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20
THE QUESTIONS OF KING MILINDA.
I, 24.
“Yes, I could.'
Teach me, then.' * Just now is not the right time for that; we have come down to the village for alms.'
24. Then young Nâgasena took the alms-bowl the venerable Rohana was carrying, and led him into the house, and with his own hand supplied him with food, hard and soft, as much as he required. And when he saw that he had finished his meal, and withdrawn his hand from the bowl, he said to him : 'Now, Sir, will you teach me that hymn?'
When thou hast become free from impediments, my lad, by taking upon thee, and with thy parents' consent, the hermit's dress I wear, then I can teach it thee.'
25. So young [12] Nâgasena went to his father and mother, and said: “This recluse says he knows the best hymn in the world, but that he cannot teach it to any one who has not entered the Order as his pupil. I should like to enter the Order and learn that hymn.'
And his parents gave their consent; for they wished him to learn the hymn, even at the cost of retiring from the world ; and they thought that when he had learned it he would come back again?
Then the venerable Rohana took Nâgasena to the Vattaniya hermitage, to the Vigamba Vatthu, and having spent the night there, took him on to the Guarded Slope, and there, in the midst of the innumerable company of the Arahats, young Nâgasena was admitted, as a novice, into the Order.
Under the rules of the Buddhist Order any one can leave it as soon as he likes.
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