reveal her passion by becoming erect,” he adds as he sees her writing something with her nails on a lotos leaf.  She reads to her companions what she has written:  “Your heart I know not; me love burns day and night, you cruel one, because I think of you alone."[276] Encouraged by this confession, the king steps from his place of concealment and exclaims:  “Slender girl, the glowing heat of love only burns you, but me it consumes, and incessant is the great torture.”  Sakuntala tries to rise, but is too weak, and the king bids her dispense with ceremony.  While he expresses his happiness at having found his love reciprocated, one of the companions mutters something about “Kings having many loves,” and Sakuntala herself exclaims:  “Why do you detain the royal sage?  He is quite unhappy because he is separated from his wives at court.”  But the king protests that though he has many women at court, his heart belongs to no other but her.  Left alone with Sakuntala, he exclaims: 

“Be not alarmed!  For am not I, who brings you adoring homage, at your side?  Shall I fan you with the cooling petals of these water-lilies?  Or shall I place your lotos feet on my lap and fondle them to my heart’s content, you round-hipped maiden?”

“God forbid that I should be so indiscreet with a man that commands respect,” replies Sakuntala.  She tries to escape, and when the king holds her, she says:  “Son of Puru!  Observe the laws of propriety and custom!  I am, indeed, inflamed by love, but I cannot dispose of myself.”  The king urges her not to fear her foster father.  Many girls, he says, have freely given themselves to kings without incurring parental disapproval; and he tries to kiss her.  A voice warns them that night approaches, and, hearing her friends returning, Sakuntala urges the king to conceal himself in the bushes.

Sakuntala now belongs to the king; they are united according to one of the eight forms of Hindoo marriage known as that of free choice.  After remaining with her a short time the king returns to his other wives at court.  Before leaving he puts a seal ring on her finger and tells her how she can count the days till a messenger shall arrive to bring her to his palace.  But month after month passes and no messenger arrives.  “The king has acted abominably toward Sakuntala,” says one of her friends; “he has deceived an inexperienced girl who put faith in him.  He has not even written her a letter, and she will soon be a mother.”  She feels convinced, however, that the king’s neglect is due to the action of a saint who had cursed Sakuntala because she had not waited on him promptly.  “Like a drunkard, her lover shall forget what has happened,” was his curse.  Relenting somewhat, he added afterward that the force of the curse could be broken by bringing to the king some ornament that he might have left as a souvenir.  Sakuntala has her ring, and relying on that she departs with a retinue for the royal abode.  On the way,