The king commanded that within those walls No mention should be made of age or death Sorrow or pain, or sickness ... And every dawn the dying rose was plucked, The dead leaves hid, all evil sights removed: For said the king, "If he shall pass his youth Far from such things as move to wistfulness And brooding on the empty eggs of thought, The shadow of this fate, too vast for man, May fade, belike, and I shall see him grow To that great stature of fair sovereignty, When he shall rule all lands--if he _will rule_-- The king of kings and glory of his time." You know how vain were all the precautions taken by the father to prevent the fulfilment of the prophecy that his beloved son would be the coming Buḍḍha. Though all suggestions of death were banished from the royal palace, though the city was bedecked with flowers and gay flags, and every painful object removed from sight when the young Prince Siḍḍārtha visited it, yet the decrees of destiny were not to be baffled, the "voices of the spirits," the "wandering winds" and the ḍevas, whispered the truth of human sorrows into his listening ear, and when the appointed hour arrived, the Suḍḍha Ḍevas threw the spell of slumber over the household, steeped in profound lethargy the sentinels (as we are told was done by an angel to the gaolers of Peter's prison), rolled back the triple gates of bronze, strewed the sweet moghra-flowers thickly beneath his horse's feet to muffle every sound, and he was free. Free? Yes--to resign every earthly comfort, every sensuous enjoyment, the sweets of royal power, the homage of a Court, the delights of domestic life: gems, the glitter of gold: rich stuffs, rich food, soft beds: the songs of trained musicians, and of birds kept prisoners in gay cages, the murmur of perfumed waters plashing in marble basins, the delicious shade of trees in gardens where art had contrived to make nature even lovelier than herself. He leaps from his saddle when at a safe distance from the palace, flings the jewelled rein to his faithful groom, Channa, cuts off his flowing locks, gives his rich costume to a hunter in exchange for his own, plunges into the jungle, and is free: To tread its paths with patient, stainless feet, Making its dusty bed, its loneliest wastes My dwelling, and its meanest things my mates: Clad in no prouder garb than outcasts wear, Fed with no meals save what the charitable Give of their will, sheltered by no more pomp, Than the dim cave lends or the jungle-bush. This will I do because the woeful cry Of life and all flesh living cometh up Into my ears, and all my soul is full Of pity for the sickness of this world: Which I will heal, if healing may be found By uttermost renouncing and strong strife.