He saw me trembling stand, and blest that boy's pure spirit seemed to
part.
As died that holy hermit's son, from me my glory seemed to go,
With troubled mind I stood, cast down t' inevitable endless woe.
That shaft that seemed his life to burn like serpent venom, thus drawn
out,
I, taking up his fallen urn, t' his father's dwelling took my route.
There miserable, blind, and old, of their sole helpmate thus forlorn,
His parents did these eyes behold, like two sad birds with pinions
shorn.
Of him in fond discourse they sate, lone, thinking only of their son,
For his return so long, so late, impatient, oh by me undone.
My footsteps' sound he seemed to know, and thus the aged hermit said,
'O Yajnadatta, why so slow?--haste, let the cooling draught be shed.
Long on the river's cooling brink hast thou been sporting in thy joy.
Thy mother's fainting spirits sink in fear for thee; but thou, my boy,
If aught to grieve thy gentle heart thy mother or thy sire do wrong,
Bear with us, nor, when next we part, on the slow way thus linger long,
The feet of those that cannot move, of those that cannot see the eye,
Our spirits live but in thy love,--oh wherefore, dearest, no reply?'

"My throat thick swollen with bursting tears, my power of speech that
seemed to choke,
With hands above my head, my fears breaking my quivering voice, I spoke:
The Kshatriya Dasaratha I, O hermit sage, 't is not thy son!
Most holy ones, unknowingly a deed of awful guilt I've done.
With bow in hand I took my way along Sarayu's pleasant brink,
The savage buffalo to slay, or elephant come down to drink.

"A sound came murmuring to my ear,--'twas of the urn that slowly filled,