पृष्ठम्:Sanskrit Literature.djvu/१२१

89 THE KUMĀRASAMBHAVA bitterly ashamed. She determines, despite all protests, to per- form asceticism until she wins her desire; in summer she exposes herself to the appalling heat and smoke of four fires, in winter lies in icy water, in the rains sleeps on the naked rock. As she is engaged in these acts a hermit appears before her and questions her; from her sighs he learns that she loves, and from her maids who that lover is. He proceeds to depict in appalling colours the god of her desire, but she fiercely and bitterly rebukes his attacks; delighted he reveals himself as Çiva incar- nate (v). All now is ripe for the wedding, but Kālidāsa detains us with a gay picture of the solemn scenes which lead up to it. The Seven Seers themselves with Arundhati come as wooers from Çiva to seek the maiden's hand; she stands, eyes downcast, counting the leaves on the lotus in her hand, at her father's side, while his eyes wander to the face of his consort, for in matters affecting their daughters householders are wont to obey their wives' desires (vi). The wedding follows, described, doubtless from the model of imperial ceremonies, with rich abundance of detail; the mother, in her excitement between joy and sorrow, cannot see to place correctly the painted mark on her daughter's forehead, and misplaces the woollen marriage thread which the nurse, more calm and practical, sets aright. With this ends the poem in many manuscripts; others add ten cantos. Of these Canto viii describes, according to the principles of the Kāmaçāstra, the joys of the wedded pair; doubtless such frankness is abhorrent to western taste, but the doubts of its genuineness which have been expressed are clearly groundless; it seems certainly¹ to have been known to Bhāravi, to Kumāradāsa, and to Māgha, and quotations from it occur in the writers on poetics. Nor in poetic skill is it in the least inferior to Kālidasa's work. The case 2 is other with the following cantos. They tell of Agni's approach, first in dove shape, then in his s proper person, to Çiva as he prolongs for centuries the joys of dalliance, begging his aid. From the seed of Çiva, cast in the ¹ See Walter, Indica, iii. 21, 25 f., ni. 6. who suggests use of viii. 63 in Vikramorvaçi, 2 Jacobi, OC.V. ii, 2. 133 ff. i-viii are used in the Çankarasamhita of the Skanda Purana, but it in ix-xvii; Weber, ZDMG. xxvii. 179 ff., 190 ff.; Pandit, ii. 19ff., 85 ff.