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EMANCIPATION OF PARSVANATHA
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water present in milk?" After considering carefully the meaning, he wrote and sent a sloka. She read: A woman takes delight in an undeserving person; a river flows to low ground; the cloud rains on the mountain; Laksmi resorts to a man devoid of merit." After considering the meaning, in order to enlighten him, she again wrote and sent a sloka. He read: Where is the fault of the writer? Why the abandonment of her by one so great? Surely the sun does not abandon the devoted twilight." Pleased by such words, Sagaradatta married her and, delighted, enjoyed pleasures daily.
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Then one day Sagaradatta's father-in-law went with his sons to the town, Pāṭalapatha, to trade. Sheth Sāgaradatta also began to do business and sometimes went to another coast with a very large ship. Seven times his ship was wrecked in the ocean and, when he returned, he was laughed at by the people, "He is without merit." His money lost, he did not abandon effort.
One day in his roaming he saw a boy drawing water from a little well. Seven times the water did not come, but it came the eighth time. After seeing that, he thought, "Men's efforts are fruitful. Even Fate fears those, for whom it has made obstacles, whose energy is unhindered by obstacles and who do not abandon an undertaking, and it (Fate) is broken."
With this thought, he tied an omen-knot,371 set out for Sinhala by boat, and arrived at Ratnadvipa because of the wind. There he sold his merchandise, bought collections of jewels; filled the boat with them and started to his own city. The sailors, coveting the jewels, threw him in the ocean at night. By chance he reached a plank from a boat wrecked before and he swam out. He reached Paṭalapatha on the coast, where his father-in-law saw him and took him to his house.
After bathing, eating, and resting, Sagara told the affair of the sailors from the beginning and his father-in-law said: You stay here. The sailors will not go to Tamalipti from fear
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371 23. Sakunagranthi. See Appendix II.
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