the mistress of this kingdom which I shall confer on thee, O thou of fair face, accept me, and enjoy, O beauteous one, all excellent objects of desire.’  Addressed in these accursed words by Kichaka, that chaste daughter of Drupada answered him thus reprovingly, ’Do not, O son of a Suta, act so foolishly and do not throw away thy life.  Know that I am protected by my five husbands.  Thou canst not have me.  I have Gandharvas for my husbands.  Enraged they will slay thee.  Therefore, do thou not bring destruction on thyself.  Thou intendest to tread along a path that is incapable of being trod by men.  Thou, O wicked one, art even like a foolish child that standing on one shore of the ocean intends to cross over to the other.  Even if thou enterest into the interior of the earth, or soarest into the sky, or rushest to the other shore of the ocean, still thou wilt have no escape from the hands of those sky-ranging offspring of gods, capable of grinding all foes.  Why dost thou today, O Kichaka, solicit me so persistently even as a sick person wisheth for the night that will put a stop to his existence?  Why dost thou desire me, even like an infant lying on its mother’s lap wishing to catch the moon?  For thee that thus solicitest their beloved wife, there is no refuge either on earth or in sky.  O Kichaka, hast thou no sense which leads thee to seek thy good and by which thy life may be saved?’”

SECTION XV

“Vaisampayana said, ’Rejected thus by the princess, Kichaka, afflicted with maddening lust and forgetting all sense of propriety, addressed Sudeshna saying, ’Do thou, Kekaya’s daughter, so act that thy Sairindhri may come into my arms.  Do thou, O Sudeshna, adopt the means by which the damsel of the gait of an elephant may accept me; I am dying of absorbing desire.’

“Vaisampayana continued, ’Hearing his profuse lamentations, that gentle lady, the intelligent queen of Virata, was touched with pity.  And having taken counsel with her own self and reflected on Kichaka’s purpose and on the anxiety of Krishna, Sudeshna addressed the Suta’s son in these words, ’Do thou, on the occasion of some festival, procure viands and wines for me.  I shall then send my Sairindhri to thee on the pretence of bringing wine.  And when she will repair thither do thou in solitude, free from interruption, humour her as thou likest.  Thus soothed, she may incline her mind to thee.’

“Vaisampayana continued, ’Thus addressed, he went out of his sister’s apartments.  And he soon procured wines well-filtered and worthy of a king.  And employing skilled cooks, he prepared many and various kinds of choice viands and delicious drinks and many and various kinds of meat of different degrees of excellence.  And when all this had been done, that gentle lady Sudeshna, as previously counselled by Kichaka, desired her Sairindhri to repair to Kichaka’s abode, saying, ’Get up, O Sairindhri and repair