Nothing. DEVAYANI Nothing at all! Dive into the bottom of your heart; does no timid wish lurk there, fearful lest it be blighted? KACHA For me the sun of fulfilment has risen, and the stars have faded in its light. I have mastered the knowledge which gives life. DEVAYANI Then you must be the one happy being in creation. Alas! now for the first time I feel what torture these days spent in an alien land have been to you, though we offered you our best. KACHA Not so much bitterness! Smile, and give me leave to go. DEVAYANI Smile! But, my friend, this is not your native Paradise. Smiles are not so cheap in this world, where thirst, like a worm in the flower, gnaws at the heart's core; where baffled desire hovers round the desired, and memory never ceases to sigh foolishly after vanished joy. KACHA Devayani, tell me how I have offended? DEVAYANI Is it so easy for you to leave this forest, which through long years has lavished on you shade and song? Do you not feel how the wind wails through these glimmering shadows, and dry leaves whirl in the air, like ghosts of lost hope;--while you alone, who part from us, have a smile on your lips? KACHA This forest has been a second mother to me, for here I have been born again. My love for it shall never dwindle. DEVAYANI When you had driven the cattle to graze on the lawn, yonder banyan tree spread a hospitable shade for your tired limbs against the mid-day heat. KACHA I bow to thee, Lord of the Forest! Remember me, when under thy shade other students chant their lessons to an accompaniment of bees humming and leaves rustling. DEVAYANI And do not forget our Venumati, whose swift water is one stream of singing love. KACHA I shall ever remember her, the dear companion of my exile, who, like a busy village girl, smiles on her errand of ceaseless service and croons a simple song. DEVAYANI But, friend, let me also remind you that you had another companion whose thoughts were vainly busy to make you forget an exile's cares. KACHA The memory of her has become a part of my life. DEVAYANI I recall the day when, little more than a boy, you first arrived. You stood there, near the hedge of the garden, a smile in your eyes. KACHA And I saw you gathering flowers--clad in white, like the dawn bathed in radiance. And I said, "Make me proud by allowing me to help you!" DEVAYANI I asked in surprise who you were, and you meekly answered that you were the son of Vrihaspati, a divine sage at the court of the God Indra, and desired to learn from my father that secret spell which can revive the dead. KACHA I feared lest the Master, the teacher of the Titans, those rivals of the Gods, should refuse to accept me for a disciple. DEVAYANI But he could not refuse me when I pleaded your cause, so greatly he loves his daughter. KACHA Thrice had the jealous Titans slain me, and thrice you prevailed on your father to bring me back to life; therefore my gratitude can never die.