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18. 10. 1 sighs. Finding the king so strange, he said “Dear son, you seem to be dejected; will you tell me its cause, if it be not uncommunicable ?” The king said " Is there anything not uncommunicable to your worship ? For one who is dejected over an unco:nmunicable thing, it is not fit to come to the penance-forest." The patriarch said “Well dear son, well ! Your courtesy is quite adequate; what is then the reason for your dejection?" The king said "I say because it is your worship's order; otherwise how can I narrate such an evil act?” The patriarch said “O dear son, the hermits are mothers to all; what is therefore shame before them ? Say you then that I, knowing your account, shall remove your dejection in any way ?" The king said “Dear sir, if that be so, then hear. This hermit Agnis'arman became a hermit on account of the dejection first due to me who am of slow merit; who did things without thinking; and who am engrossed in actions fit for unfit persons. [18] I am all the more dejected that I have not abandoned the conduct of an unfit person even though he has undertaken so high a vow." The patriarch said "If that be so, enough of dejection. What is the reason ? If he has become a hermit by reason of you, then you indeed are his friend for his bliss, leading him to religion. Why then are you dejected ? And also now I do not conceive at all of any evil action in you who fear the next world and who know the scriptures. Will you now tell me, what you did to him ?” The king said, “O revered sir, how thus having invited him, I, who suffered from headache, out of carelessness, did not inform the
