poetics illustrating how romantic situations should best be treated in
Sanskrit poetry--the conduct of mature mistresses, experienced lovers, sly
go-betweens, clowns or jokers being all subjected to analysis.[98] The
subject of the text is secular romantic poetry and Krishna himself is
never mentioned. None the less, in producing their illustrations, the
artists made Krishna the central figure and we can only conclude that
eschewing the obvious _Rasika Priya_, Raja Kirpal Pal had directed his
artists to do for Sanskrit what Keshav Das had done for Hindi poetry--to
celebrate Krishna as the most varied and skilled of lovers and as a
corollary show him in a whole variety of romantic and poetic situations.
As a result Krishna was portrayed in a number of highly conflicting
roles--as husband, rake, seducer, paramour and gallant.

In one picture he is 'a gallant whose word cannot be trusted' and we see
him in the act of delicately disengaging a lady's dress and gazing at her
with passion-haunted eyes. The poem on the reverse runs as follows:

Showing her a beautiful girdle
Drawing on a fair panel with red chalk
Putting a bracelet on her wrists
And laying a necklace on her breasts
Winning the confidence of the fawn-eyed lady of fair brows
He slyly loosens the knot of her skirt
Below the girdle-stead, with naughty hand.[99]

In another picture, he appears as 'a gallant well versed in the ways of
courtesans,' the dreaded seducer of inexperienced girls. He is now shown
approaching a formal pavilion, set in a lonely field. Inside the pavilion
is the lovely object of his attack, sitting with a companion, knowing that
willy-nilly she must shortly yield yet timidly making show of maidenly