Indian Antiquary Vol 60

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Charles E A W Oldham, S Krishnaswami Aiyangar, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarka
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 79

APRIL, 1931]
NATURE STUDY IN THE SANSKRIT DRAMA SAKUNTALA
65
a sweetmeat with sugar, as a common article of diet, and is often ground into meal for other foods.
As the king steps forth to reply to Sakuntalå just after she has written a letter to him on a lotus leaf, in which she refers to their mutual stricken state, he says that, although she is like a withered lotus, he is like a blotted-out moon. The daylight causes this special lotus, the Nymphoea Lotus, to fade away, and it blooms only in the night. Comparing himself to the moon, is a favourite metaphor of Duşyanta because of the Indian idea of the influence of the moon upon the lotus flower.
The old hermit, Kanva, shows the usual feeling of India with reference to a daughter. His great concern is that she may have a suitable husband and that she may find favour in her new home. Hence he takes her round the sacrificial fire, which is surrounded by darbha grass. This darbha grass is the same as kusa grass (Eragrostis cynosuroides, R. and S., the Poa cynosuroides of Retzius), but is not to be confounded with ddrvá (Sans.) grass, which is known in northern India as dúb (Cynodon Dactylon), a very different grass, though it is also supposed to have had a special efficacy in the early ages. The kusa grass is a coarse kind of grass, which grows readily on dry, barren soil. Its Sanskrit name, kusa, seems to have been given to it at a very early period, for it is said to have been consecrated to Kusa, one of the sons of Rama. However that may be, almost all literature in India has some reference to the sacred uses of this plant. Its leaves are very long with sharp points and edges. The Hindus fre. quently say of an intellectual person that his intellect is as sharp as the kuća leaf. In the Veda, it is said to have been produced at creation like a " drop of fine gold.” Unlike the kusa grass, durvd is a very nutritious food for animals. Because it supplies food for the cow, the Hindus value it all the more, and in the early days considered it the home of benevolent nymphs. In the Veda, it is said of it: “May Durva, which rose from the water of life, which has a hundred roots, and a hundred stems, efface a hundred of my sins and prolong my existence on earth for a hundred years." Its flowers are beautiful, and when examined under the lens, appear like delicate jewels set in constant motion by the gentlest breeze.
In Act IV, the young disciple sent by Kanva to discover the time of day, finds it out in a peculiar Indian fashion. He notioes the closing of the white lotus, which means that the moon has gone down, also the early awakening of the peacock and of the deer, rising from their hoof-imprinted couch, curve their backs and stretch their limbs as if preparing for their movements of the day. This shows how olosely observant of nature the dramatist really was. When SakuntalA is about to start on her long journey to the home of king Dugyanta, ber foster father, Kanva, orders flowers from the forest, and the result is given in the following sentence : "One tree revealed a white linen robe, another gave dyes to stain her feet, while still others gave various kinds of ornaments." The dye may have been the bruised leaves of Lawsonia alba, already mentioned in a previous passage, where the feet of dancers were said to have been stained with this colour. Then, as Sakuntala leaves the forest, voices in the air refer to the way by which she shall journey, as cooled and beautified by streams gleaming with lotus blossoms and the roads as densely shaded by massive trees, while even her pathway is perfumed with soft pollen spread on the way and cooled by favouring breezes. To show the sorrow of all living things at her departure, the poet says that the browsing deer let fall the tender grans they are chewing, the peacocks cease to dance, and the creepers drop their withered leaves, like tears of grief. Kanva, the hermit, musing on the love of Sakuntala for the fragrant jasmine, and hearing her request to be allowed to bid it farewell, compares the marriage of his daughter to the king to the twining of the jasmine vine round the mango tree. This is a motif frequently found in the lyrio poetry and dramas of India. Referring to her pet fawn, he says that she reated it so tenderly, healing the cuts made by lusa grase with cooling oil and feeding it with the tender dyamaba grains, so that now it will not willingly allow her to depart. Syemaks is the grain of a kind of millet (Panicum frumendacown,