Gaudavaho

Author(s): Vakpatiraj, Narhari Govind Suru, P L Vaidya, A N Upadhye, H C Bhayani
Publisher: Prakrit Text Society Ahmedabad

Page 43

(xxvi)
do not become known merely by their eminence, but only after having been decorated with honours by you" (717). “Some of your enemies exhausted themselves and (breathed their last) on your sword; some others surrendered and sought refuge with you. The remaining ones escaped to the sea, while a few found shelter -( God knows where )" (721). "The censure of fickleness (atta. ched) to Lakşmi has been completely wiped out by you alone. She gave you overlordship, without, however, the evil traits of a dictator" ( 723). “Vanity was passed on by you to your supplicants, who now strut about, stiff and erect, with the fulfilment of their great desires; hence it is that no such trait (of vanity) persists in you even in your position of supreme authority” (728). In the end they describe in minute details the act of the removal of bodice by his beloveds (731-736), before they get into bed with him, 'dressed in thin, flimsy apparel.' . Thus, as the Poet tells us, “ the King stopped all other activities with a view to concentrating on the pleasures of love" (737). Among the ladies that stood in attendance on him were those of the king of the Magadhas, whom he had slain and whose wives he had captured as prisoners and collected them in his hareni. They were made to wave chowries over him as so many slave-girls and, as a result of such a woeful plight, says the Poet, “the streams of tears (flowing down) on the cheeks of these ladies, which bear reflections of the hairy strings of chowries (wielded and) waved by them in his service, are not observed, having been already absorbed inside ( the cheeks ) through fear " ( 697). Love Scenes :
The Poet seizes this opportunity to satisfy one of the requirements of a Mahākāvya by depicting scenes of