[Pramāṇa](https://indike.org/pramana/) › [Studies](https://indike.org/pramana/ins) › [Polity, law and society](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity) › [Sexual Life in Ancient India: A Study in the Comparative History of Indian Culture](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915) › v2.c11.81 # Sexual Life in Ancient India: A Study in the Comparative History of Indian Culture v2.c11.81 Sexual Life in Ancient India: A Study in the Comparative History of Indian Culture v2.c11.81 - **Language:** English ### [v2.c11.81](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v2.c11.81) Yudhishṭhira showed her she must put a check on herself; he told her that her Gandharva husbands did not deem it now the time to take revenge, and would see to that by and by. Draupadī cried out: “I am but too considerate for these weak-souled men. The first-comer may beat¹ them, whose eldest is a dice-player.” After these words she ran weeping and with streaming hair into Sudeshṇā’s abode. She purified herself, washed her limbs and her clothes, and considered what she should do. She decided that only Bhīma could and would help her. So in the night she crept to him in the kitchen, clasped him as a creeper does the tree, and awoke the sleeper: “Rise, rise, wherefore dost thou lie sleeping, O Bhīmasena, like a dead man! For no evil man touches the wife of a man that is not dead, and still lives.” Bhīma started up, and asked her what was distressing her. She burst into bitter complaints of what she had already had to bear, and that now at the fresh insult her heart was ready to burst. But what else could she expect, since Yudhishṭhira, the evil dicer, was her husband, the man who had brought himself and all belonging to him from kingly pomp and splendour into the very depths of poverty and contempt!² She now drew a picture of the degrading life the brothers led; and she herself, she said, was a slave; she, the once proud daughter of a king, she a queen, whom the sea-ringed earth had obeyed, must wait in awe on her mistress, with her delicate hands pound sandal-wood and prepare salve, and tremble to see whether it was to the liking of her lady. And she showed Bhīma her hands all horny. Bhīma raised her hands to his lips, and wept with her. Then he explained to her that he himself had wished to take a bloody vengeance at once, but Yudhishṭhira had stood in the way; she must have patience only a little while longer, until they could come forth before the world. But she made him see that the danger from the all-powerful woman-hunter was too great, and that the warrior has no other duty but to destroy the foe. As so often before, so now again Bhīma must save her. “Break this man mad with love, like a pitcher on the stone! If to-morrow morning the sun rises on him, who has brought me so much unhappiness, as on a living man, I shall mix myself poison, and drink it; but I will not fall into Kicaka’s power. It is better I should die here before thine eyes, Bhīma.” Weeping, she leant against his breast, and he spoke loving words of consolation to her. Then he wiped away her tears, licked the corners of his mouth¹ with rage, and spoke: “I will slay him even to-day together with his kindred. Give him a tryst this evening. There is the dancing-hall, built by the king of the Matsyas. By day the maidens dance there, at night they go home. In it there is a heaven-like, firmly made bed. On it I will show him his forbears that died before him. Look to it that thou art not seen speaking with him, and that he comes there.” - [Previous: v2.c11.80](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v2.c11.80) - [Next: v2.c11.82](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v2.c11.82) - [Up: v2.c11](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v2.c11) ## Linked texts (1) - [Mahābhārata](https://indike.org/pramana/in.lit.mahabharata.vyasa) — Vyāsa, Sanskrit --- Source: [https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v2.c11.81](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v2.c11.81) · Pramāṇa