A History of Sanskrit Literature c22.s2.9

c22.s2.9

The king, however, treats them with honour, having bethought him that his niece and nephew were reported to have adopted the ascetic life, and questions them as to their history. In Āçvāsa ii the youth, who enjoys like his sister the rare gift of knowledge of past births, tells a curious tale. There was a king of Ujjain, Yaço’rtha,¹ and his wife Candramatī bore him a son, Yaçodhara, whom on the sight of his whitening hair the father placed on the throne, retiring to contemplation. The life of Yaçodhara is described, and the poet displays his knowledge of policy in conversation between the king and a minister, in which are set out with legendary examples the fate of kings who choose bad ministers, and of kings who cast aside their faithful servants. Yaçodhara seems ideally happy, he delights in the Veda of the bow, but one night he finds that his wife leaves his side for a guilty intrigue. He meditates slaying her, but is deterred by the scandal, and his mother, who suspects the truth, seeing his sudden aversion to life, counsels him to perform a sacrifice including the slaughter of all kinds of animals. The king, however, will have nothing to do with sacrifices destructive of life, and there ensues a polemic between him and his mother on the Jain faith, to which she realizes that he is tending. He argues, however, that offerings to the dead are absurd, and that crows are the real recipients of the bounty tendered, while the idea of water as purifying is ridiculed. A vast array of poetical authority is adduced by the king, who quotes almost all the great poets down to Rājaçekhara, and the queen, perhaps wearied by his eloquence, compromises on a cock of flour. The wicked wife, however, sees her chance, insists on cooking the mixture, inserts poison and ends the mother and son alike (iii). In Āçvāsa iv we have the account of the fate of the mother, son, and wife in later births as the result of their crimes, the slaying even of an effigy of a cock being a sin. The wicked wife repeats in these rebirths her evil deed. At last, however, the cycle is complete, and the mother and son are reborn, with knowledge of the past as the twin children of Yaçomatī and the sister of Māridatta. Needless to say, the king is now induced (v) to take instruction from Sudatta, and in the end is converted along with the goddess and his people.