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VASUDEVA'S MARRIAGE WITH KANAKAVATI
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lamented very loud at the top of her voice. Whence is there any fortitude of women who have fallen upon an evil fate? 'Oh! Husband, why have you deserted me? Was I a burden to you? For a snake's own skin surely is not a burden to the snake. Or have you hidden somewhere in a thicket of creepers for a joke? Show yourself. For a joke does not give pleasure for a long time. I beg you-be gracious to me, goddesses of the forest. Show me my husband or the road purified by him. Earth, open in two like a ripe melon. I shall enter the chasm given by you and attain rest.
With these lamentations Bhaimi, weeping, watered the forest-trees with her tears like a canal with its water. She did not have a moment's rest without Nala on water or on dry land, in shade or in the sun, as if suffering from fever. As she was roaming in the forest, she saw and read the words on the border of her garment, her lotus-eyes blooming with joy. She thought: 'I surely am the hańsi to the full pool of his heart. Otherwise, how could I be the abode of the favor of his commands? I think a husband's command is superior to a guru's command. The people here (will be) entirely harmless to me executing his command. So I shall go to my father's house, the source of comfortable living. Without the husband his house is only a source of humiliation to women. Even with my husband I would like to go to my father's house. Now especially, I shall go to it, obedient to my husband's command. '
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With these thoughts Bhaimi began to advance on the road with the banyan tree, seeing Nala's words like Nala standing at her side. Tigers with open mouths, even though they had got up to eat her, were not able to go near her like a fire. Serpents could not approach her like a snake-charm embodied, not even rising from the ant-hill as she went along hastily. Elephants, though attacking their own shadows with their tusks with the idea they were other elephants, though rutting, went far from her like a lioness. No other calamities happened to her on the road. Everywhere there is good fortune of women
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