bridles, saddled them, and catching up their weapons, rode slowly
towards the Raja's palace. During the three hours of return hardly a
word passed between the pair. Vajramukut not only avoided
speaking; he never once replied till addressed thrice in the loudest
voice.

The young minister put no more questions, "for," quoth he to
himself, "when the prince wants my counsel, he will apply for it."
In this point he had borrowed wisdom from his father, who held in
peculiar horror the giving of unasked- for advice. So, when he saw
that conversation was irksome to his master, he held his peace and
meditated upon what he called his "day-thought." It was his
practice to choose every morning some tough food for reflection,
and to chew the cud of it in his mind at times when, without such
employment, his wits would have gone wool-gathering. You may
imagine, Raja Vikram, that with a few years of this head work, the
minister's son became a very crafty young person.

After the second day the Prince Vajramukut, being restless from
grief at separation, fretted himself into a fever. Having given up
writing, reading, drinking, sleeping, the affairs entrusted to him by
his father, and everything else, he sat down, as he said, to die. He
used constantly to paint the portrait of the beautiful lotus gatherer,
and to lie gazing upon it with tearful eyes; then he would start up
and tear it to pieces and beat his forehead, and begin another
picture of a yet more beautiful face.

At last, as the pradhan's son had foreseen, he was summoned by
the young Raja, whom he found upon his bed, looking yellow and
complaining bitterly of headache. Frequent discussions upon the