grievance, like a new boil rising upon an old one!  Yesterday, while we were lagging behind, my royal friend entered yonder hermitage after a deer; and there, as ill-luck would have it, caught sight of a beautiful girl, called [S’]akoontala, the hermit’s daughter.  From that moment, not another thought about returning to the city! and all last night not a wink of sleep did he get for thinking of the damsel.  What is to be done?  At any rate I will be on the watch for him as soon as he has finished his toilet.

[Walking and looking about.]

Oh! here he comes, attended by the Yavana women[34], with bows in their hands, wearing garlands of wild flowers.  What shall I do?  I have it.  I will pretend to stand in the easiest attitude for resting my bruised and crippled limbs.

[Stands leaning on a staff.

Enter King DUSHYANTA, followed by a retinue, in the manner described.

KING.

True, by no easy conquest may I win her,
Yet are my hopes encouraged by her mien,
Love is not yet triumphant; but, methinks,
The hearts of both are ripe for his delights.

[Smiling.

Ah! thus does the lover delude himself; judging of the state of his loved one’s feelings by his own desires.  But yet,

The stolen glance with half-averted eye,
The hesitating gait, the quick rebuke
Addressed to her companion, who would fain
Have stayed her counterfeit departure; these
Are signs not unpropitious to my suit. 
So eagerly the lover feeds his hopes,
Claiming each trivial gesture for his own.

MA[T.]HAVYA.

[Still in the same attitude.

Ah, friends, my hands cannot move to greet you with the usual salutation.  I can only just command my lips to wish your Majesty victory.

KING.

Why, what has paralysed your limbs?

MA[T.]HAVYA.

You might as well ask me how my eye comes to water after you have poked your finger into it.

KING.

I don’t understand you; speak more intelligibly.

MA[T.]HAVYA.

Ah, my dear friend, is yonder upright reed transformed into a crooked plant by its own act, or by the force of the current?

KING.

The current of the river causes it, I suppose.

MA[T.]HAVYA.

Ay; just as you are the cause of my crippled limbs.

KING.

How so?

MA[T.]HAVYA.

Here are you living the life of a wild man of the woods in a savage unfrequented region, while your State-affairs are left to shift for themselves; and as for poor me, I am no longer master of my own limbs, but have to follow you about day after day in your chases after wild animals, till my bones are all crippled and out of joint.  Do, my dear friend, let me have one day’s rest.

KING. [Aside.