heart thou didst fascinate on the brim of the tank, on the fifth day
of the moon, in the light half of the month Yeth, has come to my
house, and sends this message to thee: "Perform what you
promised; we have now come"; and I also tell thee that this prince
is worthy of thee: just as thou art beautiful, so is he endowed with
all good qualities of mind and body."

When Padmavati heard this speech she showed great anger, and,
rubbing sandal on her beautiful hands, she slapped the old
woman's cheeks, and cried, "Wretch, Daina (witch)! get out of my
house; did I not forbid thee to talk such folly in my presence?"

The lover and the nurse were equally distressed at having taken the
advice of the young minister, till he explained what the crafty
damsel meant. "When she smeared the sandal on her ten fingers,"
he explained, "and struck the old woman on the face, she signified
that when the remaining ten moonlight nights shall have passed
away she will meet you in the dark." At the same time he warned
his master that to all appearances the lady Padmavati was far too
clever to make a comfortable wife. The minister's son especially
hated talented intellectual, and strong-minded women; he had been
heard to describe the torments of Naglok [FN#60] as the
compulsory companionship of a polemical divine and a learned
authoress, well stricken in years and of forbidding aspect, as such
persons mostly are. Amongst womankind he admired --
theoretically, as became a philosopher --the small, plump,
laughing, chattering, unintellectual, and material-minded. And
therefore --excuse the digression, Raja Vikram --he married an old
maid, tall, thin, yellow, strictly proper, cold-mannered, a
conversationist, and who prided herself upon spirituality. But more