The Social and Military Position of the Ruling Caste in Ancient India, as Represented by the Sanskrit Epic c2.s6.55

c2.s6.55

But Drupada was a king, and must have been an unusually affectionate father, for in general there appears to have been no sentiment but contempt for the girl. At least, this is the frequent statement: boys are blessings, girls are a nuisance. Girls, anyway, are no good, ‘but a daughter is a torment,’ it is said.* The care of marrying her and the responsibility she unworthily bears is meant; as Mātali exclaims in another place, against the girls of great families, that a daughter is a constant risk to three families, her mother’s family, her father’s, and finally her husband’s (v. 97. 15–16). But natural affection was stronger than systematic contempt, and we are glad to learn from the Epic’s own words that, in spite of the usual fixed difference in the regard felt for son and daughter, ‘some fathers love the boy more; some, the girl’ (i. 157. 37). A rule of the ‘house-manuals’ says that when a man returns from a journey and meets his son he should kiss him on the head, and murmur ‘out of the heart art thou born; thou art the self called son; O live a hundred years,’ and kiss him three times more, murmuring benedictions—‘but his daughter he should only kiss, without words.’