"By your help I am now versed in all _mantras_. I am prepared to give
you such a mantra as by its virtue you will be able at once to repair to
Heaven. You need not suffer hell by slavery to a Chandal."

The king replies, "Many thanks for your kind offer. But how can I accept
your offer as this body belongs to a Chandal? I will not go anywhere
before death."

The hermit says, "Then take this money and deliver your wife."

The king thankfully declines the offer with the observation, "I have
sold my queen in my hour of need. To buy her back is not in my power."
The hermit soliloquizes,

"Blessed is Maharaja Harischandra! What fortitude! what wisdom! what
generosity! what a sense of duty! The world has never produced a nobler
man. A tempest shakes even the mountains, but behold! this noblest
specimen of humanity is not moved by the severest of afflictions!

It is morning. The birds are singing. The sun is up in the horizon. The
king is sitting on the banks of the Ganges. He is thinking of his fate
when he hears a female voice crying. He approaches the lady. The scene
is horrible. An unfortunate lady, the queen Saibya who had been deserted
by her husband, has come to burn her son, the support of her life. She
was serving as a slave in the house of the Brahmin who had bought her.
Her son Rohitashya, was stung by a deadly poisonous snake. No body would
help her. She has come to the burning-ground to burn the dead body of
her son. The queen weeps and faints. The king stares at the face of the
corpse for a long time and at last recognises his dead son. He too
faints. After a long time he recovers, and finds that the queen also has