The Light of Asia | Page 5

my dream-readers foretold.?This boy, more dear to me than mine heart's blood,?Shall be of universal dominance,?Trampling the neck of all his enemies,?A King of kings--and this is in my heart;--?Or he shall tread the sad and lowly path?Of self-denial and of pious pains,?Gaining who knows what good, when all is lost?Worth keeping; and to this his wistful eyes?Do still incline amid my palaces.?But ye are sage, and ye will counsel me;?How may his feet be turned to that proud road?Where they should walk, and all fair signs come true?Which gave him Earth to rule, if he would rule?"
The eldest answered, "Maharaja! love?Will cure these thin distempers; weave the spell?Of woman's wiles about his idle heart.?What knows this noble boy of beauty yet,?Eyes that make heaven forgot, and lips of balm??Find him soft wives and pretty playfellows;?The thoughts ye cannot stay with brazen chains?A girl's hair lightly binds."
And all thought good,?But the King answered, "if we seek him wives,?Love chooseth ofttimes with another eye;?And if we bid range Beauty's garden round,?To pluck what blossom pleases, he will smile?And sweetly shun the joy he knows not of."?Then said another, "Roams the barasingh?Until the fated arrow flies; for him,?As for less lordly spirits, some one charms,?Some face will seem a Paradise, some form?Fairer than pale Dawn when she wakes the world.?This do, my King! Command a festival?Where the realm's maids shall be competitors?In youth and grace, and sports that Sakyas use.?Let the Prince give the prizes to the fair,?And, when the lovely victors pass his seat,?There shall be those who mark if one or two?Change the fixed sadness of his tender cheek;?So we may choose for Love with Love's own eyes,?And cheat his Highness into happiness."?This thing seemed good; wherefore upon a day?The criers bade the young and beautiful?Pass to the palace, for 't was in command?To hold a court of pleasure, and the Prince?Would give the prizes, something rich for all,?The richest for the fairest judged. So flocked?Kapilavastu's maidens to the gate,?Each with her dark hair newly smoothed and bound,?Eyelashes lustred with the soorma-stick,?Fresh-bathed and scented; all in shawls and cloths?Of gayest; slender hands and feet new-stained?With crimson, and the tilka-spots stamped bright.?Fair show it was of all those Indian girls?Slow-pacing past the throne with large black eyes?Fixed on the ground, for when they saw the Prince?More than the awe of Majesty made beat?Their fluttering hearts, he sate so passionless,?Gentle, but so beyond them. Each maid took?With down-dropped lids her gift, afraid to gaze;?And if the people hailed some lovelier one?Beyond her rivals worthy royal smiles,?She stood like a scared antelope to touch?The gracious hand, then fled to join her mates?Trembling at favour, so divine he seemed,?So high and saint-like and above her world.?Thus filed they, one bright maid after another,?The city's flowers, and all this beauteous march?Was ending and the prizes spent, when last?Came young Yasodhara, and they that stood?Nearest Siddartha saw the princely boy?Start, as the radiant girl approached. A form?Of heavenly mould; a gait like Parvati's; the?Eyes like a hind's in love-time, face so fair?Words cannot paint its spell; and she alone?Gazed full-folding her palms across her breasts?On the boy's gaze, her stately neck unbent.?"Is there a gift for me?" she asked, and smiled.?"The gifts are gone," the Prince replied, "yet take?This for amends, dear sister, of whose grace?Our happy city boasts;" therewith he loosed?The emerald necklet from his throat, and clasped?Its green beads round her dark and silk-soft waist;?And their eyes mixed, and from the look sprang love.
Long after--when enlightenment was full--?Lord Buddha--being prayed why thus his heart?Took fire at first glance of the Sakya girl,?Answered, "We were not strangers, as to us?And all it seemed; in ages long gone by?A hunter's son, playing with forest girls?By Yamun's spring, where Nandadevi stands,?Sate umpire while they raced beneath the firs?Like hares at eve that run their playful rings;?One with flower-stars crowned he, one with long plumes?Plucked from eyed pheasant and the junglecock,?One with fir-apples; but who ran the last?Came first for him, and unto her the boy?Gave a tame fawn and his heart's love beside.?And in the wood they lived many glad years,?And in the wood they undivided died.?Lo! as hid seed shoots after rainless years,?So good and evil, pains and pleasures, hates?And loves, and all dead deeds, come forth again?Bearing bright leaves or dark, sweet fruit or sour.?Thus I was he and she Yasodhara;?And while the wheel of birth and death turns round,?That which hath been must be between us two."
But they who watched the Prince at prize-giving?Saw and heard all, and told the careful King?How sate Sidddrtha heedless till there passed?Great Suprabuddha's child, Yasodhara;?And how--at sudden sight of her--he changed,?And how she gazed on him and he on her,?And of the jewel-gift, and what beside?Passed in their speaking glance.
The fond King smiled:?"Look! we have found a lure;