In utmost grief; in the Cha.n.dala's house
Abiding--morning, noon, and eventide,
And night, the king thus made lament:
"Alas! my tender wife, overwhelmed with pain,
Looking upon her son in misery,
Bewails her lot. But yet she says: 'The king
Will surely ransom us, for he has gained
By now more money than the Brahman paid
For us;' and all the time she little knows
My fate--worse than her own. For I have passed
From woe to woe--kingdom and friends--my wife,
My son, have passed from me, and now the state
Of a Cha.n.dala holds me." While he dwelt
A slave in the Cha.n.dala's house, the forms
Of those he loved were still before his eyes--
Were ever in his mind. Meanwhile the king,
Obedient to his master's will, became
A robber of the dead; and night and day
He watched for plunder. "One part of the spoil
Is for the king, three for thy master, two
For thee. Go to the city's southern part,
Where is the dwelling of the dead, there wait."
Obeying the Cha.n.dala, to the place
Of burial he went;--an awful place,
Filled full of fearful sounds and loathsome sights--
Of evil smells, and smoke, and locks of hair
Fallen from the dead; while troops of fiends and ghouls,
Vampires and demons, wandered to and fro.
Vultures and jackals prowled, and spirit forms'
Of evil hovered o'er. The ground was strewn