And Aranyani said: Babhru, thou art so simple, and thy soul is like crystal, so that I can see into thy secret thoughts without needing to be enlightened by thy voice. Didst thou not say to thyself: I care absolutely nothing for Chandana, so only that I may listen while she talks? And Babhru hung his head, with a blush. And Aranyani clapped her hands in triumph, and exclaimed: See! O Bruin, thou art guilty. Yet despair not, for thou shalt hear all about Chandana, just the same. Know, that long ago, there was a King, who had innumerable wives, and fifty sons, of whom this very Chandana was one. Now all these sons lived in anxiety, saying to themselves: Which of us all will be the heir to the throne, and succeed our father when he dies? So they remained, rivals, and each had his eyes fixed upon the others, fearing to be supplanted. So Chandana's case was worse than thine, O Bruin, since thou art without a rival. And then, after a while, that old King, out of all his fifty sons, chose this very Chandana for his heir; and appointed him _yuwaraja_,[31] with all the proper ceremonies. So when they were completed, that overjoyed _yuwaraja_ ran, fresh from the installation, to the _awarodha_,[32] to tell his mother of his triumph, and increase it by her praises. But he found her, to his amazement, all in tears, and as dismal as if he had come only to tell her of his death. So he said: Mother, what is the reason of such misery, on such a day of exultation? Should the gloom continue, while the sun is rising? But his mother looked sourly at him, and she said: Fool! thy rising sun is setting: thou art out, in thy quarters, and mistakest west for east: and soon enough, it will be night for thee. And Chandana said: I do not understand thee. Then said his mother: The King thy father discovered, long ago, the elixir of life: and even now he has been living for fifteen hundred years. And this is a jest that he plays, now and then, for his own amusement, making one of his innumerable sons his heir. For all his heirs die before him, as thou wilt also, never even reaching so much as the very first step of that throne that lures them on and hangs always just before them, like a bundle of _hariali_ grass held by a crafty rider on a stick before the nose of the deluded beast of burden that carries him along. Thine is only the phantom of a sun that will presently go down and disappear, leaving the true sun, thy father, still in the very blaze of noon. [Footnote 31: _i.e._ "little king," Prince of Wales or Dauphin. The story is a piece of old folklore, and one version may be found in Somadewa.] [Footnote 32: The women's apartments, or _gynaeceum_.]