arms upraised,
    Five fires around and o’er him blazed. 
    Each weary month the hermit passed
    Breaking but once his awful fast. 
    In winter’s chill the brook his bed,
    In rain, the clouds to screen his head. 
    Thousands of years he thus endured
    Till Brahma’s favor was assured—­
    And the high Lord of living things
    Looked kindly on his sufferings. 
    With trooping Gods the Sire came near
    The King who plied his task austere:—­
    ’Blest Monarch, of a glorious race,
    Thy fervent rites have won my grace. 
    Well hast thou wrought thine awful task,
    Some boon in turn, O Hermit, ask.’

    Bhagirath, rich in glory’s light,
    The hero with the arm of might,
    Thus to the Lord of earth and sky
    Raised suppliant hands and made reply:—­
    ’If the great God his favor deigns,
    And my long toil its fruit obtains,
    Let Sagar’s sons receive from me
    Libations that they long to see. 
    Let Ganga with her holy wave
    The ashes of the heroes lave—­
    That so my kinsmen may ascend
    To heavenly bliss that ne’er shall end. 
    And give, I pray, O God, a son,
    Nor let my house be all undone. 
    Sire of the worlds! be this the grace
    Bestowed upon Ikshvaku’s race,’
    The Sire, when thus the King had prayed,
    In sweet kind words his answer made:—­
    ’High, high thy thought and wishes are,
    Bhagirath of the mighty car! 
    Ikshvaku’s line is blest in thee,
    And as thou prayest it shall be. 
    Ganga, whose waves in Swarga flow,
    Is daughter of the Lord of Snow. 
    Win Siva that his aid be lent
    To hold her in her mid-descent—­
    For earth alone will never bear
    Those torrents hurled from upper air;
    And none may hold her weight but He,
    The Trident-wielding deity,’
    Thus having said, the Lord supreme
    Addressed him to the heavenly stream;
    And then with Gods and Maruts went
    To heaven, above the firmament.”

SAKOONTALA

BY

KALIDASA

[Translation by Sir Monier Monier-Williams]

INTRODUCTION

The drama is always the latest development of a national poetry—­for the origin of poetry is in the religious rite, where the hymn or the ode is used to celebrate the glories of some divinity, or some hero who has been received into the circle of the gods.  This at least is the case in Sanscrit as in Greek literature, where the hymn and ballad precede the epic.  The epic poem becomes the stable form of poetry during the middle period in the history of literature, both in India and Greece.  The union of the lyric and the epic produces the drama.  The speeches uttered by the heroes in such poems as the “Iliad” are put into the mouths of real personages who appear in sight of the audience and represent with fitting gestures and costumes the characters of the story.  The dialogue is interspersed with songs or odes, which reach their perfection in the choruses of Sophocles.