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142
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY
[MAY, 1913.
and intoxicated lovers of the beautiful women. The following verse, on the other hand, with which begins the description of the city is considerably more interesting:
10. Where the houses towering high, of purest wise, with flying flags and trim women, quite resemble the peaks of silver clouds variegated with flashes of lightning.'
Vatsabhatti has given himself great pains to bring out the best possible resemblance between the houses and the clouds and thus to excel the parallels frequently used in the kavyas. This fact is specially proved by the double application of the word 'lightning-flash'. He is not merely content with describing the lightning-flash as the mistress of the cloud, dancing before the house for a moment, as Indian poets do very often, but he portrays the same as the gay flags waving over the houses. There can be little doubt that Vatsabhatți in this intended to surpass some poet known to him, and we can hardly help thinking that he had before him the description of the palaces in Alaka, which Kalidasa gives in the beginning of the Aparamegha in Meghadûta. The verse runs thus:
विद्युत्वन्तं ललितवनिताः सेन्द्रचापं सचित्राः संगीताय प्रहतमुरजाः स्निग्धगम्भीरघेोषम् । अन्तस्तोयं मणिमयभुवस्तुङ्गमभ्रंलिहामाः त्रासादास्त्वां तुलवितुमलं यत्र तेस्तैर्विशेषः ॥
Where the palaces can match themselves with you (the cloud) by means of these and other particulars their lovely, fair inhabitants resemble your lightnings, their gaily coloured portraits, your rainbow, their drums struck for concert, your lovely, deep thunder, their jewelled floors, the schimmering drops of water that you hide, their terraces towering up to the clouds, your height."
In the view that Vatsabhatti tried to compete with Kalidasa, we are still further confirmed, if we observe that in the next verse, he adds all the details met with in Kâlidâsa, which are left out in verse 10. In that verse, he says:
11. And (where) other (houses) resemble the high summits of the Kailasa, with long terraces and stone-seats, resounding with the noise of music, covered with gay pictures, and adorned with groves of waving plantain trees."
The agreement of thought and imagery is thus quite complete. something more, and it is what we expect of an imitator and a rival. that Vatsabbatti's verses are on a lower level than those of his model.
The next verse also, in which the description of the houses is further elaborated quite in an insipid manner, presents one point worthy of notice.
12. Where the houses adorned with rows of stories, resembling gods' palaces, of pure lustre like the rays of the full moon, raise themselves up, having torn open the earth.'
Here, the statement that the houses raised themselves up, breaking through the earth' is quite striking. If this expression means anything, it suggests a comparison of the houses with something to be found in the deep or the nether world, with something like the thousand, white-shining heads of Sesha. Such an image is however, defective, when there is already a comparison of the houses with the vimanas, the moving gods' palaces, soaring up high in the sky. The difficulty, I think, may be solved by supposing that Vatsabbatti has confounded, with little understanding, two comparisons used by the poets of his time. The comparison of houses with the vimánas of gods is not rarely found in epic works, but is still more frequently met with in the kavyas. On the other hand, that of buildings with things in the nether world comes only as now and then in artificial poetry. Thus in Kalidasa's Raghuvansa XII. 70, we have:
स सेतुं बन्धयामास प्रवगैर्लवणाम्भसि । रसातलाहिवोन्मन्नं शेषं स्वभाव शार्ङ्गिणः ॥
Only, Vatsabbaṭṭi says It goes without question
