So they all stood round in silence, watching the child's eyes. And at last, the King, and his ministers, and his physicians and astrologers, drew a long breath, and looked at each other in amazement. And the prime-minister said: King, this is a wonderful thing. For these eyes are the eyes, not of a child, but of a sage[3], or rather, of a god. And surely this is no mere mortal maiden, but rather some deity, or portion of a deity, smitten by a curse, and doomed thereby to descend for a period into this lower world, to expiate awhile sins committed in a former birth. For such things often come about, And beyond a doubt your Majesty is favoured, in being chosen by the deity to be the means of his incarnation. Then hearing this speech of his minister, whose words were always suited to the events, the King was excessively delighted. And he celebrated the birth of his daughter with extraordinary magnificence, and gave gold and villages to Brahmans and the poor. And taking counsel with his astrologers and Brahman sages skilled in names and their applications, he gave to his daughter the auspicious name of Shrí[4]. For he said: Her eyes are like lotuses, and like the pools in which they dwell: and surely they are the very echo of the eyes of the Goddess of Beauty when she rose from the sea, and lay in her blue lotus cradle, lapped by the foam of which she was composed, and gazing at the wondering waves with eyes that mocked them, and robbed them of their hue. Then time passed away, and the years with the seasons followed each other like caravans over the desert, and old age and grey hair came and took up their dwelling at the wrinkled root of the King's ear. And meanwhile Shrí grew from a child into a girl, and at length the dawn of her womanhood broke. And like the horns of the waxing moon, her limbs rounded and swelled into the very perfect orb of supreme loveliness, and she became as it were the very salt of the sea of beauty[5], inspiring in all who drank of it insatiable thirst, and an intolerable craving for the water of the blue lakes of her eyes. And at last there came a day when the King her father looked at her, and said to himself: The fruit is ripe: and now it is time that it were plucked and eaten. So he went to the apartments of the women, to find her mother, his principal Queen, Madirekshaná[6]. But when she learned the object of his coming, the Queen said: _Aryaputra_[7], it is useless. For our daughter will not even listen to the word husband, much less undergo the thing. The King said: What is this? Should the cornfield refuse the plough, or a maiden refuse to be married? Is she not now of ripe age, and does not a grown-up maiden in the house bring upon herself and her relations infamy in this world and the next? Madirekshana said: Speak to her yourself, and persuade her to it if you can. For of her own accord she told me, that her marriage was a thing not to be thought of, even in a dream.