TALES FROM THE HINDU DRAMATISTS - Awaken Video

already the husband of the princesses of Magadha, Malava, Panchala,
Avanti, Jalandhara and Kerala, is wedded to Mrigankavali. As soon as the
ceremony is gone through, a messenger from the court of Chandraverma
arrives to announce:--
"O queen! His Majesty Chandravarma wishes it to be known that
Mrigankavarma is not his son but his daughter. In the absence of a son
he dressed her as such to satisfy his desire for a son. Now that a son
has been born to him, it is not necessary to keep up the pretence. The
king requests you to settle a suitable marriage for her. The sages have
prophesied paramount sovereignty for her husband."
The queen becomes stunned and soliloquises:--
"What is play to me, Providence ordains to be a stern fact. Man
proposes, God disposes." She now finds that she has taken herself in,
and given herself another rival wife. As the matter is past remedy,
however, she assents with a good grace. The minister is glad that his
aims are fulfilled. All are happy, Why should Kuvalayamala alone be
sorry? The queen therefore allows her lord to marry Kuvalyamala.
To crown the king's happiness, a messenger, sent by the General of His
Majesty's forces, now arrives from the camp with the news that the
allied armies of Kernata, Simhala, Pandya, Murala, Andhra, and Konkana
have been defeated, and Virapala, king of Kuntala, the ally of
Vidyadhara Malla, reseated on a throne, from which his kinsman,
supported by those troops, had formerly expelled him. The authority of
Vidyadhara Malla as paramount sovereign is now declared to extend from
the mouths of the Ganges to the sea, and from the Narbada to the
Tamraperni in the Deccan.
RATNAVALI OR THE NECKLACE.
A holy seer announces to Yaugandharayana, the chief minister of Vatsa,
the king of Kausambi, that whoever shall wed Ratnavali, the fair
daughter of Vikramabahu, the king of _Sinhala_ or Ceylon and maternal
uncle of Vasavadatta, the queen of Vatsa, should become the emperor of
the world. The faithful minister, desirous of securing paramount
sovereignty for his master, sends, without his knowledge and consent, an
envoy to the court of Vikramabahu to negotiate the match. Vikramabahu
declines to inflict the curse of co-wifeship upon his daughter and
niece. The disappointed envoy returns home.
The premier is sorry, but does not lose hope. After much deliberation,
he hits upon an ingenious device. He proclaims in Ceylon by agents that
queen Vasavadatta is dead, being burnt by chance and that the king,
though much grieved, has at last consented, at the request of friends
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