Alas! O Saivya! where hast thou gone?" Then in his dream he seemed to see his wife And son lamenting: "What hast thou to do With gambling? Oh protect us, mighty king!" The vision faded, and he saw no more The cherished forms. And then the dream returned By power divine. And Harišchandra stood In heaven, and he beheld his wife on earth, With flowing hair, dragged forcibly along-- Stripped of her clothes: the cry came to his ear, "Protect us, king of men!" Then, snatched away, The demons hurried him before the judge; And Harišchandra seemed to hear the words: "Go forth! return once more to earth! Thy grief Is well nigh past and ended; joy ere long Shall come to thee. The sorrows that remain Endure." The king, then driven from the sky By Yama's messengers, falling through space-- Senseless in fear and terror, filled with pain Yet more exceeding--thought within himself, "How shall I suffer all these torments sore!-- The changes manifold of form--the pain In Nâraka." Then Harišchandra sought Aid from the gods: "O mighty lords," he said, "Protect me! O protect my wife and child! O mighty Dharma, thee I worship! Thee, O Krish.na, the Creator! Faultless ones, Both far and near, before you now I come, A suppliant. On thee, O lord of prayer, I call! on thee, O Indra too! to thee O ancient one! I pray--immutable!" The vision fled, the king arose from sleep. His tangled hair, his body black and grimed, Recalled to him his state--the plunderer Of dead men's clothes. His recollection gone, He thought not of his sorrowing wife and child, For reason failed. The loss of kingdom, wealth, And friends, his dwelling-place among the tombs, Had overthrown his senses, and destroyed His mind. Then to the burying-place the queen Came, bearing the dead body of her son-- Pale and distracted. "My beloved son! My child!" she kept exclaiming, while she threw Dust on her head. "Alas! alas! O king! O that thou could'st behold thy child," she said-- "Thy child now lying dead upon the earth, Killed by a serpent's bite. Alas! my son! So lovely! so delightful!" Then the king, Rearing the sounds of mourning, went in haste To rob the dead: nor did he recognize His wife, in that sad mourner, changed by grief As if into another. And the queen Knew not the form that stood before her, clothed In rags, with matted hair, withered and foul. Then recollection dawned upon the king, Seeing the dead child's princely form, the thought Of his own son came o'er him. "Ah! my child! What evil chance," he said, "has brought thee here! A child of princely race thou seemest. He, my son, Long lost to me through my accursed fate, Would have been even such as thou in age." Then raised the queen her voice, and thus she spoke: "Alas! has some unexpiated crime Brought upon us, my child! this endless woe. My absent lord! since thou did'st not console