A History of Sanskrit Literature c11.s7.10

c11.s7.10

The effective and pathetic picture of Sītā's end and the return to heaven of Rāma might well have closed the poem, but Canto xvi is not without merit. Kuça, Rāma's son, reigns at Kuçāvatī; in a dream Ayodhyā appears to him in the guise of a woman whose husband is afar, reproaches him with her fallen condition, and bids him return. Kuça obeys, Ayodhyā once more is glorious, and a description of the delights of summer rivals, but fails to equal, that of spring in Canto ix. For the rest the poem sinks in interest, as Kālidāsa has nothing to tell us but names of worthless kings whose harems supplied their sole interest in life. We cannot deny¹ his authorship of Cantos xviii and xix; no ancient authority questions them, and they are cited, if rarely, by writers on poetics. But their brevity and the utter abruptness of the end, when the widow of Agnavarman, a worthless debauchee, is awaiting the birth of her child, suggest that we have no more than a rough draft. Yet we would gladly assign to a poetaster meaningless puns on names of kings, as when Pāriyātra is merely said to have exceeded in height the Pāriyātra mountains, or the incredible tastelessness of the action of a king who hangs his foot out of the window for the people to kiss.