and shallow lovers’ quarrels do not fan the flame, but put it out: 

     “Love which, once dissolved, is united again, after
     unpleasant things have been revealed, tastes flat, like
     water that has been boiled.”

The commercial element is conspicuous in this kind of love; it cannot persist without a succession of presents: 

No. 67:  “When the festival is over nothing gives pleasure.  So also with the full moon late in the morning—­and of love, which at last becomes insipid—­and with gratification, that does not manifest itself in the form of presents.”

The illicit, impure aspect of Oriental love is hinted at in many of the poems collected by Hala.  There are frequent allusions to rendezvous in temples, which are so quiet that the pigeons are scared by the footsteps of the lovers; or in the high grain of the harvest fields; or on the river banks, so deserted that the monkeys there fill their paunches with mustard leaves undisturbed.

No. 19:  “When he comes what shall I do?  What shall I say and what will come of this?  Her heart beats as, with these thoughts, the girl goes out on her first rendezvous.” (Cf. also Nos. 223 and 491.)

No. 628:  “O summer time! you who give good opportunities for rendezvous by drying the small ditches and covering the trees with a dense abundance of leaves! you test-plate of the gold of love-happiness, you must not fade away yet for a long time.”

     No. 553:  “Aunt, why don’t you remove the parrot from
     this bed-chamber?  He betrays all the caressing words to
     others.”

Hindoo poets have the faculty, which they share with the Japanese, of bringing a whole scene or episode vividly before the eyes with a sentence or two, as all the foregoing selections show.  Sometimes a whole story is thus condensed, as in the following: 

“‘Master!  He came to implore our protection.  Save him!’ thus speaking, she very slyly hastened to turn over her paramour to her suddenly entering husband.” (See also No. 305 and Hitopadesa, p. 88.)

SYMPTOMS OF MASCULINE LOVE