Alone in the vast forests, peopled by wild beasts and infested by thieves and Mleccha-tribes, poor bewildered Damayanti wandered about in quest of Nala; asking, in her trouble, the fierce tiger and the silent mountain to tell her where her lord had gone. After wandering about for three days and three nights the unfortunate queen came to the delightful asylum of some ascetics, and, entering it fearlessly but with great humility, she was welcomed by the holy men, who, struck by her beauty, inquired whether she was the presiding deity of the forest, the mountain, or the river. Damayanti explained her situation and received from the ascetics most comforting assurances of early reunion with Nala and great future happiness. After which “the ascetics with their sacred fires and asylum vanished from sight,” to the great amazement of the queen. Further wanderings in the denser parts of the forest brought Damayanti into a somewhat open space, where she found a party of merchants encamped beside a stream with their horses, elephants, and other beasts of burden. The merchants could give her no information about Nala, for, as the leader of the party assured her, she was the only human being they had met in those vast forests. However, as they were bound for the city of Suvahu, Damayanti attached herself to the caravan. The distance to be traversed was evidently a very long one and the forest very extensive; for, after they had proceeded many days, they were still in the woods, and one evening encamped on the border of a lovely lotus-covered lake. In the dead of night a herd of wild elephants coming down to the lake discovered the tame elephants belonging to the merchants and instantly made a furious onslaught upon them. Indescribable confusion followed. Some members of the party were trampled to death under the feet of the mighty beasts, some perished by their huge tusks, others fled for safety in all directions. The fugitives concealed themselves in the thickets or took refuge in the branches of trees. Horses, camels and elephants, fighting with each other and rushing about in frantic terror, added to the wild confusion of the dreadful scene of disorder and uproar, which was intensified by the outbreak of a terrible fire. Amidst the general panic, the shouts and cries of men and the noise of wounded and furious animals, Damayanti naturally awoke in the greatest alarm; but she soon had occasion for special fear for her own personal safety from an unexpected quarter.