And he looked at her fixedly, and said: Jest not with my devotion, for it may be, thou art nearer the truth than thou imaginest. Will any King whatever love thee half as well as I do? Yet thou wilt not love me, and as I think, it is because I am not on the level of thy thoughts, and not a King.[37] Then she laughed, and exclaimed: Alas! poor Bruin, thou art mad: for all these Kings are only dreams, yet art thou as savage as if they were actually before thee in a row. And he said: Aye! only dreams: and yet the dreams are earnest, and are thine. Kings are the very matter of thy dreams. Is not this the subject of thy reveries as thou gazest at the sand? Ha! am I right? Dost thou never long for some King's son to come and fill thy life with joy, and deliver thee from the monotony of this wood, and thy father, and myself? Am I not below thee, in thy estimation? Then for what canst thou long, but for thy peer? [Footnote 37: It should be remembered by the English reader that "sons of Kings" are more numerous, in India, than in the West. All Rajpoots are sons of Kings: and Aranyani herself a Rajpootni. To marry a King's son would be for her, not merely a desire, but a duty: an affair of caste. All this flavour evaporates in a translation.] And he looked keenly at Aranyani, and as her eyes met his, she wavered, a very little, and looked away, and said: Alas! poor Babhru, thy love is jealousy, which makes thee so sharp-sighted, that thou seest things that are not there. So trouble not thy foolish head about anything so slight and insignificant as the subject of my dreams, otherwise thou wilt place thyself on the level of the zanies of Chincholi. And he said: Thou speakest the very truth: I am the very type of a fool, striving to reach what is above him and beyond his reach, even when he stands on tiptoe: and that is, the level of thy thoughts. And Aranyani said: See now, I said well, thou art the very fellow of the sages of Chincholi: a city, into which on a day there came a certain sanctimonious ascetic, called Pinga, from the colour of his hair. And arriving at the square before the palace of the King, he sat down in its middle, and spreading out his left hand open before him, he looked intently at its palm. And so he continued, wrapt in the contemplation of his hand, paying absolutely no regard to anything around him, till night. And this he did every day, all day long, till at length he became the very target of the curiosity of the people of the town, who crowded round him in a throng, disputing as to the meaning of his singular behaviour, and all maintaining opposite opinions. And one said: This ascetic is undoubtedly pondering on the Panchatantra.[38] And another: Beyond a doubt, the holy man is meditating on Death. And yet another: Is not this an ascetic? And of what should he meditate but the five fires? But a pundit passing by, said: His meditation can be of nothing but the syllogism and its members.